Video Gear: February 2013

Monday, February 18, 2013

Overview of GoPro Hero 3 Black Edition

Late last year GoPro released their new Hero 3 series of cameras. The Silver and White Editions were met with a murmur of yawns, but then they announced the Black Edition! 4k, 2.7k, over-cranking to 240fps, Protune, Wi-Fi built in, manual white balance, built in time lapse, the GoPro remote preview and control app, and better low light performance...etc. Woohoo!

My friend Clarence was in love. He had to have one. Before Christmas these little cameras were essentially non-existent in San Diego. If you found a store that was getting in a shipment you had to reserve a place in line at the delivery truck door. Clarence did just that and I'm pretty sure broke a few of California's traffic laws in the process. Now, these sporty little cameras are readily available and Video-Gear has them in stock. When people ask which one they should get I just tell them to go with the Black Edition. It's an absolute no-brainer after you try all three.

As you can see in the picture below, the stock items that ship with the camera provide you with reasonable rigging options. The case comes with two backs: waterproof and audio friendly. The mounts are sticker backed and work surprisingly well. Clarence has been using a number of these on his motorcycle and nothing has gone flying down I-5 yet. The kit even includes the Wi-Fi remote. Oh, and nothing says "I have a YouTube account" better than GoPro stickers!

The side of the product box gives you details on most of the supported specs. Unfortunately 4k is only supported with 12fps (4k-cine) and 15fps (4k) - at least according to the GoPro app. The box may not be giving us the complete story given firmware upgrades over time. The 4k resolution is probably best for time lapse type videos. At 2.7k you get 24/25/30p, but only 24p in 2.7k-cine mode. Everything below 4k is likely just a scaling of the sensor. The 1080p-60fps is enough for over-cranking in many situations and at 720p you get up to 120fps! That's more speed options than any DSLR delivers today. The next solution to over-crank that fast is the Sony FS-700!

One issue I found is that the 4k footage doesn't directly import into Premier Pro CS5. You have to convert the footage through the free Cineform Studio software into an AVI file. The MOV conversion didn't work for me on my PC. The Apple folks may face the opposite situation (dunno?).

I previously wrote about Protune and the GoPro Hero 3 color science in the blog entries here, here, here, and here. In practice I found Protune to be quite usable. With the Hero 3 you can lock down white balance in Protune mode to 3000k, 5500k, 6500k or "cam raw", which solves most auto-white balance induced color problems, but you still can't lock down exposure. One warning is that "cam raw leaves the color **very** desaturated and the color matrix at basically what the name implies. Considering this is 8-bit 35Mb/s footage in Protune mode, I recommend that you test this setting yourself before thinking that 8-bit raw-looking footage will give you the adjust-ablility you want. The additional nice thing about Protune is that it gives you the full (claimed) 11-stop latitude of the camera. Normal mode still tends to be pretty consumer contrast-y.

One of my friends tried to import the Protune footage into Final Cut 7 and didn't have any luck. So test this configuration with your editing software before assuming it will work in your production.

On of the most compelling reasons to get the Hero 3 camera is the built in Wi-Fi and GoPro app compatibility. In the photo below you can see one of the screens in the app as it appears in the iOS version of the app. The app is also available for Android. The two apps are somewhat different. Clarence uses the Android app on his phone and the iOS app on his iPod Touch (shown below).

While using the GoPro app you can preview framing! Finally! It makes life with these devices so much easier. ...and because you can capture at 2.7k you can shoot a bit wide and re-crop or re-size the video later. The downside to constantly using the Wi-Fi preview is that we were finding that the camera would go through a battery every 80-90 minutes on the Black Edition. The battery life on the Silver Edition was quite a bit longer, even with Wi-Fi preview turned on. To solve this during a day long shoot we found a couple USB cell phone chargers and plugged those into the cameras to keep them powered.

