Tyler Purcell

I have most of the Rokinon's under 85mm and they're not bad for the pocket camera. The wider lenses are a bit slow and super soft, I'd say everything from the 24mm and up is fine though. If you want wide angle stuff, I'd just source some S16 cinema primes like the older Arri or Optar. I absolutely love the 12-120 S16 zoom on the pocket. It's a worthwhile investment augmented with S16 cine primes or Rokinon's. I don't like non-cinema DSLR glass, even older, because the focus system isn't designed properly for focusing whilst shooting and the zoom ratio is all wrong as well. So you can buy cheap DSLR glass, most of it looks ok, but just don't expect it to work as smoothly as cinema glass. In terms of slow-mo, there are some really cool plugin's that solve the problem.

Do the pulses speed up or slow down based on where you are in the reel, or is it identical from start of reel to end?

I bet they've thought about it for rich people.

No problem, you've just showed your true colors once more. Alright guys, I've learned my lesson. I thought we were having a conversation, but we aren't. I'm being dragged on the seabed once more for entertainment purposes. It's a real shame that's how you treat fellow filmmakers, but that's the internet I guess. I thought people who worked in this industry were above this sort of abuse.

What kills me is that we're stilling dealing with a 1.90:1 aspect ratio screen, we're still dealing with 2k distribution in most cases and 4k in very few 'special' venues. How this movie could even deserve the IMAX logo stamped on it, is another example of how big business abuses customers. They built up a reputation of excellence and now they don't care because it's all about money. Reminds me of the THX syndrome. Back in the day THX meant timbre matched speakers, with special EQ's, with high power amp's and low THD. Today anyone can put a THX logo on their speaker systems, but nobody cares because the brand is dead thanks to the devaluation of their product. IMAX is going the same way, for every "new" digital IMAX theater, there are literally dozens who stop paying for IMAX equipment and turn back into regular theaters now that IMAX doesn't offer anything special. Standard run of the mill polarized 3D and nothing special 4k distribution. I have a feeling non science museum IMAX theaters will go the way of THX very soon, maybe within the next 5 years. Once theater owners realize the Dolby 4k laser system is much less money and the audience clearly doesn't care since they keep going, they'll not resign IMAX contracts. That's not to say IMAX's NEW 4k Laser projectors aren't awesome, because they truly are. No doubt the best looking digital projection device made. Yet, for 1.5M EACH, it's a tall order for theaters that aren't bringing in some serious bux.

Ya know, the question I didn't ask is how the shoot was structured. They may have been going to different facilities in order to save a buck or two, vs long-term rental. I do know the days in question were the only two days with any problem. Since I don't have any files online right now, I can't check the camera SN, to see if it matched the other ones. Also, I do know there were two cinematographers involved, the two days in question may have been pickups. I agree with you that rental houses usually reset cameras. However, this camera may have been borrowed from a friend. I don't think they would have rented one, I think it was a "package" deal, cinematographer comes with equipment. That's the way this particular director tends to work.

I think Canon's development cycle is 3 years. It seems they're always 3 years behind everyone else. Had the C700 been a specialty camera, like an 8k VistaVision size imager... that's a different story. They could have just updated the C300MKII with all the bells and whistles the 4k C700 has.

Looks like the problem material was two days on a particular green screen set. The rest of the shoot was exposed properly. The entire scene being shot with the camera was underexposed, not one particular element. I may have figured out what the problem was though. I was talking with one of my other friends who works at local rental house. He said some rental cameras have home made LUTs on them and perhaps they were looking at the monitor using the wrong LUT. That to me seems more logical because they would have used the scopes built into the monitor and if the HDSDI output was fixing the problem, they may have never noticed it. Funny enough, I was talking with the director about it today at lunch, just for shits and giggles since you guys were so interested. The DP is one of his good friends and likewise, he's a super nice bloke. Anyway, he said they were in a hurry to light and that may have been the issue. He recognizes the problem though, I wound up getting the gig through his recommendation.

Ahh got ya... well that's good to know. Still $30k doesn't get you much.

Did I say documentary? Sorry... it's an industrial. So green screen and built/physical sets on a sound stage. It has people being interviewed and people reading scripted (teleprompter) lines. The material in question was green screen, so the people doing the visual effects, couldn't pull a key from the converted material. They couldn't work with the raw RED files. So I had to do the clean up work in DaVinci, which works natively with RED material. It was kind of a hybrid solution, but it solved the problem and the net result looks great. Of course, when you pre-color 900 shots, it's hard to color match. So once the VFX people are done, I will get the entire project back as sequences and color balance everything.

