Canon 7D vs. RED ONE - a real footage comparison

[Rob Ruffo]

Why would I hate on anyone Michael? I just think that the opening of this thread was kind of strange for a "good contributor." I'd expect that from a new guy like myself. I like tests like anyone else but they need to be unbiased. Rodney Charters is not a member of any forum that I know of but he is a known professional. If he was a member here going on about this camera is better than that camera then his credibility would have been lost with me. But since he's not, and has nothing to lose or gain from examples like above, then I'll take a chance and trust that he's doing what he can to get the best out of all the cameras he's testing. That's why I made the comment above.

But going back to my first question...really...what is the point of Sanjin's test? Why are we comparing a $1,700 camera against a $30,000+ camera? I'm not sure what the point is. We can see what the RC folks are trying to do....but I have no idea where this is going? Looking in from outside the box it just seems to me like the message is "my cam is better than yours." And if that's not the case then I go back to my original question...what's the purpose? The Red cam is a professional cinema camera....why on earth would someone try and compare that to a consumer DSLR that happens to record video? You see what I'm saying?

I've seen so many flame wars against different camera owners in other forums that I had to jump in here and ask the question....why!!??

It's about deepening tech knowledge, and understanding WHY it is so much more (although $30 000 is a bit high, you can get a working cam for way less than that.0. By picking out flaws and quality differences in 7D footage, we all learn more about what makes a great cam.

 

[Scott Fullmer]

The thing is You Can Actually Buy and use a 7d Today at a store or on line. you cant get a scarlet or an epic or i would already have it
I plan to try doing 3d with 2 7D cameras this week sick of waiting for a camera system that i cant actually buy even though I need it
i will also try marry 2 HVX200a for 3d any suggestion welcome (plan side by side)

 

[Uli Plank]

Don't expect too much! The 7D is plagued by serious aliasing (like all other current DSLRs in video-mode) and it might stand out even more in 3D. Get a good HD camcorder (the HVX 200 is a bit outdated in sensitivity and resolution).

 

[Gary Stone]

Scott, have you considered that 3D 1080p panasonic that's coming out?

 

[Stephen Strangways]

Strange to see that even a still picture from the 7D has aliasing.

It doesn't, if you view it properly. Which demonstrates something interesting...

When I followed the link:

This is 7D still photo acquisition during a video shot.

Download original 7D 5K full size jpg here>>>

it opened a large 5184x3456 JPG which my web browser (Firefox) scaled to 1488x992 so it would fit my monitor and browser window. It showed a fair bit of aliasing on the siemens star. Clicking on the image to view it non-scaled, 1:1, the aliasing disappeared.

What's interesting is what the aliasing looks like. The pattern almost perfectly matched the look of the aliasing in the horizontal lines of the 7D video capture, but it also showed aliasing in the vertical lines that the 7D video capture didn't.

What that means to me is further evidence that the 7D is skipping horizontal lines, but sampling all the pixels vertically and doing a decent scaling job. This it certainly not news, as many have said it before, but it's still not "100% confirmed" so any further test results that can be gathered are, IMO, worthwhile.

Further, if you look at the R1 shot in Final Cut scaled to fit the preview window, you'll see equal horizontal and vertical aliasing as the preview skips lines in both directions. And it's not just the Siemens star... you can see aliasing in the white lines surround the black patch of the 3cP chart on the right. The 7D video clip shows less aliasing of those lines which, though slightly skewed, are primarily vertical.

That's even more horizontal line skipping/vertical scaling evidence. So I think it's pretty safe to say that with a 7D or other similar imaging system, it's the horizontal lines you most need to worry about in regards to aliasing.