MZed has just released a new and extensive course on color grading by Ollie Kenchington. This new course is the follow-up to the highly acclaimed “Directing Color” course and aims to give a more in-depth perspective on a colorist’s actual work. Here’s what you need to know. The course starts with an hour-long, very in-depth hands-on tutorial to setting up your grading suite: monitor setup, display choice, appropriate ambient lighting for the room you are working in, as well as neutral grey paint, which of course has to be pigment-free – nothing is left to chance here and Ollie patiently takes us through the whole process. As we progress, we get into working with Resolve, starting with a module on contrast adjustment and one on color balancing (what other courses might consider to be primary and secondary adjustments). Here, we are taken through basic adjustments with lift, gamma and gain controls, the additive RGB color model, and color and luminance perception in general. We also learn how to utilise the scopes and use them to double-check our perceptional biases. All of the hands-on examples shown here are punctuated time and again, as are all the other modules, by short on-topic-interviews with industry professionals like director/cinematographer Brett Danton, colorist Toby Tomkins, cinematographer and fellow MZed educator Philip Bloom, director Sam Buchanan and Oscar-winning make up artist Peter Swords King. Following our basic color corrections, we start working on more advanced topics like continuity (between different cameras, as well as between different takes of the same scene) and skin tones. Ollie gives interesting insights into his workflow, using versions and groups, while utilising color checkers to make matching relatively easy. Finally, we get into the more creative parts of the color grading process with modules on creative looks and film emulation. Ollie goes into some detail here, showing us when, where and how apply LUTs, how to build your own look and how to utilise tools like FilmConvert and Resolve’s own film grain effect. To top it all off, we get a module on working with RAW and how to grade for HDR output. Who is the course for (and who is it not for)? In my opinion, the course would suit two primary groups: DPs, editors or directors who have some experience with color grading and would like to take it more seriously Colorists just starting out or at the early intermediate stages This makes sense, as for total beginners and casual colorists it might seem a little far fetched to invest a few thousands into getting a workable reference monitor and kitting out a proper coloring suite with neutral gray paint and a 6500K light bulb. On the other hand, if you know the van Hurkman books on color correction by heart and only start having fun when you’ve created 30+ nodes per image, then this course might also not be for you, as you will have heard most things mentioned here before. That said, the interviews with industry professionals might be interesting to you even then. What works and what doesn’t I have to say, with regards to other offerings on the market right now, this course is incredibly well put together. Ollie Kenchington gets it right, offering just the right level of theory and background knowledge to be effective, without dragging on about theoretical stuff for ages. His calm and considered presentation nonetheless never gets boring or lifeless, just checking off topics because they are on the list. Rather, you do feel that somebody is teaching you, who not only takes color grading very seriously, but also enjoys the process. The footage used in the examples is of very high quality throughout and the examples are very balanced, being taken from commercial, documentary but also narrative work alike. The same thing goes for the industry interviews. These, of course, provide a very valuable professionals’ perspective, but they also give entertaining insights into the collaboration process with directors and the day to day work of being a colorist. This is not the kind of course that will teach you the ins and outs of every facet of Resolve, rather it aims at being somewhat software-agnostic – this is not a bad thing, just something to know going into it. The module on creative looks could just have been a tiny bit longer for my taste, giving a peek into a little more advanced workflows, with more than just serial nodes. In fairness, this might have been a little too much for this particular course, though. The main thing I actually missed from the course was some seriously bad footage. Most shooters probably won’t be at the level of Brett Danton, working with a production crew, or Philip Bloom, so there might be a shot with seriously blown highlights or noticeable shadow noise here and there. While I understand that including this might bear the danger of encouraging some people’s “fix-it-in-post” mentality, it would nonetheless have been interesting to see just how much you can reasonably expect to achieve when something does go horribly wrong. My last gripe is one with MZed, not really this course in particular (though it does happen here too): the usage of music. While I do understand the impulse to try and maybe keep viewers more engaged or interested, I have to say the way it is utilised doesn’t work for me personally at all. Rather than just having the same confidently playful elevator tune play constantly underneath everything that’s being discussed, I’d strongly suggest only using music to punctuate important parts, or for transitions. That said, I enjoyed the course thoroughly and was able to learn quite a few things that will surely come in handy when grading my next project. All in all, it was a great course that I can recommend whole-heartedly to anyone (in the two groups discussed above) interested in color grading. The course is available now and Mzed is celebrating its launch by offering a chance to win some cool prizes in addition for watching the first module of Ollie’s Mastering Color for free! Head to their competition page to learn more. FULL DISCLOSURE: Ollie Kenchington is my fellow contributing writer at cinema5D. However, I had my Mzed membership long before joining cinema5D and this is my honest evaluation of Ollie’s course. What do you think about this course? Does it fit your interests regarding color grading? Would you be interested in taking it? Let us know in the comments!