The only issue I have with the Wi-Fi preview is that there is about a 6 second delay between the live action and the preview image. So while adjusting stands, furniture, people, etc..., you just have to be patient.

The Hero 3 cameras have a number of viewing angles available, that are essentially crops of the sensor since the camera still has a fixed f/2.8 lens. In the photo below I recorded all three angles of view at 1080p so you can see the difference between ultra-wide, medium, and narrow. I was only a few feet from the flowers, so even at the narrow setting the field of view is respectably wide. Also, since this is a digital crop there is no lens distortion reduction, it's just less apparent if you're looking at a crop in the center of the lens. With 4k resolution available I would have expected GoPro to do some lens correction in camera. Maybe in the future.

I also took two frame grabs of the footage at 2.7k and 4k so you can download them and look at the resolution. The pictures have not been cropped and only the text label was added in Photoshop. Notice how there was a color shift in the 4k frame? This footage had to be processed through the Cineform Studio software so I'm guessing that's where the color shift occurred - something to watch out for if you end up using this software to convert footage for edit software compatibility.

I used the original GoPro when it first came out and it was frankly a huge disappointment. I might have well just used a Logitech web cam (very bad experience). However, things have clearly improved and changed for the better with the Hero 3. If GoPro allows manual exposure through a firmware upgrade this camera will be even more functional. They just need to provide some type of case with a variable ND filter so the shutter speed can be chosen instead of dictated. The lack of motion blur still gives this camera away. Yes, I know it can be added in After Effects, but there's just something visually better about doing it in camera.

Personally, the 2.7k resolution is a huge deal. It allows me to not only crop the footage, but also downscale to provide sharper looking footage. At 2.7k I can reverse some of the lens distortion in my edit software without feeling guilty about the resolution reduction. But the biggest selling point for me is the GoPro app. I wouldn't want the camera without it now. Clarence and I were recording an instructional video for two days straight and we knew exactly what we were recording and when the boom mic was in the shot. Without the preview the Hero 3 would have been unusable for that project. The 120fps over-crank came in handy when the instructor wanted to show an action in slow motion - no problem. The project's video is going to the web, so down-rez'ing to 720p was perfectly OK.

The Hero 3 Black Edition is in stock at the shop. Call Jeff or Nikita if you'd like to check one out...and bring your Android/iOS device loaded with the GoPro app.

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Sony FS-700 Day Two and 3/4: Associating with a Ninja.

After surviving the five mile trek through the Ramona Grasslands I finally made it home just in time to call my friend Mike Brown. Mike is a local photog/videographer and happens to own a piece of gear I wish I had, an Atomos Ninja. We decided to see what improvement, if any happens when you connect an external high quality recorder to the Sony FS-700.

Mike's girlfriend, Mel, agreed to be our super-model/willing victim. After whipping out Mike's Arri tungsten Fresnel and using the ceiling as a bounce source we set up the camera with his 35mm Zeiss ZF.2 and a Novoflex E-mout to F-mount adapter.

You'll have to excuse the long loading time of the pictures below. I wanted to show high quality screen shots so you can see what little difference exists between the internal and external recorder. The only place I noticed a difference was in Mel's sweater. You can see more detail in the Ninja capture than the AVCHD capture...however, the difference is very subtle. You will likely only be able to pick up a difference if you view the pictures in full resolution. Please keep in mind that this is a very ad hoc test and other scenes, such as nature, may have a more profound difference (or not). The FS-700 is back in the shop this week, but if it becomes available again I plan to do more testing in more complex situations.

What the external recorder does give you is better chroma key capabilities (simply because of 4:2:0 versus 4:2:2 capture) and better ability to push color grading (less compression in the Ninja)- again two things I intend to test if the camera becomes available again. What I really want to test are these two codecs against the 4k raw output that's supposed to be released in April!

