Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

The place for questions about shooting with Blackmagic Cameras.
  • Author
  • Message
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostFri Jan 21, 2022 9:57 pm

I've have the Ursa Mini Pro 12K for about 60 days. I am blasting light onto my sets and still getting noisy footage 8K 120 fps ( see attached jpeg) added to 1080x1350 timeline

Firmware 7.7
Lens: Canon CN-E 30-105mm T2.8 LS
T15 aperture
8:1 compression

Tried different setting with the NR in the COLOR panel of DR and getting little to no effect. Then tried Premiere with BCC Noise Reduction and same thing, no effect.
Attachments
burger and Coke_1.1.1.jpg
burger and Coke_1.1.1.jpg (943.97 KiB) Viewed 4030 times
Offline

devinpickering

  • Posts: 37
  • Joined: Wed Mar 06, 2019 3:46 pm
  • Real Name: Devin Pickering

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 3:28 am

Hey there - can you post the log image? Do you know how you exposed the image in-camera? Wondering if, or to what degree you were overexposing TTR?
Offline

Nick Lavigne

  • Posts: 172
  • Joined: Thu Oct 04, 2018 5:36 am
  • Location: Connecticut, USA
  • Real Name: Nick Lavigne

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 5:50 am

Did you black shade the camera sensor?
Offline
User avatar

Jamie LeJeune

  • Posts: 2012
  • Joined: Tue Feb 26, 2013 4:33 am
  • Location: San Francisco

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 8:13 am

Share a BRAW frame from one of the clips where you feel there is excessive noise. Single BRAW frames can be exported from the raw tab of the a color page in Resolve.
www.cinedocs.com
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm4601572/
Offline

Sean van Berlo

  • Posts: 607
  • Joined: Wed Jul 01, 2015 6:33 am
  • Location: The Netherlands

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 9:22 am

Just be aware also that at T15 you are definitely running into the diffraction limit of this sensor, which is costing you a lot of sharpness.
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 2:40 pm

1 BRAW is 7MB and the attachment limit is 2MB.

The forum admin doesn't allow me to add Dropbox links in my post either. Not sure what else I can do to share those. Any tips on how to share a BRAW file?

I also wasn't aware of a Black Shading calibration. I'm familiar with black shading on our Chronos 2.1 camera but I don't see any sensor calibration in these menus.
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 3:30 pm

I just checked the camera and the calibrate sensor is greyed out. Can only calibrate the motion sensor. Manual says thats available for the 4.6 G2 (nothing about the 12K camera)
Offline
User avatar

Uli Plank

  • Posts: 21278
  • Joined: Fri Feb 08, 2013 2:48 am
  • Location: Germany and Indonesia

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 7:23 pm

The 12K doesn't have that. It seems to be self calibrating with the help of those white sensels.
If you want to post a DropBox link, add a single space somewhere in the URL.
No, an iGPU is not enough, and you can't use HEVC 10 bit 4:2:2 in the free version.

Studio 18.6.5, MacOS 13.6.5
MacBook M1 Pro, 16 GPU cores, 32 GB RAM and iPhone 15 Pro
Speed Editor, UltraStudio Monitor 3G, iMac 2017, eGPU
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 7:30 pm

I have a couple different frames (space added in the dl link)

The Coke label is what I am specifically concerned on this one:
https: //www.dropbox.com/s/11qdpywqds0eq45/A001_01211200_C053_104.braw?dl=0

This one was shot in 4K and seems to have less noise:
https: //www.dropbox.com/s/ceqgy2rkv8x81se/A001_01241313_C062_2053.braw?dl=0
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 8:31 pm

you have to delete the space between the colon and /.

Otherwise I couldn't post the link without the forum moderator software blocking the post for pasting links
Offline

Ryan Earl

  • Posts: 517
  • Joined: Sun Jan 17, 2016 6:56 pm

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 8:42 pm

vimaxmedia wrote:The Coke label is what I am specifically concerned on this one:


burger and Coke_1.1.1.jpg
Burger and Coke
burger and Coke_1.1.1.jpg (943.97 KiB) Viewed 3798 times


I think you are at least a 1.5 stops underexposed. I would try again with F5.6, F8, F11, record exposures of all three.

My quick development settings are below:

Screenshot 2022-01-26 153608.png
Raw Panel Dev
Screenshot 2022-01-26 153608.png (29.47 KiB) Viewed 3798 times
Offline

Ryan Earl

  • Posts: 517
  • Joined: Sun Jan 17, 2016 6:56 pm

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 8:48 pm

Play around with the noise reduction sliders too while watching the video in motion.

These are set to "30" in this example, but you can slide all the way to 100.

Screenshot 2022-01-26 154720.png
Screenshot 2022-01-26 154720.png (22.47 KiB) Viewed 3789 times
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 8:53 pm

I did use NR at different settings to little or no effect. I will try adjusting aperture at different settings and see how that turns out.

I am recording to a Samsung 980 Pro inside an eternal NvME case. Still cant record at 120 8K or 240 4K at any better compression than 8:1. And that Samsung drive has uber fast read write speed
Offline
User avatar

Jamie LeJeune

  • Posts: 2012
  • Joined: Tue Feb 26, 2013 4:33 am
  • Location: San Francisco

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 9:22 pm

Ryan Earl wrote: I think you are at least a 1.5 stops underexposed. I would try again with F5.6, F8, F11, record exposures of all three.
Agreed. Closer to 2 stops under IMHO. But even at 2 stops under, it cleans up nicely with some spatial noise reduction (and likely with a bit of temporal too, though that has no impact on a single frame, so I wasn't able to test that).

