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Friday, December 3, 2010

Testing testing testing

Hi everyone,


First of all thanks for all your comments and emails.  It's certainly been quite an interesting week of testing since I wrote the initial first few pages of this blog.


I've got heaps and heaps to talk about, as I have learnt a hell of a lot about all kinds of stuff that's related to shooting on the 5D with anamorphic lenses recently.  Some bad, but mostly all good.


The main thing is that this whole crazy idea is working... I have even managed to get some "ok" pictures out of the camera.


However there is a long way to go before my focus puller, the post house, the director and myself are going to be totally happy enough so that we can start shooing some real drama on a real set.


I will go into finer detail about all of this soon, but for now I thought I should put up a little bit of vision.


Here is a really quick test that I shot a few days ago on my 50mm Lomo in my apartment and on the way up to get a coffee at my local.  It's all handheld and pretty on the fly.


I freaked a few people out too cause it kinda looked like I was carrying a gun.... one early morning jogger even thought I was an undercover cop trying to bust speeding motorists with some new fan-dangled portable speed camera.


I have also shot a whole bunch of more boring tests like ASA / Noise tests, aperture tests, Grid tests for checking distortion, etc etc.  I'll put up the relative and more interesting versions of these tests soon.


Please note:  This movie was 3GB when I output it originally in Prores 4:4:4.


Now it's down to 36MB which has introduced a lot of noise, banding and pretty much anything else you see that is bad.  


Obviously this is not ideal when trying to show something off, however I have tried everything I know of to get a better picture on the net.....vimeo links etc etc and can't find a way to upload something that is big enough (700 MBs +)  that will do the footage any justice.


Does anyone have any great ideas on how to show large video files on the net?  here's a link to the vimeo version of the same file:


Please do not expand this file as it totally turns to shit....












Righto....

Well first of all I would like to say that this has definitely been an interesting few weeks of learning and jumping logistical hurdles. For instance I had no idea how to run programmes like compressor or final cut, and I had no idea that my 35mm lens (once it arrived) would be the size of Antarctica: see image.





Also my poor 3 year old macbook computer nearly caught fire the other day as it tried desperately to de-anamorphasize a single RAW still image that I had shot on the 75mm Lomo.  Luckily I've managed to get hold of a Macbook pro with a whole bunch of RAM, which has been a godsend.

Now last time I left you I was about to embark on a week of testing, which myself and Olli (1st AC) have now done.  We tested all the kinds of stuff that you'd want to know about before shooting a film on a new format; like noise levels at high ASA settings and resolution tests at wide open apertures etc etc.

What we first had to do was to figure out the exact amount of cropping that would need to be done in order to achieve the best resolution images, yet have no cut off. (vignetting) 

This process took forever but we finally managed to come up with the right settings for the left and right crop.  In case you are interested here is a screen grab of the compressor settings...  I would have killed for this the other day.


Because my Lomo's are not really the worlds best quality when it comes to modern standards, the images that they create are relatively degraded and slightly soft at wide open apertures.

This is a common occurrence in old zoom lenses as well as in many anamorphics, due to the high quantity/quality of glass involved in their design.  

I knew that I would need to shoot at around T4 in order to achieve a suitable image quality.  So an important test for me to do was to find out how far I could push the ASA in the camera before the images became too grainy.

Here are a bunch of them that we did.  They are ungraded and still in their original anamorphic ratio.








Here is a vimeo link to the asa tests that we shot:


One of the more interesting tests that we performed, was a distortion test.  We did this by putting up a large grid in front of the lens that was exactly centred and level to the focal plane of the 5D.

We then cropped and resized the footage for a scope aspect ratio of 1:2.40.  We figured out that we are loosing about 35% of our horizontal resolution.  Not great .....  but that's the downfall of 16x9 anamorphic for you at 2:1 squeeze compared to 4x3 anamorphic.

Once that was done I took it over to my mate Garry Jacques who runs a post house here in Sydney www.heckler.tv  where he put it up on After Effects.

I didn't know this but 3D graphics people can't work in an anamorphic world as all Anamorphic lenses tend to have some amount of distortion (depending on quality) and it just so happens that my 1980's Russian Lomo's have a shit load of distortion.  

So what Garry wanted to do was to come up with a formula in After Effects that would counteract the distortion which was inherent in each of my lenses so that the images would become flat or undistorted.  (This is mainly apparent on the edges of the frame)

I also found out that each individual lens has varying amounts of distortion in various areas of the image.  Therefore once I had done the distortions tests for each lens, Garry could then provide me with the perfect formula to counteract the bendiness...is that a word?  hmmmm.....it is now :)

In other words he could turn my cheap arse Lomo lens with all it's beautiful aberrations, into a brand new $40'000 Hawke Anamorphic with the press of just a few, well selected buttons.

Here is the original un-squeezed anamorphic 50mm footage: Remember do not expand the player into full screen....total crap




Here is the same 50mm footage, cropped and de-squeezed, but before being "Flattened" in after effects.






Garry is sending me over the flattened footage soon....  I'll put it up as soon as I get it....  sorry about that.

While I have been off playing around with test footage, Olli has been trying to get his head around just how to accessorise the 5D with the Lomo's in a way that is fast and reliable on set.

One of the main issues with the lenses is that the focus wheel is usually found right up at the front end of the lens.  See picture:  


Not only that, but the whole front of the lens also breaths in and out as your pull from far to near and vice versa...  sometimes there is up to an inch or so of movement. 

This movement creates a large gap between the mattebox and the front element which is right where you need to have your follow focus!

We are still sorting this issue out but it looks like neoprene (wetsuit) doughnuts are the way to go.

Even more annoyingly, I have had to ditch my brand new Redrock micro mattebox and replace it with an Arri MB14, as my enormous 35mm lens wouldn't even come close to being able to fit into the Redrock mattebox.

So if anyone wants a brand new "Redrock Delux 15mm Mattbox" plus a custom built pelican case and a brand new 15mm Redrock Follow focus you can bid on it now....


Here is a picture that Olli sent me from the test bay yesterday, showing the 35mm lens with a preston attached. I will upload some high quality images of the camera rig once we have sorted everything out accessory wise.

I can't thank the guys at Panavision here in Sydney enough, as without them and their support, we'd be totally screwed.







ok...there's heaps more to talk about but that's enough for now.  

Back soon.





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