Grain and noise in stills

[Joshua Napier]

Nick,

I just got back from shooting another one of these still/video jobs with the RED. I ordered a much larger lighting package and was able to get the ISO down. I'll post results as soon as I can for all to see. Would love to get the communities feedback.

Cheers,
Josh

 

[Joshua Napier]

Karim,

That's the issue, I'm not getting great results using the NR built into REDCINE-X. I downloaded the new IPP2 and the results are a magnitude better. I still feel like I'm missing something though. I guess the fact that this platform and workflow are new to me...I can't help but feel that I haven't unlocked all of the cameras potential just yet. I just got back from shooting another one of these campaigns and I managed to get the ISO down (by half). Haven't processed the images yet but what I say on set looked very clean. Catching up on things this week but at the first opportunity I'll post some stills.

Thanks,
Josh

 

[Curtis boggs]

This is epic-w, 250iso, 200th shutter, T6.1 20mm on Sigma 18-35 cine. 8:1
Stills pulled for magazine spread.

It's CRAZY clean!!

sorry for the crappy facebook compression

https://scontent.forf1-1.fna.fbcdn....=dc8f63b7cb1e9233939f7f8de0defec1&oe=5A238B9E

 

[Mike Finegan]

This is epic-w, 250iso, 200th shutter, T6.1 20mm on Sigma 18-35 cine. 8:1
Stills pulled for magazine spread.

It's CRAZY clean!!

sorry for the crappy facebook compression

https://scontent.forf1-1.fna.fbcdn....=dc8f63b7cb1e9233939f7f8de0defec1&oe=5A238B9E

So you just rolled film at 24fps 8:1 compression and were happy with the results as stills? Why not do 2:1 and 2 frames per second if it is static shot just for stills?
What made the biggest improvement so far - the much lower than 'native' iso or IPP2 and 'new debayer' in redcinex
Thanks!
Mike

 

[Curtis boggs]

So you just rolled film at 24fps 8:1 compression and were happy with the results as stills? Why not do 2:1 and 2 frames per second if it is static shot just for stills?
What made the biggest improvement so far - the much lower than 'native' iso or IPP2 and 'new debayer' in redcinex
Thanks!
Mike

Mike,

Actually in this case that frame was shot in 6K and 75fps for slow mo. So it was shooting for stills and video at the same time.
At the time it used Dragon color 2 but the frame you see here was graded using The Beta version of RCx ans IPP2 color.
There was no reason to drop the compression rate as in my previous tests 8:1 was plenty clean enough for any magazine printing
and actually looks better then my full frame Nikons.

What made the biggest difference was hitting the sensor with plenty of light. I was a touch "hot" and brought the image down
in post, great way to avoid noise. By "hot" is was exposed about 2/3 brighter then my meter reading.

 

[Mike Finegan]

Thanks for follow up. Maybe the slight blur/texture reduction improved the overall look.
I have just been struggling with getting clean stills that are at level of DSLR but where the subject matter is full length portrait.

 

[Curtis boggs]

Mike,

The still frames i pulled of the bike looked just as good as the full frame Nikon.
I think the advantage i had in the situation was my model wasn't moving!

If i was going to shoot models or portraits for stills i'd jack the Shutter speed
way up to 1/500th or something.
I think the motion is the biggest battle to fight.

With stills and models it's easy, shoot in the studio and use strobes to freeze things.

 

[Mike Finegan]

I actually meant even with model standing very still and 1/250 shutter
How many Mpixel is the Nikon and does it have OLPF?
If 800 w/o OLPF (similar to a7r2) I suspect they will not look the same
But glad it is working and thanks for sharing!!