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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 :)

Focus....

Me too...
welcome!!


:sifone:
 
Matt Reyer said:
Dear Jim,

I am only worried about one thing, and that is the touch-screen auto focus. I am worried because I have sausage fingers, and will only be able to afford the smallest screen you offer, so I figured I may have trouble touching my subject accurately (I have no doubt your camera will be able to focus accurately, just my sausage fingers being able to land on the screen in the right place). Will a (dare I say it?) stylus work on the screen, or will it be a capacitive-touch screen like the iPhone and only detect human skin?

Keep up the good work!
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Speaking of the iPhone, it would be cool, especially for Mr. Sausage Fingers, where you could touch and hold your finger to the screen and a small focus-magnify window pops up allowing you to pinpoint accurately. Some people do have fat fingers :) Even with a stylus-type of indicator, nailing an EXACT spot may take 2 or 3 taps depending on the framing and lens used (and level of hand shakiness)... i'd imagine.

Regardless, this is an AMAZING feature. So glad I'm lined up for stage 2.
 
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Mike Hechanova said:
And hearing that RPP/RPZ will be most efficient with this AF system makes it tough call between the similarly priced Compact Primes.
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I think you may be confusing Red's currently shipping PL mount lenses (RPP / RPZ) with their yet to be released Electronic FF35 lenses.
 
Wayne Morellini said:
Still, I am still thinking of what name to call ourselves when we use these cameras. It is pretty obvious that from the controls and styles we have to use with them we will be a new breed (this is really just a vein attempt to get away from the term videographer on the low end, which is so less classy than cinematographer and makes me want to cringe). What should we call ourselves, motionographers doesn't quite cut it.

Jim, can we have a naming competition/thread, prize a scarlet camera, potentially even a 3D rig?
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From Jim
Jannard said:
... does that make you a "cinemaphotographer"?

Jim

(courtesy of Jarred)
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I have been following the news about RED for over a year now and I have been reading reduser's forums for probably just as long. But after having screamed "SCARLET!!! SCARLET!!! SCARLET!!!" basically at everyone around me, I thought I'd actually join the forum and share my excitement with others who actually care! :)
I can not wait to hold her in my hands!
 
It is really nice to know and see RED aware of it.

Although another ballpark (around 18/19 mbps as poor bitrate), the New Nikon D3100 announced today promises for its H.264/MPEG-4 1920x1080 24fps movie mode:

AF-area modes for live view and movies - four AF-area modes depending on the subject: normal-area AF, wide-area AF, face-priority AF, and subject-tracking AF.

http://imaging.nikon.com/products/imaging/lineup/digitalcamera/slr/d3100/features03.htm#f04

1080p sample available (courtesy of Nikon Polska):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mx8wXa9SeJc&feature=player_embedded#!
 
Aiden K. said:
I dont know if this has been answer, or asked, but will there be an auto-focus option with EPIC using canon (or similar) lenses in MOTION mode?
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of course :)
 
they are all capacitative...
 
Alex Mack said:
Seriously! Look; I for one am anticipating brilliant AF, and a new way of shooting.. one that can be relied on.

No one is typing DOS commands anymore.

Higher systems of tech offer higher levels of functioning, in ways that we can never quite prepare for or adapt to. Shooting will get better, because we don't have to bother with something a machine can do...

What I'm trying to say is.... :)
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Manual <anything> will never go away. Technology (no matter how good it is) can, and will fail at the worst possible time, and the backup may not have that automatic feature someone might have come to depend on.

One should know how to focus (efficiently) manually.
Woodworkers should know how to do a dovetail manually.

Alex Mack said:
No one is typing DOS commands anymore.
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Try (say) quickly renaming 1000 ".abc" files to ".txt" from within Windows...
 
I dont think hes suggesting the retirement of manual focus. Just the addition of AF. While I can understand that MOST who use the RED will rely on MF, but there are some of us who will shoot certain "projects" where MF just doesn't cut it like the AF of current video cameras out today.

Denis Haineault said:
Manual <anything> will never go away. Technology (no matter how good it is) can, and will fail at the worst possible time, and the backup may not have that automatic feature someone might have come to depend on.
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Denis Haineault said:
Manual <anything> will never go away. Technology (no matter how good it is) can, and will fail at the worst possible time, and the backup may not have that automatic feature someone might have come to depend on.

One should know how to focus (efficiently) manually.
Woodworkers should know how to do a dovetail manually.



Try (say) quickly renaming 1000 ".abc" files to ".txt" from within Windows...
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Not only that, but focus is an artistic decision, and sometimes your actors will do thing you do not anticipate - a really good ass. cam. will use his or her sense of aesthetics and understanding of the scene to make a good call. "Robo focus" is not something you often need or want.

Auto focus is only useful in limited situations, like maybe following an actor in on Steadicam, and the like . Much as I embrace new technology, auto-focus, no matter how brilliantly implemented, has never been anything that really excited me much.
 
I think being able to track actors as they move toward the camera, for instance, could save a lot of time by not having to set marks, and it'd also give them more freedom, in that they wouldn't have to always hit those marks (except for continuity, of course). Not as amazing a feature as HDRx, to be sure, but I think it'll end up being a pretty useful tool in the arsenal.
 
I think Kennan Ward is going to love this little feature.
 
Martin Weiss said:
I love these Shock and Awe days.
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The best part is every other camera maker in the world has a very clear picture of exactly what RED is up to. And they still won't/don't see it coming. . . The way I see it. No matter how successful, no matter how innovative, no matter how far ahead, at Red Digital Cinema, every year is year-zero.

Great auto-focus for motion without question cannot be an easy thing to master, and manual focus still and will always have it's place on the top step. I think it is forgetting what auto/manual means and thinking about the ways it could be made easier to use for the people involved. Row through the gears in a Nissan Gojira with it's Semi-Automatic weaponry of transmission and tell me auto has no place ;D

As a VFX nerd one of the greatest things about AF is it's ability to replicate the "Distance from Camera" HUD in Maya, hehe. . .
 
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Tracking Wildlife, fast moving animals, birds flying towards you.
Wildlife camerawork, sports????

Guys life just got a bit easy, when you need it you have the option Auto and Manual.
The best part in 5K motion.

Thanks Jim, love this and HDR.
Yusuf Thakur
 
There are a lot of situations when AF will be great. I think we are mixing different camera aplications in this thread. One think to have in mind in fiction Cinema work, I think, is that none of the known cine lenses out there will be compatible with that feature, so, for quite a time, it's gonna be limited to Still lenses (maybe some B4 lenses) and the anounced new RED lenses. And you know how "picky" with the lenses we DPs are.
 
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