From my understanding, the industry uses JPEG and Tiff partly due to their higher color gamut and ability to accept higher bit depth images. Currently, the max we can do outside of those two codec's is REC 2020 14 bit. The current RED Code is a 16 bit format with a wider gamut then REC 2020. Remember, JPEG is the standard for DCP playback as well. So it's not JUST a camera codec, it's also the delivery codec. Adobe's CinemaDNG, based on Tiff, isn't quite as efficient and doesn't have the infrastructure jpeg has. So it's been relegated to a 2nd tier codec. With that being said, Tiff does have some benefits, one of them being it's ability to separate each color in a true RGB system. This is what RED had to develop when they designed Red Code and it's NOT an inherent JPEG trait. I'm pretty sure DCP uses the compressed color space JPEG2000 variation of the format, not like Red Code.

Canon has an up hill battle with this camera, the more I read, the more I wonder what it's purpose is. What we do know is that the body is $38k for PL mount. That's a very different price bracket then their current flagship model. It's also a pretty big camera, clearly borrowing styling cues from the F5/55. A lot bigger then their current flagship model. Honestly, I don't know if Canon can compete at that level. With used Alexa's dropping in price and a complete RED Dragon package being less then just the body of this new Canon, it's seemingly directly competing in the "I need a single system" camera market, which is already flooded with cameras, half it's price. Sure the C700 seems to do everything, but that in of itself is a red flag. I wonder if they're taking a page from Blackmagic and making an expensive/larger version first and then releasing a mini version next? C600 @ NAB? :P

I don't think it's right to post people's names in a public setting, where they may not remember what happened and aren't here to defend themselves. Also, if someone where to google their name, this thread could pop up. No reason to piss anyone off for the curiosity sake. I would love to post what I did to fix that clip, but after spending 20 minutes trying to get things back online, I realized that it's a futile attempt. The section in question is very difficult to find in the 20+ TB worth of material that's scattered about on 8 drives. If I stumble upon it, I will gladly make a thread about it and discuss it further. I also have a really cool fix I did that's similar, something I shot and messed up badly. It's always great to learn from mistakes, but even that material is long gone.

A compression type that uses mathematical equation of moving images can be considered a "codec". Yes it's true these two file systems are frame based, but they could be wrapped in a single file which is what Red did with Red Code. JPEG and Tiff as compression types can compress and store a greater gamut and bit depth then any other standard moving image codec we currently use. I happen to use the Tiff flavor personally, which is CinemaDNG.

JPEG/Tiff

Ohh I see your confusion! I'm a creative person and I'm not good with language. You used the word unfathomable earlier and I thought it was used in reference to something being impossible. As in, it's impossible (unfathomable) that someone with 30 years of experience doesn't know what they're doing, so it's assumed they do. In that context do you understand what I was trying to say with my earlier statement you take so much anger from? Do you know that other people on this planet, may use the language improperly. Your next hissy fit is unnecessary. It always amazes me how much anger people have.

The producer/production company split ways with the client and I was given the project after that happened. The client couldn't find their own mailbox in a rain storm, let alone script notes. Luckily, I have all of the red raw files and with Red Cine X, you can see the metadata and it gives you a picture of what happened on set. The cinematographer is a pretty well known guy in the industry, I'm sure many of you have heard of him. He's a FB friend with me and we chat every once in a while. So I could ask him, but since I already fixed the issue, thanks to the high latitude of the RED raw files, I don't see a need to bug him about something he shot 4 years ago. It was a lot of work to fix though... It would be fun to show how I fixed it through a screen grab.

Again, I'm "complaining" about other people's work, using specific cameras.. not my work. I'm generally happy with my rushes and because I personally use a high dynamic range codec and under expose slightly, I have a lot of latitude to make corrections in post. I don't judge people like that. Thanks for your advisement, but does the client sit with you in the coloring bay? Do they get angry at you (the cinematographer) when the look they are trying to achieve is impossible because of what you did or the limitations of the equipment? Unfortunately in the real world, the client is with the editor and colorist quite a bit and when stuff looks like crap, thanks to the look the client is seeking in post which may not match what was on set, you have to determine where the problem lies. This is why colorists all over the world, dislike lower-end cameras and very much like higher end RAW capture cameras. They want greater latitude for the client to make decisions in post because as you very well know, those things always happen. I mean, stuff I've edited and colored has been on national and regional broadcasts over the years. At the same time, I've worked on little indy short films for a few hundred bux. I'm not doing this work to make lots of money, I do it because I enjoy it.

