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Nikon D4. The new king with uncompressed HDMI output.
  • 208 Replies sorted by
  • @Aria - I've heard otherwise (that VG10 actually gives a cleaner picture than VG20/5n). I don't care too much about it though - because If any of those, I use a 5n.

  • I wish that some of the features of D4 the GH2 had , :-( especially HDMI, great remote control (ipad, iphone, ...) hope Panasonic will learn something from this before they come out with GH3. Very excited!

  • New video, for now I don't have any idea about the quality with that ugly ugly youtube compression. Can't these corporate shooters put in on some better place for better viewing quality. The second thing is this ultra low dof the 5d and Philip Bloom popularized, ugly, ugly distracting, fed up with those faces where just part of it are in focus. In this case as he moves many times it is his mustache that is in focus and the rest of this face blurry. When you see an interview and when the subject eyes/connection are most of the time not in focus and his mustache is!!! See some aliasing and the image seem to suffer a lot from over-sharpening/edge enhancement, don't know if it is the camera, youtube or the setting from the people that edited it.

  • It looks bad.

    Original footage: http://www.mediafire.com/?4nla03itio1m81j

    image

    image

    Nikon just lost £4 grand from me, and I am sure I am not the only one.

  • Nikon just lost £4 grand from me

    I laughted very loud :-)

  • How can Nikon lose £4 grand if they haven't gotten anything from @eoshd yet? :)

  • I don't know that this video alone is enough to really judge the cameras qualities on. I didn't like the Bokeh of this lens, nor the overuse of DOF. Didn't like the look of the oversharpened edges either. The Aliasing was the LEAST of my concerns and I didn't really find it to be a visual distraction as much as the other factors mentioned previously.

    To be honest, i'm more interested in how the technology will filter down into their APS-C cameras, more so than the FF body. I think APS-C has the right level of DOF for my work. Still I need more evidence of what this cameras real capabilities are before making a real judgment.

  • The core issue is what you get from the hdmi output. This particular footage was pretty highly compressed in itself (although it showed clear signs of bad downscaling). Is the scaling handled the same way for the hdmi output? Who knows.

    Only a thorough video review will reveal the full picture.

  • That does look pretty bad EOSHD. Where did you get the "origional" from out of curiosity, just to discount it from being poor recompression.

    Also, why are the frame sizes 1920x1200?

  • and why is the pixel aspect ratio 0.75:1 ???

    A number of shots also have a bad frame rate/shutter speed soap opera look that makes me think Joe doesn't know video(although he might).

  • For all the critique that Canon got for the overpriced C300. One has to admit that they know how to promote their gear. They did make the most of the camera, even made a 8 bit camera accepted by some DP Hollywood or at least promoted by them. Now Mr Nikon should use some proper film guy to do its promotion. No photographer that think he is doing still and that his subject is not going to move. How difficult is it to comprehend that a human being is going to move and that choosing a 2o cm dof is much better than a 2 cm one, more so when you have a straight talking head.

  • @EOSHD

    Where did the footage come from? That doesn't look anything close to straight-outta-camera (raw) material...

  • "That does look pretty bad EOSHD. Where did you get the "origional" from out of curiosity, just to discount it from being poor compression."

    Was posted to my forum http://www.eoshd.com/comments/index.php/topic,210.0.html

    "Also, why are the frame sizes 1920x1200?"

    First is a screen grab from VLC on my Macbook.

    I don't deny it is more heavily compressed than straight out of camera. But I can tell what is poor compression and what is bad downscaling.

    WHY was also very soft. Looked no better than my Nikon J1 with Expeed 3 for detail. And yes, D4 is also Expeed 3, but it seems, with slower sensor which allows for less sampling of data per frame (= poor downscaling).

    The file is 1080p. Look at the initial titles, they are pixel perfect.

    Just my opinion, nothing final, but yes Nikon just lost £4,000 from me!! Unless the final release footage is miraculously different, which I don't see how it can be.

  • @eoshd Why are you always so stupid? Judge the real output not some stupid transcode from a photographer who doesn't know shit about video.

  • You are fucking stupid @sohus to think my judgement is final. I have said again and again that I am under no illusions that all this footage came from - the web in a compressed format - and not direct from the card. It is also, probably, pre-release firmware. All I am doing is judging what we have at the moment. This may change when the camera itself gets released.

    And if you will, show me the proof that the D4 is doing such a wonderful image... Good luck finding it.

    "Stupid transcode from a photographer who doesn't know shit about video"

    Are you saying every single photographer Nikon asked to shoot video on the D4 doesn't know how to export 1080p properly?

  • @sohus

    LoL.... tell us how you REALLY feel.

    People have a tendency to be very sensational, I agree.

    I've heard people coming back from CES saying that the D4 footage looked pretty bang on though, people who's opinions I really do trust right here in my backyard. We had one on order but decided to pass because for now... I'm still looking forward to actually getting footage straight out of cam.

