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Extrem high-speed


axel lindahl

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Hi!

 

Im Axel, dp from sweden and Im a rookie at this forum. I have a quite big shot coming up with a lot of technical things in-camera, cos the director wants as little post-work as possible. W will probably shooting in France.

 

The thing is we are going to shoot extrem high speed, like 4000fps and we probably will be going for 2K instead of 35mm.

I know the Phantom can handle this but there are rental problems with phantom around europe because we are shooting very soon.

 

Maybe the Phantom will be available for us but in case not does anyone know any alternatives?

We have been looking at industrial and military-cameras but the problem there is the resolution. Also the Weisscam have been discussed but it does only support PAL at 1000fps and that isn't enough for us.

 

If any of you have any familiar experience or experience with the Phantom I would be very grateful for your input. Every input is very appriciated!

 

//Axel

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Hi Axel,

 

I recently tested a French based Phantom, it was not as good as it should be. Make sure that you test any camera you use first, otherwise you may be disappointed.

 

I don't think you will get 4000 fps @ 2K, what are you shooting?

 

Stephen

 

Hi!

 

Im Axel, dp from sweden and Im a rookie at this forum. I have a quite big shot coming up with a lot of technical things in-camera, cos the director wants as little post-work as possible. W will probably shooting in France.

 

The thing is we are going to shoot extrem high speed, like 4000fps and we probably will be going for 2K instead of 35mm.

I know the Phantom can handle this but there are rental problems with phantom around europe because we are shooting very soon.

 

Maybe the Phantom will be available for us but in case not does anyone know any alternatives?

We have been looking at industrial and military-cameras but the problem there is the resolution. Also the Weisscam have been discussed but it does only support PAL at 1000fps and that isn't enough for us.

 

If any of you have any familiar experience or experience with the Phantom I would be very grateful for your input. Every input is very appriciated!

 

//Axel

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The Phantom can not do 4000fps at 2k. I am not aware of any digital system that can shoot 4000fps at HD resolutions, let alone even a 35mm film camera that can shoot 4000.

 

4000 is really fast, are you positive you need to go that high speed? What is the action you are photographing?

 

You can see some 1000fps stuff from the Phantom that I shot at my companies website http://www.studiobattlerattle.com (we specialize in shooting/ consulting for extreme high speed shoots).

 

Kevin Zanit

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Thanks for reply!

 

I have more or less realised that 2K will be too much to ask for at 4000fps. 1920 might be the one in the end.

The thing is that we are finishing in Lustre and my experience is that Lustre can compress 35mm scanned to 2K into 1920 and 720 very well and the grading looks fabulous but when starting with like 720 then it really doesn't hold.

Therefore I would say that 1920 is my rock bottom.

 

The action we are shooting are explosions, kind of like the end of Zabriskie Point but the director is talking about take it further. We are also going to shoot some things in 1000fps, like close-ups with differnet kind of liquids running down the face.

 

Honestly I have not much experience with "raw" HD, 90% of what I do is 35 but as I understand it that shooting at this speeds digital is better. If you have any opinions in this matter, I would really appriciate!

 

You seem to be much more experienced than me shooting high-speed, Im very thankful for all your input!

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No I also heard that the french one was a bit tricky.

I talked to a rental house here in Sweden last week and they had also tested the french-based Phantom and had big problems with it.

Their experience was that it was more broadcast- than film-based.

 

Did you have any technicans from the rental house with you?

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I have worked with several of the high-speed digital cameras, and in my experience the Phantom is the best one so far. I am not aware of any camera that can do 1920 at 4000 fps let alone any HD resolution (in other words you are looking at an SD size image at these frame rates).

 

For these types of frame rates, digital is usually your best option. It is most cost effective, and the quality tends to be better.

 

Like I said before, are you positive you actually need 4000fps? What is the action you are shooting?

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Our Phantom HD cameras look great and can be rented for overseas work. At 1920x1080 the camera can get to just over 1000fps. At 1280x720 the top speed is just over 1500fps.

 

Please feel free to contact me directly if you would like to discuss a rental.

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Did you have any technicans from the rental house with you?

 

Hi,

 

The camera came from a sales agent, 'technican' probably does not really describe the person that came with the camera to do the demo. An instruction manuel on its own would have been more useful.

 

I was testing the camera for a client who wanted to buy one, obviously the sale did not proceed.

 

Stephen

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.... let alone even a 35mm film camera that can shoot 4000.

I remember something like that from maybe 10 - 20 years ago. The camera consisted mainly of a flat drum about 3 ft. in diameter, with a piece of 35 film about 10 ft. long emulsion in on the inside of the drum. They had to pull a vacuum on the whole drum. I don't remember for sure if the drum had to spin, or if it was just a spinning prism of some sort in the middle. Whatever it was, it had to spin so fast that air was a real problem, thus the vacuum. It could go so fast that a rifle bullet hitting an apple would only move a little over an inch in the ten feet it could shoot. I heard that they were talking to Panavision about it, maybe somebody there will remember better than I.

 

 

 

-- J.S.

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