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Noise in AJ-HPX 2000P
I’ve been shooting with the AJ-HPX 2000P in 1080i 60 DVC Pro HD. I’m seeing what looks like noise in my footage. However, no gain is on. The noise is most visible in darker areas, however it’s not just the blacks. It could be a blue that generates noise. And “noise” is not the most accurate term to describe it except that comes close. It looks as if you were shooting with some gain, except that the scene could be perfectly lit. In fact, I’ve seen it in all types of shooting conditions. And I see it in footage shot in the DVC Pro 50 codec in standard def on that same camera.
The only way that I have viewed this footage is by capturing it directly into Final Cut Pro through a card reader using the Log and Transfer command in FCP. So I am looking at this footage after it has been wrapped in the QT wrapper.
Is this a capture issue with QT or is this something endemic to the Panasonic camera? What can I do? This is super aggravating.
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14 Replies
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Hi John,
Check to see if you have Dynamic Range Stretch on. It is a function that many believe is a good thing for all occasions, but in reality is not. It really is helpful for those very wide latitude shots but for nomal shooting, it adds noise.
Hope this is the problem.
Best,
Jan
Jan Crittenden Livingston
Product Manager, HPX500, HVX200, DVX100
Panasonic Broadcast & TV Systems -
Have you played with any of the menus?
I thought we had the same problem until I dug in and got busy with the menus.
The stock look out of the box can look a bit noisy. After I tweaked though, the images are downright fantastic, although we shoot in AVC-I. AVC-I has proven to be a very clean codec.
If you don’t feel comfortable with jumping in, there’s some presets on panasonic.com that might help you get a better start.
https://www.panasonic.com/business/provideo/scene_files.asp?model=HPX2000
And Jan’s solid advice of shooting with DRS on only when you need it should be heeded.
Jeremy
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Jeremy,
Can you be any more specific regarding what sub menus you have been tweaking. We have the 2000 as well and I have found it noisy as well. I think its codec dependent as you are not seeing any of it monitoring the camera, its just showing up in the files. DRS is not the issue for us. Its off.
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Jim,
AVC-I or DVCPro HD? DVCPro HD I imagine? Also, what geometry?
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I see it in DVC Pro 50 as well as DVC PRO HD 1080i (I haven’t tried 720p). It’s really weird because the noise definitely breeds in the darker areas of the frame. However, I see it in darks no matter what the color, whether it’s green or blue or black.
It’s almost as if there are two issues. There is a general grain that is minor compared to the noise in the darker areas.
To my eye, it looks like compression “noise” (although that’s not the correct term) along the lines of what you get when you export a QT movie from FCP using QT Conversion, and in some cases in that process you might see gradations of black in the converted file with noise living in some of those gradations. Like on your video’s fade outs to pure black and at that moment you see a jump in the compression noise.
I’m guessing this is a camera issue and not a codec issue because it seems to cut across at least two codecs. But why?
Has anyone looked at the recorded MXF files in a program other than FCP, like AVID? I just want to make sure this is not something that QT is doing to the file when it captures it straight from the P2 card into FCP. I don’t know if FCP simply wraps a QT wrapper around the MXF or whether it does any further compressing.
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[John LeBlanc] “It’s really weird because the noise definitely breeds in the darker areas of the frame. However, I see it in darks no matter what the color, whether it’s green or blue or black. “
That sounds like DVCpro HD to me. Have you played with the color settings of the camera at all?
Did you try the color profiles on panasonic.com? Try DIGINEG or VIVID and see what you get.
Also, do you have the AVC-I board?
The Log and transfer process simply rewraps and muxes the MXF media. There’s no transcoding so you don’t have to worry about that. What you shoot is what you get, bit for bit, in DVCPro HD.
Any chance you can post a native file or two (a couple of seconds would do it) on yousendit or somewhere. I’d like to make sure we are speaking the same language, or in this case, seeing the same noise.
Sorry for the typos.
Jeremy
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Jeremy,
We’ve been shooting into DVCPro HD 720p. The artifacts I am noticing are standing block, not noise. Since its not visible whilst monitoring the camera, I am assuming its the codec. I have a still of something we shot pretty early on with the camera in this configuration at:
https://www.ibexcom.com/file/exp_2000.zip
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Yes, that looks like compression to me. Make sure to get a black balance every time you fire that thing up. That could cure some of what you’re seeing as well.
Also, investing the $3000 in AVC-I (and then shoot AVC-i 100) is well worth it, in my opinion. You can check the latest creative cow magazine to read more about how and why we chose to buy the HPX2000.
Jeremy
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That’s exactly what I see in my footage except it extends to dark colors as well. We do indeed black balance and it doesn’t help. So, then, are you thinking that this is compression in the DVC PRO HD codec only or compression in the camera across all codecs, because I see the same thing in DVC Pro 50 on this camera.
Can anyone speak to whether they see this in the next camera model up?
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I do not see it in AVC-I. It does look like DV100 or dv50 compression.
Also, you guys have the latest firmware for this camera?
Also, you might want to check out different gamma setting to see if that might help lessen this effect. (or spend the $3,000 for AVC-I).
Thanks, by the way, for sending the screen grab. This helps to see what you are seeing and it’s not the noise that I thought you meant. It helps when we can talk about the same thing.
Jeremy
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