In this first-look hands-on review with the long-awaited Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K, we took a close look at all aspects of the camera: Apart from the quality of the footage itself, we judged ergonomics, handling, design as well as low-light and dynamic range performance. Watch above and read below to learn more! The Unicorn Is Here Ever since its announcement at NAB in April this year, the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K has become the most-anticipated camera release of the year. We shot an exclusive interview with Blackmagic Design founder Grant Petty in Las Vegas, where he answered all of our questions about the newly announced device. Blackmagic promised to start shipping the camera in September – and for once, they somewhat managed to keep that promise. Very small numbers of the BMPCC 4K started being shipped out at the end of September, however they are still nowhere close to meeting demand. It seems like production has been somewhat slow, but at least by having had a press loaner for about two weeks we can confirm that it works, and it works really well. Size, Monitor, Handling What’s most striking about the new Pocket 4K is the fact that you need very big pockets. Just like Blackmagic’s URSA Mini was never “mini”, the Pocket 4K doesn’t fit in a pocket. Compared to its predecessor, the very popular Blackmagic Pocket Camera camera, the BMPCC 4K is very large. However, that is thanks to a gorgeous 5 inch multitouch display at the back of the camera. It’s 1080p and brilliant in every way, particularly for a camera that costs so little. It’s super easy to judge focus and the controls are very responsive. What’s missing is a viewfinder, which means loupe adapters like Zacuto’s Z-Finder might have a renaissance. However, as you are required to use the screen with your hands, such a loupe might prove impractical because you will have to take it off constantly in order to be able to control the menus and change most settings. So that only leaves you with adding an external viewfinder to this camera when working out in sunshine (where you really can’t read the screen well). While the screen is really nice and very responsive to any input, it’s unfortunate that Blackmagic decided against a floppy screen or even just a tilt screen – especially because there is no viewfinder as an alternative whatsoever. Very often you find yourself bent over backwards with this camera when you are shooting with it alone without assistants. The BMPCC 4K feels good in the hand when you have large hands like me, but I know that some other people will have a problem with the hefty grip of the camera. There are two microphones left and right of the lens mount which should in theory bring nice stereo sound, however you find yourself touching these microphones all the time when holding the camera, because they are not ideally placed. However if you are aware of it, it’s of course much easier to avoid doing when filming. In terms of menu design, Blackmagic Design is still my personal champion … the menu is so straightforward and easy-to-use that you really never need to touch a manual or anything like that. When you see camera menus like this, you start wondering why all the other (mostly Japanese) camera manufacturers never managed to make straightforward menus where you can actually find stuff more easily. Battery Life The BMPCC 4K uses Canon LP-E6 type batteries. The same standard as the 5D Mark II and III, and many many other popular Canon cameras. This is a nice move since it means that you can continue using your old batteries. However, the power management of the camera seems to be quite poor. At random times below 20% charge, the camera actually simply shuts off without warning. Also, a battery also typically only lasts 35-45 minutes, which isn’t long at all. We recommend using an external power solution like for example the Core SWX Powerbase EDGE with a dummy battery, which can last you many hours, if not a full day! It makes your footprint with the camera bit bigger, but also more powerful and reliable. Core SWX Powerbase EDGE Battery for Blackmagic Design Pocket Cinema Camera 4K Sensor and Sensitivity The BMPCC 4K comes with a MFT sensor that is supposed to be quite light sensitive, with a dual ISO of 400 and 3200. In my video test I could verify that these two ISO values were indeed the two with the least amount of noise in the picture. If you are aiming for high quality images, I would not shoot beyond ISO 6400, however I think it’s totally acceptable to do so for documentary or other reality content. The noise of the sensor is quite pleasant and should be fairly easy to get rid of using de-noise in DaVince Resolve (which, by the way, comes for free with the camera in its Studio version – the normal version is free anyhow). This camera is miles better than the original Pocket camera when it comes to low light, and it’s a lot better than many others in the market. During the shoot of the intro of this review, we were losing light rapidly as all of this was shot after sunset in the woods. With a 25mm MFT f/1.2 lens from Olympus, I was able to get exposure by increasing the ISO progressively, with the lens always wide open. As you can see above, even the ISO 16,000 shots are tolerable, albeit noisy. Codecs, Resolutions and Frame Rates What sets Blackmagic cameras apart is the fact that they record RAW and various flavours of ProRes, as opposed to highly compressed proprietary codecs like most other manufacturers. That means 12-bit RAW recorded internally in a camera, and that is a big deal – especially at this price point. The Pocket 4K cannot record in Blackmagic RAW yet (we have reported about it in an interview with Blackmagic here), but it records RAW in DNG sequences (which is of course data intense!) However, the RAW images end up being 12bit, while ProRes HQ is only 10-bit (which is still much better than what 90% of professional cameras in the market can do). What’s impressive is the capability to record up to 60fps in full quality in 4K. Only when you want to go even higher with your frame rates, you have to switch to 1080p and activate a dedicated “sensor crop” button. Under