  • EOSHD, 124MB's for 4minutes of 1080p video doesn't seem to be a good indication of quality. I think for detail, compression is ruining the screen grabs. Do you know where the poster got the file from? For all we know it could just be ripped from youtube (using something like saveyoutube.com), I think saying that it was "original" is disingenuous, given you don't know where it came from.

    I would agree that there is aliasing showing up on details such as the strings. When watching on youtube 1080p, I only noticed it on one take though. Luckily, I never saw any color moire even in your frame grabs.

    I guess we'll have to wait until we can actually get straight out of camera shots.

  • @joesiv Yeah, I know. It is compressed. But 'Why', which wasn't as heavily compressed, had the same softness.

    I completely agree we'll wait but as I have already said it does't look good. And a low bitrate for YouTube does not cause aliasing.

  • I was at CES. On a 60 inch HDTV the D4 footage looked pretty stunning. As far as Sohus statement about photographers - I generally agree. You need to get some professional filmmakers, and some professional post house with a professional color suite to make Hollywood films, otherwise you are making indie films and attempting to imitate hollywood films or do your own style. The same could be said of Bollywood films or Hong Kong Films - a lot goes into those, more than one person shooting, editing, and coloring the film themselves. This is not to discourage the independent producer, but rather to tell people not to expect Hollywood results from non-hollywood style filmmakers.

    That being said, I think if the D400 has the same video features as the D4, and the 5D mark 3 has the same video features as the 1DX, then we are in for a decent year in DSLR cinematography. Otherwise, if I'm going to spend more than $5000 I'm going to get a Red Scarlet - because its upgradeable, it records in Raw onboard, and its modular, otherwise we're still just hacking away at making consumer tools into professional tools.

    That being said, the GH2 is still top of the heap for value - but often paying clientele are idiots and because they heard about Canon this and Canon that they want a 7D. Those stupid Xtranormal videos are bang on correct about client mentality. No one wants to hear "I have this thing that is the same as X, actually it's even better - it's called Y, and not as many people use it, but it makes a great picture. Clients say, "I want X, I heard about the X. Shane Hurlbut uses the X, X is good." Then we say "Y is better, you will get better results." "I want X"

    This is the discussion with 75% of clients. This is why the Arri Alexa is the most popular camera in hollywood right now - not the Red Epic - despite the fact that Epic may be better at certain things. The arri is still a very good camera.

    Whatever, cameras are cameras, filmmaking is filmmaking.

    Choose the tool that the client will pay you the most money to use, and gives you results you are proud of. End of story.

  • "How can Nikon lose £4 grand if they haven't gotten anything from @eoshd yet? :)"

    Cancelled my pre-order!

  • @eoshd Where did you read my judgement? I just despise your sensational journalism and judgements. "Sony's new camera's rock" while you didn't touch them, purely based on specs. Are they crippled? Yes. Are they crappy? Yes. Do people buy them? I know nobody who did. Now you see one crappy clip in a NON native format and the Nikon D4 sucks. Learn when to judge. Maybe the D4 does suck... could very well be with Nikon's less than stellar video offerings. But I will judge once the final camera's are out there and I have native footage that I can work with myself.

    I would respect you a lot more if you did just that. But is is not in your genes. You are the Daily Mirror of filmmaking journalism. I always loved it when you banned everyone with criticism on your blog. Good that you can't do that here :)

  • Corrections List For Sohus

    • Not one crap clip, but many
    • Compression does not cause aliasing
    • H.264 IS the native format
    • I know plenty who bought the NEX 5N, NEX 7, A77 and A65. Not at GH2 level for resolution but better sensors and many plus points
    • I have said again and again and again and again that I'll reserve final judgement until the final moment. Until then I will admire Nikon's lack of ability to get proper footage out in the open, and the stuff that does all point to a poor downscaling job
    • I banned everyone with criticism on my blog? Right. Ok.

    YOU need to get a FUCKING CLUE. Learn how compression from a YouTube upload differs in appearance from poor downscaling of a sensor designed for photography. Learn how to accept a dynamic judgement that is capable of shifting as new evidence comes to light. Learn how to be quicker to judge, and sharper with it. Above all, put something worthwhile back into the community instead of trolling me.

  • No matter how compressed it is on YouTube, it doesn't introduce aliasing. I'm afraid it looks like a line skipper, which also explains why it overall looks a bit soft. I have no doubt it has wonderful dynamic range, but I'd be very disappointed paying £4k into a Nikon system for those characteristics.

    I still think the FS100 is the best camera in this price range. Lets hope Canon do something different with the new 5D...although I'm not a massive fan of overly large sensors. mFT to APS-C/s35 is my preference.

  • @EOSHD

    Did you ever consider that the file may have been output at say 720P (since some people don't know what they're doing), then shoddily uprezzed to 1080 from a 720?

    There are too many factors in the chain to consider, and to me, everything you've posted looks like 720 -> 1080 footage. I am fine with being wrong, but I definitely will not be hanging my hat on what's in this thread.

    @Sohus -- agreed again.