Craig Janeway

Adding an eye for pin registration to the machnice vision is one option? It would only need to capture the area of perf data several perfs ahead of the the main sensor. Then, operator would assign the ratio between frame and perf, and the software would pick perf and frame relationships as it scans. A two window, or "frame in frame" monitor display can show pin registered perf and its associated frame(s) as they scan. One could mark manually with indicator mark on the first few frames to compare and see if scanner is assigning the right relationship before starting a full scan.

By adding a dedicated eye to the machine vision for perfs, experimentation could be done to explore if say pin registration on a 2 perf away setup, the scanner could use say the next pin registration perf one full section above what the camera use, and still get registration?

Is it possible the OP's video was re-scanned on a scanner that had a bad roller or pressure plate not right, or something the film was dragging and scrapping on as it was scanned? I would still expect the steady software to correct it, but couldn't the scanner have a mechanical flaw (bad/dry roller, dirty gate etc) along with needing better steady software?

Hi Perry,

 

I'm downloaded the clip you've kindly provided, and I completely agree with you - I can't see any evidence of rocking at all. The red lines you've put there do make it hard to see but even so, if there were any rocking it would have to be so tiny as to be irrelevant. So that's nice to see.

 

So back to the main issue.

 

What is the source of the rocking in the scan of Moises clip.

 

1. It is not in the camera (as I've previously argued and anyone else can test for themselves using screen grabs).

 

So that leaves (as the only other option):

 

2. It is in the scanner registration.

 

This begs the question as to what then is the cause of the difference in rocking between the scanner registration used in each case. In the identification of such will then be a solution to eliminating such rocking.

 

I suspect, but don't know, that the software registration may be confused by the weaving right edge. It may very well be assuming that the left and right edge are the same distance from each other. In the case of Moises clip this will be a very wrong assumption.

 

C

That really is brillient! Having a changing distance between edges when the software is programed to a set distance, would throw off calculations for "squareness." In fact, the slope of the change along the edge(s) may well be reflected in frame positioning via software, so we see the rotation via numbers based on a variable and not a constant, as the software is programed to expect. ... but also that the software lacks the ability to correct it self and eliminate a degrading top edge flatness. Shouldn't the software be looking at the frame and not edges of the film?

Back to the difference between a high tech digital scanner (to make it sound good) and a lowly Elmo K100 Super8 projector (to make it sound bad) I went ahead and did a test to remind myself of Super8 running through a projector. I used some film shot a few years back on a Leicina with 100D.

 

Oh my god.

 

The projected Super8 film looks so damned brilliant. I keep forgetting how brilliant Super8 looks projected. It's insane. Especially when you project it small so the light is really really bright. Digital images look so dead in comparison. So am really glad I went to the effort to pull out the projector and throw some film up.

 

Anyway - that's beside the point. The purpose was to conduct the jitter test. So I made a video of the Super8 being projected, selecting a tripod shot from the film, and sure enough, on the resulting video there was jitter. I don't know if this is in the projector or just vibrations of the chassis. I might try another one with sandbags.

 

BUT in any case the jitter was never rotational. There was no rocking. It jittered left and right, and it jittered up and down, but it didn't ever rotate at all, not by even one pixel (on a 1920 x1080 video).

 

So if the rocking motion in the scan is meant to suggest something that Super8 does in a camera, or in a projector (or both), I'm afraid the Elmo K100 definitely disagrees.

 

That said, the scanner does a much better job than the projector in terms of translational jitter. Basically the scanner eliminates it - at least in the scan of the Logmar material (once you correct for the rocking - and again I ask the question - how could I eliminate rocking if it's burnt into the film?).

 

So in terms of the scanner giving a "Super8" experience we might call it even.

 

But in terms of making Super8 better than that which a Super8 projector gives us (in terms of jitter at least), there's easily scope for such - the scanner is already doing better than the Super8 projector in terms of sideways and up/down motion, so if it can meet Super8 projection in terms of a zero rocking motion, then the result would be excellent.

 

C

Awesome that you did the comparison and the camera and projector have been eliminated from the equation as the source. :) So, the issue now is to determine why rocking is scanner induced. Or, more appropriately, discuss what the best way to counter the rocking from scanning. Since it's all software as it is, would this mean there is a software fix, or in your estimation, will this require a combination of improving film transport during scanning (mechanical) and say an "anti-rotation correction" factor add to software's evalutive routines?

I just thought that the lighting in that test was completely irrelevent to its purpose and I don't know why he (Craig)harped on about it in that quasi condescending way.

