Best Monitor Ever Just Got A Little Better

Best Monitor Ever Just Got A Little Better

I've had my Leader LV5330 for about a year now and I've become painfully attached to it. Even to the point of operating handheld with it on-board for extended hours much to the chagrin of my back and shoulders. It's not a big piece of gear but honestly, it's a little too heavy for handheld. If you like to operate ENG cameras with a small on-board, those new Marshall 6.5" monitors are a much better option.. I digress.

The Leader is great because it does everything. You have total image (and even audio) evaluation for HD production and it fits in a  tiny pelican case. Considering what it is and what it does, it's slightly stiff price of around $6500 is actually a real bargain. In earlier posts I lamented several missing features in the 5330 that have now been remedied by a brilliant new firmware upgrade! My biggest gripe with the scope was that it didn't have "Blue Only" It's a very sharp SDI display with about the same resolution as a Panasonic 17".  It has chroma, brightness, and contrast controls but because there was no "Blue Only" feature, really no way to precisely calibrate it. That was a big head scratcher so I blogged, and bitched, and emailed. Though I can claim no credit for this, they listened and now there's not only a Blue Only feature but you can view any color channel independently as well as Red and Green minus Blue, Red and Blue minus Green, etc. Very cool.

Also of note - unlike the previous version, your picture calibration settings are now brought over to the Multi displays - Pic and Waveform, 4Screen, etc. And a new function that is quickly becoming my fav is you can assign "SCREEN CAPTURE TO USB" to the "Short Cut" button which makes saving continuity stills incredibly fast. In addition to these, there are a whole slew of new features and once Leader posts release notes for the upgrade, I'll be sure to link to them here.

You can get the firmware upgrade by emailing Sales@LeaderUSA.com

Weisscam HS-2 initial impressions

Weisscam HS-2 initial impressions

I was just trained on this thing and I've got to say, it's pretty amazing. The first point that comes to mind is that I learned the entire camera and accessory operation as well as the workflow in a single morning session. It's an incredibly intuitive system unlike another very popular High Speed Camera. As of now there are really only two practical high framerate video cameras available so you can't discuss the Weisscam without drawing comparisons to the Phantom. Being a trained Phantom operator who works with the camera often, I will readily admit that the system isn't without its problems. It produces amazingly rich images though and once you wrap your head around it and are aware of the shortcomings, it's actually fairly simple to operate. The point of this post is not to compare the Weisscam to the Phantom tit for tat though, I just want to share with you my first impressions. Newly available to the east coast through Tamberelli Digital, Weisscam HS-2 powered by P+S Technik.

It's big. It's boxy. It's ugly. It also makes some very pretty pictures and in 1080p can shoot 2000 frames per second which is already twice as fast as the Phantom HD. It's also incredibly light sensitive. The camera has 2 workflows, HD video and RAW. I'll get more into that in a moment but the exposure index rating for HD Mode is 400 ASA. In RAW it's 600 ASA. I was shocked we were able to do table top work at 2000 fps using only 2 - 2k watt HMI's and at a stop of T5.6. Absolutely incredible technology.

Here's the Specs from their site. My revisions are in quotes.

• 1.500 fps in 2K (RAW)

• 2.000 fps in 1080p

• 4.000 fps in 720p (not available yet)

• Super 35mm format

• Single CMOS sensor

• Interchangeable lens mount

• 12 bit RAW uncompressed

• 10 bit YCbCr 4:2:2 & RGB 4:4:4 (not available yet)

• Output: HD SDI single, dual link & Gig E (camera interface)

• 600 ASA sensitivity (400 ASA for SDI workflow)

• 10 F-stops dynamic range (more like 8)

• 16GB / 32GB onboard memory

The camera is designed to output it's captured frames in 2 ways - HD-SDI and RAW. The HD workflow is very well tested and seems to be the preferred method for dealing with Weisscam footage. Basically you record to the camera's on-board 32GB buffer, you then very quickly and easily mark your in's and out's on the wireless touch screen hand set, you can then use the same hand set to paint a  look on the video or tweak the blacks, gamma, etc.

Once your ready to capture, via HD-SDI you play the corrected video out in real time to a 10 bit 422 recorder like Sony SRW-1 HDCAM SR Deck or Panasonic AJ HPM-100 P2 Deck where it's recorded on the fly. This is a very straightforward and rock solid way of dealing with the footage. The only real downside is that you're baking the video and everyone on set has to be patient while the frames are recorded in real time. If you have a good eye and know how to read your scopes, you can record a very robust image using this method and because it's 10 bit 422, you have plenty of latitude in post production. Tamberelli sends their Weisscam out with the Panasonic 110 P2 deck (with the AVC-I board) and have recommended this workflow if you don't have the intention of shooting RAW. The RAW workflow involves the Weisscam DM-2 DigiMag.

Just like the Video Workflow, the first portion of the capture process is identical. You record the event and then trim the clip, instead of playing the frames out of HD-SDI you play them out to the DigiMag via the RAW Link connections (BNC) where the RAW 422 12 bit picture data is recorded in real time with Standard RAW Mode or twice as fast in Fast RAW Mode. The DigiMag is really not like the CineMag on the Phantom HD at all which transfers huge amounts of data in a few seconds. Whatever workflow you decide on for the Weisscam, there is a bit of downtime involved in between takes. Also the DigiMag takes a very long time to download its 2 TB of data over USB. It's an overnight process. Not a quite yet a practical workflow for rigorous production in my opinion. 

First impressions were very positive and as I work with the camera more, I'll be sharing my thoughts here as always so please check back for updates.

Everyone have a great weekend!

HD EXPO NYC

HD EXPO NYC

Or actually, Createasphere, as it's now known as.

I'm heading to the New Yorker Hotel right now to attend this year's conference. It's going to be a jam packed day and if my brain isn't too overwhelmed I'll be sure to do some live blogging. I'm especially excited to take Gamma & Density's Color Management and Data Workflow Workshop. Here's the write-up:

3cP - Gamma & Density Co.'s Cinematographers and DIT's Data Management and Color Correction Program which also allows the production of dailies on-the-set Digital Image Management for Arri, Panasonic, Panavision, Red, Viper, Canon Cameras and Silicon Imaging Digital Cameras.

Attendees will leave with a practical understanding of data-based image capture, data management, image and color management throughout the production/post- production process, how to communicate color and "look" information to post-production, and how to smoothly move and transform the large volumes of image data from the raw camera capture through dailies to editorial and on to final delivery.

Gamma & Density Co. (www.gammadensity.com) is a pioneering world known company specializing in manufacturing and management of digital and film cameras workflows, tools and applications for cinematographers, helping them to preserve and manage the uniqueness of their vision technically and artistically. The seminar will be conducted by the Gamma & Density Co. Team.

Topics to be discussed and hands-on demonstrated are:

Data and Color management and on-set color control via Gamma & Density's 3cP fully integrated into workflow
Data Management (From CF card to drive – Back Up – Import [RED files])
Color Consistency throughout the pipeline
GD Charts
Live on set color corrected previewing
Accurate color representation from ingestion to final projection
Communicating with Post
Reports
CDLs and LUTs
File Generation

Pretty cool right? I'll let you know how it goes.