DSMC Camera Firmware release 5.1.55 and 5.2.21 beta

[Ketch Rossi]

Thanks TEAM!!

 

[Phil Holland]

Thank you Jarred and Graeme... Really kinda special that you keep improving the sauce and thank you Phil And John for taking personal time to test and be so patient with us all.


Cheers from Austria,

Peter

Cheers Peter. We must catch up when your back on this side of the globe.


Also, I've just dug a bit deeper into D.E.B. and let me tell you both the Red Channel and Blue Channel are completely different beasts when it comes to Channel Noise and Texture. Much, much cleaner. You could already a pull a nice blue screen with Dragon, but this is some next level improvement in both of these Color Channels.

You're a crazy man Graeme. Crazy in ways that I really appreciate.

 

[Eric Haase]

1) Is this a software only process or will the Rocket X be doing some of the lifting?

2) Will there be an increase in transcode times with a Rocket X with this on?

 

[Martin Stevens]

THANKS to all those involved.

 

[Phil Holland]

One other morning discovery as I'm trying this out now on various types of footage. This improves Tungsten material to a certain degree as well. In fact due to the cleaner Color Channels D.E.B. seems to be squeezing out a subtle amount of extra detail in a shot. Subtle, but noticeable for the pixel peepers out there.

1) Is this a software only process or will the Rocket X be doing some of the lifting?

2) Will there be an increase in transcode times with a Rocket X with this on?

Don't know what will happen in the future, but I imagine Rocket-X support is coming. I'm a GPU dude. It's not really increasing export times for me. I'll look closer at this later today though just in case.

So, to put it in very simple terms, this is basically working as a noise reduction piece of software to be used in post. Is that a correct assesement?

I wouldn't actually call this noise reduction as it's not impacting the image this way, in fact it's sort of doing the opposite of that in terms of resolution los. While I know the tool is called Dragon Enhanced Blacks, it looks to me like Graeme has tweaked the way the Red, Green, and Blue Channels are demosaiced (debayed). Green is the least effected by this, but the big changes are Red and Blue. Perceptional and now measured different between D.E.B. and none D.E.B. images seems to be more or less the same. As is the Dynamic Range. It's more or less an improved way to create the final debayered image.


The net result of this, and you guys are hearing about it as I'm looking at and reviewing various material shot over the last few months, are:

- No more "red speckles". This is a global effect across the entire tonality of the image at any ISO.
- Vastly cleaner Red and Blue Color Channels with more detail maintained.
- Slightly higher overall resolution in the RGB image.
- Slightly cleaner looking Tungsten images (less "blue splotches") which also shows improvement at lower Kelvin Ratings.


This is an interesting thing. In some ways it's a moderate overall effect. In other ways it's freaking huge.

To add a note on how it's being implemented now via RCX. Red has provided a solution that works in Redcine-X Pro so people who have shot material can process their material with D.E.B. A nice color science related update. Will it come to be default on? Will it happen in camera? These are the early days of how D.E.B. Does Debayer (pun intended). We'll see where and how Red can implement this elsewhere. Right now it's allowing future and past material specifically with the new OLPF to be processed in a slightly better way. And again, 3rd party support is dependent on the SDK and the 3rd Party Developers. You're seeing this at the moment before any of that has been released.

 

[Rob Macey]

Will D.E.B also be an in-camera option as well? Excuse me if this has already been answered.
Thank you.

 

[Timur Civan]

Graeme took the red channel code and put it in RCX... much better that way... as it remains upgradable over time and works with existing footage already shot with Dragon and the new OLPF. The power of RAW.

Will it eventually make it to camera body? I ask because 99.99% of my shooting is handing a drive over to a post house, and god knows what they run, or even how to use RCX if at all.

 

[Ryan Sauve]

Will it eventually make it to camera body? I ask because 99.99% of my shooting is handing a drive over to a post house, and god knows what they run, or even how to use RCX if at all.

+ 1 In-camera is definitely the way to go in my opinion although I'm sure they're probably working towards that solution.

 

[M.D. Biemann]

Thank you

 

[Mark van Coller]

Wow these are exciting times. I just got my Dragon email can't wait to get it now.

 

[Adrian T.]

Great improvement! Thanks!

Just curious why there is a DEB on and a DEB off switch? ... what ever DEB is, turn it on, leave it on and throw away the on and off button.

+1

Please make the switch on by default or ditch it altogether!

 

[Jarred Land]

Just curious why there is a DEB on and a DEB off switch? ... what ever DEB is, turn it on, leave it on and throw away the on and off button.

