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ARRI AMIRA in 2019 - Does it hold up?


Fernando Vilanova

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5 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

When I look at your samples above and I see different looks generated through lighting, filters, lenses, but also through grading. I also see a lot of "controlled" lighting, which I mentioned was where the Sony cameras seemed to be OK. The exterior shots are practically sunless and many interiors have a muted color pallet. It's pretty easy to make any camera system work well when you have full control AND no extreme's in the color pallet, highlights or black's. It when you hit the extremes, that the camera system falls apart. 

I handle lots of nature footage shot with F55 in raw in extreme conditions and it grades fine. I have to do a basic "dailies grade" on every clip and it rarely takes more than 50 seconds to one minute to make it look nice first time. then copy-paste to the other clips of the scene and fine tune the brightness differences and fine tune occasional momentary color casts if there is any (greenish reflections from vegetation on  a single clip etc). To get the material to render overnight I have to regularly do this to 300 or 400 or 500 clips in a single day so I need to work pretty quickly and have less than a minute to use per clip.

Based on this I would say the Sonys grade pretty well like any other camera and the material if fast to work with. Very rarely you need to touch any raw settings, just the basic LUT to all the clips and then fiddle with the Resolve Panel to get it look nice. Take into account that this is nature footage where most of the time the lighting can't be controlled and there may be extreme contrasts at times. 

By my experience the Reds tend to need a little bit more work to get them look nice quickly, even the newer sensors. they are not bad but there is a difference... they are not "muddy" like some other cameras but the colors need more work to get them pop up nicely. So far the easiest to work with on this project have been the F55 and Varicam LT material. The Inspire2/X7 raw material needs intermediate versions to be first rendered but the material itself is pretty easy to grade after you get from proresraw into some workable format like normal prores

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Satsuki, AJ, lovely work! I’ve just wrapped what I think was my eleventh feature with Sony cameras. I always play around a bit with LUTs from film to film. This time I was using the Arri X-2 709 LUT with an exposure compensation to 800 ISO. It looks very much like Sony’s LC709a LUT, but with better blacks. I fully expect color correction to be the usual simple job of applying the LUT, and balancing exposures shot to shot. Next time, I’m going to take a look at the Venice LUTs and see how they look.

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Hi Sat /AJ.. lovely shots .. shows what you can do ,actually very easily , but yes you will need some of competence in the first place ..  ? ..

You should try the fx9 ..Ive had a play last week in Tokyo.. still demo models .. but apart from the camera being being good.. dual ISO .. the menu's all changed,..FF  6K sensor .. variable ND .new EVF screen.. blah blah... in custom the new S Cinetone setting for 709 is very nice.. and does look very similar to the Venice sREC 709 LUT for out of the box settings.. its a brand new sensor and new color filters .. its NOT the same. sensor as the Venice .. but its a big move forward.. set it to S Cinetone and shoot..  

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39 minutes ago, Stuart Brereton said:

Satsuki, AJ, lovely work! I’ve just wrapped what I think was my eleventh feature with Sony cameras. I always play around a bit with LUTs from film to film. This time I was using the Arri X-2 709 LUT with an exposure compensation to 800 ISO. It looks very much like Sony’s LC709a LUT, but with better blacks. I fully expect color correction to be the usual simple job of applying the LUT, and balancing exposures shot to shot. Next time, I’m going to take a look at the Venice LUTs and see how they look.

Stuart .. you might also be interested in the.. fx9 .. if you shoot slog3 (.cine) and whack on the Venice s709 LUT it looks very very similar to the Venice slog3 with the same LUT applied..default out of the box Venice look.. for alot cheaper ? .. you can use pretty much any lens in the universe .. the dual ISO is also very good .. and you wont have to overexpose the Slog as very little noise in the 6k sensor..  the only negative on the camera seems to be the rather cumbersome loupe design or lack there of.. of the fs7.. but the screen itself is something like 4 times the res.. 

