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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 :)

High frame rates: lower ratios VS higher resolution

Nathan DuMoulin

Nathan DuMoulin

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Higher frame rates come with a trade off, either sacrificing compression or resolution. The question is, which yields a better final image when delivering at 4K or 1080p?

I've taken a look at Scarlet-W and compiled three little tables, each one using a different strategy. The blue chart favors lower compression ratios, the green favors maintaining higher resolution, and then red is a middle ground.

I'm sure this has been addressed a million times over the years, but with the influx of new Red owners resulting from Raven and Scarlet-W (myself included), I figured it couldn't hurt to revisit and discuss this. A thread by Akin (http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?125466-Scarlet-Dragon-Slow-Motion-Test-Knife) covers this issue briefly, where it would seem that resolution trumps compression when in the lower resolutions (2-3K range), however does this hold true at 4K and above?

Thanks!


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The best answer I've seen thus far is to turn on the edge-detection tool and to judge whether the scene is "too edgy" (needs low compression), not edgy at all (favor resolution), or somewhere in the middle (balanced). I'm sorry I don't have a hard-and-fast way to describe the lines of demarcation between these three, but at least you know what tool to use. With time and practice, I'm sure you can figure out what to look for.

I will also note that due to the lower noise figures of DRAGON in SCARLET-W vs. SCARLET-D, 13:1 is probably between SCARLET-D's 11:1 and 12:1. And 12:1 is really not a bad place to be at all.
 
All the feature and TV projects I've seen here in LA go for 5:1, and most of the DPs I'm in contact with are nervous about going any higher than that for 4K. I don't know of anybody shooting at more than 24fps except for slo-mo.
 
Serdar abdyrasulov said:
Hi guys, does compression ratio affects on dynamic range and noise?
Click to expand...

Compression ratios will increase or decrease the noise that is apparent in the frame. This can lead to decreased useable dynamic range as a result (specifically in the low end), but compression DOES NOT directly affect dynamic range.
 
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good idea to analyze such matters, finding that balance can be very difficult, doing testing to develop an intuition is usually good

some folks opt towards setting a standard for the project as marc mentions

how we do it 'round here is to pick what's best for each scene
 
either way, would take FPS over Compression, the i would only use low compression for things like motion tracking
 
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