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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 :)

Issues

I was really hoping that there would be a 1000 asa stock. I was also hoping that RED would be very good in low light. It should in theory. I hope in the long run that will be the case. There will be noise but is it more than 5218 3 perf?
 
HOLLYWOOD SCHMOLLYWOOD said:
I was really hoping that there would be a 1000 asa stock. I was also hoping that RED would be very good in low light. It should in theory. I hope in the long run that will be the case. There will be noise but is it more than 5218 3 perf?
Click to expand...

Hi,

For 1:1.85 extraction S35 3 perf has the same grain as 4 perf. If you want lower grain traditionally people would shoot anamorphic.

Rated @ 320 asa 5218 is not very grainy at all.

Stephen
 
Back onto matters Red, the thing to do is test with 80 series filters and
redetermine an effective Red ISO where noise is no longer an issue for
tungsten cinematography.
The ISO with this chip does seem to stretch upwards in daylight
situations so it may follow that the camera can be pushed to produce
good results in low light situations at an effective ISO above 320,
after 80? lens filtering is used.
It's all in the testing. Red owners, any offers.
Mezmo
 
I find it hard to believe that you introduce any noticeable noise by simply adjusting the white balance.
 
Sorry... been busy building lens mounts. What are you guys doing here?

1st off- Offhollywood is shooting ISO 320-400 and says he has NO NOISE. A few others have the same results. Some of you have a LOT of noise. Let's see here. What could be the cause?

I posted long ago that if you were getting a lot of noise, you were doing something wrong. What could those things be?

1- old firmware
2- under exposure
3- non-optimal processing (the most common error)
4- bad sensor (unlikely)

Mark has #6 & #7. He has been keeping up with all the firmware upgrades. He also seems to have shot the most footage (maybe with the exception of Soderbergh). Neither Mark or Soderbergh is complaining of too much noise (just the opposite). This should give us some place to start. It is possible to get clean footage.

Now, on RED's side. We are making a clean image cleaner. We had one customer preview the new stuff and comment "what the hell have you guys done?"! (in a good way).

I think instead of deciding that the camera is too noisy (or not), we should start out by asking the guys who are getting clean results exactly what they are doing to get good results.

We are improving things everyday. So keeping current with firmware upgrades is mandatory. If you are getting noise, it would be helpful to know what build and what you shot. The "chicken scratch" in the blue channel happened under certain circumstances with early builds but was fixed over a month ago. Tungsten will be more noisy than daylight. Big under exposure is not good for noise levels. Processing is critical. It is very easy to add noise depending on your workflow settings.

I stand on RED being a VERY low noise level camera. And getting better everyday. If you are getting a lot of noise, something is wrong somewhere.

Jim
 
Thanks Jim,

you nail it now for the rest of us.

Also "The noisers" could nail themselves and their "issues" on a wall.
 
It's about 12:40 here.

I've started and aborted a few posts about the noise levels in the footage I've been shooting and handling since the camera shipped. The thing is, I really don't know how to phrase my findings in a way that comes across in any other way than "nuh-uh."

I have about as much hands-on time as anybody else with the cameras since they shipped. I have terabytes upon terabytes of footage from almost every condition you could imagine... low contrast, high contrast, day, night, underexposed, overexposed - you name it.

The thing is, there just isn't that much noise. If you pull a frame an analyze it as a 10 megapixel still, will you find noise? Of course. If you isolate the blue channel - the noisiest channel in just about every camera - will you find noise? Of course. If you raise your ASA, will you find noise? Of course.

But as I stated above, there just isn't *that much* noise. In a properly exposed image, the noise hides itself in shadow. It's a given that there will be noise in the shadows... less light results in noise.

But speeds over 320 being unusable? That is simply wrong. I've found that I can and have produce a noiseless image with a proper exposure at 500 ASA and a nearly noiseless [read: you must look for the noise to find it] image at 640 ASA. When you get to 800, you start to see noise in the brighter shadows.

But when you see noise, does it break the image? No. Even at 640 ASA, the noise hides itself in motion and shadow. If you've done any crushing or scaling to the image, it'll hide more.

I don't know what you guys are doing to bring all this noise out. Are you putting a backwards S-curve on the footage? Are you trying to flatten out shadows that you should've lit up a few stops? I'm just not quite understanding it. When you take things that are darker and brighten them up to a level at which they were not originally exposed, you will bring noise out. If I shot a contrasty scene and later decided to flatten it out, the newly brightened shadows would reveal noise. If the camera sees it as black... let it stay black! Trying to make it gray will bring out the noise again...

