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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 :)

Off the chart...

Brian Harbauer said:
Man that's a great idea. That's usually what I find myself doing anyways. I just hit next page until I see a poster with red lettering.
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That's good if you only want official information, but by doing that you miss a lot of brainstorming. Think of these threads as being like a corporate meeting where people get together and get to know one another and pick their brains for relative information.

I have a friend who is a captive insurance agent... that is, he can only sell his employer's insurance. This big name company requires that agents meet fairly regularly to get the latest info from the company reps. My friend always complains about having to attend these meetings and listening to boring presentations that they could have given him over the phone in about 10 minutes.

But yet, when he tells me about the meeting over weekly coffee, after the complaining he starts mentioning what he and this agent, or that agent, talked about that he apparently found beneficial. Sure there is small talk on the threads just as there is at those corporate meetings. But sometimes small talk opens the doors to communication that can lead to big ideas.

Just read the "important" posts at your knowledge-accumulation peril.
 
Mark Collins said:
Not sure that HDR is going to reduce the size of your crews at all. You still have to light properly. You shouldn't have to rely of the colorist, as awesome as they are, to do the work for you in post.

All HDR does is give you more dynamic range, allowing you to do much more to the image in post, it doesn't mean you have to light differently.
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I get frustrated by DPs who hang onto this idea that everything has to be lit 'properly' (not saying that's you). As the latitude and sensitivity of cameras increases proper lighting might be no lighting at all. To my taste much of what I see in the cinema and on tv is overlit. With a more sensitive and dynamic camera you can achieve the modeling effect you want with smaller, lighter lights, it might just be bounce or practicals. Beautiful images don't have to be always 'properly' lit anymore. It's a style thing I happen to like appart from it's effect on the means of production.
 
Stu Mannion said:
I get frustrated by DPs who hang onto this idea that everything has to be lit 'properly' (not saying that's you). As the latitude and sensitivity of cameras increases proper lighting might be no lighting at all. To my taste much of what I see in the cinema and on tv is overlit. With a more sensitive and dynamic camera you can achieve the modeling effect you want with smaller, lighter lights, it might just be bounce or practicals. Beautiful images don't have to be always 'properly' lit anymore. It's a style thing I happen to like appart from it's effect on the means of production.
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And good luck to you....
 
Stu Mannion said:
I get frustrated by DPs who hang onto this idea that everything has to be lit 'properly' (not saying that's you). As the latitude and sensitivity of cameras increases proper lighting might be no lighting at all. To my taste much of what I see in the cinema and on tv is overlit. With a more sensitive and dynamic camera you can achieve the modeling effect you want with smaller, lighter lights, it might just be bounce or practicals. Beautiful images don't have to be always 'properly' lit anymore. It's a style thing I happen to like appart from it's effect on the means of production.
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Go buy a book of Rembrandt paintings.
Mostly lit probably by a candle in the artist's studio. The candle's artfully placed, to produce art that lives and breathed hundreds of years later. No one would say that his lighting isn't "proper" lighting. It took care, time and an artful eye to compose and create those images, (and continuity of light), and produce something grippingly dramatic.
Rembrandt didn't just walk into a room, say "yeah - this'll do...".
 
I get frustrated by DPs who hang onto this idea that everything has to be lit 'properly' (not saying that's you). As the latitude and sensitivity of cameras increases proper lighting might be no lighting at all. To my taste much of what I see in the cinema and on tv is overlit. With a more sensitive and dynamic camera you can achieve the modeling effect you want with smaller, lighter lights, it might just be bounce or practicals. Beautiful images don't have to be always 'properly' lit anymore. It's a style thing I happen to like appart from it's effect on the means of production.
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And when you have the same color on the character and the wall behind him ? Without lighting, you will get the same general color... I mean, even with high latitude, when it's the same tint, it's the same tint. It's ugly...

I'm not saying 18k HMI are always needed for sure, but lights of any kinds are and always will be needed.
You need light to create the mood, backlights, to cut the edges nicely, so we can see the difference between every subjects. Create contrasts on your picture... At least a 3 points light set...
 