that sensor crop, you are then able to record 120 frames per second. Dynamic Range Tests and Questions … Our technical expert Gunther Machu ran a couple of cinema5D Lab Tests with the BMPCC 4K before it had to go back to the manufacturer. Before you read on, in case you haven’t read it yet, please look at our recent article explaining the methodology of our lab tests – here’s the link. The result: 11.6 stops of dynamic range for a signal to noise ratio of 2 (12.7 stops for a signal to noise ratio of 1) at ISO 400 (10.5 and 11.8 stops for ISO3200), in ProRes 4K DCI 25p. Interestingly, when we tested the same DCI 4K 25p RAW (1:1) we found that the dynamic range reading was lower (by about a half stop). Only when we selected the “highlight recovery” option in DaVinci Resolve and then exported frame grabs into IMATEST we got similar results to ProRes. This is a bit strange, because we tested also the old Pocket Cinema Camera and it had the same dynamic range reading in ProRes and RAW – and when we enabled the “highlight recovery” option in Resolve, we actually got about 0.6 stops higher DR in RAW that with ProRes. How come that the DR of the new Pocket 4K is lower in RAW, and only matched ProRes when “highlight recovery” is selected in Resolve? Is ProRes doing this HL recovery automatically? We reached out to Blackmagic Design, and received a reply very promptly: Reply from Andy Buckland, Blackmagic Design (after a call with Gunther Machu): The Pocket Cinema Camera 4K uses our new demosaic algorithm developed with Blackmagic RAW, before encoding to ProRes. This new algorithm helps to reduce noise and improve the dynamic range in ProRes capture. With Cinema DNG RAW, the demosaic is still performed in DaVinci Resolve. That enables full control and manipulation over debayer settings, noise reduction, and highlight recovery to increase the dynamic range measurement beyond that of ProRes.   By applying minimal temporal noise reduction to the Cinema DNG RAW files in DaVinci Resolve – the lower steps on the waveform can be cleaned up nicely, bringing the available dynamic range of RAW in line with those seen in your ProRes tests. Then by enabling highlight recovery, the available dynamic range in Cinema DNG RAW increases beyond that of ProRes.   ProRes users benefit from the new debayer algorithm in terms of dynamic range and reduced noise at capture, resulting in a faster turnaround. RAW users benefit from the full control and manipulation of the image, to decide which parameters they would like to tweak and finesse. Conclusion There are many more things to say about the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K, but please do watch the video if you haven’t seen it yet, as many things are covered there in more detail. Blackmagic really did their homework with this one and listened to as many customers as possible when designing the successor to their original Pocket Camera. The image out of it is beautiful and “cinematic”, the dynamic range is better than the one of similar cameras in the market right now, and it’s just very enjoyable shooting with it. It’s not a perfect camera of course, but it has a lot to offer. I can’t wait to took a much closer look at the camera soon. What do you think about the BMPCC 4K? Did you pre-order one, and are you still waiting for it? Please let us know in the comments below. 

In this guest review, Vienna-based filmmaker Florian Gintenreiter takes a close look at this combination: the FUJIFILM X-T3 on a DJI Ronin-S. Intrigued? Read on for his hands-on impressions. FUJIFILM X-T3 – DJI Ronin S combo My preordered DJI Ronin-S came in late July and I only had my FUJIFILM X-T2 to put on the gimbal and play a bit, but the XT-2’s weak internal codec (8-Bit 4:2:2 @ 100MBit/s) was prohibitive for professional work, so I waited for my ordered Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K to arrive but it hasn’t been delivered to this date (yes I know I am not alone waiting for it!). Then — much to my surprise — FUJIFILM’s awesome X-T3 camera came out, which sports an internal codec that’s vastly superior to the X-T2, great focus-tracking and got a sleuth of other video-related improvements. I decided to upgrade from my trusty X-T2 and ordered FUJIFILM’s new flagship camera. Check out Johnnie’s hands-on review and footage from the X-T3 here in case you missed it.  FUJIFILM X-T3 equipped with the XF 16-55 f2.8 zoom lens FUJIFILM X-T3 on DJI Ronin-S Apart from our own review, the internet is full with reviews and tests of X-T3’s video and stills capabilities, so in this article I chose to focus on its usability on the DJI Ronin-S gimbal (which was also reviewed on cinema5D in an extensive hands-on and tutorial review here already). As soon as the X-T3 arrived I slapped it onto the DJI Ronin-S and started experimenting. The camera together with the FUJIFILM XF 16-55 f2.8 zoom lens was quickly balanced and handled easily by the gimbal’s strong motors. That’s the setup I took out on a first commercial job. The FUJIFILM X-T3’s vastly improved autofocus-system with enhanced face and eye detection, made it fairly easy to use on the gimbal. Of course the focus slipped here and there, but overall autofocus helped a great deal. Controlling Light I personally don’t like to use vari-NDs because they’re basically polarising filters that can make skin look waxen, the sky unevenly exposed and introduce other strange artifacts. Instead, I used a set of Gobe 77mm screw-on ND filters consisting of ND2, ND4 and ND8 on the FUJIFILM XF 16-55 f2.8 lens. They’re great because filters can be combined, and in addition, the lens sun hood can still be used and the lens-cap can be put on top of the filter. This filter set up helped me to keep the shutter speed at around 1/50 and get a decent low working f-stop. The first shoot with the FUJIFILM X-T3/Ronin-S combo went well, but two things became evident fairly soon: The gimbal is a rather heavy beast and needs to be handled with both hands using its foldable tripod as an extension of its grip. Even though the XT-3’s screen can be viewed when it is on the gimbal (which is further helped by its ability to tilt up and down), its is small and its visibility is