REDuser ethics

[Peter Moretti]

...

My friend told me about a test with the Red and a Canon XLH1. Canon is under $10,000! Canon with the Canon lens and the Red was shot with the Red zoomlens. He says the Canon looked equally as sharp and has more of dynamic range. The XLH1 is about 7-8 stops, red claims 11! some body is lying about the numbers and it should be easy to find out.

...

The EX1 has more dynamic range than the XHG1, which is essentially an H1 with a fixed lens. Does the EX1 have more dynamic range than a Red? IDTS, but honestly I've never conducted a test or seen. I've just assumed it was a given that the EX1 < the Red.

 

And how are you going to color correct the XLH1's HDV 4:2:0 color and keep it from falling apart? Now if he captured uncompressed out of the XLH1's HD-SDI port, I believe the XLH1 can look really really good, although it's still only 8-bit color, but at least it's 4:2:2.

[Walter Graff]

"And how are you going to color correct the XLH1's HDV 4:2:0 color and keep it from falling apart?"

 

Funny, I color correct 4:2:0 footage every week for local, regional, and national commerical content and it doesn't "fall apart". It corrects just like any other color sub sampling scheme. Can we once and for all drop this myth from any conversation.

[Peter Moretti]

"And how are you going to color correct the XLH1's HDV 4:2:0 color and keep it from falling apart?"

 

Funny, I color correct 4:2:0 footage every week for local, regional, and national commerical content and it doesn't "fall apart". It corrects just like any other color sub sampling scheme. Can we once and for all drop this myth from any conversation.

Walter, with all due respect, I was just over at a post house last month and sat in front of an Avid DS Nitris and was shown 4:2:0 color not holing up when being push for a film. The colorist was even complaining about even DVCPRO HD giving him lots of headaches compared to the 4:4:4 likes so much more. I wish that you were right, because I have a lot of stuff I'd like to shoot handheld with an HDV camera recording to tape, but there is a lot of evidence to the contrary. That being said I'd LOVE for you to be proven right.

[Dan Goulder]

Walter, with all due respect, I was just over at a post house last month and sat in front of an Avid DS Nitris and was shown 4:2:0 color not holing up when being push for a film. The colorist was even complaining about even DVCPRO HD giving him lots of headaches compared to the 4:4:4 likes so much more.

To be fair, there's a considerable difference between correcting 4:2:0 for a commercial, and correcting it for a theatrical film out. That correcting 4:4:4 files is less of a headache than correcting DVCPro HD should also be no revelation.

[Walter Graff]

Walter, with all due respect, I was just over at a post house last month and sat in front of an Avid DS Nitris and was shown 4:2:0 color not holing up when being push for a film. The colorist was even complaining about even DVCPRO HD giving him lots of headaches compared to the 4:4:4 likes so much more. I wish that you were right, because I have a lot of stuff I'd like to shoot handheld with an HDV camera recording to tape, but there is a lot of evidence to the contrary. That being said I'd LOVE for you to be proven right.

 

 

There is no proving right or wrong here. You made a generalization that 4:2:0 does can not be color corrected and falls apart. It does not fall apart for video. That is an erroneous statement in the context of the generalization you made. Now you are making yourself clearer. That is good. It may not have as many legs for filmout, I do not disagree, but even then plenty of 4:2:0 films have been made and they look fine. I myself have done filmouts with my JVC HD 200 and the results were fine. What is often lost in such scenarios is merely detail and density in the blacks. Knowing what to do to gain color with various formats makes filmouts more palatable. Problem with many of these colonists, is they complain about everything not being doable, as you suggest. I deal with these guys too. They will tell you how bad something will end up and often I find they are not right, just purists looking for the best signal they can get from the getgo. Nothing worng with that. Sometimes if they'd just deal the hand dealt them, rather than hating the game, they'd probably have nicer lives. If you are going to push a product for filmout, obviously 4:4:4 is the best you can get, but in this day and age, 4:4:4 is more an anomaly than reality. And with that, many successful films have been made on much lesser subsampling schemes that did just fine. I myself have seen colorist try to put down lesser formats, but when that is what I have, I want someone to work to give me the best he can, not start as a defeatist. DuArt has done numerous 4:2:0 work for film and even those who are there will often say the results are better than they expected. And DVCPro is far from perfect, and even not one of the best 4:2:2 formats out there. When you look at how little information it samples per frame you realize why 4:2:0 and 4:1:1 subsampling codecs are not far from it.

