Ryan E. Walters
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Earilier this week Shawn Nelson came over and with his RED I was able to run through a series of tests with the RED. I have put together a posting on my Blog regarding the testing, as well as links to the stills. I hope to have the footage up later. (I have some test footage of some more interesting things then the charts that are provided in the stills.)
My Blog posting can be found at my web site: http://www.ryanewalters.com under the Indi-HD section. Or by going here:RED First Impressions
Here is the blog posting as well:
In preparation for an upcoming shoot, I met with Shawn Nelson of Nelson Entertainment to test out and get familiar with the RED camera. For those of you who haven’t heard, the RED camera is the next revolution in digital cinema. Designed from the ground up it is a completely modular 4k digital cinema camera that costs $17,500. It is a revolutionary camera at a revolutionary price.
Before beginning a shoot with new piece of gear, or a new camera, I prefer to have a day or two to test it out and get familiar with it. When shooting with a new camera, I like to take it out and push it to it’s limits, see how I can break the image. Then when I am done with the testing I can evaluate how far I can push it around, and where I need to stay in order to protect the image quality. Below you will see sample stills of the test images I shot. If you would like to download the full quality Targa stills, or the video you can find them here:
Uncompressed Test Images:
- 2k Targa Test Stills 29MB Zip file
- Sample Video (coming soon)
After the tests were completed Shawn was kind enough to process the images for me so that I could evaluate them. Currently the processing application is only available to RED customers, and it is only available for Mac users with an Intel machine. Since neither of these apply to me, Shawn made sure that I had what I needed from our testing.
The first test that I was interested in completing was a resolution test. Taking a resolution chart that I have for 16:9 HD video I was more then impressed with the results.
Using the RED 18mm - 50mm Lens, I was more then satisfied with the results- This is a sharp lens and imager that is able to resolve more then enough detail. In fact, This test chart that I had printed at the local Kinko’s does not go far enough in the horizontal and vertical scales to adequately show the detail capable in this camera. Both of those scales go up to 1,000 and you can clearly see the defined lines in both scales at the 1,000 mark. Using the flutes, it appears that the lines are blending together at around the 1,600 marks.
The next test that I was interested in performing was to see if there was any white shading / lens shading in the image. This is where a color cast can be introduced into the image at various points. Usually it is red or green, and appears as a faint color cast in the lower edges / corners. This is typical in lower end cameras, and occurs to a lesser degree in higher end cameras. (Especially if an adapter like the Pro35 is used.)
As you can see from the resulting image of a white card with a black paper tape cross, the image does not exhibit the white shading issues that I have seen on other cameras. For more information on Lens Shading / White Shading these links are very helpful-
Lens Shading / White Shading:
- Shading Correction
- http://www.pstechnik.de/en/downloads/54_PRO35_Adjustment of the color shading.pdf
The next thing that I wanted to shoot was my Kodak Color chart. I shoot this chart before each different lighting setup. That way when I take the footage into be edited, I have a clear reference for black, white, grey, etc. I can then manipulate the image in post and grade it accordingly. I am not a colorist by any means- but having the chart has proved invaluable in getting looks to match from scene to scene.
The final test that I wanted to complete was to see how far I could push the image- see how it breaks down, and where it’s limits are. For this test I set up a white sheet, a black sheet, a grey card and then Shawn and I sat down wearing grey sweatshirts. (Sorry for the lack of good looking models for this test- you’ll just have to put up with our ugly mugs.
). The scene was then lit with a 500w broad light. Using my light meter set at an ISO of 320 it gave me a reading of T5.6. I then proceeded to overexpose and underexpose the image. The RED was set at an ISO of 320, and the lens was the 18mm - 50mm T3 Red lens. Starting at T3 and going up to T16 you can judge for yourself what an acceptable range of under and over exposure is at.
SEE IMAGE POST #2 & #3
To my eye, it looks like the image can be pushed 2 stops in either direction and still be fine. At T16 the image exhibits noise in the blacks, and it is very noticeable in the grey card.
I must admit that the testing was very helpful for me, and hopefully these images will be helpful to you as well. I am VERY impressed with this camera. Using it through out this night of testing was straight forward and simple. Shawn had told me prior to the testing that the camera was easier to operate then the DVX100, and I would have to agree. The menu system is straight forward, and easy to access. no where near the pages and pages of complicated menus that the Varicam has!
This revolutionary camera records the image in a RAW format. And for those of you who shoot digital stills in RAW, you know how valuable that is for later touchup / grading work. While I do not have the Red program to process the footage, I was told that since just about everything is non destructive (except for shutter speed and frame rate) and you can go back and correct the image / choices you made on set. So, for instance that image at 320 ISO at a T16 may be acceptable / usable after all. By using the Red program you can go in and correct the ISO setting, and with the ability to go up to and ISO of 1600 that allows for some amazing flexibility in the grading of the footage.
All in all, I am very impressed with this camera- it is going to change the way things are done. I can only imagine that the other camera manufactures are wondering what they are going to do next? How a $100,000+ camera that records at a lower resolution then a $17,500+ camera can compete is beyond me. right now those other companies have some time to figure out their marketing strategy- as there is about a 9 month waiting period of backorders. But once production ramps up, and the camera is more widely available it will definitely take the market in a new direction.