During this simple test I noticed one other issue with purple fringing around highlights. After some searching on Google I found out that the FS-100 and Canon C300 have reports of a similar issue. Most people relate it to the design of the micro lens on the sensor and what happens when you overload the pixel's photo site. So it appears that nothing can be done externally besides making sure that absolutely nothing in your frame is overexposed and causing a single pixel to be saturated. This isn't a good sign for run and gun productions, like weddings or documentaries. However, does this mean that the camera is necessarily "bad"? In my opinion, no. It's just like the warts on ALL video products from $100 to $100k. You know the limitations and you work around them. Obviously lots of people are producing beautiful work on the FS-700.

As usual, if you want to check out the demo camera this month call the guys at the shop. If you have additional questions, Sal, Mike, or Len will be glad to help.

Tuesday, February 5, 2013

Sony FS-700 Day Two: Hanging with the Divine Bovine.

I spent Sunday hiking around the Ramona Grasslands with a 50 pound camera slung over my shoulder. It was very lumberjack-ish and I have the bruises on my shoulders to prove it. It's too bad that no one makes a good heavy duty back sling for a cinema camera, sort of like a sword holder. I could have used it by mile 3.

The camera was essentially equipped the same as day one, however I got to use my full arsenal of Zeiss prime lenses. Now I understand why nature cinematographers use zoom lenses. Every time I would need to change lenses the little varmints I was trying film would disappear. They quickly and categorically became known in my mind as "those little bastards." Lucky for me there are lots of wild cows and bulls roaming free on the grasslands. Even they would get away from time to time, but mostly the bovine were curious as to why I was carrying around a great big funny looking contraption.

On this day the camera was powered with a Sony NP-970 battery. According to the user manual the camera supports the NP-770, which came with the demo unit, and the higher capacity NP-970. The problem I experienced was that the camera wouldn't recognize the battery charge capacity on the NP-970, but would on the NP-770. I had both batteries with me, but decided to see if this was a firmware bug or a true battery issue. Well... the NP-970 lasted me all day. Perhaps this is, or will be fixed with new firmware.

The other issue that came up continuously is that the camera would lose track of the shutter speed I had manually set. It also wouldn't keep track of individual shutter speeds based on normal, slow, or super slow motion mode. If you cycled through the different shooting modes and had 24p set to 1/48th (for instance) then when I went back to normal 24p mode the shutter speed would be 1/96, 1/100, 1/60...anything but 1/48th.(?) I also found that if I shut the camera off while in one of the slow motion modes that the shutter speed would come up incorrect for normal mode every time. To add to the frustration, the shutter speed would get reset to some other value when I went into slow motion modes. I lost a shot or two because of this need to keep resetting the shutter speed. Again, perhaps this is a matter of a firmware upgrade since this is Sony's demo camera.

Now I completely understand why people were psyched with the included ND filters. I used them all day. All I brought with me is a polarizer, a 2-stop grad ND, and a 1 stop ND. That's a much lighter load than bringing all eight of my filters! The grad pretty much lived in the matte box all day. The polarizer was used quite often too. It definitely helped tame the hazy skies. Every once in a while the mechanism that switched ND filters would get stuck mid-change, but that was always handled with a quick wiggle of the ND lever - Much, much, easier than switching out matte box filters! Excellent feature and a BIG advantage over the FS-100.

The video below is my edit of the Ramona Grasslands footage. Feel free to download the video from Vimeo for closer look at the graded footage without web streaming compression.

Cine4 gamma was used all day because I was mainly concerned with maintaining highlights, which the FS-700 did quite reasonably. With this gamma curve the camera has 5 stops before blowing out. Sometimes the camera couldn't handle the skies, even with a 2 stop grad ND and polarizer, but you can't expect more than 7 stops of highlight retention without a Red Epic in HDRx mode. There was only one shot that was less than acceptable because of the sky blowing out.