Contraire

Contraire

I get frustrated by DPs who hang onto this idea that everything has to be lit 'properly' (not saying that's you). As the latitude and sensitivity of cameras increases proper lighting might be no lighting at a
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ll.

In TV and often in Film it is not the DOP who believes it all has to be properly lit. It is usually the opposite but it is producers and sometimes the directors who see it differently. Producers who are paying their cast the big bucks will complain if they can't see their faces fully lit saying they pay this actor $XXXXX and I wanna see their face.
 
Stu Mannion said:
I get frustrated by DPs who hang onto this idea that everything has to be lit 'properly' (not saying that's you). As the latitude and sensitivity of cameras increases proper lighting might be no lighting at all. To my taste much of what I see in the cinema and on tv is overlit. With a more sensitive and dynamic camera you can achieve the modeling effect you want with smaller, lighter lights, it might just be bounce or practicals. Beautiful images don't have to be always 'properly' lit anymore. It's a style thing I happen to like appart from it's effect on the means of production.
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I don't know if you are right or wrong, but I can't wait to see what Epic X with HDRx can do with just pure (full) moonlight. Maybe it won't meet my hopes, but to portray the scene I envision in pure NatureVision is one of my first things to try with my HDRx enabled Epic.
 
i have a bookmark for all posts by jannard, and another for jarred. it's much better for sure.
 
Elsie N said:
I don't know if you are right or wrong, but I can't wait to see what Epic X with HDRx can do with just pure (full) moonlight. Maybe it won't meet my hopes, but to portray the scene I envision in pure NatureVision is one of my first things to try with my HDRx enabled Epic.
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I'm not sure it's a matter of right or wrong.

There's no right way to expose or light an image, it's a subjective judgement based on script, artistic choice that relates directly to objective factors like resources, space and time.

However, even if we have our preferences I'm sure a DP should know how (and practice) how to light for all scenerios and styles.
 
Pietro Impagliazzo said:
I'm not sure it's a matter of right or wrong.

There's no right way to expose or light an image, it's a subjective judgement based on script, artistic choice that relates directly to objective factors like resources, space and time.

However, even if we have our preferences I'm sure a DP should know how (and practice) how to light for all scenerios and styles.
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All good points. But I think Stu Mannion may have been making a point that I also agree with... New ways of lighting may have to be honed when shooting with Epic and HDRx.
 
Elsie N said:
I don't know if you are right or wrong, but I can't wait to see what Epic X with HDRx can do with just pure (full) moonlight. Maybe it won't meet my hopes, but to portray the scene I envision in pure NatureVision is one of my first things to try with my HDRx enabled Epic.
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I would think that whatever Red's HDR trick is, it's probably not making the sensor more light sensitive, it's just adding stops in the highlights (by reading out photosites before they clip or something). So I wouldn't count on improved low-light performance, necessarily.
 
Chris Kenny said:
I would think that whatever Red's HDR trick is, it's probably not making the sensor more light sensitive, it's just adding stops in the highlights (by reading out photosites before they clip or something). So I wouldn't count on improved low-light performance, necessarily.
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I hope you are not right. I am really counting on that. I know the MX sensor gained DR by lowering the noise floor. I just assumed something similar was happening with the HDRx, only at both ends. 18 stops gotta come from somewhere.
 
HDRx will extend highlights

HDRx will extend highlights

Elsie N said:
I hope you are not right. I am really counting on that. I know the MX sensor gained DR by lowering the noise floor. I just assumed something similar was happening with the HDRx, only at both ends. 18 stops gotta come from somewhere.
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I would bet you a large sum it will be almost entirely highlights. The low light sensitivity of sensors is limited by physics (photon statistics, etc), and modern camera sensors are within about 2 stops of what theory says is possible with any sensor technology whatsoever. On the other hand, highlights are a "mere matter of technology" which is generally improving with time.

