We got over 20 messages with essentially the same video sample in our inbox this week. They all touted the new interpolation from the DAIN experimental App or (Depth Aware Video Interpolation App) which now analyses footage with a Neural network AI algorithm that crunches motion vectors and even what seemed impossible before “Object Occlusion” to generate higher frame rates from lower fps sources. The technology is pretty fascinating and should be further improved by more training and samples over the coming years.
For stop motion animators, this is a complete game-changer as now you could animate with as little as 8fps and then interpolate to 30fps or 60fps with very little in the way of tearing and artifacting as long as the footage is well lit and objects clearly defined. To make matters more interesting, it also analyses footage with shallow depth of field yielding impressive results.→ Continue Reading Full Post ←
Now that Panasonic has officially announced the Lumix S5 Full frame camera which we saw as a direct replacement for the GH5 line even when now it seems a GH6 may be in the cards for a future release, it is now time to examine the slow motion modes on the camera to see if they stand a chance at becoming a feature which will be a seller for the new device or just one more feature.
When the GH5 was announced about 3 years ago it came with a 180fps 1080p mode that was better than many camera’s 120fps modes and quickly became our favorite Lumix camera for slow motion as we noticed how the quality of the 240fps mode on the GH5s low light geared camera was heavily inferior in resolution. The GH5 really became the best value along with the G9 for 180fps slow-mo modes in Full HD.→ Continue Reading Full Post ←
Samsung will start shipping to stores the Galaxy Note 20 and Galaxy Note 20 Ultra on August 21, 2020. This new phone is the latest and greatest on their line of ultra-performance devices that offer little compromise at a premium price. It has a 108MP sensor on an f1.8 lens on the Note 20 Ultra 5G version that can do crazy zoom and pixel averaging in low light. The more pixels you record even if they are small let you do more computational photography processing to average noise and artifacts out to end with a crisper lower resolution image that is pleasing and punches above it’s weight.
However, not all is good news since the video mode in Samsung devices when it comes to slow motion has been stalling in the last iterations to a max 960fps mode in HD 720p which is now on this phone an interpolated 480fps mode that is slowed 2x to 960p. This makes the Note 20 line an inferior slow-mo device to even the Galaxy S10 which offers real 960fps. The good thing here is a full second of recording at 480fps on the Note 20 line which translates to 16 seconds playback at 30fps and 32seconds with interpolation.→ Continue Reading Full Post ←
It’s here, yes it is finally here you are not seeing things. In what may be the most anticipated camera release in years, Sony has finally unveiled the a7s III video-centric mirrorless camera. It has all the new performance benefits of processing and AF seen on other Sony bodies but now applied to a 12 Megapixel back-illuminated full-frame sensor geared to shoot pristine 4k and be able to shoot stills as a secondary function. The original 5D from Canon shot 12.8 MP in 2005 when it was introduced and it is still being used out there by many professionals as it was and still is a wedding workhorse. However 15 years later which in the camera world seems like a century, we get a brand new Sony camera with 12MP and that is actually a great thing!
The slow motion on this camera has a lot of good but also some hidden secrets that you should know about before plunking your hard-earned cash. We get what may be the best 120fps 4k footage we have seen in any camera under 10k USD at full 4:2:2 10 bit quality which after looking at the samples left us with nothing but praise to see such a well-executed mode with the added benefit of being able to shoot nearly 1hr worth of it before the camera temperature spoils the party. Excellent performance!→ Continue Reading Full Post ←
Canon has now released the final specs and estimated release dates for the EOS R5 and R6 cameras. There is a lot of good advancement in features especially in video mode as what many believe is an afront to Sony and Panasonic who dominate video recording on ILCs. The R5 can record 24fps and 30fps 8k video or 8192 x 4320 pixels in RAW quality which is a staggering 1TB of storage or 2600 Mbits/s for only 51 minutes of recording time. That means that every hour you will eat up through a full TB of your RAID backup storage. We see this mode being transcoded to an intermediate format like Blackmagic RAW or BRAW or Apple ProRes as soon as possible.
There is more bad news, on the 120fps 4k front there is no other option of recording but All-I which saves every frame independently in 10-bit 4:2:2 which is good for excellent quality but at the cost of 1,880 Mbits/s which is 224MB/sec or 13,447MB / minute of recording time. Better get a ton of memory cards and hard drives ready!→ Continue Reading Full Post ←
Due to reader demand, we are posting new slow motion samples for the Galaxy S20 line. We see just slight improvements over the Galaxy S10 in terms of detail and color but since the phones are the new flagship for the defacto Android international brand, there is a lot of weight in what it can do when it comes to the video mode. There is no secret that Samsung has stagnated in slow motion since the Galaxy S8 and the S20 is an evolutionary step with better reproduction and more intelligent capture but not really groundbreaking.
There is no increase in frame rates above 960fps at 720p and the resolution is not even true 720p as it is jagged and stair-stepped in detailed shots. We kind of see it as a 480p mode upsized to 720p. We do gain a 1 full second record time instead of 0.4sec on the S10 which is a big improvement even when the resolution is still kind of identical. It would have been great if Samsung could have done a solid and created a true 960fps 1080p Full HD Mode. We will have to wait for another crack at it on a future phone.→ Continue Reading Full Post ←