[John Sprung]

DuArt has done numerous 4:2:0 work for film and even those who are there will often say the results are better than they expected. And DVCPro is far from perfect, and even not one of the best 4:2:2 formats out there.

What underlies all this is that 4:2:2 is sort of an antique. There's no theoretical reason for it to be any better than 4:2:0.

 

Back in the days of analog TV and CRT's, the first component systems were developed. They sampled luminance across a scan line at four times the subcarrier frequency, and color difference at twice the subcarrier frequency -- 4fsc, 2fsc. That's where the original 4:2:2 notation came from.

 

In digital, it became possible to undersample both horizontally and vertically, and we had a sort of notation mutation. Originally the ratio was luminance to red and blue color differences. 4:2:0 doesn't mean that you discard the blue record, it means that you undersample both horizontally and vertically. Unlike cats, we have equal horizontal and vertical resolution, so that works just as well for us. 4:2:0 appeared first in low end gear, which may cause a misperception that it's not as good as 4:2:2.

 

All this works because our eye/brain combination sort of fits its color information onto the framework of its luminance picture. There's a longer explanation in the "Help me out here" thread. http://www.cinematography.com/forum2004/in...st&p=228540

 

 

 

-- J.S.

[Walter Graff]

Yes John, and all this creates incredible myths about color sampling. And if it was only that simple. There are actually four ways of 4:2:0 color sampling so it's not as simple as this is less than that. In my green screen seminars this month the groups were amazed to se that 4:2:0 prosumer cameras cut no less a key than 4:2:2 prosumer cameras when we shot with all the formats and then keyed them all and looked at the results. The web is a great thing as it let's lots of information get into people's hands. The web is a dangerous place as it let's lots of information get into people's hands.

[Luke Haywood]

Hi Jim,

 

That was an address that Red advertised some time age, I have received many emails from you but never from that address.

 

Stephen

I just stumbled on this post from about two years ago:

Granted it doesn't specifically say it's Jim's address, but you can see how people might get the idea that it is.

So can we conclude that just because we write to Jim at that address, it does not mean that he will be reading it?

[Matthew W. Phillips]

For an example of "RED ethics" (which is the title of this thread), I want to post this link to a thread on REDuser.net which I find absolutely hysterical and outrageous.

 

This poor fellow shot tons of footage with the RED using a REDraid drive. He is not able to retrieve his footage and is upset. His replies? Basically that it's not the RED company's fault, it's his! He should have backed up the data and not trusted REDs drive so he isn't entitled to anything. I don't see anyone objectively looking, or caring, about this problem in a system they all spent tens of thousands of dollars on.

 

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=13927

[Matthew W. Phillips]

 

Does this mean I should shoot in 3-strip technicolor?

[Matthew Rogers]

For an example of "RED ethics" (which is the title of this thread), I want to post this link to a thread on REDuser.net which I find absolutely hysterical and outrageous.

 

This poor fellow shot tons of footage with the RED using a REDraid drive. He is not able to retrieve his footage and is upset. His replies? Basically that it's not the RED company's fault, it's his! He should have backed up the data and not trusted REDs drive so he isn't entitled to anything. I don't see anyone objectively looking, or caring, about this problem in a system they all spent tens of thousands of dollars on.

 

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=13927

 

He was also foolish to not fully research the camera's media, or hire someone who already knew and could fill him in on the specs. I don't see why it's RED (the company) fault that he did not understand the system and therefore not properly backup his data. I don't see any problem in the system that I paid alot of money for. Every system has it's limits/faults and you need to know what they are before you shoot on it. I know that I need to backup my hard drive throughout the day or shoot with enough CF cards to get me through the day. I feel sorry for the guy, but he should have done more research before he shot on the RED.