But as Mark, Jim and several others have already stated, a properly exposed and processed image will produce a ridiculously clean image at 320 ASA and a very clean image at 500 ASA. I'm very comfortable shooting at 640 ASA and 800 doesn't scare me if the scene calls for it.

Shoot some footage, process it and watch it at the highest resolution you have available to you. If you're seeing noise... there's a problem. Maybe you underexposed it, maybe you pressed the noise button... who knows. But this camera is capable of producing stunning images in the right hands... if it's producing ugly ones, something has gone wrong.
 
Hope and expect you're right Jim.

However having many people shooting your camera and giving feedback is good and bad.
First it gives us all a lot more 'experience' and real world knowledge about the camera than what we could do on our own. We learn by other's mistakes and posting experiences of how to do it right.

So I'd like to know what MacGregor is doing wrong and Mark is doing right, if that is the case? I'd also like to know how far this camera can be pushed.

Obviously the problem is that all this feedback/testing is not at all controlled and has a high subjective element. No perfect world out there.

Important to get a common base on this one and with everything right, to see what noise we should expect out of the camera and also what post techniques cause issue.

We learn more from our mistakes and would hate to see MacGregor shouted down on this one.
Dave,
 
Brook... I've always liked you. This is as close a description to what I'm seeing as I have heard anyone post. Now, admittedly, I have the luxury of seeing the future. And it is even better than you have described.

I think one of the areas that people have introduced noise is in RED Alert! If you monkey too much with settings there without adult supervision, you can introduce a lot of noise before output. I also think that some have shot footage with older firmware and gotten the "chicken scratch" noise in the blue channel. We posted that problem (remember the Kodak nightmare test) and have fixed that.

If anyone has noisy footage that they have no explanation for, please let us know. We are here to help.

Jim
 
david farland said:
... and would hate to see MacGregor shouted down on this one.
Dave,
Click to expand...

I absolutely do not want to "shout MacGregor down". If he has problems, we want to understand why. But I also don't want people to believe we have a noisy camera if we do not. There should be an explanation for the disparity in results. If everyone was getting noisy results, then it would be hard to say that our camera is not noisy. But we are getting a wide range of noise results, which points to process.

We want all our customers to be happy with the footage they are shooting. If they are not, we don't have a good program. We need help to find out why some are not getting the results they expect so we can fix it. If it is not the camera, it is something.

Jim
 
Jannard said:
... But I also don't want people to believe we have a noisy camera if we do not...

Jim
Click to expand...

Obviously some people still don't know to use RED and then for their own mistakes they would (like to) blame RED with some "Issues".

It should be clear by now.
 
Jim,
It's just your post have a little bit more weight than others on this forum.

I'm interested in optimum workflows and the limits of what your camera can do.

I'm hoping Macgregor will post the camera output and see what other can and can't do.
If it's the firmware or his exposure or limit of the camera I'm hoping he will also share his setup information with us as it's not fair/informative otherwise.

But I didn't think you were shouting him down...were you!


Dave,
 
The Third Man said:
Obviously some people still don't know to use RED and then for their own mistakes they would (like to) blame RED with some "Issues".

It should be clear by now.
Click to expand...

That is not constructive. It's insulting to the original poster, and you know it. We don't need this kind of crap in here.
 
Stokestack said:
That is not constructive. It's insulting to the original poster, and you know it. We don't need this kind of crap in here.
Click to expand...

It's not about insulting.

It's about RED and us,

the future RED users.

Also it's about a good or a bad "image" of RED as a camera in eyes of future customers.

If you did not get results you wanted then "be constructive" to yourself and face your own mistakes.

Etc...the life sometime has a bitter taste...

Nobody's Perfect...

Sorry...
 
New filter call - Tiffen, anyone?

New filter call - Tiffen, anyone?

I have seen amazing city-night photography tests produced by the RED1 using only existing light, on the Sony 4K projector.

But, to increase the performance of a 5000K sensor at 1000 ISO and beyond, it´d be great to have a specially designed filter to do this, with minimal loss in sensitivity.

An LLD filter - just the other side of the spectrum - for RED? Tiffen, do you hear me?

Øystein
 
Concrete said:
LOL, that you know by personal and repeated experience.

Nah, Sanjin, stop trashing Mac every chance you get. You ain't doing yourself no favor.
Click to expand...

Yeahh Concrete,

I was almost to order a set of Blue filters yesterday...
 
If my memory serves me well (it usually doesn't), MacGregor shot the dry lake footage? It was incredible. Very nicely done. But that was shot early on at a time when we did have noise issues under certain circumstances. If he is getting a noisy result with newer (last month) firmware, I would be very concerned. I'd love to have more details about his experience.

Jim
 
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