Driftwood Cluster X Series 4:│Moon T8│Spizz T7

ilia310101

@driftwood thank you so much for moon T8! its amazing

Shaveblog

@driftwood Further testing with both SanDisk Extreme 45MB/s and SanDisk Extreme Pro 90MB/s 64GB SD cards shows the same FCPX import error with 24H footage, but 24L footage has no issues with FCPX import at all.

The odd thing is this doesn't appear to be simply a matter of excessive bitrate with the 24H settings, as T8 seems no higher in terms of bitrate than your other all-I patches like T7 and IV2, which FCPX has never had problems rewrapping to H.264.

I confirmed that the importing errors occur whether I ask FCPX to import only (just H.264 rewrap) or to transcode to ProRes 422.

Hope this helps you, Nick, and thanks for the new Moon. So far it's your best looking patch IMO, with more natural skin tone and detail than T7 or IV2.

matt_gh2

@shaveblog Thanks for the jpg - very helpful.

Reckless

I shot a test clip with T8 on the 24p low setting and had an average bitrate of around 80mbps. Then I shot a few on the high setting and averaged around 73-75mbps. It is my understanding that this is a variable bitrate setting based on the results from my tests and the reported findings of other users. Larger file sizes of 140-150mbps do not concern me, in fact I have become accustomed to them by now. @driftwood Is there any possibility of releasing a more fixed bitrate version? I like to get as much encoded info as possible, it seems that a lot of bitrate is sacrificed with this patch. I however an not the expert so my opinion doesn't count for much, just my two cents. Thank you Driftwood for everything you have done so far!

Shaveblog

Glad to see my recommendation to remove the Pasadena Audio hacks from T8 restores in-cam playback for those shooting on a fast enough SD card. Attached is a JPG of the ticked Ptool boxes you want to untick - be sure to untick the boxes AFTER loading the original T8 patch but BEFORE saving the modified version to your SD card. This should make your T8 24H clips playable in-cam, even though the FCPX import bug remains to be addressed.

Guys, this is a beta testing thread. If you want to help Nick improve this patch, lower your noise and raise your signal. Be helpful with your feedback, which means including relevant data (not just "I having a SD card" but what card is it, were you shooting 24H or 24L, etc. - even my cheap-ass Transcends can reliably span T8 if I shoot lower bitrate 24L).

And don't worry about grading your test footage or adding Starbucks muzak, in fact don't bother posting "test footage" at all unless you're seeing problems with the video - we all know Nick's patches look good when properly installed and your GH2 isn't broken, you're not adding anything productive to his feedback loop with three mins of graded tsotchke closeups and Stereolab unless you're seeing some repeatable problems and want to bring them to Nick's attention. He's not looking for good looking T8 footage. He knows it looks good. He wants to hear about problems so he can fix them. Keep the thread focused on that and you'll get the new improved T8.x much faster.

inukhiphop

@marciocons thanks but the idea originated with @Shaveblog

@TATZU and @jebsly I was attempting to max-out the video bitrate with Moon T8 24H (wide-angle lens, lots of small moving elements in the image) and believe I did from looking at the stream parser results. I have since been able to get in-cam playback, with short clips at an average bitrate of about 50mbps (poorly lit, interior, shot with a Nikon 50mm). Perhaps it's only when you hit that max bitrate with the video that the audio settings make a difference for in-cam playback? I will try to replicate my treetop test today with just the audio settings reverted to stock, to see if I can playback the shot in-cam.

With that said, a quick look at the Moon T8 image does seem superior to T7, and the one quick shot of my skin tone (a light brown/beige) does seem subjectively more pleasing and more consistent than it did with T7, which was more than acceptable.

jebsly

Here's my first quick test with Moon T8:

Shot with my 50mm Nikon f1.8, which is quite a soft lens. ISO was never higher than 500, smooth profile, all -2, 24H.

First impressions are that I'm very happy with the images coming out of it. Very clean at low/moderate ISOs, pretty sharp, no artifacts that I've noticed. I really like the colour, and would agree about skin tones as someone mentioned earlier.

Shooting on a Sandisk 95mbps card, I didn't have any problem with playback, and didn't even need to turn it off and on again. Spanning also seems to work fine.

Bitrate for these shots was between 64 - 111mbps.

Overall, looking very promising!

marciocons

@babak I dnt know if this procedure will solve you problem. In order to disable pasadena, go to audio settings and uncheck all the options under it. By the way, shooting at 24p, I could not see the issues you described.

babak

Just briefly tried both "T8" and "Spizz T7" for HBR 25p. Naturally I first tried the T8. To my surprise the footage looked very noisy and pixalated. I got suspicious and reinstalled the hack, but result were the same!!! Spizz T7 looks very good though, better than all other hacks I had tried for shooting 25p. Unfortunately it doesn't span (i use sandisk extremepro 95mb/s 64gb). The camera stops recording after 5 to 15 minutes. Is there any way at all to solve this issue, like disabling audio settings etc.? (I looked for the so called "pasadina" audio hacks in Ptool3 but couldn't find any)...

driftwood

Quantization parameters QP

TATZU

@inukhiphop I'm getting in camera playback and i didn't remove any audio settings... And i don't even have that expensive sandisk 95mbps everyone is always raving about.

matt_gh2

Great tips guys - will try.

marciocons

@inukhiphop I followed you advice and disabled the audio settings (Pasadena) and I confirm that in-camera playback is working now. By the way, I am using 64gb 95mb/s Sandisk SD card.