 

My question is why are you bias against people who like the RED? Is there something wrong about being excited about cool new technology? I understand there are a few who are loud that get most Redusers a bad name, but I believe there are also some similar people here. RED may not have the DR of film yet, but it's getting closer, and in two years has made a pretty big revolution because of price and quality.

 

Matthew

[Matthew W. Phillips]

My question is why are you bias against people who like the RED? Is there something wrong about being excited about cool new technology?

 

Of course there is nothing wrong with wanting to shoot on RED and being excited about it. But you have to admit, that thread was laughable. What if I bought an Arriflex Super 16 cam and I loaded it with film, the camera caused my film to get scratched, and people told me "It's not Arri's fault that their camera malfunctioned!" That's the attitude I get from REDuser.net concerning REAL problems that people experience. It is absurd to think that a shooting platform is considered stable if it requires three backups to be sure. That's not stability. When I shoot film, I load one roll of film at a time and there is no backup. Any given take on film is the ONLY copy of that take in existance. If that can is opened, it's done. It cannot be replaced. BUT with film, as long as there isn't human error, you're good to go.

 

I am not much of a fan of digital acquisition but I respect digital shooters who have skills. What I don't respect is noise-filtering and dismissing GENUINE concerns as human error. If a drive fails, it fails. It might be unwise to not backup, but that does not make the drive failure the person's fault. It's still a drive failure and needs to be fixed.

[Brian Langeman]

Don't hard drives fail no matter who they're from? Red or anybody else? So isn't it a risk you take with any digital camera that records to a hard drive? How can you blame Red for something they can't control, or anyone for that matter. Hard drives sometimes fail, it's a fact of life.

Edited June 11, 2008 by Brian Langeman

[Matthew W. Phillips]

Don't hard drives fail no matter who they're from? Red or anybody else? So isn't it a risk you take with any digital camera that records to a hard drive? How can you blame Red for something they can't control, or anyone for that matter. Hard drives sometimes fail, it's a fact of life.

 

It wasn't any harddrive...it was a RED raid drive. If it's so unreliable, why would they even sell it? It seems like this whole RED thing is Caveat Emptor. It's no wonder some of us stick with film. What good is 4k if it never makes it to the editing table?

[Ruairi Robinson]

It wasn't any harddrive...it was a RED raid drive. If it's so unreliable, why would they even sell it? It seems like this whole RED thing is Caveat Emptor. It's no wonder some of us stick with film. What good is 4k if it never makes it to the editing table?

 

 

Good point. No camera, or roll of film has ever failed, once, ever, in the history of cinema.

 

That's why shoots on film don't need insurance at all.

 

Yours respectfully,

R.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

Good point. No camera, or roll of film has ever failed, once, ever, in the history of cinema.

 

That's why shoots on film don't need insurance at all.

 

Yours respectfully,

R.

 

Wow, I'm so flattered that the Academy Award nominee has so much time while planning his feature with Leo to constantly lend me his sarcasm. And you're right too! Film isn't stable at all...in fact, I don't know how it's been around over 100 years since it sucks so bad.

[George Ebersole]

Häakon is a young and good fellow enough in order to have this mate posting in any way other than as a non-pretensious hint about where this talented, promising DoP can go:

 

 

 

*snip*

 

* by Concrete, reduser.net poster: "(...) adding some grain (latter two). The image was too clean for me!" :lol:

Wow. That is very clean looking stuff. I can't remember the last time I saw rushes (or stills thereof), but they didn't look like that.

 

Incredible.

[Matthew Rogers]

Good point. No camera, or roll of film has ever failed, once, ever, in the history of cinema.

 

That's why shoots on film don't need insurance at all.