rather poor outdoors SmallHD Focus monitor A monitor is needed The DJI Ronin-S lacks mounting points, so I cobbled something together with rig-parts I had lying around to mount my Atomos Shogun Inferno to the Ronin. Then, I installed the F-Log to Rec.709 LUT which is provided by FUJIFILM on their website onto the Shogun. That made it possible to more precisely expose F-Log, while monitoring the image with correct colors and contrast. I took this setup out on the second commercial job and it worked even better, although the Shogun’s additional weight made the rig hard to operate for a longer duration. Recording Externally on Shogun Inferno – Dropping Frames EDIT: Atomos just responded to my support ticket in a most helpful way and are working with me to narrow down the problem. Everything points to the fact that despite me using HDMI 2.0 cables they might be too slow or poorly shielded to handle the 10Bit data stream from the FUJIFILM X-T3.  I will keep you posted on any progress. As the Shogun is also a recorder I tried to record the XT-3’s 4:2:2 10Bit HDMI output to the device for even higher quality files than its internal 10Bit 4:2:0 recording, but I ran into some problems there. The Shogun kept dropping frames. I tested two different HDMI cables and ruled out the SSD I recorded to as culprits. The recordings were missing frames every couple of seconds. Fortunately I recorded everything to the XT-3’s internal cards and those recordings were fine! Through cinema5D I made FUJIFILM aware of the issue and they promised to look into it.  Also, I have informed Atomos about the problem and they have asked for details to be able to work on the problem, which I have provided. Let’s see if and when this gets fixed. It’s also possible that my XT-3 has some sort of hardware problem on the HDMI-out as I have not found anyone with a similar problem on the web. (Or maybe no one is recording externally)…. As a side note, the XT-3 formats its cards with the FAT16 file system so file size is limited to 4GB, which is about 1:22 minutes at 4K 25p 400MBit/s. For longer recordings it will split the clip into 4GB chunks that need to be stitched together in post. That’s a nuisance, but it’s frame-accurate. Because of the dropped frames, recording from the XT-3 externally is not an option for me at the moment, so I decided to stick with recording internally for the time being. The footage out-of-camera is very solid and the quality difference to Atomos recorded ProRes422HQ is negligible for my purposes. I would’t be confident doing green screen work though. SmallRig’s side handle Pimping the Ronin-S As with the X-T3, a lot has been published about the Ronin-S gimbal itself, so I won’t go into any details here. (See Nino’s full Ronin-S review and tutorial here). In a nutshell, it is an awesome piece of equipment, which plays well with the FUJIFILM X-T3 even though it is currently not yet supported to be controlled by the gimbal. When it comes to Pimping the Ronin-S, Chinese accessories company SmallRig has designed a side-handle for the Ronin that made my makeshift Shogun contraption obsolete and the Ronin much more comfortable to operate. On top of the grip is a cold-shoe and a few 1/4 and 3/8 inch mounting points for adding accessories. Because of the Shogun’s weight and problems to record the XT-3’s output I got the small, lightweight SmallHD Focus monitor and attached it to the handgrip’s cold-shoe mounting point. The SmallHD Focus — with its ability to put a LUT on the image, numerous image analysis tools like false colour, peaking, waveform, its quick touch-interface and its low weight — is the perfect monitor for being used on the Ronin. I just had to mount it upside-down, so its own bracket would be clear of the Ronin’s handle. Future Improvements Camera: I hope that FUJIFILM will consider changing the X-T3 internal recording files system to FAT32. This will allow for clips to be larger than 4GB, which will make the X-T3 an even more useful camera in general. I will also be looking into the possibility of powering the camera from the gimbal — it should be possible because the Ronin has power-taps built-in. Gimbal: I hope that DJI will add support for the X-T3 for at least start/stop control and one-shot AF. I don’t know if that’s possible but maybe they could even add support for the manual-focus-wheel like it has for the Panasonic GH5. There is already a thread in DJIs forums about that. I made sure to second the request for a FUJIFILM support there and if you’re interested in the combo, maybe you will too. DJI has announced a few accessories for the Ronin-S that have the potential to make the device even more useful: A separate battery charger, a cheese-plate, a command unit, a top-bracket, a GPS unit and most interestingly a focus-motor that can be controlled via the Ronin’s focus-knob. Nothing of this has come out yet. But the focus motor has me interested! Last but not least, I decided to get the SmallRig cage for the X-T3, which makes it possible to add an HDMI cable clamp to protect the rather flimsy micro HDMI port of the XT-3. The additional weight is not a problem for the Ronin-S. A Word on Editing For maximum quality I have recorded everything in 4K using the H.265 10Bit 4:2.0 400MBit/s all Intra codec. Even though I’m using a 18 core iMacPro with the Radeon Vega Pro GPU and a fast RAID, my system struggles with the codec, so I transcode to »Optimized Media« inside FinalCutProX or DaVinci Resolve respectively to get smooth editing speeds. FUJIFILM X-T3 – DJI Ronin S combo Conclusion This DJI Ronin/ FUJIFILM X-T3-Rig combination is something that I’m confident now to take out on any shoot. The XT-3’s really good autofocus that includes face and even eye tracking makes it a breeze to use on the Ronin even without a focus puller and a wireless focus system, which makes it ideal for one-man-band shooters. I intend to have the X-T3 and the Ronin in my trusty bus to keep handy for those jobs where budget does not allow for a larger gimbal or Steadicam, which to my opinion, it can not fully replace, yet… Are you using either the Ronin-S or the X-T3 already? Are you combining the two too? Let us know in the comments below! 