TATZU

@driftwood or anyone really "Subsequently, you get a finer low frequency matrix that strives to knock out artefacting at the expense of QP and higher bitrates." What does QP stand for?

Tjabo

I think that is the point of this type of testing... This is like an alpha or maybe a beta test.

inukhiphop

@Shaveblog It's odd that you would bury the lede like that. I clearly stated that I'm using the recommended card, and had no luck spanning. The first was a full card, so couldn't record another small clip, and the other tricks (record a short clip, turn off/on) didn't work either.

And then you say your play-back "may have to do with the fact" that you removed "Pasadena" (which is clearly not a standard step when installing the patch) almost as an aside. But if that is a way to get consistent (or in my case any) in-camera playback, it would appear to be a pertinent piece of information for @driftwood as those of us with external recording would likely accept lesser audio to sync with in exchange for the ability to review clips in the camera.

Thanks for the tip

Shaveblog

FCPX import issues aside, I'm getting in-cam playback of all my T8 test clips. I'm using the recommended Sandisk 64GB 95MB/s SD card. I'm wondering if the guys having problems with in-cam playback and/or spanning are using the recommended higher speed SD cards.

The fact that I'm getting in-cam playback may also have to do with the fact that I removed all traces of the "Pasadena" audio hack in PTool before saving the new patch file. I don't feel the "Pasadena" hacks do anything to improve the in-cam audio, but they do seem to prevent in-cam playback, so I untick all the audio boxes in PTool before saving a new patch.

matt_gh2

@driftwood Since Spizz T7 has the same Moon T8 matrix when using 24P, does that mean the image will look similar? That would be good, because then we can get the look of Moon T8, but still get in-camera playback, by using Spizz T7 on 24P. Thanks.

Shaveblog

Thanks Nick. I tried copying the Private folder over to the desktop and importing from there, but it behaves no differently than importing right off the card via the usual USB 3.0 media reader which has never given me issues with FCPX importing your earlier patches.

FYI when you choose, as I do, to untick "optimize footage" during import, FCPX refrains from transcoding the files to ProRes but it does rewrap them to H.264 before copying the files to your library. I'm wondering if perhaps Apple's rewrap implementation is less happy with T8 clips than ClipWrap's seems to be.

I'm running a 3 drive setup with my system, with an SSD OS/boot drive and two Hitachi 2TB drives in a RAID-0 array for the home folder. This gives me SSD speed across the board, so I don't think that's the bottleneck. I'll do some more testing on my end.

driftwood

Thanks @Shaveblog. Ill take a look on my identical hackintosh. Did you copy the entire Private folder over to your hard disk first?

Shaveblog

@driftwood FWIW Moon T8 clips throw errors during FCPX 10.1.2 importing using a Sandisk Extreme Pro 95MB/s 64GB SD, with the following msg:

      "Import Failed

      The following clip encountered an error during import and is still referencing media on the camera:

      Clip Name: Clip #2
      Event: test

      Original Name: Clip #2
      Volume: Untitled"

The clip may be added to a project and edited but it remains on the SD card. If I rewrap the MTS to H.264 with ClipWrap, FCPX has no problem importing it.

I am not transcoding during import, just having FCPX copy over the native files and analyze for color.

Initial eyeballing looks good, and T8 spans on this 95MB/s Sandisk SD. But FYI something seems to be preventing T8 clips from importing as usual with FCPX, at least on my i7-3770K Hackintosh.

driftwood

25p works in HBR mode..@kritzresn

Has anyone tried out Spizz T7 yet? Extremely good HBR modes /720 modes etc and lovely fine low/hi freq matrix - plus moon t8 matrix on 24p

zachasurp

I thought MoonT7 was the peak, but would love to see what T8 will bring to the GH2. I hope to compare T8 with the GH4 this weekend!

kritzresn

No Moon T8 with 25p ? :)

rostislav

Many thanks for your work. I've tested Moon T8 with Sandisk 45mb/s without issues, spanning as well, Nebula and Moon T7 also works flawlessly in 24L (24H wont work)

The only exception is DREWnet - V6,T6,T9 - all wont work with my card 45mb/s card, currently i'm using sanity for the smaller file size (V6 seems to be most reliable, but it does not span)

Can you please release a smaller filesize/longer gop versions of Moon T8? I'd love to be able to utilize the new matrix (but still maintain a ~40mbs bitrate) DREWnet seems unreliable for some reason.

Thanks!

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