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Canon XM2
- Thread starter Eddie Rex
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OSPV, well white paper stuck on cardboard will do for the white balance without actually buying it. However for different colours i shall pop in at the stationary shop and buy some multicoloured papers, which should only cost a few pennies a card.
Interesting to know that wedding videographers require a warm tint to the picture, which i imagine they would use a blue card for the white balance to create a warm orange tint.
I took some test shots of the Moon last night using manual settings S1/700, F3.4, 18DB (using a white card for the white balance) and got a very clearly defined picture, but rather plain looking. Tonight i shall do some more test shots using different colours for the white balance and see what i get.
Tommorrow, i shall do some daytime shots. All shall be eventually uploaded on youtube.
Interesting to know that wedding videographers require a warm tint to the picture, which i imagine they would use a blue card for the white balance to create a warm orange tint.
I took some test shots of the Moon last night using manual settings S1/700, F3.4, 18DB (using a white card for the white balance) and got a very clearly defined picture, but rather plain looking. Tonight i shall do some more test shots using different colours for the white balance and see what i get.
Tommorrow, i shall do some daytime shots. All shall be eventually uploaded on youtube.
if you want a stiff whitecard that you can carry around, get a piece of foamcore from a craft shop. It will do double duty as a light reflector, to fill shadows on sunny days.
OSPV, i have constructed my own white board by sticking a white sheet of paper onto a card and been using that today for a few test shots.
Knightly, i already have a silver and gold reflector (bought ready made) that i use with my stills photography and could also use in filmmaking aswell.
The test shots from today and yesterday can be seen on www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-co6Hycy5g where i explain the manual settings and the colour used for the white balance. Only problem were the windy conditions causing too much noise, and i did not know how to overcome it. Any suggestions?
Knightly, i already have a silver and gold reflector (bought ready made) that i use with my stills photography and could also use in filmmaking aswell.
The test shots from today and yesterday can be seen on www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-co6Hycy5g where i explain the manual settings and the colour used for the white balance. Only problem were the windy conditions causing too much noise, and i did not know how to overcome it. Any suggestions?
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Sorry, Eddie ... I wasn't making a derogatory comment about your whiteboard, except I was thinking that one day you might want to replace it with something more indestructible. No worries.
Your test shots were interesting. I'm not saying I could have done better test shots (people have been a bit sensitive lately), but I'd like to see the white balance cards, the orange one and the white one, in the video. The reason is this ...
Imagine you are testing (or shooting) a blue cast (I want to keep this simple), so you shoot a normal white balance shot for reference, shoot a short 1-5 seconds with the orange card, set the white balance using the orange card, shoot 1-5 seconds of the white card (which will now look bluish), then shoot the blue-cast footage.
Now, in post, you can use your white-picker tool on the video of the orange card to add a matching blue cast to normal footage and stock clips you may intermix with your video.
And you can use your white-picker on the bluish looking white card to reverse the color cast. You may want to remove it from certain elements, or what-have-you.
Although you could create these references at a later time, they will be most accurate if they are recorded under the same conditions, and at the same time as the associated footage.
Regarding wind: the wind has, on multiple occasions brought me to the brink of suicide. It blows things over, bangs your equipment around, tousles your hair, and makes terrible noises in unprotected microphones. There are ways of dealing with all of these things, but I can't talk about it without having a panic attack. It was actually a bit spooky for me, just watching your test shots. I think the only thing worse is blotchy, bright sunlight. Please don't ever show me a video with wind and blotchy sunlight in the same scene! That would be too much.
Your test shots were interesting. I'm not saying I could have done better test shots (people have been a bit sensitive lately), but I'd like to see the white balance cards, the orange one and the white one, in the video. The reason is this ...
Imagine you are testing (or shooting) a blue cast (I want to keep this simple), so you shoot a normal white balance shot for reference, shoot a short 1-5 seconds with the orange card, set the white balance using the orange card, shoot 1-5 seconds of the white card (which will now look bluish), then shoot the blue-cast footage.
Now, in post, you can use your white-picker tool on the video of the orange card to add a matching blue cast to normal footage and stock clips you may intermix with your video.
And you can use your white-picker on the bluish looking white card to reverse the color cast. You may want to remove it from certain elements, or what-have-you.
Although you could create these references at a later time, they will be most accurate if they are recorded under the same conditions, and at the same time as the associated footage.
Regarding wind: the wind has, on multiple occasions brought me to the brink of suicide. It blows things over, bangs your equipment around, tousles your hair, and makes terrible noises in unprotected microphones. There are ways of dealing with all of these things, but I can't talk about it without having a panic attack. It was actually a bit spooky for me, just watching your test shots. I think the only thing worse is blotchy, bright sunlight. Please don't ever show me a video with wind and blotchy sunlight in the same scene! That would be too much.
OSPV, i suppose i could show the different cards i used for the white balance and all i used were an A4 sized card with a sheet of paper stuck to it. Very cheap and simple.
I think the wind can be reduced by using that "furry thing" (which looks like a dead cat) over the external mic. Sorry if the test shots are rather disturbing, i am sure the wind will drive everyone up the wall!