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12 minutes ago, Stuart Brereton said:

Certainly interested to take a look, Robin. I have a friend who pre-ordered one, and is expecting delivery in January. We'll definitely be doing some testing.

Looks to be a good beast from what I saw .. I think it certainly can be called a B camera for Venice... for 16-9 shoots anyway..17-9 next FW.. no anamorphic as yet.. but the sensor is large enough to do it, if it ever happens .. not really the target market .. but a big improvement color science and menu wise.. and advantage of the down sampling 4K..  now if only they can put a fx9 plug on the high end EVF,s !

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29 minutes ago, Phil Connolly said:

And we have come full circle back to the FX9 as suggested much earlier. 

At least we have now established its possible to grade Sony footage. 

And as a bonus.. you don't have to replace them every 3 years like those unless Arri,s, that cant even handle the ocean breeze in Hollywood .. no problems with my Sony's at my Malibu house.. go figure .. ?

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31 minutes ago, Stuart Brereton said:

Was that ever really in doubt, Phil?

I've had my moments with Z1 footage. 

But the nice thing with Sony is you don't have to grade it that much, shot correctly you can get close to the look you need in camera.  

Some cameras (e.g the BM Production 4K) take quite a bit of work just to get them looking neutral. 

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14 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

More flat gray skies with very little contrast. 

I can't control the weather! Also, I take it you didn't look at the link I also posted. That short was shot in the shade, but has a lot of silhouettes and contrast.

 

Satsuki, Stuart, and Robin: thank you!

 

Satsuki, your stuff looks great too!

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21 hours ago, Satsuki Murashige said:

I mean, how can you get any more ‘uncontrolled’ than shooting extreme wide shots at the beach? For the tighter shots, I throw in a bead-board if possible but that’s as bare bones as it gets!

I mean it wasn't direct sunlight, you weren't having to deal with extreme highlights, etc. Those are the situations where most cameras struggle, but the Sony cameras struggle quite a bit. 

21 hours ago, Satsuki Murashige said:

Also, controlling the light is kinda the definition of the job! I know that sounds snarky, but it’s also the truth. You use all the tricks in the book - I always carry an 85 and 81EF with the Sonys so I can warm up the image to taste. I always carry a Sapphire Blue #2 grad and a Pola. I carry a 36” Floppy (fits in most cars) for negative fill and a silver stipple/white headboard. I often use the matte box eyebrow or tape to create a little vignette at the edge of the frame. Etc, etc.

Oh you're correct and the solutions you talk about are great. I never used an 85 filter on a digital camera because if I want to warm things up, I generally change the color balance in camera slightly. This trick always works on the Red, Arri, Blackmagic and Canon cameras, but I found it not to work at all on the Sony cameras. I just assumed that I don't need to specially treat the image using exterior influences. With digital, I generally only carry ND's and some sort of mist with me, just to soften things up if need be. 

I personally don't like working the tech to fit my needs, I'd rather replace the tech with one that fits my needs. I mean this is why the most popular cinema camera in 2019 is the Alexa Mini, or one of it's brothers. Nobody really needs to do anything in order to make it look good. This is why so few people who can afford to rent an Alexa, chose to us anything else. I do think the Venice is the best camera they make, but from the shows I've seen shot with it, I don't think it competes at all with the Alexa's.

Ohh and thanks for the explanation on how you shot everything, it really helped give me insight on why the images you were able to deliver actually look good. 

 

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17 hours ago, aapo lettinen said:

I handle lots of nature footage shot with F55 in raw in extreme conditions and it grades fine.

Nature is easy, you don't have to deal with skin tones. You can basically make up the color pallet in post because there isn't a constant you need to be working towards that if you don't nail, the audience won't care. I too have worked on nature shows shot with Sony cameras, it's quite easy to deal with, but so is any camera system for that matter. 