 

Here's the thing. If there was some way to make a backup of film on set, I'm sure the insurance companies would REQUIRE you to do so. However, there is not, so they cannot require it. Yet, for the RED it is very simple to make backups throughout the day. In fact, the RED should give you WAY more security then film because you should be able to walk out with as many backups as you want at the end of the day. Film you can't do that. Most video tapes you can't do that. Only with flash/hard drive based media can you do that. Ideally, this is where the RED Flash Drive comes in with no moving parts. Red is hoping to start shipping them late this summer.

 

It's really like making sure you don't have a rip in your film changing tent or making sure the cans are sealed properly.

 

Matthew

[Brian Langeman]

It wasn't any harddrive...it was a RED raid drive.

 

So....... :huh: That's still 2 hard drives...

 

Any type of spinning media hard drive is susceptible to the same inherent flaws that they all have regardless of who manufactures them.

[Mitch Gross]

I guess my question is if you have such a problem with saving to hard drives then what do you suggest instead? What do editors do with their in-progress work, or are you in favor of forcing everybody to use Moviola uprights?

[Stephen Williams]

That's why shoots on film don't need insurance at all.

 

R.

 

Hi,

 

Having shot many millions of feet over the last 30 years> I have never lost any footage due to scratching, fogging or other screw ups. I have a feeling insurance is often used as an excuse for incompetance, lack of testing & experiance. Some people just are not cut out to shoot on film IMHO.

 

Stephen

[Matthew W. Phillips]

Stephen, may I ask if you own a RED? Rumors on REDuser.net is that you do. I don't believe it unless I here it from your mouth.

[John Sprung]

Film is kinda like baseball. It's been around so long that we know, accept, and manage the risks. If you proposed a brand new spectator sport in which this thing about the size of an old time cannon ball would get blasted into the audience at 100 MPH randomly once every few games, the answer would be absolutely no way. The liability lawyers would have a field day.

 

If RAM and hard drives had been around for 100 years, and photochemical imaging was the new technology, everybody would be on about how it's vulnerable to heat, light, radiation, some bozo opening the can, etc. What's happening now is we're learning what the mechanisms and probabilities of failure are, and what the reasonable precautions are, for digital work.

 

No technology is absolutely failure free. In 22 years of TV post on half a dozen to a dozen series per year, plus MOW's and pilots, I've seen lots of film screwups. But certainly less than half a dozen that rose to the level of an insurance claim. I can't think offhand of more than a couple.

 

We've had film break in the soup because the first AC was in a hurry threading and pulled outward instead of straight down. We've had a big stunt shot thru the base. We've had film flown to or from location on a plane with radioactive isotopes (that was a claim, IIRC). We've had a shutter out of sync (vertical streaking on lights). We've had blue blobs caused by tiny particles of magnesium wearing off of a bad magazine. Of course we've had scratches, hairs, and a bunch of other stuff. Firsts have even blown focus once in a while. ;-)

 

Bottom line, we've learned to live with those risks, and we'll learn to live with the risks of each new technology as it arises.

 

Specific to this case, there are two things to learn. 1. Never to have too many eggs in one basket. Having a whole day's work on one drive is a mistake. 2. On location or on stage, you need to back stuff up to something such as an S.two, Codex, or InPhase Tapestry.

 

 

 

-- J.S.

[Matthew W. Phillips]

So basically the gist I am getting from the digital shooters on this thread is that REDs failures are not REDs fault. They are not responsible because "all shooting methods have problems." Wow, maybe I should get into the camera building game so I can make faulty products with no accountability whatsoever for the consumer outcome...I can always just say "oh well, that's your bad."

 

I know film shooting has it's risk but I have heard a handfull of stories about bad happenstance from people who have shot film for 20+ years compared to MANY stories about failed drives, undesirable reboots (that take 90+ seconds) in just less than a year in. I think I'll stick with the relatively remote risks of shooting with film.

[Brian Langeman]

I don't think you understand the concept of a hard drive failing. So there isn't any point in trying to persuade you that it's not Red's fault.

 

If you don't understand the need to backup digitally acquired footage because of hard drive risks, then you should definitely stick with film. There's nothing wrong with film, and it's definitely got it's advantages, especially if you aren't willing to research this new way of obtaining footage.