As many of you are well aware, the cinema5D lab was built up a few years ago, and huge efforts were put into detailed camera tests concerning dynamic range, sharpness, rolling shutter etc … No new measurements were done in a while, but now we decided to start again, in a step by step manner, building on this foundation. Therefore, as a first activity we are bringing back the dynamic range measurements. This article is intended to describe the workflow and also philosophy of our test and should serve as a reference for those readers who want to engage / contribute to our method and findings. Dynamic Range Measurements – the Conundrum To the best of the author’s knowledge there is no industry standard available for movie cameras, and even the most simplistic definitions are vague as you will see quickly (there is an ISO 15739:2003 standard for digital still picture cameras though from which we will borrow some of our terms and definitions). That has left a lot of room for interpretation and also allows each camera manufacturer to publish numbers which are not always directly comparable between the cameras. Because dynamic range of a camera is an important feature our target here is to establish an independent base reference benchmark which allows direct comparison between the various cameras on the market. What is the Dynamic Range of a Camera? The dynamic range of a camera can be simplistically defined as the ratio of the maximum and minimum luminance that a camera can capture. Sounds good, but how to quantify the term “capture”? The ability of a camera to capture highlight detail is quite obvious, but the problem starts in the shadow details – here, noise starts to kick in quickly and we are left with room for interpretation which kind of noise is still usable or not – at this point, let’s talk quickly about sensor noise and signal to noise ratio (SNR). Noise is the random reported variation of luminance of pixels compared to their actual luminance value. Therefore, below a certain base luminance the image may be so corrupted by noise that we cannot really say that detail in the shadows is captured accurately or that image detail is usable. The ISO 15739:2003 standard is helpful here as it defines a signal to noise ratio of 1 as being the threshold value for dynamic range measurements. However experience shows that for movie cameras a signal to noise ratio of 2 (or a root mean square value of noise RMS = 0.5 = 1/SNR) is a more conservative approach leading to “usable” shadow detail. Lucky for us the ARRI ALEXA factory dynamic range statement of 14 stops seems to correspond very well to the 0.5 = 1/ SNR equation as past cinema5d results showed, hence we will continue to use this threshold value to determine the dynamic range of different cameras. The Testing Procedure We are using a DSC labs Xyla 21 backlit transmissive chart in a completely dark room, which provides 21 stops of dynamic range. This chart is filmed offcenter from the horizontal axis (to avoid lens flare) using the following methodology:  At the highlight (left) end we hard clip the first two patches, then stop down until the second patch is on the cusp of clipping.  Now we have 2 methods to identify the dynamic range: a) a visual inspection of a waveform plot and the recorded patch image b) IMATEST: we export frames from the video file and run it through the IMATEST software which calculates a numerical value for the dynamic range using advanced image analysis algorithms (see http://www.imatest.com/docs/stepchart/). While transmissive tests are the simplest/most accurate/comparable tests of dynamic range, they also give us very little information regarding how the camera responds to colors and detail across that range. Hence, it is just one piece of information out of many other factors when making a judgement about a camera. Visual Inspection and the IMATEST Software Results As the first patch is clipped, but the second is still within range, we start to count visually from this second patch downwards, hence from patch two to three is your first stop, from 3 to 4 is your second stop, and so on. So far so good. At the shadow end, a visual inspection is more difficult as we have to count until the last discernable stop sticking out from the noise floor. See figure 2 below from the Sony FS7 (SLOG3 10bit internal, values scaled to 8bit), which I tested again among other cameras to ensure consistency with past measurements. The noise is (visually) indicated by the red line, and if we count all clearly discernible stops from the noise floor we get about 12 stops, maybe a bit more. Fig. 2: Sony FS7 SLOG3 step chart waveform plot (from Premiere Pro). Cleary discernible is the noise floor (indicated by the red line). Every patch clearly sticking out from the noise floor is a „usable“ stop, giving us about 12 stops range. Now there is of course some ambiguity in the visual method (where exactly is the noise floor?), and here is where the IMATEST software comes