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18 hours ago, aapo lettinen said:

So far the easiest to work with on this project have been the F55 and Varicam LT material

I've been grading the varicam for a while. I do think color wise, it's MUCH better than the Sony's. I guess my only real beef with the camera is lack of an optical low pass filter, so moire is a huge issue AND, I'm not a fan of the stock codec's of course. They fall apart if you try major corrections. I do mainly industrial/commercial work and a lot of times, the clients don't pay attention to the details on set. So you get into post and they're like "we don't like their shirt color" and I'm like, ok. It's super easy to change someone's shirt color in Davinci, as long as it's not the same color as their face lol. I just found the Varicam's image to fall apart a bit when working the image hard. Noise floor with a combination of poor codec, it's just a bad combination. If the Varicam shot Pro Res XQ 444 internally, it would be on my short list. However, with the stock codec's, it's not good for me. 

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5 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

I mean it wasn't direct sunlight, you weren't having to deal with extreme highlights, etc. Those are the situations where most cameras struggle, but the Sony cameras struggle quite a bit.

I dunno, looks pretty good to me...

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This was my first job with the F5 and we shot this in early 2014. Back then, the camera only recorded XAVC 300 internally and only in HD. I don't remember if S-Gamut3.Cine/S-Log3 was available then, but I don't think so - we shot this in S-Gamut/S-Log2.

I also exposed at 800 ISO based on my camera tests, which means there is only 4.7 stops of highlight range recorded above middle grey. Nowadays, I shoot a 1250 ISO so the highlight retention would be 2/3 stop better. I also now shoot XAVC 480 and 4K, which helps the image look even better.

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Hi Sat.. I haven't used the fx9 outside of one room ,during a demo, but at that time it was only me there, so I could do what I wanted.. well except put the camera in my bag and walk out. !.  but in 6K mode .. any noise issues go out the window .. in custom mode.. high ISO is nothing short of amazing ..(like the Venice). Alister Chapman ,who has shot quite a bit with the camera, and who was always an apostle of over exposing log ,to minimize noise.. is now on record as saying you just dont have to with this camera in 6K sensor mode..  that with the new S Cinetone / s709 LUT.. its very easy to get a good picture out of the box.. for shoots without budget /time for a full grade ..

Hopefully they add in 480 4K and a "pro" level EVF.. sooner than later ..

 

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20 minutes ago, Robin R Probyn said:

Hi Sat.. I haven't used the fx9 outside of one room ,during a demo, but at that time it was only me there, so I could do what I wanted.. well except put the camera in my bag and walk out. !.  but in 6K mode .. any noise issues go out the window .. in custom mode.. high ISO is nothing short of amazing ..(like the Venice). Alister Chapman ,who has shot quite a bit with the camera, and who was always an apostle of over exposing log ,to minimize noise.. is now on record as saying you just dont have to with this camera in 6K sensor mode..  that with the new S Cinetone / s709 LUT.. its very easy to get a good picture out of the box.. for shoots without budget /time for a full grade ..

Hopefully they add in 480 4K and a "pro" level EVF.. sooner than later ..

 

Hiya Robin,

Low-light on the FX9 would probably be the biggest improvement over the F5, I find anything over 1250 ISO to be too noisy for my taste. But no XAVC 480 (or UHD Prores!) is a deal-breaker for me, unfortunately. I think XAVC 300 is fine for interviews and doc b-roll, but for green screen, narrative, and commercial it's not really good enough anymore, in my opinion. Already got the color part covered with my current camera. ?

Do the LUTs stay active when shooting off-speed now? That would be another big improvement. And yeah, that new EVF is ergonomic rubbish. Flimsy E-mount adapters, sigh. I know it has a locking tab, but you still can't treat it like a native PL mount like the FZ adapter. My cine zooms will require double lens supports, one for the mount and one for the lens...

Anyway, I'm sure it will be a huge money-maker for the early adopters. But it really feels like a step backwards to me. Those ergonomic flaws are why I avoiding buying an FS7 in the first place...

