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Is this a Sad day for Cinematographers who could trail a shot in telephoto?


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We've reached the point where someone can shoot something in wide mode, then digitally zoom in to create the digital reality / illusion of a magnificently tracked telephoto shot. I think it's a sad day for cinematography when a wide shot can be manipulated to such a degree. Am I wrong? Digital Zoom in makes wide shot look like an amazingly shot telephoto shot.  

Not only is it a magnificently manufactured moment, one of the women let go of the flag when it was firmly in her grasp and it was probably not noticed because in wide mode it's not that evident, they trick shot manipulate it into telephoto mode and didn't pay attention. It's total crap bullshit manufactured moment and this video has gone mega viral.

 

Screen Shot 2021-04-08 at 9.38.13 PM.png

Edited by Alessandro Machi
Added the photo of the "flag being grabbed and then let go", so this manufactured video could go viral.
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What's so special about it? The fact you can stabilize based on the head movement of the person? Or the zoom which is just a digital zoom, nothing special, I punch in like this on my iPhone shots for fun all the time. I don't get why this is anything unique or new? The finished product is ultra-low resolution and looks like total crap. Nobody cares what stuff looks like on their phone anyway. 

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8 hours ago, Robin R Probyn said:

I think the aspect ratio is far more of a problem  ? .. and yes I doubt this persons use of a crappy digital crop in will be putting Roger Deakins  ,or even me !  out of a job anytime soon ..

Does Deakins even shoot anymore? Wasn't he replaced by an autonomous drone years ago? lol 

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The image fidelity is quite poor. This does bring up an interesting question of shooting things in a wide to crop in etc. I remember watching older RED advertisements that you can 'Shoot in a wide! Crop in, multiple shots in one!' blah, blah. However from looking at the RED image fidelity and also the resolving power of contemporary optics, or even perfect optics I doubt we'd ever be able to seriously crop into an image without impact to the image fidelity, unless we all started to shoot on incredibly large formats.. oh wait... 

As already with the UMP12k the 2.2 micrometer photo sites are far too small for any contemporary lens or even an 'impossible' perfect lens to resolve... well... (MTF(70+)) at most likely the f-stop required in the case of shooting for multiple shots. 

I do wonder if to achieve the possibility of using one camera to shoot multiple shots, broadcast companies will start moving towards larger formats as well.

 

 

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5 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

Does Deakins even shoot anymore? Wasn't he replaced by an autonomous drone years ago? lol 

Well its an interesting idea .. could the lighting ideas of Roger Deakins be used in some AI program to come up with virtual lighting 3D setups .. given the script, story board and location details !..   you never know .. !

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19 hours ago, Robin R Probyn said:

Well its an interesting idea .. could the lighting ideas of Roger Deakins be used in some AI program to come up with virtual lighting 3D setups .. given the script, story board and location details !..   you never know .. !

Combine that with digitally re-generated actors  who have passed on and you’re all set! Seems like so much fun. Yay... ??

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2 hours ago, Satsuki Murashige said:

Combine that with digitally re-generated actors  who have passed on and you’re all set! Seems like so much fun. Yay... ??

The said deceased actors could then give out the prizes at the AI Oscars !. known as the Big Al,s ... I think we are onto something here sir ..

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3 hours ago, Robin R Probyn said:

The said deceased actors could then give out the prizes at the AI Oscars !. known as the Big Al,s ... I think we are onto something here sir ..

Ok. I’ll order up a carafe of bleach so we can start working on this in earnest. I’m pretty sure my previous President said that was fine...

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On 4/10/2021 at 9:45 AM, Gabriel Devereux said:

 I remember watching older RED advertisements that you can 'Shoot in a wide! Crop in, multiple shots in one!' blah, blah.

That is fundamentally a legitimate feature of high resolution sensors. Several productions shoot their cameras full frame and compose for a window. You just can't go crazy with it, that's all.

