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Foveon Sensor for RED ?

D

doondoon

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The way Foveon sensors record images is very similar to the way that film does. I'm not sure if the sensor actually delivers what it claims (much more color and more film like images).... but the theory behind it makes sense.
http://www.foveon.com/article.php?a=69

I'm guessing part of the reason film has that "soft forgiving feel" is because of the density of the celluloid itself. The thickness of the celluloid masks what might have been an "overly sharp" image. The light is actually being received at different depths of the celluloid... giving it a soft and slightly three dimensional feel.

Whereas a digital sensor is perfectly flat (the light is hitting on one exact flat plane), hence the sharp digital more two dimensional feel of the image.
If this is true ( I don't know if it is... I'm only speculating) then wouldn't the way the Foveon sensor assist in obtaining that soft filmic look?

Would it be possible/ beneficial for RED (sometime in the future) to use a sensor like Foveon to push digital cinematography closer to the holy grail look of film ?
 
Um... Let me think about it.... No.

1) noisy, and poor colourimetry due to silicon being a poor colour filter. Images come out RAW very low saturation, which needs to be boosted, which adds more noise.

2) slow

3) low resolution

4) overly sharp due to current implementation avoiding using an optical low pass filter

5) the look of film is not the holy grail. If you wan the look of film, shoot film. Foveon doesn't look anything like film anyway.

Graeme
 
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Graeme Nattress said:
5) the look of film is not the holy grail. If you wan the look of film, shoot film. Foveon doesn't look anything like film anyway.

Graeme
Click to expand...

Graeme I know you're a huge part of what's behind RED and I tip my hat to you... (as you know quite well) you guys are accomplishing things most of us thought wasn't going to be possible for a long time.
thanks for that !

Earlier today I happened across the Foveon sensor site and thought it was an interesting concept.
My post was (A) a query to RED and (B) speculative (I'm not very technically adept in terms of sensors, codecs and algorithms) I was just asking a question - no offense intended.

Regarding your comment about film not being the holy grail... you're entitled to your opinion just like the next guy, but keep in mind it's subjective. I for one (and I don't think I speak for myself) think film looks best. Unfortunately I can't always afford to shoot on film (neither can many of the productions I work with). Therefore seeing digital (RED) move more towards the look of film is very important to me. IMO- the reason RED is so popular is because you guys achieved what many others could not and for a great price too. Part of your achievement is capturing the "look of film". If film wasn't regarded as "the grail" to many then why are the specs of RED mimicking a traditional 35mm film camera ?

Sincerely,
Barack Obama
 
I really think we are beyond this conversation. Film is film, video is video, Red is Red. I have been a film nut for almost 25 years and Red Digital Cinema is the first time I have seen images that I actually enjoy MORE than 35mm film. One is not necessarily BETTER than the other. There is definitely a different aesthetic but for the first time IMHO the Red LOOK exceeds the 35mm film look. It's easy, if you like the film look better, shoot film.

I might have to see what Epic has up its sleeve before I can say I feel the same about some of Ron Fricke's work (just saw the Baraka 8K transfer to Bluray) but that's another conversation.
 
No offense taken. Sorry if my response seemed terse or aggressive.

Film has a very specific look. To emulate that look digital would mean that that artifacts need to be added to the image. Part of film's magic is those artifacts.

So, my holy grail is not the look of reality, but more the look of whatever you want it to look like, to make the image as good and as flexible as possible. I don't want "sharpness at any cost", in that I don't want aggressive edges. I do want good, low noise images, which implies high dynamic range, good colourimetry, accurate, but pleasing colours. RAW is part of the holy grail. REDCODE RAW is part of the holy grail because compression isn't evil. Compression is enabling.

Hope that explains my comments on holy grail!

Graeme
 
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danbrazda said:
I really think we are beyond this conversation. Film is film, video is video, Red is Red. I have been a film nut for almost 25 years and Red Digital Cinema is the first time I have seen images that I actually enjoy MORE than 35mm film. One is not necessarily BETTER than the other. There is definitely a different aesthetic but for the first time IMHO the Red LOOK exceeds the 35mm film look. It's easy, if you like the film look better, shoot film.