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Wonder why nobody has mentioned a used Sony F65 before... I think she is superior to an amira and much cheaper in the used market these days. You can get them for around 5K and it's a wonderful real 4K digital camera with mechanical shutter and a very cinematic exposure latitude, netflix approved and rock solid. EX-Machina, Oblivion… there are many visually stunning movies shot on it recently…

 

 

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33 minutes ago, Philip Reinhold said:

Wonder why nobody has mentioned a used Sony F65 before... I think she is superior to an amira and much cheaper in the used market these days. You can get them for around 5K and it's a wonderful real 4K digital camera with mechanical shutter and a very cinematic exposure latitude, netflix approved and rock solid. EX-Machina, Oblivion… there are many visually stunning movies shot on it recently…

 

 

Because (up against the Amira) you're comparing one of the easiest cameras (to physically work with on set) with one of the most complicated.

The F65 is an imaging beast, but it's also a bit of a beast to work with. I've come close to pulling the trigger on one several times (the price is certainly right!), but the compressed codecs don't let you use variable framerates, and the raw files are very large. So it's a bit of an all or nothing camera.

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9 minutes ago, Mark Kenfield said:

but the compressed codecs don't let you use variable framerates, and the raw files are very large. So it's a bit of an all or nothing camera.

Not that far from the Arri-Raw workflow the Topic creater asked for right? Sure Files are bigger because Arriraw out of the amira is only 2.8K.

I used the F65 only once and was pretty happy with the results back then. I didn´t remember it beeing to difficult but sure we had a good organized DiT to Post Workflow.

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3 hours ago, Satsuki Murashige said:

Hiya Robin,

Low-light on the FX9 would probably be the biggest improvement over the F5, I find anything over 1250 ISO to be too noisy for my taste. But no XAVC 480 (or UHD Prores!) is a deal-breaker for me, unfortunately. I think XAVC 300 is fine for interviews and doc b-roll, but for green screen, narrative, and commercial it's not really good enough anymore, in my opinion. Already got the color part covered with my current camera. ?

Do the LUTs stay active when shooting off-speed now? That would be another big improvement. And yeah, that new EVF is ergonomic rubbish. Flimsy E-mount adapters, sigh. I know it has a locking tab, but you still can't treat it like a native PL mount like the FZ adapter. My cine zooms will require double lens supports, one for the mount and one for the lens...

Anyway, I'm sure it will be a huge money-maker for the early adopters. But it really feels like a step backwards to me. Those ergonomic flaws are why I avoiding buying an FS7 in the first place...

Yes who knows if 480 will be implemented .. Im sure it can.. hopefully in FW.. does the fs7 have it yet ..? I think they did eventually .. I guess the problem is its actually a very cheap camera and the market its aimed at primarily, Sony deemed they don't need it.. but if the camera moves up the food chain.. maybe will get 480 a decent EVF or use of the good ones already out there..and even anamorphic as the sensor is big enough..maybe even its own raw recorder ?? 

The good news is yes LUTs in S&Q up to 60p UDH.. higher frame rates in V1 will be HD .. and no separate LUTs.. but the EVF will always have a 709 "looK" LUT.. any frame rate.. but its called gamma assist now like the A7,s..  TBH I dont find it a problem for SDI out now as all monitors have built in LUT,s..I think even my EYE has.. I have 3 x Small HD and they are all built in Slog 3 /cine LUTS .. so thats easy these days.. and you have one for the EVF too..well 709 anyway.. the other good thing is not having to stay with the 3 preset WB in Cine EI .. you can dial in anything and there is tint adjustments like the Venice .. so quite a bit of the Venice goodness has come through to a $10K camera.. its all laid out better than the fs7 and more square shaped at the back .. nice feature is a big multi function rotary button on the front .. very convenient .. ton ,s of assign buttons.. all buttons light up to show you if they are active.. and you have to give them a long press to activate .. pretty much impossible to do accidentally  ..  and a smaller hand grip ...new interface with those controls.. everything alot faster .. The AF will be great for say interviews .. or race cars.. but general HH I'd still prefer I decide where it is..  so used well, a nice feature .. but I think that will only really work on Sony lenses .. and surprise Sony are coming out with 3 new cine zooms.. which I'll have to buy !.. as a fellow f5 owner I found its the only camera I ,ve  seen thats worth a move away from the f5.. for me the side LCD would be the main thing I'll miss..  certainly if I was an fs7 owners I'd be queuing at the door .. I wouldn't worry about the locking mount... its pretty good even on the fs7II.. fx9 is also a stronger body.. not much plastic .. Im at least hoping the actual production loupe is better made and a bit shorter !! than the demo model I used.. but its the Achilles heel so far..