in very handy. Our Workflow using IMATEST: Using the FFMPEG library we extract the highest quality I-frames directly from the video file, using this command (thereby avoiding any influence of an editing system):  ffmpeg -i videofile.mov -vf „select=eq(pict_type\,I)“ -vsync vfr framegrab%04d.tiff  Those high quality tiff framegrabs are imported into IMATEST, and the region of interest is selected: Fig. 3: patch image from the video file, selection of region of interest in IMATEST IMATEST will then analyse each patch via advanced algorithms to calculate signal to noise ratios and then spits out the following chart (among a lot of other stuff) –  the dynamic range for various SNR values: Fig. 4: IMATEST Result plot for the Sony FS7 For the Sony FS7 IMATEST spits out a dynamic range value of 12.1 stops for 1/SNR = 0.5, and 13 stops for a SNR value of 1. Also, the software identified 17.7 discernible patches. Hence, the Cinema5d dynamic range value for the Sony FS7 is 12.1 in UHD (3840×2160). Image Downscaling One word about image scaling: if you scale the Sony FS7 image from UHD to full HD (1920×1080), you get an increased dynamic range in IMATEST of about 0.3 stops in the Sony FS7 example (resulting in 12.4 stops), as the downscaling averages 4 UHD pixels into 1 FHD pixel thus lowering the noise. Another argument for 4k acquisition and 2k delivery. What happens by downscaling and how is the dynamic range increased? Well, the signal value of four neighboring pixels has a high degree of correlation (luminance will be roughly the same), whereas noise for those pixels in general should show no correlation as it is random.  Now, by downscaling (or averaging) four pixels of an 3840×2160 image to 1 pixel of an 1920×1080 image the signal value should stay very much the same, but the noise value will reduce because noise is random (uncorrelated), hence averaging (or in mathematical terms the root mean square value of noise which is measured in the recorded image) scales with the inverse square root of the number of samples that we average. Hence 4 pixels into 1 gives a factor of two (sqrt(4)=2) higher signal to noise (SNR) ratio. Higher signal to noise ratio for a given luminance = higher dynamic range.   Scaling for our testing is also done using the ffmpeg library (libswscale) to avoid any influence of the editing software. The nice part about IMATEST is the fact, that all analyses are based on pure mathematics and not subjective opinions. Also, as long as 1 patch is clearly clipped you can underexpose / overexpose the stepchart and IMATEST will still give you the same result within a few percent difference. I did a lot of tests recently with the software and retested the Sony FS7, the Sony A7sII, the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, the GH5, GH5s and the FUJI X-T2 / X-T3 to make sure I can reproduce all past results – a very interesting experience, as it gives a lot of insight on the capabilities of the different sensors, and also manufacturer’s claims. So here is a table of those recent results for your convenience (the ARRI ALEXA values are from past testing, but reproduced here as a reference too): Fig. 5: table of recent testing results (exception: ALEXA values for reference from past cinema5d  testing). The value in bold on the right side of the table is the cinema5d dynamic range rating.               Manufacturers will probably use the less strict ISO15739:2003 SNR = 1 definition (signal value equals noise) as it gives a higher dynamic range reading. As can be seen from the results above, for this definition in the highest native resolution the Panasonic GH5s would be a 12 stop camera, the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera a 12.5 stop camera, etc…  One more thing: in the beginning of the article, the definition of the dynamic range was given as the ratio of maximum to minimum luminance the camera can capture – IMATEST will also spit out a “patch range” value which is the maximum number of patches that IMATEST was able to discern (not shown in figure 5). Here, for example the GH5s value was about 14.7 detected patches, and the Sony FS7 value is 17.7 (see figure 4).  Hence, whenever a dynamic range reading of a camera is stated be aware that it only makes sense if also a clearly stated noise threshold value for this dynamic range result is given. Last but not least, never forget that also the objective results of the IMATEST software will just be a relative value. Some cameras with advanced codecs allow you to still retrieve image detail from the noise floor with advanced post processing, while others don’t. So don’t be discouraged by a better / or lower dynamic range value of this or that camera, at the end it is still the guy behind the camera who makes the film ;-) As a summary, we hope that you will find our results helpful, and we are looking forward to include dynamic range measurements again for future camera reviews! What do you think? Let us know in the comments below.