I think the wind can be reduced by using that "furry thing" (which looks like a dead cat) over the external mic. Sorry if the test shots are rather disturbing, i am sure the wind will drive everyone up the wall!
The wind thing is sort of an inside joke. Try setting up a 10x10 green background (think "huge sail") in a gusty wind. I've had some days when I felt like I was rigging a sailing ship, more than setting up for an effects shot.
It doesn't matter what your cards look like. You can use toilet paper, if you can get it to work, or the front of an oven. The important thing is to have a reference when you go into post. Maybe I'm getting ahead of you, here, but it helps to have something that you know is white in your shot for color correction. You can also add a matching color-cast in post, by having the white balance card (in it's original, correct color) as a reference.
Maybe someone else can help explain, or maybe I should just stop racing ahead and let you discover this stuff at your own pace.
It doesn't matter what your cards look like. You can use toilet paper, if you can get it to work, or the front of an oven. The important thing is to have a reference when you go into post. Maybe I'm getting ahead of you, here, but it helps to have something that you know is white in your shot for color correction. You can also add a matching color-cast in post, by having the white balance card (in it's original, correct color) as a reference.
Maybe someone else can help explain, or maybe I should just stop racing ahead and let you discover this stuff at your own pace.
OSPV, i know nothing about colour correction.
When i asked one of my buddies who works at a production company here in Hull (UK) he said colour correction is an art aswell as being techinical, and i could make a start by adding some colour correction filters. As i have no idea how to add colour correction filters to a scene, i still remain retarded.
When i asked one of my buddies who works at a production company here in Hull (UK) he said colour correction is an art aswell as being techinical, and i could make a start by adding some colour correction filters. As i have no idea how to add colour correction filters to a scene, i still remain retarded.
There is always something to learn. It is for this reason that I hate to look at video I edited 2 or more years ago ... it's just disturbing. Color correction is an art, but if you shoot everything with the same camera and you do a good job of it, color correction is just icing on the cake. I'm sure a professional color corrector will scream when they hear that, but I'm not a professional color corrector, so I can play the dumb blonde.I've had to color balance between 2 cameras on many jobs, and I've learned how to give my video the look I want. I probably have a long way to go. What I wanted to impress upon you, at this early stage in the game, is that a reference is invaluable when doing color correction or color matching. What you need to know when shooting is that you want to get a shot of a white object (white card, white house, someone's white shirt, etc.), as a reference. Have the white object feature prominently, properly lighted, and in the same light as your subject matter.
Someday, when you are trying to figure out how your video relates to reality, you can check the color of the white reference object. If the white thing is not actually white, you can use a tool to make it white, and apply the same correction to the rest of the clip to get correct color. Also, you could use this information to match color balance between two video clips, different cameras, different lighting conditions, etc.
As I mentioned in the beginning ... for now, just get the white reference whenever you can. It never hurts to have something you don't need, but it could come in really handy when doing final color correction.
Eddie, some things I can shed some light on:
The XM-2 neither has a real 16:9 mode nor a real progressive (frame) mode. Both modes come with a resolution penalty. The XM-2 does the same you would do in post: it captures the image in 4:3 and then scales it up electronically before writing the image onto tape. So the only benefit of doing in-camera 16:9 on the XM-2 is a slightly less compressed image. This is because a miniDV tape always has a 25 MBit data rate. If you write a 4:3 image and stretch it in post you will waste 30% of the 25 MBit compared to the camera 16:9 image taking full advantage of the bandwith.
If you do progressive frame mode you also lose 30% of your resolution, as the sensor is not capable of capturing a full frame at once. They do a trick called pixel shifting in the green channel to raise the resolution. That means take the upper or lower frame from the blue and red channel und combine it with a half pixel shifted green channel. You can see the resolution loss yourself when filming some sharp edges like a CD jewelbox with and without frame mode / 16:9 mode.
The main advantge of filming 4:3 and doing 16:9 in post is - as already has been written - that you can rearrange your frame in the vertical, you can deshake easier, and you can do a virtual vertical camera pan.
About an anamorphic lens:
I used the Optex anamorphic lens, which is also a 0.7 wide angle converter. It has the benefit of true 16:9 by using the full resolution of the 4:3 CCD of the XM-2.
Disadvantages:
o stretched image in the LCD and viewfinder makes it harder to follow the action when moving the camera
o you can't use the full zoom range of the camera
o vignetting on one side in full wide angle mode
o no additional filters can be used in front of the lens because there is no thread (except you got a matte box)
To make the differences between the different modes more clear, I have got some example images for you:
(all examples are progressive images)
This image is full 4:3:
This image is a 4:3 letterboxed in post:
This image is a 4:3 image converted to anamorphic 16:9 in post / in camera with electronic 16:9
This image is true anamorphic 16:9 like it is recorded by a Canon XL-2 with 16:9 sensor or a camera with anamorphic lens
The XM-2 neither has a real 16:9 mode nor a real progressive (frame) mode. Both modes come with a resolution penalty. The XM-2 does the same you would do in post: it captures the image in 4:3 and then scales it up electronically before writing the image onto tape. So the only benefit of doing in-camera 16:9 on the XM-2 is a slightly less compressed image. This is because a miniDV tape always has a 25 MBit data rate. If you write a 4:3 image and stretch it in post you will waste 30% of the 25 MBit compared to the camera 16:9 image taking full advantage of the bandwith.
