Dragon with Low Light OLPF vs Sony FS7

[Willie Hahn]

Hi everybody,
it would be great, if you could help me with this one:

For an upcoming "documentary style commercial", I am torn between the Red Scarlet Dragon (with the Low Light OLPF) and the Sony FS7 (internal recording).
I will be shooting in bars at night time, lit mostly with practicals, at 50fps and occasionally up to 100fps. I won't be able to light much, maybe hide one or two KinoFlos as top lights above the bar.

I really don't like the Sony's look, but I'm afraid I'll have to go down that road because of the FS7's base iso of 2000 vs the Red's 800.
But maybe you have experiences with similar situations. Do you think, the Red could be on pair with the FS7 in the described low light situation? I assume I'd be rating mostly at ISO 3200.

Thanks!

 

[Nick Morrison]

Scarlet-W with Lowlight OLPF would get you 2000 ISO.

 

[Oron Cohen]

Are you renting or using your own gear? If renting, why not do a quick test in the rental house? if not renting and you have access to both cameras still go ahead and test. every situation is different, every film shoot is different, every DOP taste and director taste is different...test, test and test, this is what I've been taught in film school (years ago) and for good reason.

Just my opinion as I know both cameras very well and could not give you a definite answer, maybe you like the RED noise better for this piece? maybe the Sony's skin tones render better to your eyes? It's all very subjective I feel.

 

[Julio Quintana]

Oron is right that noise is so subjective that you really have to test to decide. Another factor is your post budget, because if you have the resources to run the Dragon footage through Neat Video, you can get pretty stunning results. Neat Video is pretty render intensive, but for a short commercial it should be no big deal at all and can make a dramatic difference to noisy shots. And since the Sony is doing internal noise reduction, Neat Video puts the two formats on an even playing field where noise is concerned.

 

[Hal Long]

If you plan on rating at 3200, the Sony will be quieter.

 

[Willie Hahn]

Scarlet-W with Lowlight OLPF would get you 2000 ISO.

Nick, how do you get to this conclusion? I couldn't find anything on that on the internet so far.

Oron is right that noise is so subjective that you really have to test to decide. Another factor is your post budget, because if you have the resources to run the Dragon footage through Neat Video, you can get pretty stunning results. Neat Video is pretty render intensive, but for a short commercial it should be no big deal at all and can make a dramatic difference to noisy shots. And since the Sony is doing internal noise reduction, Neat Video puts the two formats on an even playing field where noise is concerned.

Julio and Oron, unfortunately, I won't be able to do a test before the shooting, I have to decide beforehand (live in another country, etc.).
The post house uses Neat Video and we could use it for this project, so that would be okay.

If you plan on rating at 3200, the Sony will be quieter.

Hal, as the Sony does noise reduction internally, don't you think I'd get a very similar result denoising the 3200 rated 5K red footage with Neat Video (the delivery is 1080p)?

 

[Michael Lindsay]

I assumed the Sony was great for low light and a friend of mine shot a music video on a fs7 rather than one of our red cameras.. It's own noise reduction is horrible. It produces weird multi frame blended edges. You also can't really further noise reduce the footage.

I don't know which is better but I was shocked by the fs7 footage.

 

[Oron Cohen]

Julio and Oron, unfortunately, I won't be able to do a test before the shooting, I have to decide beforehand (live in another country, etc.).
The post house uses Neat Video and we could use it for this project, so that would be okay.

Hal, as the Sony does noise reduction internally, don't you think I'd get a very similar result denoising the 3200 rated 5K red footage with Neat Video (the delivery is 1080p)?

Willie,

If you can't test, what kind of style are you after? does everything needs to be super clean? or some light grain would be okay?

In any case, I feel like if your going for 1080p finish and could use Neat Video, and you like the look of RED better, go for the RED, I don't think there will be any major difference in noise, if anything, 5K Dragon downsampled to 1080p + NR would look very good @3200 ISO.

 

[Manfred Baulig]

I would go with Red and use a Sigma Art Zoom or Primes.
The Monitor on the FS7 is a complete disaster to hit the right focus point...even with peaking on.

 

[Justin Campos]

Coming from 2 years on a F5 to Red Epic/Dragon, I can definitely say the Red is not only cleaner, but the look is better.
The "Sony look" is real, and not great for a commercial. Red footage grain is also more pleasing IMO.
That said, it takes a little post work to get clean results on high ISO on either cam, and considering you shooting internal on the sony, even more reason to go Recode raw 5k.

 

[Nick Morrison]

Nick, how do you get to this conclusion? I couldn't find anything on that on the internet so far.

There have been MANY samples on Reduser.

Here's the latest:
http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?144621-Scarlet-W-Low-Light-ProRes-Test

We shot on a CF Weapon 3 weeks ago with SKINTONE OLPF at 1600 and were VERY IMPRESSED.

I can only imagine how clean LOWLIGHT OLPF would have been...

Remember, the DRAGON SENSOR in the new DSCM2 cameras (Weapon, Scarlet-W, Raven) is much cleaner than it was in the older DSCM bodies (Epic/Scarlet).

 

[Daniel Stilling]

Regardless of camera chosen, use fast lenses.

 

[Adam Becker]

Hi everybody,
it would be great, if you could help me with this one:

For an upcoming "documentary style commercial", I am torn between the Red Scarlet Dragon (with the Low Light OLPF) and the Sony FS7 (internal recording).
I will be shooting in bars at night time, lit mostly with practicals, at 50fps and occasionally up to 100fps. I won't be able to light much, maybe hide one or two KinoFlos as top lights above the bar.

I really don't like the Sony's look, but I'm afraid I'll have to go down that road because of the FS7's base iso of 2000 vs the Red's 800.
But maybe you have experiences with similar situations. Do you think, the Red could be on pair with the FS7 in the described low light situation? I assume I'd be rating mostly at ISO 3200.

Thanks!

Hi Willie,

I have worked with both of those cameras in low light situations. You can probably make either camera work but there are a few things I can shed some light on, so to speak.

The FS7's XAVC is a little bit noisier to my eye and a little more difficult to grade, especially if you are in Slog3 Cine EI. Slog2 has a bit more contrast built in, so you may find it preferable in the situation you describe.

The Dragon may look too curshed in RedGamma4, but the information is easiy recovered and the noise to my eye is more organic looking. You may want to experiment with using RedGamma3 to get your desired look with in-camera meta-data.

Depending on what lenses you are willing to expeiment with, one thing that I have used before with Sony E Mount cameras is the meta bones speedbooster. If you can use fast modified still lenses with manual iris control, you can squeeze a FF 35mm FOV onto the Sony's S35 sized sensor. This will create a look in and of itself, and also help minimize the noise on the comporessed XAVC files, but your DOF will be very shallow.

I guess it really depends on how you want to work and how you want it to look. If you use the Dragon I think others have been right to suggest fast lenses... try to get into the Super Speed territory, because that'll help a lot.

Best,
Adam