Hot on the heels of Canon’s EOS R announcement, FUJIFILM have just announced their new camera, the X-T3. If I’m not mistaken, it is the first APS-C sensor size mirrorless camera that records in 10-Bit internally. We were lucky enough to get our hands on a production model to check its video capabilities. If you are short of time, let me start with my conclusion. The X-T3 is the BEST camera FUJIFILM have ever presented, when it comes to video performance. Interested in finding out more?  FUJIFILM X-T3 A bit of History If you’ve been following the development of FUJIFILM’s cameras, I’m sure you have noticed that something very interesting is happening. From the moment the company has noticed that shooting video with large sensor mirrorless cameras is much in demand, they responded by fulfilling that demand and since then haven’t stopped refining their products. The X-T2 was their first camera to include 4K recording and F-Log picture profile (Externally first and then internally via a firmware update). Then, the X-H1 came and brought even more possibilities for the creative video shooter: In-Body Stabilisation System, Internal F-Log recording and the ETERNA film simulation picture profile, just to name a few. (See my FUJIFILM X-H1 review here). An easy way to identify what codec you are using by looking at the LCD   FUJIFILM X-T3 at ISO 8000. On top and bottom of the picture, an ungraded parts FUJIFILM X-T3, What is new (in no particular order) Now, there is a new kid in the block, one that – in my humble opinion – surpasses both, the X-T2 and X-H1 in terms of video performance. FUJIFILM have listened carefully to feedback given by filmmakers and created their best ever video orientated mirrorless camera. Including a completely new sensor and the processor behind it, led to some fundamental progress. So what is there to be so excited about? Here is a complete list of enhancements – some to be found for the first time inside any of FUJIFILM’s cameras: (Besides the H264 codec), the camera is now equipped with a new H265 codec (When a manufacturer decides on implementing 10-Bit internal recording and yet at the same time stick to a modestly priced recording media, H265 is the obvious choice) A choice between two different types of compressions. Long GOP/ALL Inter 4K, 10-Bit, ALL Intra, 4:2:0, 400Mbps internal recording (Up to 30p) 4K/60p (in H264 mode), up to 200Mbps External 4:2:2 10-Bit recording via HDMI Excellent autofocus system (Working well in lowlight conditions and slow-motion too). In addition, “Eye detection/Face detection” focusing method is functioning in video mode too Zebra pattern Simultaneous support for 4K/60P 4:2:2 10-Bit HDMI output and 4K/60P 4:2:0 10-Bit internal SD card recording The headphone jack is now built into the camera body itself, no need to purchase the camera grip for that purpose Good Rolling Shutter performance. We have measured 9ms in 4K/25p recording mode, placing the camera above FUJIFILM’s own X-T2 Good Dynamic Range. With 11.2 stops of DR, this little camera is doing rather well against its competitors. High Frame Rate Recording. The camera can do up to 120 frames per second in Full HD mode. Due to some internal changes made by FUJIFILM, the result when shooting slow-motion is better than what can be found in the X-T2 or X-H1. Mind you that the only downside when comparing that feature to the other two cameras is the greater crop factor . (1.29X vs 1.17X  ) Improved lowlight capabilities. FUJIFILM worked their magic on that front too and one can shoot comfortably up to ISO 8000. In some conditions, ISO 12,800 can be used too.  Full HD now supports double the data rate of the X-T2 and X-H1 (200Mbps vs 100Mbps) No sensor crop factor when shooting in 4K mode up to 30p. When Shooting 4K/50/60p the crop factor is 1.18X New and improved noise reduction processing Future firmware update will bring HLG HDR picture profile (BT2100) New EVF diopter lock. Small thing but very useful… Not new but worth mentioning, as so many other manufacturers are struggling to get it right: In video mode, all the related photo functions in the menu are greyed out, making it easy to concentrate on the video menu items Front tally light (A useful feature that can be found with the X-H1. Nice to see that it migrated to the X-T3). Dynamic Range Comparison   Rolling shutter chart. The X-T3 is doing well! What Could be Improved:  While there is an overall improvement in regards to the camera specifications and performance, it suffers from the absence of the following: No internal body stabilisation system. Obviously, a  smaller camera body has to accommodate a smaller IBIS mechanism which apparently was not available at the time of releasing the camera. (If I may guess, some extra functionality is needed to be reserved for the future X-H family of cameras). As with all other FUJIFILM cameras in this category, the LCD screen cannot be swivelled. (Tilted only). If you think that this type of feature should be found at lower end cameras only, think twice. This is the age of mobility and “selfies”. With such a great autofocus system, a camera with a swivelled LCD screen could have appealed to a greater number of users. Camera start time (In video mode) is too slow Some of the menu quirks that were found in the X-T2 and X-H1 were inherited by the new camera. For example, by pressing an assigned button to digitally “zoom in” for easier focusing confirmation, when starting to record, the enlarged portion of the picture will NOT “jump” back in to the actual recording perspective. The result – especially when shooting “documentary style” – can be disturbing… In long recording sessions, be prepared to have many short video clips. With such a high data rate, ALL intra, 10-Bit recording, a single video file will reach its 4GB FAT32 limit quickly 20 minutes recording time limit when shooting in 4K/50-60p but the good news is, when shooting  4K/24/25/30p the actual recording time has been increased to 29:59 min WITHOUT the grip, as opposed to only 10 mins on the X-T2″ Man at work during lousy weather with the X-T3. Photo credit: Arturs Slosbergs In the Field: By now I can say that I’ve collected enough X-T3 hours in order to share that this is a well thought through camera that has one major limitation, the exclusion of an Internal Body Stabilization System.  