If you do progressive frame mode you also lose 30% of your resolution, as the sensor is not capable of capturing a full frame at once. They do a trick called pixel shifting in the green channel to raise the resolution. That means take the upper or lower frame from the blue and red channel und combine it with a half pixel shifted green channel. You can see the resolution loss yourself when filming some sharp edges like a CD jewelbox with and without frame mode / 16:9 mode.
The main advantge of filming 4:3 and doing 16:9 in post is - as already has been written - that you can rearrange your frame in the vertical, you can deshake easier, and you can do a virtual vertical camera pan.
About an anamorphic lens:
I used the Optex anamorphic lens, which is also a 0.7 wide angle converter. It has the benefit of true 16:9 by using the full resolution of the 4:3 CCD of the XM-2.
Disadvantages:
o stretched image in the LCD and viewfinder makes it harder to follow the action when moving the camera
o you can't use the full zoom range of the camera
o vignetting on one side in full wide angle mode
o no additional filters can be used in front of the lens because there is no thread (except you got a matte box)
To make the differences between the different modes more clear, I have got some example images for you:
(all examples are progressive images)
This image is full 4:3:
This image is a 4:3 letterboxed in post:
This image is a 4:3 image converted to anamorphic 16:9 in post / in camera with electronic 16:9
This image is true anamorphic 16:9 like it is recorded by a Canon XL-2 with 16:9 sensor or a camera with anamorphic lens
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Nice pix, thanks for that. what is the thread size on the optex converter?
I prefer to shoot in frame mode, even with the resolution loss, because I really hate the look of interlaced footage for narrative work. And with the pal version of this camera as you two have, a 6% slowdown in post gives you 24fps
I prefer to shoot in frame mode, even with the resolution loss, because I really hate the look of interlaced footage for narrative work. And with the pal version of this camera as you two have, a 6% slowdown in post gives you 24fps
The Optex converter comes with an adapter ring 52->58mm. The XM-2 itself has a 58mm thread.
Unfortunately the Optex converter can not be purchased any longer, as the company went out of business last year. But you can buy an anamorphic adapter from Century Optics. They also claim it is fully zoom through able - which I doubt a bit, but who knows.
Unfortunately the Optex converter can not be purchased any longer, as the company went out of business last year. But you can buy an anamorphic adapter from Century Optics. They also claim it is fully zoom through able - which I doubt a bit, but who knows.
That isn't so hard to believe. My AG-LA7200G is fully "zoom through able". I originally purchased it to do inside work, where I needed a wider angle. It would have been far less useful, if I couldn't use it at the lens's shortest focal length. It is, however, a 72mm, and a large, expensive piece of glass.
If it weren't for a commercial requirement for the adaptor, I can think of better ways to spend $750. Let's not forget, that a subtle improvement in image quality will probably not make or break your movie. Whereas, poor lighting, or poor audio could be a huge detractor. I'd go for a decent lighting setup, a good tripod, and at least one good microphone, before I'd blow the budget on an anamorphic adaptor.
Thank you Freezer for all the details, which is much appreciated.
I now understand its better to film 4.3 than 16.9 for a better picture quality, and i am familar with the letter box effect which i have seen on premiere pro 1.5 (never used it though).
The photos are very interesting, especially when enlarged by 200% which clearly shows the difference in picture quality. However, is the fake 16.9 created in post from an orginal 4.3? And is the true 16.9 created by using anamorphic lens, while filming with the 16.9 mode?
I now understand its better to film 4.3 than 16.9 for a better picture quality, and i am familar with the letter box effect which i have seen on premiere pro 1.5 (never used it though).
The photos are very interesting, especially when enlarged by 200% which clearly shows the difference in picture quality. However, is the fake 16.9 created in post from an orginal 4.3? And is the true 16.9 created by using anamorphic lens, while filming with the 16.9 mode?
Ok, last week my Canon ma300 adapter arrived and i noticed there are two XLR connectors which are labeled L and R. Therefore when i plug in the cable from the Sennheiser mic into one of the XLR connectors, for example the XLR connector labelled R, i noticed the audio is then only recorded on the R side.
Do i require a cable that connects into both the XLR L and R, so it records on both L and R?
If i am not making any sense please do let me know?
Do i require a cable that connects into both the XLR L and R, so it records on both L and R?
If i am not making any sense please do let me know?
If I know I'm recording mono, then I select the left input for both channels in my camera settings. You may not have this option. However, if I decide to keep just one channel of audio, after I've finished the recording, I just pan that channel (in post) so that it plays back on both channels.
As long as you get your audio recorded clearly (on the left, right, or both channels), you'll have no problem manipulating it in post and getting what you want from it.
As long as you get your audio recorded clearly (on the left, right, or both channels), you'll have no problem manipulating it in post and getting what you want from it.