SCARLET NO NOISE AT 4K, 3K, 2K

[Paul Schneider]

I've just gone through a series of lens and camera tests with my Scarlet in preparation to get this mule working.
Read a lot of threads and comments here regarding folks having noise in their footage, especially at the higher speed, cropped 2K settings.

After some extensive testing I've found no discernible difference between any of the frame sizes or crops. None. When my cam is black balanced appropriately and exposed properly (between 320-800iso) the 2K/60 is clean as can be... and I'm pleasantly surprised.

Just wanted to say that, because many folks are saying otherwise.

 

[D Fuller]

It turns out that in photography, exposure is still important. ;-)

 

[Terry VerHaar]

I won't claim to be a world class expert, but my results seem to be very similar. :thumbsup:

 

[Ryan De Franco]

It depends on your exposure.

It depends on your individual camera.

Many people don't have time to black balance before documentary shoots. You show up in a hot arena with the morning's blackshade from an air-conditioned house? You might've made the noise worse.

Your camera's components almost made the grade for Epic but just missed? Nice, you'll see good noise results. Your camera's components barely made the grade for Scarlet? Ruh roh.

Like all things in life, acceptance of fate plays a big part in the result. Like all things involving cameras, exposure might have the strongest effect on outcome.

 

[Carey Lee Coffey]

Great to hear.

 

[Al Lougher]

Hmmm. I shot some footage yesterday 2K 60FPS, daylight, ISO800, PERFECT exposure. I'm going through the footage now and the noise is at unacceptable levels. I did a black shade prior to shooting also. Am I missing something here?

 

[Uli Plank]

Well, RED doesn't bury any noise in black and does no in-camera filtering (other than black-shading), while others do.
So, you may want to do some careful crushing of the shadows and some noise filtering in post. Plus, if your scene is low-contrast, you can go higher with your exposure as long as the "traffic lights" aren't turned on.

 

[Scott Crawley]

It turns out that in photography, exposure is still important. ;-)

This would be the quote of the year... If it weren't so utterly pathetic that someone had to say it in the first place.

 

[Scott Crawley]

Hmmm. I shot some footage yesterday 2K 60FPS, daylight, ISO800, PERFECT exposure. I'm going through the footage now and the noise is at unacceptable levels. I did a black shade prior to shooting also. Am I missing something here?

I don't know what you are seeing or why, but at this point I'm thinking that Red should take on a few cases and clear up the issue with a brief statement of summary. I'd like to know with some certainty why so many folks are complaining.

 

[Al Lougher]

I'm hoping it's just me and being a bit of a noob with this camera. I hate to say it but I've been far from impressed with my first bit of footage on this thing. First soft images and now noise. Not happy

I'm going to upload a clip in a short while so you can see how bad it is. BTW I did shoot RC 12:1 so not sure if that introduces too much noise?

 

[Stephen Gentle]

Your camera's components almost made the grade for Epic but just missed? Nice, you'll see good noise results. Your camera's components barely made the grade for Scarlet? Ruh roh.

I don't think this is really a concern. The main difference in the processing components is going to be their maximum clock rate - and that means either they actually function reliably, or they won't at a given speed. That's not going to affect noise...

 

[Andy White]

Hmmm. I shot some footage yesterday 2K 60FPS, daylight, ISO800, PERFECT exposure. I'm going through the footage now and the noise is at unacceptable levels. I did a black shade prior to shooting also. Am I missing something here?

You may want to denoise or apply noise reduction in post. Don't forget that you're using a windowed portion of the sensor. The RAW workflow is different in many senses - at the basic one, nothing is applied in-camera and you make the choices regarding what's done to the image... that's really the primary difference.

It's hard to judge without seeing your sample footage - or knowing specifics (ND/lens/T-stop etc) - but you also mentioned soft footage in another post - are you shooting wide open? You may also want to add sharpening in post as you're getting RAW output, without any sharpening algorithms added... there's been a ton of posts on this since the Scarlet came out.

Checking through Vimeo earlier I saw this - http://vimeo.com/40243973 - it's NOT my footage, so I don't know anything about it, but just thought it looked cool (Epic - a bit of 2K at the head and 5K 120 for the rest).

 

[Al Lougher]

You may want to denoise or apply noise reduction in post. Don't forget that you're using a windowed portion of the sensor. The RAW workflow is different in many senses - at the basic one, nothing is applied in-camera and you make the choices regarding what's done to the image... that's really the primary difference.

It's hard to judge without seeing your sample footage - or knowing specifics (ND/lens/T-stop etc) - but you also mentioned soft footage in another post - are you shooting wide open? You may also want to add sharpening in post as you're getting RAW output, without any sharpening algorithms added... there's been a ton of posts on this since the Scarlet came out.

Checking through Vimeo earlier I saw this - http://vimeo.com/40243973 - it's NOT my footage, so I don't know anything about it, but just thought it looked cool (Epic - a bit of 2K at the head and 5K 120 for the rest).

Question: In REDCine-X is the little gray bar on the left (see red arrow below) the level of noise in the image? I was pretty sure my histogram when shooting was between the "goal posts" with nothing in the left level.

Regarding the soft images I was shooting like an f8 or something. I was just outside with f22 focus infinity, ISO800, 4K and still pretty soft. Must be my lens afterall.

 

[Scott Crawley]

You realize that the infinity marking is not a single, precise point on a stills lens? You still need to carefully set focus at infinity. You can't just slam the lens to the end of the scale and expect it to be properly set. You push through, then pull back a little like you would focusing at any other distance.

That short indicator represents the level of noise that you find unacceptable? That level shouldn't be problematic at all. Your parade shows that your blacks are too high at 18%. When you bring them closer to where they belong you shouldn't see any of that noise.

 

[Al Lougher]

You realize that the infinity marking is not a single, precise point? You still need to carefully set focus at infinity. You can't just slam the lens to the end of the scale and expect it to be properly set.

Yep. I was zooming in and checking the focus with focus assist. Looks sharp as a tack on the LCD. Soft in the R3D. I really think it's my 24L Scott, it seems to be softer wider than say in the 50-70mm range.

 

[Scott Crawley]

Yep. I was zooming in and checking the focus with focus assist. Looks sharp as a tack on the LCD. Soft in the R3D. I really think it's my 24L Scott, it seems to be softer wider than say in the 50-70mm range.

That is also true of mine. It is not at it's sharpest @24. 35 is OK, stopped down a little... f4 I think maybe a stop more.

 

[Andy White]

On the lens, try using ND's and keeping your 'sweet spot' Fstop lower... lenses are often softer wide open and also fully closed (again, a recent thread had some examples of this).

It might be a combination of things - try some more tests with ND's to control your exposure (rather than f22) - try and stay F8.

Waveform wise, I'd be looking for a fatter exposure (more mid and to the right) if this was shot on a sunny day outside... of course, I've no idea what the image is - so I could be way off

 

[Al Lougher]

Thanks guys. I'm heading out to get some footage so will try a few of the suggestions and report back with my findings.

 

[Andy White]

Thanks guys. I'm heading out to get some footage so will try a few of the suggestions and report back with my findings.

:thumbsup:

 

[Scott Crawley]

Thanks guys. I'm heading out to get some footage so will try a few of the suggestions and report back with my findings.

Remember that your exposure process is correct: expose to the right planning to align blacks during the 1 light.