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Perspective distortion fix
I can’t find any information on how to fix perspective distortion while shooting (interiors in particular), as well as a fix through FCPX with a wide angle lens.
I’ve an a7riii with Laowa 15mm f2, a “zero distortion” lens. While the lack of pincushioning etc might be really good, it’s just too wide to not suffer from perspective distortion, which means I’ve not found a way to do any movements, pans, tilts, anything with this lens, without them being too distracting to use. I bought it primarily for real estate videos, but the distortion in the left and right thirds of frame are too distracting for movement.
I’ve tried the Alex 4D Plugin designed to correct GoPro footage, but that makes it worse.
I’m not sure how I can ever use this lens for any motion, surely there must be a fix, please help!
I’ve uploaded a few seconds of VERY rough handheld footage to illustrate what I mean: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCZlE3ELGKESome contents or functionalities here are not available due to your cookie preferences!This happens because the functionality/content marked as “Google Youtube” uses cookies that you choosed to keep disabled. In order to view this content or use this functionality, please enable cookies: click here to open your cookie preferences.
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4 Replies
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You see that effect a lot in real estate and renovation TV shows so to some extent viewers are probably getting used to it and may not actually notice the distortion. And certainly those shows don’t go out of their way to correct it.
The only thing I can think of for FCPX is maybe the Boris lens correction plugin.
Outside of FCPX, the full version of Resolve also has a lens correction option built in. Going a step higher up the food chain it might be worth taking a look at the Mocha lens module which is pretty good at resolving distortion.
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Jeff Kirkland | Video Producer & Cinematographer
Hobart, Tasmania | Twitter: @jeffkirkland -
Thanks for the info Jeff,
Unfortunately the Boris FX plugins are out of my budget, I’d only be using it for this and if I’m spending that much I’m better to put it towards a different lens. What lens I’ve no idea, I thought this one was going to be perfect.I’m downloading the free version of Resolve 15 now just incase that lens correction is there, as you said the “full” version, again that’s too much on my freelance “salary”!
Before switching to Sony full frame I had this lens on a GH4 and it was perfect, no panning issues at all. Wish I could go back.
https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/882235-REG/Tokina_atx116prodxc_ii_AT_X_116_PRO_DX_II.html/pcur/CAD?gclid=EAIaIQobChMItOP6qKTI4AIVhsDACh1OdAwfEAAYASAAEgLEevD_BwE -
The crop on the GH4, even with a speedbooster, would have cut off the outer edges of the image so you wouldn’t see the issue. Can’t say I’m a big fan of the full-frame look when it comes to video.
As far as Resolve goes, I’m pretty sure you need the full version to try the lens distortion fix but I haven’t used the free version in a long time so I’m a bit vague on what works and doesn’t.
It’s also possible that while it’s disabled in Resolve, it might be doable on the Fusion page.
Like I sad though, you see that lens distortion all the time in real estate shows so if all else fails, I would leave it as is and see if the client even notices.
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Jeff Kirkland | Video Producer & Cinematographer
Hobart, Tasmania | Twitter: @jeffkirkland -
Yes I managed to work out Resolve, and it will give a preview of the correction but it’s only truly available in the “full” version. However, it was good to be able to preview it as it’s not able to fix it unfortunately. It would take a lot of time with key framing to apply it in different increments as the camera pans – it needs a different amount of filter depending on the angle.
So it seems a 15mm lens is just going to be too wide to ever use for real estate videos.
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