I might have to see what Epic has up its sleeve before I can say I feel the same about some of Ron Fricke's work (just saw the Baraka 8K transfer to Bluray) but that's another conversation.
Click to expand...

Yes, I agree to some extent. Film is Film. Digital is Digital... but, for instance, when the Varicam was at the top of he digital food chain there still weren't many big narrative productions that were shooting on it. Why? Because it still looked like VIDEO. That's all changing now. Full frame sensor, more dynamic range, ect... ad nauseum.

People wanted digital to look more like film (not more like better digital). The carrot that everyone is chasing is the "film look"... at least that's how I see it. This is not to say that it's "better" but it IS the STANDARD. Every movie that I grew up obsessing over was shot on film... it's hardwired in my head. Obviously perspectives change.. but it's changing on both ends. Perspectives and more film like digital acquisition... they'll meet somewhere in the middle.
 
Hmmm, hate to tell you.
Red still looks like Video, as it is Video.
 
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Graeme Nattress said:
No offense taken. Sorry if my response seemed terse or aggressive.

Film has a very specific look. To emulate that look digital would mean that that artifacts need to be added to the image. Part of film's magic is those artifacts.

So, my holy grail is not the look of reality, but more the look of whatever you want it to look like, to make the image as good and as flexible as possible. I don't want "sharpness at any cost", in that I don't want aggressive edges. I do want good, low noise images, which implies high dynamic range, good colourimetry, accurate, but pleasing colours. RAW is part of the holy grail. REDCODE RAW is part of the holy grail because compression isn't evil. Compression is enabling.

Hope that explains my comments on holy grail!

Graeme
Click to expand...

yes thank you : )
 
doondoon said:
People wanted digital to look more like film (not more like better digital). The carrot that everyone is chasing is the "film look"... at least that's how I see it. This is not to say that it's "better" but it IS the STANDARD. Every movie that I grew up obsessing over was shot on film... it's hardwired in my head. Obviously perspectives change.. but it's changing on both ends. Perspectives and more film like digital acquisition... they'll meet somewhere in the middle.
Click to expand...

The look of film is constantly changing also. Some newer stocks look fugly compared to some old stocks and some old stocks look crappy compared to some newer ones. Film is just one medium in an aresenal. Our goal is provide the best looking image and that does not mean copying a film look or a technically perfect one.

What looks good is also related to what one grows up with. Those that grew up with film have a different aesthetic than those that didn't. Something doesn't have to look like film to be a beautiful image.
 
Now I'm learning to appreciate the unique aesthetics of film, video and digital cinema. I grew up watching drama mostly shot on video, so it doesn't quite have those US soap connotations with me. However, that means the video I like was shot on tube cameras, recorded on Ampex Quad 2" tape.

Now I'm really enjoying the look of digital cinema. Specifically the RED vision of digital cinema. It's not harsh - it's smooth and continuous, with a nice texture like silk, not like the sandpaper of modern (not old, tube) video. But it has an edge, just not aggressive. The colours and textures can be subtle, and show fine detail, but it's not exaggerated. It's natural. Edges are not binary (on/off). They show the full transition from light to dark, or dark to light.

Graeme
 
Graeme Nattress said:
Now I'm learning to appreciate the unique aesthetics of film, video and digital cinema. I grew up watching drama mostly shot on video, so it doesn't quite have those US soap connotations with me. However, that means the video I like was shot on tube cameras, recorded on Ampex Quad 2" tape.

Now I'm really enjoying the look of digital cinema. Specifically the RED vision of digital cinema. It's not harsh - it's smooth and continuous, with a nice texture like silk, not like the sandpaper of modern (not old, tube) video. But it has an edge, just not aggressive. The colours and textures can be subtle, and show fine detail, but it's not exaggerated. It's natural. Edges are not binary (on/off). They show the full transition from light to dark, or dark to light.

Graeme
Click to expand...

Couldn't agree more.