Lighitng has everything to do with the quality of the finished product. I'll harp all day about looking for and filming using a good camera angle in relation to available light, and if subject is in shade, use bounce light from a reflector, and also be aware of skin tone and compensate for it. These things can't be "corrected" in post (though many think they can).

 

Hi Craig,

 

Our camera does not support auto exposure, everything is under user control.

 

All the best

Lasse

Thank you. :) I'm new at Super8 and just learned of your camera. Fine camera from what I read. Didn't know it was a manual exposure only. So, handheld metering and using good judgement for subject placement and exposure compensation for special lighitng situations is operator's responsibility.

...

Now in the scan, the grading increases the grain considerably.

 

C

Yes, this was my reasoning in relation to the OP's title of the post as part of the reason I see as "Not my best Super 8 footage yet." The scanning is secondary to actual filming. If the you place a dark skinned person in the shade and have light behind them, you have a backlit subject standing in the the shadow facing the camera with light behind and above subject, and camera aimed in direction of the light. If you are in auto exposure, you have a setting situation that auto should be turned off and manual exposure adjustments set to expose for the shadow and for darker skin tone, not counting the possible direct lighting affecting metering. True it was labeld a "sound test" but the title of the thread wants us to look at the footage and make personal observations, I'm assuming?

...

And in this clip, if anyone cares, or bothers to do the same test I did, they won't have to keep making up fairy tales about where the rocking might be. They will instead know.

 

It's in the scanner.

 

C

I believe you are absolutely correct. A nice example for us non-pros and without the ability to show this, would be for someone to shoot on a Logmar with side guide not engaged part way, and then engage it to show how these two situations look like, and then project and telecine projection and compare to scanned footage using stabalization and also without stabalization. This way, a "Trouble shooting guide" could be produced for all to see and understand, and this way long debates and guessing would be put to rest for the future.

I did want to add that something simple like adding graphics to the inside of the Logmar to indicate film path, like where the top and bottom loops should be, would be for people like me. :) Oh, and a notice to "engage guide before closing!"

After reading about the Logmar here: http://www.filmkorn.org/sensational-a-new-super-8-camera-from-denmark/ I realize the camera can be ruled out as the source of any rocking if film is loaded properly (the manual side guide is re-engaged after loading film). The registraton pin is being utilized according to the my read, as it holds the frame absolutely in place while film is being exposed per frame, so jitter is not possible. Just looking at the film transport system, I can't see anything that would allow weave or rocking, so I'm convinced that any weaving or rocking is manifest during the stabalization process for which the scan device is inducing the weave (side to side movement), and I do think jitter as well, which the software combines the weave and jitter in such a way as to create the rocking.

It may be the chosen method to reference each frame that is the source of this "rotation" of frame in software, as calculations are not absolute and probably looking to "average" out movement. Perhaps with the Logmar, no use of stabalization should be employed?

I've been looking at the OP video for like 40 minutes now trying to see what I can see, until I felt like I knew it pretty well. Right at the end of this 40 minutes of doing all kinds of things to look for different things in a purely courious fashion, I noticed something strange to me. Note, I'm just a courious observer with no professional skill at this...

I noticed the debris building up along the right side. Interesting this is, looks like debris is seen accumulating just after there is a good tug on the right and top right corner goes down and back up. Looks like maybe the right edge is being chewed/scraped (or whatever the term is) and little pieces of film are piling up along the right side, to me anyway.

Right side starts out pretty clean and builds up debris, and left side remains pretty much the same from start to finish. If movement of rocking and debris are related, then that's something, right?

So, could it be rocking from drag on the right, and less on left due to perf/claw holding left side in place?

Film stock kodak 7203 50D. Processed and scanned to a 4K Log by Pro8mm. This film has been downres to 1080p for Vimeo purposes. It has not been edited or processed in any form other than the color change to B&W, the sound is the wild production track with no processing. This sound test was performed in a single take using double system, the Logmar Super 8 film camera and the Sennheiser MKH 416 directional shotgun microphone. The audio was recorded with the Tascam DR-70 Linear PCM recorder.