Because right now it is specfic to Dragon footage with the new OLPF. Remember this was originally going to happen in the camera calibration... We shifted the code from being in camera to being in the debayer which gives the opportunity for Graeme to adapt this in a smaller form to more hardware combinations... perhaps even to MX footage ( no promises ) . Since its more open there is the SDK support and Rocket support and everything else that goes with it so there needs to be an on off switch until it works with everything... and until there has been hundreds of more hours of testing to make sure there is no negative side effect that pops up where you would want to turn it off.

 

[Phil Moreton]

Great to see the update and improvements that are happening with this. Thanks for everyone giving time for this.
Unfortunately I feel this ideally needs to be in camera not just a RCX button.
Otherwise it's just another element that production will look at against the Dragon.

 

[Charles Bergquist]

This isn't totally comprehensive, but here you go :

Version 5.2.16




6K - 82.81
6K 2:1 - 84.51
6K WS - 99.91
6K HD - 83.12
5K - 95.69
5K 2:1 - 100.83
5K WS - 119.08
5K HD - 95.69
4K - 119.51
4K 2:1 - 124.01
4K WS - 148.68
4K HD - 119.51
3K - 159.10




Version 5.2.21


6K - 82.81
6K 2:1 - 84.51
6K WS - 99.91
6K HD - 83.12
5K - 96.39
5K 2:1 - 101.60
5K WS - 120.16
5K HD - 96.39
4K - 120.83
4K 2:1 - 127.37
4K WS - 150.72
4K HD - 120.83
3K - 160.24

Thank you for this info! That 0.92 fps makes all the difference in the world, previously had to go to 4K 2:1 to get to exactly 120fps.

 

[Martin Stevens]

These are the early days of how D.E.B. Does Debayer (pun intended). We'll see where and how Red can implement this elsewhere. Right now it's allowing future and past material specifically with the new OLPF to be processed in a slightly better way. And again, 3rd party support is dependent on the SDK and the 3rd Party Developers. You're seeing this at the moment before any of that has been released.

Phil...... I'm pretty sure that "D.E.B. Does Debayer" was shot on film.

 

[Kemalettin Sert]

Added Dragon 6:5 aspect ratio

didnt we have this one on previous builds?

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

Just checking...

Just checking...

If I'm reading this right… (please confirm or deny specifics to avoid confusion)

1) DEB will be added to beta RCX-P shortly, it will work with any Dragon/new OLPF footy

2) This decoding addition will be put in the SDK soon for inclusion in the usual 3rd party tools, timeline for implementation unknown

3) An on/off toggle for DEB will persist to accommodate tools that may not support it initially

4) DEB will be added to in camera processing pipelines at some point in the future - but not until it matures a bit more

Cheers - #19

 

[Phil Holland]

If I'm reading this right… (please confirm or deny specifics to avoid confusion)

1) DEB will be added to beta RCX-P shortly, it will work with any Dragon/new OLPF footy

2) This decoding addition will be put in the SDK soon for inclusion in the usual 3rd party tools, timeline for implementation unknown

3) An on/off toggle for DEB will persist to accommodate tools that may not support it initially

4) DEB will be added to in camera processing pipelines at some point in the future - but not until it matures a bit more

1. Currently it's available as an on or off button in Redcine-X Pro and has currently been optimized for Dragon with the newer OLPF/Calibration.

2. Yes. Jarred mentioned essentially that. When will that all go down? I have no idea. We'll certainly be getting RCX with it first.

3. Since it's a metadata "switch" it will allow the footage to pass through to software that doesn't support it. This is an advantage of implementing the change this way as footage is still support in 3rd party apps.

4. Sounds like a maybe and likely after extensive testing.


Long and the short of it. D.E.B. being induced through metadata rather than in camera calibration (at least for now) allows us to keep working as it's developed and implemented. If it was just dropped into a camera Calibration and/or Firmware it would likely mean our footage doesn't show up in 3rd party tools.

Everything we're seeing now is an ongoing development. This is just the current implementation. Down the line especially after extensive testing anything is possible in terms of if it's "allways on" by default or happening in camera.

 

[Adam Howden]

Great stuff, nice work Red Team.

I'd love to see this implemented in the camera. The most common complaint I here is the complexity of the red system. Not being able to control or often even have input into people's chosen post path's means that mistakes or non best practices often get implemented. Making this a feature at capture in camera along with simplifying and not complicating the post path is the way forward in my opinion.

 

[Jon Carr]

Is it possible for REDcine-X to recognize Dragon footage with the new OLPF and turn on D.E.B. by default, but still have a switch to turn it off?