Speaking of exposure, I mainly used the optical extension tube and the on-camera LCD to judge exposure throughout the day. Sometimes it worked, sometimes not. Sometimes the best I could do was set the exposure between the histogram goal posts when I couldn't tell for sure. What I learned is that you can't always trust the on-camera LCD for correct exposure...however, and more importantly, the footage was grade-able to return the correct exposure as long as nothing was clipped. 70% of the shots in the above video have some sort of tweaking to their exposure. Can't tell which ones? Neither can I. This ability to recover exposure and grade footage is a huge advantage over DSLRs. When Sony provides the 12-bit 4k raw upgrade in April this camera will be even better! (albeit heavier too - my poor shoulders)

As far as compression goes, yes, the AVCHD low bit-rate compression did lose a lot of detail with all the natural brush around. In fact, all the footage *required* sharpening in post to bring back some form of detail. Footage without sharpening was noticeably soft. I'll get more into this in the next blog entry, but the codec leaves me a bit less than enthusiastic about the in camera codec quality. Sony should really consider an update that would allow us to shoot Prores HQ directly to the FMU. I also saw aliasing in the super slow motion shots again, such as the horse galloping up the hill. Another user confirmed that he experience aliasing in super slow motion on the FS-700 as well. So if you do use super slow motion shooting on the FS-700 the same rules apply as if you're shooting on a DSLR. Watch out for alias causing items in the shot.

Overall, I was mostly satisfied with my user experience. The controls are a bit fiddly and I did lose a shot or two while trying to adjust the camera (shutter speed wrong again - augh!), but I wouldn't call that my summation of my opinion here. The grade-ability of the footage made up for most of the user experience short comings. Like any camera, the FS-700 has it's own quirks and I'm sure I would produce technically better footage with a bit more experience.

The camera is back in the shop as of Monday morning, so feel free to stop by and check it out this month. Give Salvador or Mike a call if you'd like to demo or rent the camera yourself.

Saturday, February 2, 2013

Sony FS-700 Day One: Let's Blow Up a Building.

I borrowed the Sony FS-700 demo camera from the shop for the weekend thinking this was going to be a leisurely review of features. I'm thinking about buying this camera, so it seemed like a prime opportunity to try before I buy. I even had a bit of time to make the silver riser plate you see in the picture above. ...then my friend Clarence calls me up and tells me they are planning an implosion of the South Bay Power Plant tomorrow morning. On top of that, Salvador from the shop calls me and says the same thing. Both guys offer to meet me down there tomorrow morning bright and early. It seems like a good opportunity to test the camera's slow motion capabilities, after all, destruction equals awesome slo-mo, yes?

So I spend all night reading the manual, translating Japanese user manuals to something a filmmaker can understand (i.e. "detail" = sharpness, huh?), and reading up on cine-gamma curves. I'm ready - except for the 6am call time. By the time I finish my FS-700 self-education and have the camera built I manage to get 4 hours of sleep and make it down to Chula Vista just before the last parking spaces are gone. Clarence doesn't show up. Salvador is there, but can't find me. I'm on my own with fifty pounds of gear, 4 hours sleep, and the camera set to cine4 gamma at 120fps.

The "Super Slow Motion" feature of the Sony FS-700 is really it's selling point so I was most anxious to try this out. Regular capture is at 24, 25, and 30fps. In super slow motion the camera can capture at 120, 240, 480, and 960fps (NTSC mode). It's only at 120 and 240fps that you get full HD, the other two resolutions have reduced vertical resolution in the captured video file. Unlike the Epic and Alexa, the slow motion features are time limited (120fps=16 seconds, 240fps=8 seconds), instead of being memory limited. Likely one of the many limitations of capturing to an SD card. The time does not get extended if you have the FMU (Flash Memory Unit) installed for some reason.

There are 3 trigger types for super slow motion, start, middle, and end. The "Start" trigger captures from the time you hit record. The "Middle" trigger captures half the time duration before the record button is pressed and the other half afterwards. The "End" trigger captures the time duration before you press the record button. The frames are stored in an internal memory buffer and written to the SD card after the trigger and capture are complete - which takes lots of time. Don't plan on high speed shots back to back!