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7 hours ago, Philip Reinhold said:

Wonder why nobody has mentioned a used Sony F65 before... I think she is superior to an amira and much cheaper in the used market these days. You can get them for around 5K and it's a wonderful real 4K digital camera with mechanical shutter and a very cinematic exposure latitude, netflix approved and rock solid. EX-Machina, Oblivion… there are many visually stunning movies shot on it recently…

Love the F65’s color and highlight detail, but it’s not good in low light, it’s a power hog, and it’s big and heavy - basically it’s like shooting 35mm. Personally, would rather shoot on film in that case! ?

You’re also stuck with Sony Raw SQ and LT, which look great but are heavy codecs. If they updated it with X-OCN, it would probably be more popular.

Also, the physical sensor size is a bit small these days. Most people want at least 18mm sensor height in the flagship camera range for full anamorphic coverage.

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Thanks for the details Robin. 

I don’t think the FS7 ever got XAVC 480, so I doubt the FX9 will either. Seems reserved for the Venice and F5/55 right now. 

Problem with not having LUTs in-camera is that you are back to managing every monitor to make sure it always look correct to everyone watching. Imagine shooting a whole day only to realize the director was looking at the wrong LUT... I don’t usually work with a DIT, so it’s on me or the AC’s to make sure it happens. Just another (unnecessary) thing to deal with. 

I guess if you are are using a Teradek then you could apply it there. But still - progress is supposed to move forward, not backward. The in-camera LUTs should be sidecar files that get embedded in metadata and follow the footage to post, like Red and ARRI cameras.

Losing ergonomic benefits is one thing, but ceding more control of the intended look to post is not something I’m down with at all. 

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7 hours ago, Satsuki Murashige said:

Thanks for the details Robin. 

I don’t think the FS7 ever got XAVC 480, so I doubt the FX9 will either. Seems reserved for the Venice and F5/55 right now. 

Problem with not having LUTs in-camera is that you are back to managing every monitor to make sure it always look correct to everyone watching. Imagine shooting a whole day only to realize the director was looking at the wrong LUT... I don’t usually work with a DIT, so it’s on me or the AC’s to make sure it happens. Just another (unnecessary) thing to deal with. 

I guess if you are are using a Teradek then you could apply it there. But still - progress is supposed to move forward, not backward. The in-camera LUTs should be sidecar files that get embedded in metadata and follow the footage to post, like Red and ARRI cameras.

Losing ergonomic benefits is one thing, but ceding more control of the intended look to post is not something I’m down with at all. 

Agreed..I guess its down to processing power ?... and the target market not needing it.. but if Sony see the possibility for the fx9 being used as a Venice B camera ,or poor man s Venice,.. maybe they will upgrade a few features .. could be wrong but I just dont see a new f5 or 55.. for sure the FZ is out.. they want everything E mount now.. Im not sure what they could make thats between the Venice and the fx9.. without it being so similar to either one.. I think its more likely to be paid FW updates ..480.. anamorphic .. .. and paid hardware .. better EVF.. integrated raw recorder .. ?

If I had the wrong LUT to the director I'd probably get more work ..

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Shot a handful of currently broadcasting spots on Amira:

https://www.ispot.tv/ad/o4X5/monopoly-voice-banking-own-it-all

 

Considering that nearly all commercials are going to finish in 1080p and Amira shares identical specs with the Alexa Mini when shooting spherical it's a solid investment today and into the future. 

 

Arri's design and build quality are top notch. I owned just about every flavor of Red before switching over to Arri a few years back and have not questioned that move once since.

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