Once you work with such a feature you actually don’t want to look back. Other than that, this is a very easy camera to work with. Please allow me to highlight some of my favourite features: In manual focus mode, the ability to tap on the screen and instantly get an accurate focus The autofocus is simply incredible. It is fast and accurate. I’ve challenged it with fast moving airplanes and 95% of the time it worked very well. I love the ETERNA film simulation picture profile. If you need to deliver nice looking results fast, don’t hesitate using this profile. The only thing that prevented me from using it during the video above, is its reduced Dynamic Range. (We’ve measured 9 stops of DR vs. 11.2 stops when using F-Log). On such a cloudy day, I needed every extra stop so the decision was easy…. Sound quality. In the above video, I did not use the internal audio recording option as my system was wireless and suffered from some interferences, but overall, the sound quality coming out of this little camera is impressive. There are enough buttons to assign different purposes to. On top, the LCD screen can serve as 4 “additional buttons”. Just assign a movement to it (Up, down, left, right) and there you go with additional functionality. The current slow motion option is truly nice. (1080 up to 120fps). I was surprised to see how well it was upscaling into my 4K timeline. The native camera ISO is 640. In case you are stuck outdoor with no ND filter around, there is a way to lower the ISO all the way down to 160 (at the expense of DR) I’m sure that many of you are wondering if I had any overheating issues. Well, during my work I did not encounter such a problem, but saying that, only time can tell if this issue actually exists. FUJIFILM X-T3. Photo credit:Arturs Slosbergs Conclusion  It is no secret that FUJIFILM is heavily invested in making affordable cinema lenses for E (Sony) and X (FUJIFILM) mounts (MK and MKX series of lenses). In my opinion, this is guaranteeing us that FUJIFILM will not stop here. Further more, by introducing the first ever APS-C sensor size camera that can shoot 10-Bit video internally, FUJIFILM is positioning itself at the forefront and becoming a serious candidate to consider when thinking of shooting video on a mirrorless camera. It is one of those companies that have no higher video market share to protect and as such, they are free to move forward as fast as their R&D capabilities and budget allows. This particular camera should get some love and attention from the filmmakers community. For the users who are heavily invested in lenses from other brands, I can only hope that some sort of a program can be established by FUJIFILM or alternatively, some other solution can be found in order to make people actually try it. We hear a lot about the love for a particular  “color science”. This camera can easily produce “analogue looking” images and further more, if you take photos with it, in my opinion, it is the one that looks less digital. FUJIFILM X-T3 Movie Recording Modes About the Above Video The shooting conditions at Radom airshow were FAR from being perfect. Rain, clouds and lots of noise made it challenging to execute, but all in all the camera performed well. On a few occasions, the camera froze and I had to turn it off and on again in order to revive it, but I could not isolate the problem. (It happened during shooting in different frame rates and resolutions). I want to believe that using a non-final firmware version was the issue. (It will be useful to hear about that from other users, in case they face a similar problem after getting the camera with the final firmware version installed).  Camera Settings F-Log picture profile. Sharpness and Noise Reduction turned down to -4, Mainly H265, ALL Intra 400Mbps DCI 4K/25p. (At times I’ve used H264 codec, 4K50p, 1080/100p). Grading is a very subjective thing… I chose FilmConvert for this job. (FJ Prov 100). Some shots were stabilized in post. You can Download an ungraded version of this video for you to explore and grade by clicking here. Edited on Adobe Premiere CC latest edition.  Lenses/Filter used FUJINON XF 100-400mm 4.5-5.6 R LM OIS, FUJIFNON XC 15-45mm f/3.5-5.6 OIS PZ,  FUJINON XF 16-55mm f/2.8 R LM WR,  FUJINON XF 10-24mm f/4 R OIS, FUJINON XF 8-16mm f/2.8 R LM WR, Heliopan 82mm Variable Gray ND Filter (This filter tends to soften the image a bit, but I like it as it kills the “video harshness”) The music used in the video above is courtesy of Music Vine. Get 20% off with code C5D20 (valid until 31st March 2019). Music tracks: “a new tomorrow” by Clemens Ruh, “Blood and sand” by Monobox, “Discovery” by ak, “Fires on the horizon” by This patch of sky, “Skyride” by Josh Stewart The Baltic Bees Jet team – Photo credit: Arturs Slosbergs A special thanks to the entire Baltic Bees team (Pilots, technicians, Arturs and Laura). Without their support it wouldn’t have been possible to complete this project. Head to www.balticbees.com to learn about their activities. By the way, if you are a pilot and looking to join an aerobatic team, drop me a line and I’ll connect you to the guys. What do you think about the new FUJIFILM X-T3 camera. Do you find it interesting enough for shooting video? Share with us your thoughts in the comment section below.