Mitch Gross

Thanks for the shoutout, Hal. Actually it was created by Andy Shipsides here at Abel after I did the Sensor Comparison Chart. We each consulted with one another on how our projects should function and what they should show. Andy's far more computer savvy than I and was much better qualified to create the Comparator tool. I'd been saying for years that we needed something like this but didn't know how to do it, so I finally did the chart. Once Andy set his mind to his tool he had a beta version up in two days and the finished product within a week.

Nice work!

We have a few on our website available in the Used Equipment section. They are not from our rental fleet but rather belong to owner/ops with whom we are doing other business. All fully serviced by AbelCine.

Why not consider a Panasonic AF100 or a Sony F3?

Not at this time.

We have tested the ARRI High Speed HMI ballasts and definitely got flicker.

Certainly. Talked on the phone many times as well. We sold him a Phantom.

I'm a reseller on the camera so I don't think it would be appropriate to give opinions outside of tech facts. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised with the camera's performance. The chip is a Bayer-pattern CMOS with a native resolution "a lot higher" than the 1920x1080 the camera outputs. Native ISO is 800 and is very clean with low noise.

Harry is talking about normal frame rate shooting, not high speed. It's a very different animal.

Abel Cine Tech is proud to have been of continuing assistance to Louis Schwartberg with his innovative use of Phantom High Speed Digital Cinema cameras.

Oscar, please send me your direct email.

Sounds like they have no clue what they're getting into. Those sodium lights will be freaky at off speeds. For more info take a look at our high speed FAQ, which has a section on lighting near the end. http://www.abelcine.com/articles/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=142:phantom-hd-faqs&catid=42&Itemid=57

It will certainly help mitigate and possibly eliminate the issue. But it will also cut down the light, which one always needs on a high speed shoot.

ARRI EVF native resolution is 1280x720. Yup, it's pretty gorgeous. Phil, I'm not sure what those other high speed cameras are, but the difference between a Phantom Flex and a "nearly as good as" other camera can be miles once you start really looking at the specs and images.

Stay away from HMIs for high speed work. A very high frame rates, a condition called "Arc Wander" can be observed. This is where the plasmatic electrical lode moves from one electrode to the other inside the glass envelope of the bulb, causing not quite a flicker but more of a shimmering effect. It is very problematical in the image and is impossible to predict. Best solution for high speed is very large tungsten fixtures (2K and above in 60hz countries, 5K and up in 50hz countries). Even on AC power these won't flicker as the filiaments will be so hot that they just won't have a chance to cool between cycles. The other option is finding true DC power (not just rectified power), which will simply leave the light hot all the time. This can be very hard to come by and is in fact illegal in many areas.

There is the Zeiss LWZ 14.5-45, which is about the same size & weight as the little Optimos. Nice little lens without the market penetration of the Angenieux lenses.

Phil, do you mind if I contact ARRI Marketing to see if they want to publish your quote on that? "The ALEXA viewfinder -- it's not crap!" :D :D :D

For all of the reasons mentioned above as well as others, this is definitely not the way to do this. I would not want to use this Chinese device.

I meant that coming at it from the "everything I've seen is crap -- how's your's" perspective makes it hard for me to expect that you'll find much to like. I personally agree about most progressive sequential finders. I move my eye across the frame and see tearing. The Sony uses a nice LCD panel. How good that panel is for your eye is something you'll have to decide for yourself. Certainly it won't be a 24" monitor, but it's pretty sweet and a lot of people like them a lot. Don't know what other terms to put them in.

Well with that attitude I'm sure you'll love the Sony color viewfinders! :rolleyes:

I think these are much older lenses.

Yes, we sell the Cineroid and it works quite well. It actually has a bunch of features such as pixel-to-pixel zoom. It's not the Sony viewfinder, but then again that's about 15x the cost. The Zacuto and the RedRock EVFs are on the way, but the CineRoid is available now. http://www.abelcine.com/store/Cineroid-Electronic-Viewfinder-EVF/#tabs

The only "trick" is that one should not use HMIs when shooting very high frame rates due to Arc Wander. Large tungsten fixtures (5000w and up) are recommended.

First off, that viewfinder costs almost as much as the camera. If you still want to go forward it would be a bit of a project. You would need to take the SDI signal coming out of the camera and change it to a component one to see the viewfinder. You would also need to feed 12v power and build a mounting bracket for the viewfinder. All of this could be done but it would be an expensive proposition. If you're really interested please let me know as we could build this for you. But I suspect that by the time you're done the camera & viewfinder combination would be in excess of $30,000.

It is the Birger Engineering mount but it won't be available until April. You'll be able to buy it from us come the time.