As it is now, when a sensor pixel reaches 100% white clip and starts to be overexposed (at least on some sensors; don't know about Red particularly) any additional photoelectrons get drained off into a "gutter", or they overflow into adjacent pixels, leading to highlight streaks. You can imagine some sensor design in which those excess electrons were somehow measured, leading to more highlight information.
 
jbeale said:
I would bet you a large sum it will be almost entirely highlights. The low light sensitivity of sensors is limited by physics (photon statistics, etc), and modern camera sensors are within about 2 stops of what theory says is possible with any sensor technology whatsoever. On the other hand, highlights are a "mere matter of technology" which is generally improving with time.
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In that case, if I may be excused, I will go cry myself to sleep.
 
I think it will be quite some time before any camera is sensitive enough to get decent exposure at 1/48th of a second in nothing but moonlight.

"So how bright can moonlight be? The brightest moonlight occurs with the moon at perigee and the earth at perihelion, right at full moon phase. You can never have the moon at its theoretically fullest phase, right opposite the earth from the sun, because whenever the moon goes there it enters the earth's shadow and we get a lunar eclipse! But assuming the eclipse didn't happen, we could assume the following: a phase angle of zero, very clear air with an "extinction coefficient" of 0.11 magnitudes per air mass, the moon on the zenith so that the moonlight passes through a single "air mass", the brightness would be 0.0462 foot candles (LV -2.0)"

http://home.earthlink.net/~kitathome/LunarLight/moonlight_gallery/technique/moonbright.htm


.0462 footcandles. At the moons Theoretical brightest.
 
Andrew Wilding said:
I think it will be quite some time before any camera is sensitive enough to get decent exposure at 1/48th of a second in nothing but moonlight.

"So how bright can moonlight be? The brightest moonlight occurs with the moon at perigee and the earth at perihelion, right at full moon phase. You can never have the moon at its theoretically fullest phase, right opposite the earth from the sun, because whenever the moon goes there it enters the earth's shadow and we get a lunar eclipse! But assuming the eclipse didn't happen, we could assume the following: a phase angle of zero, very clear air with an "extinction coefficient" of 0.11 magnitudes per air mass, the moon on the zenith so that the moonlight passes through a single "air mass", the brightness would be 0.0462 foot candles (LV -2.0)"

http://home.earthlink.net/~kitathome/LunarLight/moonlight_gallery/technique/moonbright.htm


.0462 footcandles. At the moons Theoretical brightest.
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If my calculations are right (Big if, feel free to correct them), it would take appx. ASA 20000 to shoot moonlight with a 1/24th shutter at f/1.4. Very achievable. In fact, you can already do that with the Nikon D3s (with terrible artifacts and resolution, but still...). Digital technology is advancing at an exponential rate, let's not forget.

Shooting in starlight will require ASA 300,000+. Now that's a target to aim for.
 
Elsie N said:
That's good if you only want official information, but by doing that you miss a lot of brainstorming. Think of these threads as being like a corporate meeting where people get together and get to know one another and pick their brains for relative information.

I have a friend who is a captive insurance agent... that is, he can only sell his employer's insurance. This big name company requires that agents meet fairly regularly to get the latest info from the company reps. My friend always complains about having to attend these meetings and listening to boring presentations that they could have given him over the phone in about 10 minutes.

But yet, when he tells me about the meeting over weekly coffee, after the complaining he starts mentioning what he and this agent, or that agent, talked about that he apparently found beneficial. Sure there is small talk on the threads just as there is at those corporate meetings. But sometimes small talk opens the doors to communication that can lead to big ideas.

Just read the "important" posts at your knowledge-accumulation peril.
Click to expand...

I appreciate the thoughts Elsie. I do enjoy the thoughts and knowledge of others, and I often do read post by post. But there are times, and I'm sure you're in the situation as well where you'd prefer to have a filter as well and find some posts directly from someone on the Red team.
 
Maybe RED improved on an old Fuji trick and put 2 photodiodes per photosite (one for highlights and one for shadows). It's possible :)
 
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