Regarding the point earlier about the fact that film is the benchmark by which all others try to achieve- I too once felt this way. It is the main reason why I rejected digital cinema cameras ranging from the Ikegami EC35 (showing my age here) to the Varicam & Cinealta flavors of the day.

Let me say again that in over 25 years of film obsession the Red One is the first to make me stop and think about what benchmark really means or should mean.
 
Thanks very much. And I think the look of digital cinema is just going to keep on improving too.

Graeme
 
i beleve it all comes back to the lighting and understand the medioum u r working with at the time... if u take the time to light it right video can look good... and i have seen bad looking film (bad lighting)...

but i do love film(lighting)....
 
@doondoon: Did you ever shoot with a camera using a Foveon sensor?
I've been there, had a Sigma, and it was horrible! I own a Canon now, which is pretty close to a Red image wise (if you are using RAW), and I'd never look back.
Foveon is one of those nice concepts in theory, which didn't succeed practically. Mankind has seen that quite a few times…
 
For me, the only reason I like Foveon stills is the color. Even on crappy jpeg web galleries it just looks like film color.

But otherwise, I agree that it is not film - overly sharp, etc. And if a Foveon image starts to move, it'll probably show the other weaknesses.

Graeme Nattress said:
poor colourimetry due to silicon being a poor colour filter. Images come out RAW very low saturation, which needs to be boosted, which adds more noise.
Click to expand...

Can a sensor be built from other material?

Non necessarily in the Foveon way, but... a kind of layered 3x sensor for each of the primary colors?
 
Well sensors are made from silicon - that I don't have a problems with. Colour filters are made from special dyes, or in the 3 chip system dichroic filters. They work well for filtering colour. In the Foveon, it's the very silicon itself that acts as a colour filter. But it doesn't split the incoming colours very well, which makes for a grey-ish raw image, which leads to the need to perform chroma noise reduction and significant boosting of the saturation as part of the raw development. Could it be done differently? I'm sure it can, but the complexity of doing so may outweigh any advantage.

Graeme
 
Seems that Sigma have just bought Foveon. Sigma cameras using Foveons seem very popular among the "I love aliassed images" crowd, but never made much market penetration elsewhere. Not least because of no 3rd party lens manufacture for their cameras.

Graeme
 
The elusive film look

The elusive film look

The reason film looks more organic is partly because the light sensitive grains are never in the same place on any successive frame. Pixels always are, and I believe this is one explanation for the very "defined" look of CCD/CMOS chips.

The Foveon principle of capturing all colours in one spot (as opposed to three CCDs filtered through prisms and dichroic filters) is more like film. It creates a different look to other digital cameras, giving a more correct approach to colour capture if analogue film is to be the standard.

The RED principle of separate RGB pixels in a Bayer pattern perhaps removes some of the defined "pixel-in-one-place" look when de-Bayered, but this is purely my speculation. That said, our eyes capture in separate RGB sensors with a brain de-bayering (?), so perhaps this method isn't too far off how we perceive things after all.

I believe that the film look is something we have grown accustomed to, and not something that is entirely natural in appearance. The Japanese prefer interlaced video and vivid colors, perhaps proof that deciding that film looks best is also a Western culture phenomenon.

Why does interlace look more natural and "closer" for current documentaries and news, while retrospective documentaries look better in progressive? Are we so caught up in progressive as the defining look of drama and acting that nothing else goes? What about things like ShowScan, will it now make a reappearance with 50/60fps capable cameras and projectors? The best of both worlds, shoot progressive with the feel of interlace!

To sum it all up, there is no longer a definite definition of what a film look comprises, other than "more natural"; i.e. more grain (more noise!) and more weave and flicker. The better qualities of film, like softer colours, more gradual changes from light to dark a.s.o. are already more or less surpassed by cameras like RED. Multiframe capable digital cameras and projectors will soon allow us to mix frame rates and use them as creative tools to convey different moods within the same programme.

All that remains is for the nostalgics amongst us to finally realize that the term "film look" is an expression that will die a quiet death together with celluloid.
 
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