 

https://vimeo.com/136780122

 

Enjoy,

 

MOY

There's been a lot of different things brought up in this thread, and I pretty much got lost with it all. I returned to your OP and just wanted to comment that from my student studies, lighting is the main reason things don't look as good as we expect later, regardless of how well and high end the post processing is. Pay attention to your lighting, and add more properly placed lighting for your subjects, and film with the best light possible that set your subject out from distracting backgrounds. Your subject is in shade, direct overhead light, and reflecting light from window and sinage forces the view to be drawn away from your speaker/actor and onto the window and sign. The top down light that's slight behind model/actor shifts viewer focus to middle (behind) subject. I'm not a professional, just saying as someone in the audience viewing and how the light and seting make me view the scene. Hope this helps to think more about lighting your subject and picking an aperture and focus that keep viewer on the subject. Good luck in the future and I hope next time out, you get what you are hoping to get. :)

Even the steady shot has quite a wobble. :(

 

But then again, it wasn't shot on a Logmar.

Very good point! ;) A good camera and lens is a good place to start.

 

Ok, so this not a conspiracy theory discussion - thank God.

 

Yes, projected film is not nearly as grainy as scanned film. The increase in grain of a scan is caused by a thing called "grain aliasing" - it's not a fake grain as such - nor scanner noise - but it's not the original grain of the film either. It's a side effect of digital sampling an analog signal (and as I've recently discovered also the lens used in a scanner plays a role).

 

So there's an argument to be had that one should do some degraining of a scan afterwards so it looks more like the original film in a projector.

 

The evolution of scanners is such that we're now recognising that by simply increasing the scanner's sensor resolution, it decreases the additional grain (grain aliasing) that otherwise occurs if scanning with smaller definition sensors.

 

So this is an important insight. It's dealing with the grain issue at it's root.

 

And/or one can run the scan through a grain cleaning process after the fact.

 

Or find a virtue in the grain that scanners produce. I don't mind it myself.

 

C

So higher definition sensors have more tiny sensing points over the surface of the chip and likely tinier sensing sites as well. Wouldn't the size of the sites need to be somewhere around half that of the tiniest grain on the film to render it accuractly? Also, the sampeling of the analog signal is done at set points along the analog's continous signal. If one could sync say two sensors to sample inbetween one another, this would add more sample points along the analog signal, and perhaps give even better results than simply thinking of just resolution? After thought, what if 3 sensors that read R, G, and B and sampling incrimentally different spots of the analog signal? :)

 

Ah I see. You want less grain.

 

The stabilisation done in your clip is not done by the scanning stage, but by a second step in which the scan is re-stabilised in third party software - due to limitations in the scanner. We're trying to avoid having to do that because it takes a lot of time, and doesn't always work with all possible shots.

 

Your clip has also had the grain cleaned up - which is a software process. In the clip at the head of this post the grain hasn't been cleaned up.

 

Where is this discussion going? Are you mounting an argument that what we're seeing in Moises clip did not originate on Super8?

 

Are you trying to suggest that it's video that's been faked to look like "Super8", but hasn't done a good job of it?

 

That's it, isn't it? Oh my god.

 

C

Right, so scanning has evloved to do the stabalization at scan time and has been improved upon with the update. Yes I was thinking grain was needing some clean up on the OP first post. How much of that is noise versus actual grain? I like grain, but scanning seems to add a bunch of white specs? Like out of place pixels. I recall my film projecting and looking not so noisy. Is there a way for software to show you what is grain and what is sensor noise? Or a way to test scan one way and see actual grain and then compare? I guess I'm asking how does software deal with "cleaning up grain" and why can't the scanner scan it better?

 

I personally scanned both of these examples. These are the ones I mentioned above, posted by Friedemann Wachsmuth. Both were shot on the Logmar, both scanned on our ScanStation - the first one you link to was scanned on the newer 5k version of the scanner, the second one, which is about a year older, was done on our old 2k scanner (same machine, different sensors). In both cases, Friedemann post-stabilized the image. In both cases, the scans were done before Lasergraphics released a software update that fixes horizontal registration, which is why he did the post-scan stabilization.

 

Neither scan exhibits any rocking until they're stabilized in software later. What you are seeing on those Vimeo clips is not what the scan looked like.

 

That said, that stabilization step is no longer necessary because it's now done during the scan using the horizontal lines of the perf to do vertical registration and the left (perf-side) edge for horizontal registration.

 

There is *no* rocking problem we're aware of in the scanner, which means this issue is either something to do with the camera (maybe the edge guide wasn't engaged?) or something that Pro8mm or Moises did after the scan was complete. But I can assure you that there is no rocking of the image in the scan itself. This issue is a red herring, in my opinion.

 

-perry

Just trying to catch up on this tread and understand it better. Your scans look really good to me. So, what's the take away from this thread? Scanning has improved? Super8 quality depends on the batch of film? Or, we need a better camera to shoot Super8?

