HD rez for telecine transfer - a little bit of serendipity.

Post by **focusgroup** » Mon Jul 28, 2003 5:35 pm

Last week we were discussing high rez transfer and I think it was Mattias mentioned the IREZ crawford camera that was just released this july.

Well seeing as Ive been trying to solve the rez issue once and for all, I went to the IREZ site. Wouldnt you know it, the area code for the company was in my state. Wouldnt you know it but when I called I was connected directly with the engineer who created the camera? Wouldnt you know it but the co. headquarters is literally 5 minutes from my house. Well to make it short I went and met with the engineer and puchased one of the cameras he has created.

I have to say I believe this is finally the method to match the rez of S8 and to adequately telecine 16 and S16. The camera has a 1/2 CCD with no shutter! The image is captured via screen grab using a keyboard or mouse trigger. The software you use is your choice. The USB 2.0 connection has a theoritical capture speed of up to 40 fps. The unit is a c mount. Very industrial. The body is machined aluminum. Each camera is personally tested by the engineer prior to shipment.

The images are uncompressed YUV bitmap at 4.2.2. color space. Holy shit boys and girls. I have personally seen the images captured using the camera and it is terrific. The unit was developed primarily for industrial and medical purposes.

The engineer furthermore is extremely interested in assisting and finding out the use of his camera for such processes. As a matter of fact one of his friends is one of the founders of AFI in California. He said his buddy never suggested this use for the camera.

Well why cant I tell you the final results? I went running out to the store to get a $30 USB 2 PCI port. When installing it I totally fucked up my operating system and the computer is unusable. I dropped of the damn thing to be fixed and should have it back by tuesday. I will immediately transfer some footage and post results here.

Now one final thing - this could be very big. He is finishing development of a 2K camera. This is what 35 and S35 is scanned at. If properly developed this will be the alternative for Indy filmakers who anticipate blow up to 35 from 16 or S16.

Any questions that you want answered post here and Ill contact the engineer. He's a very nice guy.

George

Post by **Cranium** » Mon Jul 28, 2003 7:07 pm

First question would be...
Price?

Post by **Cranium** » Mon Jul 28, 2003 7:12 pm

Nevermind, found it. Wow. Very reasonable.
$595 according to the site.

Post by **Skylab001** » Mon Jul 28, 2003 8:28 pm

Paul Cotto actually already owns one of these cameras too....he's the one who found them. I'm sure he'll post something here soon. So far the only drawback to it is that it will only function with a PC so us MAC users either have to set-up shop with a PC or find another solution. I emailed them and they said they are not going to support the MAC platform except possibly with a 1394b version, and if they do it would be about a year

Unfortunatley 1394b is only supported in 17" powerbooks and the new G5's

even with those drawbacks it's still exciting to see how this stuff will look!

Post by **Cranium** » Mon Jul 28, 2003 8:41 pm

Maybe I'm looking at the wrong ones...
I seem to recall Paul mentioning having to modify his camera for a C-mount lens?

The one I was looking at has a C-mount.

Post by **christoph** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 2:30 am

Skylab001 wrote:Unfortunatley 1394b is only supported in 17" powerbooks and the new G5's

you can get firewire800 PCI cards for older macs...
still, a years is a long wait.
++ christoph ++

Post by **Skylab001** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 4:07 am

you can get firewire800 PCI cards for older macs...
still, a years is a long wait.
++ christoph ++

This is true, unfortunately my only 3 PCI ports are full

Post by **istvan** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 8:22 am

sorry, could anyone give me a link? Unable to find the product.

Thanks,
Istvan

Post by **jukkasil** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 9:02 am

http://irez.globalmedia.com/crawford1.php

Post by **paulcotto** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 6:36 pm

Hi,
Yes, I was the one who broke the news of this camera. I bought mine over a week ago and so far I have not had it running yet. The engineer is working on the problem and I have provided details to him. Actually I did get it running for about 30 minutes before I screwed up the USB 2.0 drivers on my computer. I have purchased 3 different USB 2.0 cards so far and none of them work with the camera. I am sure it's a simple fix once they figure out the problem. If you are thinking about buying one you should order the USB card that Global Media makes at the same time as ordering the i1300C camera so you wont have difficulty like I do installing the camera since they have proven it works with that card. You MUST be running Windows 2000 SP1~SP3 OR Windows XP SP1. No other operating system is supported, not even the MAC yet. I also suggest you buy a Sony 45mm Macro lens from eBay seller "mavin". I donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t see any listed right now but they list them all the time.

Sorry I did not post a follow-up but I was waiting until I got the camera running before I reported on it. I would wait to order until I get it running $600.00 is a chunk of change after all...

Regards,
Paul Cotto

Post by **focusgroup** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 9:07 pm

Paul

Would you please tell me which stop motion capture software you will use for your USB 2.0 port? I have been unable to find the proper software to work with the USB as of yet. Any info would be greatly appreciated.

George Caramanna

Post by **paulcotto** » Wed Jul 30, 2003 12:36 am

Any software that does direct video for windows will work. Dodcap should work for single frames, thats what I plan on using. There is also a twain driver for PhotoShop type programs. Please wait until I test the camera. The engineer called today to say they are FedExing me a new camera and USB 2.0 card tomorrow that they will be testing overnight tonight. The USB does not have anything to do with the software you will use to capture video. Keep in mind it does 15 fps on a reasonably fast computer so it's not real-time.

Regards,
Paul Cotto

focusgroup wrote:Paul

Would you please tell me which stop motion capture software you will use for your USB 2.0 port? I have been unable to find the proper software to work with the USB as of yet. Any info would be greatly appreciated.

George Caramanna