Everything. Narrative, documentary, commercials, industrials, BTS, trailers. The only thing I don't do is model/fashion work. There is no other explanation. "Mistakes" are corrected when you turn on the histogram and realize how far off you are. "Mistakes" are corrected when you look at the video monitor and see how off it is. "Mistakes" are corrected when your DIT watches the material (in this case with Red Cine X) and tells you something is wrong. I believe the shoot was multiple weeks, but on the same sound stage.

David, I bet your accurate. It's 10 bit in 4k and 12 bit in 2k. Most likely a limitation of the processor.

Yes, it's actually very unusual. Most editors stay away from coloring. I only do it because it interests me. Sometimes what I do is final, other times I will export my DaVinci project for someone else to finish. Needless to say, I enjoy the "finishing" aspect of projects as much as editing, so I attempt to secure that part of the project whenever I can. Not accidentally, absolutely intentional. I don't have any footage online, but I will gladly post some samples someday. I'm going to reboot that project in October/November and I'll have things online once more. I was professionally trained as a youth and used it as a backup job for years.

One little detail... I think the imager processor is 10 bit. They seem to put that in the specs very clearly.

Here is the difference. You and I can't afford an Alexa, but if we had the money, we'd probably own one or at least a RED of some flavor. We're kinda stuck in a sub $5k camera world. I'm not a blackmagic devotee at all. In fact, outside of the pocket and Ursa Mini 4.6k PL, I think the rest of the cameras are seriously flawed. I haven't bounced on the URSA Mini yet because I think they'll do a major update soon. Still, I've never been just a shooter. If I shoot something, I'm most likely editing it. So things like codec's take a higher precedence then things like imager size, resolution or even built in audio capabilities. This is because, time is money and for me, the quicker I can edit something, the quicker the turn around, the more money I make. Most of the time I'm looking for "acceptable" rather then "perfect". I also like run and gun, so having a lot of dynamic range, especially in the highlights, is important for me. Maybe not so important for a big movie shoot where you can control everything. Hence the reason people get away with using crappy cameras on bigger shows. What I personally look for is camera system that fits perfectly with a native post production workflow. I'm also looking for something cinematic, something that doesn't have highlight clipping issues, that doesn't flatline in situations with too much brightness and isn't overly noisy.

But look at the price! HOLY poop! Canon is trying to break into the higher end market. Problem is, that market is pretty flooded with very good cameras.

My job is to make what other people shoot look good. So when handed a shot, it doesn't matter what format it's in, I have to make it look good. Lets say your signal to noise ratio is 50db. When you record a LOG curve, it requires translating that curve during coloring, which means raising the highlights and lowering the mids and blacks. Since you've baked in particular noise level, you're increasing the noise when you do this coloring work. I'm not talking imager noise, but "codec" noise. It's only hogwash because people like you, refuse to learn. I'm not making anything up, I work with top colorists all the time, on bigger jobs that I simply can't do. They always balk when I send the MPEG anything, they just don't want to deal with it because in their eyes, it's substandard. Few months ago, thanks to another thread where people said MPEG worked fine... I produced a video that destroyed the XDCAM 50 codec. Now that I have access to an F5, I will gladly produce a video that destroys the XAVC codec as well. We both know that's going to be a tough endeavor, but I know it's weaknesses and I will flaunt them. Of course... my "comparison" camera like in the last video, will be a $1000 blackmagic pocket camera in Pro Res HQ. I will use the same ISO, same stop, even the same glass just to keep that out of the equation. When I have time, I will make this, just to have a laugh. That's not what I said, I said it's unfathomable that the myriad of cinematographers I've cut and colored, are bad cinematographers. It also humors me when those same people work with a RAW or Pro Res camera it looks fine. So is it the cinematographer, or is it the camera? The feature I'm currently editing has a baked in look. That's because the cinematographer did a test with log and found the signal to noise ratio on the MPEG file to be a problem. Also I doubt anyone shooting with an F65 uses XAVC codec. Again, with Pro Res or RAW codec, the higher end Sony cameras look fine. Then it's down to all the other Sony bugaboo's, which the list goes on and on. Thank god the F5 and F55 have most options right on the side screen.