I’m excited to see what Team Red delivers next. With a quality set of prime cinema lenses slated for the end of 2007 expect more great things from this company.
My Blog posting can be found at my web site: http://www.ryanewalters.com under the Indi-HD section. Or by going here:RED First Impressions
Here is the blog posting as well:
In preparation for an upcoming shoot, I met with Shawn Nelson of Nelson Entertainment to test out and get familiar with the RED camera. For those of you who haven’t heard, the RED camera is the next revolution in digital cinema. Designed from the ground up it is a completely modular 4k digital cinema camera that costs $17,500. It is a revolutionary camera at a revolutionary price.
Before beginning a shoot with new piece of gear, or a new camera, I prefer to have a day or two to test it out and get familiar with it. When shooting with a new camera, I like to take it out and push it to it’s limits, see how I can break the image. Then when I am done with the testing I can evaluate how far I can push it around, and where I need to stay in order to protect the image quality. Below you will see sample stills of the test images I shot. If you would like to download the full quality Targa stills, or the video you can find them here:
Uncompressed Test Images:
- 2k Targa Test Stills 29MB Zip file
- Sample Video (coming soon)
After the tests were completed Shawn was kind enough to process the images for me so that I could evaluate them. Currently the processing application is only available to RED customers, and it is only available for Mac users with an Intel machine. Since neither of these apply to me, Shawn made sure that I had what I needed from our testing.
The first test that I was interested in completing was a resolution test. Taking a resolution chart that I have for 16:9 HD video I was more then impressed with the results.
Using the RED 18mm - 50mm Lens, I was more then satisfied with the results- This is a sharp lens and imager that is able to resolve more then enough detail. In fact, This test chart that I had printed at the local Kinko’s does not go far enough in the horizontal and vertical scales to adequately show the detail capable in this camera. Both of those scales go up to 1,000 and you can clearly see the defined lines in both scales at the 1,000 mark. Using the flutes, it appears that the lines are blending together at around the 1,600 marks.
The next test that I was interested in performing was to see if there was any white shading / lens shading in the image. This is where a color cast can be introduced into the image at various points. Usually it is red or green, and appears as a faint color cast in the lower edges / corners. This is typical in lower end cameras, and occurs to a lesser degree in higher end cameras. (Especially if an adapter like the Pro35 is used.)
As you can see from the resulting image of a white card with a black paper tape cross, the image does not exhibit the white shading issues that I have seen on other cameras. For more information on Lens Shading / White Shading these links are very helpful-
Lens Shading / White Shading:
- Shading Correction
- http://www.pstechnik.de/en/downloads/54_PRO35_Adjustment of the color shading.pdf
The next thing that I wanted to shoot was my Kodak Color chart. I shoot this chart before each different lighting setup. That way when I take the footage into be edited, I have a clear reference for black, white, grey, etc. I can then manipulate the image in post and grade it accordingly. I am not a colorist by any means- but having the chart has proved invaluable in getting looks to match from scene to scene.
The final test that I wanted to complete was to see how far I could push the image- see how it breaks down, and where it’s limits are. For this test I set up a white sheet, a black sheet, a grey card and then Shawn and I sat down wearing grey sweatshirts. (Sorry for the lack of good looking models for this test- you’ll just have to put up with our ugly mugs.
). The scene was then lit with a 500w broad light. Using my light meter set at an ISO of 320 it gave me a reading of T5.6. I then proceeded to overexpose and underexpose the image. The RED was set at an ISO of 320, and the lens was the 18mm - 50mm T3 Red lens. Starting at T3 and going up to T16 you can judge for yourself what an acceptable range of under and over exposure is at.SEE IMAGE POST #2 & #3
To my eye, it looks like the image can be pushed 2 stops in either direction and still be fine. At T16 the image exhibits noise in the blacks, and it is very noticeable in the grey card.
I must admit that the testing was very helpful for me, and hopefully these images will be helpful to you as well. I am VERY impressed with this camera. Using it through out this night of testing was straight forward and simple. Shawn had told me prior to the testing that the camera was easier to operate then the DVX100, and I would have to agree. The menu system is straight forward, and easy to access. no where near the pages and pages of complicated menus that the Varicam has!
This revolutionary camera records the image in a RAW format. And for those of you who shoot digital stills in RAW, you know how valuable that is for later touchup / grading work. While I do not have the Red program to process the footage, I was told that since just about everything is non destructive (except for shutter speed and frame rate) and you can go back and correct the image / choices you made on set. So, for instance that image at 320 ISO at a T16 may be acceptable / usable after all. By using the Red program you can go in and correct the ISO setting, and with the ability to go up to and ISO of 1600 that allows for some amazing flexibility in the grading of the footage.
All in all, I am very impressed with this camera- it is going to change the way things are done. I can only imagine that the other camera manufactures are wondering what they are going to do next? How a $100,000+ camera that records at a lower resolution then a $17,500+ camera can compete is beyond me. right now those other companies have some time to figure out their marketing strategy- as there is about a 9 month waiting period of backorders. But once production ramps up, and the camera is more widely available it will definitely take the market in a new direction.
I’m excited to see what Team Red delivers next. With a quality set of prime cinema lenses slated for the end of 2007 expect more great things from this company.
