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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Camera Shootout

J

jstunzi

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Be on the lookout this Friday for a same camera comparison test that includes two RED Ones using Nikon and PL mounted lenses as well as other industry standard cameras including film. I produced this same scene comparison test with Zacuto last week during my trip to Chicago.

UPDATE:

p338275948-4.jpg


The shootout is now officially up.

Check it out on vimeo here. http://vimeo.com/2437826
More information can be found here. http://www.zacutoimages.com/img/v5/p338275948-4.jpg

Higher quality uploads are also in the pipe for anyone interested.
 
Lakeview Productions provided the REDs. Interested to see the results, Joe!

-Chris
 
Thanks Chris! There will be a roundtable discussion also released. I won't spoil the awesome scene setup, but I must say it was cool to use such a wide variety of cameras. We used over 11!
 
Here's a more formal plug...
"In the Great Shootout of ’08 see a same shot comparison of: 35mm motion picture, RED, EX3, HVX200, HPX170, HPX3000, Nikon D90, Canon 5D Mark II, Letus35 Ultimate and Elite DOF adapters, Redrock and more. A discussion precedes and follows by four filmmakers ranging in age from 18-46. They discuss what's best. You won’t believe the conclusions."
 
Joseph,

I am having trouble replying to your pm. Can you check your permissions?

-Chris
 
It's because we're not friends yet. It should work now, I friended you.
 
HAHA Chris!

It does have problems, but it's impressive technology for the price point. I can see how down the road these second and third generation cameras could be good for indie/prosumer filmmakers. They're not REDs or Film! But they're a 35mm DOFA for a much cheaper price point.
 
Interesting. Thanks for posting.

It's always difficult judging these shootouts by watching compressed / scaled clips online and not having seen the production or post process.

But I was surprised at some very important factors that were not mentioned when they were debating which Camera was preferable for certain types of productions.

I may have missed some points, but I don't remember hearing considerations for FrameRates, Read-Reset Times, lens and lens mount interchangeability, Record Times, Modularity, and when talking about Film, the time/cost of telecine (compared to creating DPX files on RED, which they did mention.) Also, not mentioned were which film Camera, the film stock, lenses used, and recording modes on the Digital Cameras.

I just found this to barely scratch the surface of talking about the real issues to be considered when choosing between different Cameras.
 
Thanks for doing the test.
I agree with Casey. I suggest showing the footage at larger resolutions and less compression. Handheld example would reveal skew for SLR's, which wasn't mentioned.
Also, don't know was it the lens, but RED footage looks waay too soft and this video might misinform the viewers.
 
As to why the Red footage looks soft, it may have to do with our conversion process from RAW before going to our post house. However, 35mm film will always look the best do you not agree?

We could have gotten into a much longer discussion and the original roundtable itself was about an hour. We had about another 2 hours of prediscussion. It all had to be cut down to around 8 minutes. So we talked about a lot of things that would be interesting to the higher-end professionals like those here on REDuser but wouldn't necessarily interest people across the board. Keep in mind this was a video done by Zacuto and they're trying to not only keep in touch with the filmmaking community but also get people interested in their products... so this was aimed at indie filmmakers too.

Larger resolution files are on their way. Give us a few days to get them up on Bittorrent. Download the full resolution Vimeo file in the meantime if you want.
 
I just stopped in for the Red portion of the shoot, but I was under the impression that the lens for the PL-mounted RED was the same as that of the film camera. RED was wide open per their request, and I thought that was also to compare to wide open on the film camera.

I haven't looked at the shootout yet, though. I hope to have time later this weekend.

Oh, and I was not there for the grading and conversion, so I can't speak to the softness issue. Focus was done by measuring, so presumably would have been the same for the two cameras with the same lens. (The back focus on my RED is correct.)

The Nikon mount was a last minute addition, and I installed it there. If the Nikon-mounted RED is the one that is soft, it could have been the back focus was off a little. I just set it to where it usually sits for Nikon mount, and did not test it because of time restraints of the actors.

I'll watch it soon and comment.
 
There a visible jump in dof between the red and film, so that sort of backs up that the fstop is different between them. Both film and red cameras have pl mounts, right? Surely the same lens could have been used too? The link says Film, Zeiss Superspeed 50mm f/4 and red Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50mm ZF f/1.4.
 
Ugh. Really? Anything that's not a Master Prime is going to have soft coma all over the image at f1.4.

I've already heard comments on other forums how the Red footage looked terrible in comparison to everything else. Higher res footage is just going to confirm that.
 
It is supposed to be a direct comparison test. We shots with two REDs. One with a Zeiss PL prime. Another with a Zeiss ZF prime. In the video, you see the footage shot with the Nikon mounted Zeiss ZF still prime lens. It was 50mm and f/1.4.

It's not a perfect scientific test. It's more to show users that with skilled hands, you can achieve beautiful images with any camera. That was the message of the first shooutout as well as this second one. I will check to make sure that it was truly f/4 on the film camera. Just incase it was a typo.

I think it's safe to say it might have been backfocus. I'll wait on Chris though.
 
Albert Armes said:
There a visible jump in dof between the red and film, so that sort of backs up that the fstop is different between them. Both film and red cameras have pl mounts, right? Surely the same lens could have been used too? The link says Film, Zeiss Superspeed 50mm f/4 and red Zeiss Planar T* 1.4/50mm ZF f/1.4.
Click to expand...

This is sad to hear. Would of been great to see a more accurate test with all these great cameras in one room. Not only does Depth of Field Narrow at 1.4, but the sharpness of the optics goes down considerably, specially compared to something shot at f4.0

All in all though.. just for fun, its great to see these tests every once in awhile.
 
Okay, I looked at the shootout. It's hard to tell with the web version, but as they used the Nikon-mounted RED, I bet it's a combination of the aperture and the backfocus being slightly off. It would be nice to see what the PL looked like.

Still, it is a nice comparison if you keep the "fun-factor" in mind.
 
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