Just an example of stabalization or "Steady" and what grain should look like with Super8: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JnxRUUEUOTA

 

The accumulated material around the frame is due to the gate not being cleaned. Nothing to do with the camera.

 

Contemporary scanners use software registration. They like to call it "optical pin registration" which sounds better than "software registration". But it is software registration, and means the scanner can be re-programmed. Earlier demos of the Logmar did not use the scanner's native software, but used third party software, because the scanner software (at that time) was locking onto the perf when it should have been (and is now) locking onto the edge of the film.

 

The sideways registration of film has never been registered by the perf. It's only scanner software developers (and many others besides) that were under that mistaken impression. Now if a perf didn't weave as wildly as this batch of Supr8 film did, nobody would ever notice the error made by the software developers. They would find the tiny left/right jitter as part of the charm of Super8 when in fact it is entirely the charm of a software error.

 

But they would not have found it quite so "charming" had the same software error been applied to the wildly weaving perf of this particlar batch of Super8 film. They'd be finding it very wrong indeed.

 

It is only when a batch of Super8, with a particularly wild weave was found, that scanner developers realised the problem - at first blaming the filmstock. Either way it didn't really matter because they could go back and reprogram the scanner. They reprogrammed the scanner to use the edge of the film which resolved the error. This is the genius of modern scanner technology - it is programmable.

 

The image is now properly sideways registered.

 

If by "edge of the frame" one means the white line down the right side of the scan, then this is the edge of the film. The right edge of the film. The fact that it is bellowing with respect to the camera mask is due to the width of the film being variable - created during the slitting of the film. The left edge of the film (which we can not see) is not bellowing left/right with respect to the camera mask. This is because film in the camera is hard locked to the camera gate by the left edge of the film. The right edge is allowed to vary in the gate. The fact that the perf is weaving in sync with the right edge of the film is due to the fact that the film perforator must have been aligned to the right edge. Had it been aligned to the left edge we would not have such a wildly weaving perf and we would not have discovered the error in the scanner software.

 

We'd be watching micro-jitter and marvelling at a software error and calling it the charm of Super8.

 

And don't get me started on grain. The grain we see in a scan is greater than the grain we see in projected Super8, due to a process called grain aliasing. By increasing the resolution of a scan the grain in the scan will move back towards the grain of film, as it is in a film projector.

 

So if you prefer to see grainier scans you are once again not in admiration of the charms of Super8 but an artifact of scanning.

 

C

I get it now. So the thread is about how a bad batch of Super8 helped scanner software developers improve the scanning process. I'm still not getting how the debris is present around the frame of the video? This is from the scanner, not the camera, correct? Also, the grain looks simulated to me. Is the software creating additional grain in a repeating pattern unrelated to gradient density of the film as well? Just eyeballing the playback, one gets the sense of a rythmic repeating pattern of both the perf and the grain, and honestly the footage/scan looks unnatural to my eyes.

The Logmar camera look like a fine working camera, but not sure why there's accumulated materal around the edge of the frame? The scanning process uses from what I can see a method to counter how it transports film via software. Everyone is assuming the edge of the frame is what we are seeing in the scan, but it's not. The perf is showing us the frame edge moving with the perf. The software is showing stable image in frame with moving perf, and to me, these look like two different videos, one of the edge like an effect, and the center video the one made to look like film. In my mind, neither are Super8, but video made to look like Super8.

The argument to project this footage is a valid one. I suggest shooting footage with the Logmar camera, and then project on a screen and take a video off the screen and show how the footage projects, and then scan it, and show how it looks scanned. Be sure to show projector to verify projection of film when making the demo video of the film projection. Just looking at grain and any jitter present that is different than the scan footage. I submit that scanning is where we lose the charm of Super8, and projection is where we'll see it. If scanning loses this charm of Super8, then we need to find another way to get the footage into digital, one that can record the fullness of Super8 (any film really).

The OP is asking why do we shoot super 8 aside from the asthetics and in his mind, low resolution of super8.

1. Asthetics is the first thing to consider when chosing a format. It provides its own unique asthetics.

2. "low resolution" in relation to what? or what do you mean by "resolution"?

Everyone hears something different when they hear the word "resoluton." For film, it's LP/mm and spatial resolution, and MTF, and perceived sharpness. You want to talk LP/mm?

You can't compare one-to-one film and digital. They do what they do completely differently, and produce a completely different looking product. Super8 does what it does better than anything else trying to look like Super8. :)