Now for an admission of stupidity on my part, albeit with 4 hours of sleep. I should have used the "Middle" trigger for capturing the implosion, but no....I was going to be all smart and stuff and capture everything by pressing the record button after the building fell so would get all the detonations too - Wrong bozo move on my part. For events like this I highly recommend just sticking with the middle trigger so you capture the core event. With the loud explosions I accidently hit the trigger just as the building was falling. Guess I won't be working at the Discovery Channel anytime soon.

One other thing that I noticed is quite a bit of aliasing at 120fps. I know this is a down-scaled 4k sensor, but the video appeared to have jaggies, just like anyone with a line skipping DSLR knows all too well. I'm not sure if this artifact was just at high frame rates, or if this is normal. Hopefully my adventure with the camera tomorrow will reveal the true nature of the sensor. Tomorrow's tests will mainly be at 24fps and under, but until then the picture below is a full resolution frame grab. If you download the view the picture at full resolution you'll see a lot of jaggies in the building support structure. I know it isn't obvious with a still picture, but the jaggies pop out when there is just the tiniest camera shake - like the shock wave from the detonations. It also didn't help that I was using my brand new razor sharp Zeiss 100mm macro lens. When perfectly focused that lens will show line skipping in a heartbeat.

Which brings me to my next point. The "Focus Expansion" function on this camera is excellent. I used the default settings that allow you to cycle through normal, 4x, and 8x zoom for setting focus perfectly. This is just as useful as my DSLR for focus checks, PLUS unlike a DLSR you can use the function while recording! "Say hello to my little friend", the focus puller screamed!

One thing this camera doesn't have is a good way of measuring the image exposure versus it's auto-exposure. On Canon DSLR's there is a little meter that tells you if you are over-exposed or under-exposed, however the FS-700, like most video cameras, only has a histogram. It would be a good firmware feature update if they added this "exposure suggestion meter" to their display. Yes, you can override it, but sometimes it's quickest to go along with the camera's suggestion. I typically use manual lenses, so auto-exposure isn't a feature that I can take advantage of.

I found a friend with an Atmos Ninja to test the internal AVCHD codec implementation with the industry standard Prores HQ. From what I've seen so far the detail in the building doesn't seem to be any better or worse than my experience with a Canon 5D mark II DSLR. Perhaps that was because I was capturing at 120fps, or perhaps it's a limitation of the on board consumer AVCHD codec. Either way, I hope to have that answered before I return the camera on Monday. The $3k BMCC shoots to SSD in Prores or CinemaDNG. The $10k Red Scarlet shoots to SSD in R3D. It seems like just a matter of time before Sony joins the club at a reasonable price.

So did I like what I saw so far...yes and no. The over-cranking is a nice feature that otherwise doesn't exist at this price range, however the aliasing turns me off. The ergonomics of the camera are usable, but the buttons are in the wrong positions for fast operation (fixed in F5, in theory). Inclusion of cine-gammas and the range of color matrices are very good, but the camera doesn't include typical paint controls of a pro camera. The inclusion of peaking and focus expansion while recording is awesome, but the display lacks a continuous exposure meter. AVCHD is adequate for a lot of things, but other cameras in this price range have far better codecs and storage media solutions. Low light sensitivity and inclusion of ND filters is great (no caveat implied...they just are). You have to realize that in this range you're dealing with the equivalent of a fully loaded Honda Accord. It's not a BMW or Mercedes. You get lots of wonderful features and most people will be happy with the performance. Maybe I'm just too picky after getting spoiled with the Red Epic - which isn't a fair comparison.

When I left the shop on Friday, Salvador gave me the stink-eye for suggesting that I might return it Wednesday. Yes Salvador, the camera will be back Monday. Then the rest of you can stop by the shop and check it out for yourselves.