Back when the Leica M9 was relatively new, I recall that one photographer was surprised at how much he could crop in. He basically said that he preferred the M9 with a short telephoto lens than a contemporary DSLRs with a long telephoto. Of course, a razor sharp lens is essential.

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On 4/12/2021 at 8:02 AM, Karim D. Ghantous said:

That is fundamentally a legitimate feature of high resolution sensors. Several productions shoot their cameras full frame and compose for a window. You just can't go crazy with it, that's all.

Back when the Leica M9 was relatively new, I recall that one photographer was surprised at how much he could crop in. He basically said that he preferred the M9 with a short telephoto lens than a contemporary DSLRs with a long telephoto. Of course, a razor sharp lens is essential.

 

There's a world of difference between framing a 6k for a post-stabilisation and delivering a 4k final and extracting multiple shots from a single frame like people do in corporate land. 

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On 4/12/2021 at 5:02 PM, Karim D. Ghantous said:

That is fundamentally a legitimate feature of high resolution sensors. Several productions shoot their cameras full frame and compose for a window. You just can't go crazy with it, that's all.

Back when the Leica M9 was relatively new, I recall that one photographer was surprised at how much he could crop in. He basically said that he preferred the M9 with a short telephoto lens than a contemporary DSLRs with a long telephoto. Of course, a razor sharp lens is essential.

Yes and no, 

If you want to obtain an 4k image, so you shoot at 8k (in S35, so note photo sites smaller than 3-4ym (micrometer)) to hypothetically crop into and deliver, as said above, a 4k image, while your overall total pixel count may be 3840x2160 pixels, disregarding the camera it won't have the same fidelity on an optical level and it most likely NEVER will. 

With resolution and cameras it's always hard to say '8k will never have the fidelity of 4k' as camera technology (especially digital) is constantly advancing. Of course a higher resolution camera will most likely always suffer from low capacity photo sites (if kept to S35) however technological advancements over the years may eventually negate or help the issue. 

However, one technology that isn't in its infancy and that we can look at the properties of, is optics and can calculate from a hypothetical 'perfect lens'. Which has attributes such as its elements being as transparent as air (somewhat unrealistic) among others only limited by the diffraction limit. However it still has its limitations when it comes to resolving power that already modern day cameras (such as the 2.2ym photo sites of the UMP12k) are already exceeding. Bellow is a bit taken from another post on the forum (Joshua Cadmium). This is calculated from a hypothetical perfect lens at MTF(50), it is important to note that it's only at MTF(74) that an airy disk is similar in size to that of the photo site of the camera. 

"For the Blackmagic 12K sensor at green 550nm, that puts MTF(50) at f3.2 and for the Alexa sensors that puts it at f12.1.
At red 700nm light, the Blackmagic 12K would hit MTF(50) at f2.5 Alexa would at f9.5
At violet 400nm light, the Blackmagic 12K would hit MTF(50) at f4.4 and the Alexa would at f16.7"
 
Just to quickly duck dive into MTF, to put it crudely you're looking at the way lights channeled through an optical system. Looking at how it channels an airy disk (the point of light the camera measures which is formed by light passing through the diagram (iris) of the optical system). 
You calculate it through line pairs per mm in relation to what the lens can resolve. Here is a quick insert I wrote on another post - to show the point I’m making point we need to calculate the line pair per millimetre for a sensor. That is done by taking 1mm (1000um) / pixel pitch (2.2um) / 2 (line pair). The UMP12k would be 227.27 lp/mm and just for a comparison the Alexa is 60.61 lp/mm
 
Now, to briefly look at a modern lens that we all know and love, the master prime. One of the 'sharpest' lenses one can use on a S35 system - "If I remember correctly a master prime just about gets MTF (74) at 70lp/mm". Sadly I don't remember exactly which focal length this is however the point is there. The increase of a pixel count on a S35 system to 'crop in' is flawed. One most likely will never be able to achieve the same fidelity, unless you use a larger format camera (not compromising photo site size while being able to increase total pixel count).
 
Edited by Gabriel Devereux
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