If the goal is to have as noise free a result as possible without noise reduction, I'd do a test setting the ISO as low as 400 and expose so middle gray on a color chart is green on the camera false color.
www.cinedocs.com
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm4601572/
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 10:30 pm

Alright guys, thanks for the info.

I shot new shots, a Coca Cola pour at 8K 120 fps and 4K 240fps at T 4.2 ISO 800. 4K has a lot of noise but the Spatial NR + Temporal NR did get rid of the noise mostly (tiny bits in the shadows). 8K 120 fps looked good with no NR.

The Coke bottle label still has a pattern on it but there will be ways around having to show product labels with slow motion action

8K: https: //www.dropbox.com/s/8g1vdxd8p55mtdy/A001_01261623_C069_0834.braw?dl=0

4K: https: //www.dropbox.com/s/21rc6bgfppmm8bo/A001_01261620_C068_2350.braw?dl=0
Offline

devinpickering

  • Posts: 37
  • Joined: Wed Mar 06, 2019 3:46 pm
  • Real Name: Devin Pickering

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostWed Jan 26, 2022 11:32 pm

Have you tried overexposing 1 stop or 2 stops over?
Offline
User avatar

Uli Plank

  • Posts: 21278
  • Joined: Fri Feb 08, 2013 2:48 am
  • Location: Germany and Indonesia

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 12:59 am

Yes, these are underexposed. But I wouldn't advise overexposing, it would clip the highlights. Just expose to the right for clean pictures.
I've seen folks making the same mistake in the early times of the Red One, and believe me, it was more noisy than the 12K.
No, an iGPU is not enough, and you can't use HEVC 10 bit 4:2:2 in the free version.

Studio 18.6.5, MacOS 13.6.5
MacBook M1 Pro, 16 GPU cores, 32 GB RAM and iPhone 15 Pro
Speed Editor, UltraStudio Monitor 3G, iMac 2017, eGPU
Offline

Sean van Berlo

  • Posts: 607
  • Joined: Wed Jul 01, 2015 6:33 am
  • Location: The Netherlands

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 5:37 am

Also are on you on the latest firmware? That apparently improves noise!
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 2:00 pm

Camera came with 7.3 firmware installed and I shot a couple of spec videos with this firmware. After a test a couple weeks ago I started noticing the noise ( probably underexposed) and found/updated the newest firmware on the BM Support page.

I now feel confident I was probably underexposing all my recent tests after pushing yesterdays tests down to T 4.2. I'll probably live in the world between T4.2 to T8 from now on
Offline
User avatar

Uli Plank

  • Posts: 21278
  • Joined: Fri Feb 08, 2013 2:48 am
  • Location: Germany and Indonesia

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 3:35 pm

vimaxmedia wrote: I'll probably live in the world between T4.2 to T8 from now on


But that is completely scene dependent. Plus, there are aesthetic reasons for the choice of a T stop. That's why the camera has ND filters. But it's a good idea to stay below 8, since diffraction will make your images soft above that, as already mentioned before.
No, an iGPU is not enough, and you can't use HEVC 10 bit 4:2:2 in the free version.

Studio 18.6.5, MacOS 13.6.5
MacBook M1 Pro, 16 GPU cores, 32 GB RAM and iPhone 15 Pro
Speed Editor, UltraStudio Monitor 3G, iMac 2017, eGPU
Offline

John Brawley

  • Posts: 4267
  • Joined: Tue Aug 21, 2012 7:57 am
  • Location: Los Angeles California

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 4:07 pm

You need to also manage your expectations a bit.

4K@240 FPS is a very tiny cut from the least pixel density mode of the 12K camera. Even with good exposure, you’re still kind of expecting the sensor to work miracles using a fraction of the available photosites.

If you need these kind of frame rates, you really need to go to more specialised high speed cameras.

JB
John Brawley ACS
Cinematographer
Currently - Los Angeles
Offline
User avatar

vimaxmedia

  • Posts: 9
  • Joined: Thu Jan 13, 2022 8:58 pm
  • Location: Madison Hgts, MI
  • Real Name: Brian Nichols

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 5:41 pm

Phantom rental is out of our customers price point or we'd have one already.

We have a Chronos HD 2.1 but have had nothing but problems with that camera shooting similar with lighting and exposure around T 5.0. 1000fps is pretty cool for speed ramps but 240 fps is kind of a sweet spot I feel. We were inclined to sell the Chronos once I get the Ursa sussed out.
Offline

devinpickering

  • Posts: 37
  • Joined: Wed Mar 06, 2019 3:46 pm
  • Real Name: Devin Pickering

Re: Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostThu Jan 27, 2022 10:36 pm

Very interesting - please let us know if exposing to the right helps with the noise. FWIW I've been exposing + one stop over for years now, I believe that these sensors really benefit from more light.
Offline
User avatar

rick.lang

  • Posts: 17173
  • Joined: Wed Aug 22, 2012 5:41 pm
  • Location: Victoria BC Canada

Noisy video with Ursa mini 12K

PostSat Jan 29, 2022 5:48 pm

Agree a stop over is a good choice when you’re not risking blown highlights. If most of your image is dominated by highlights though, don’t add more light or those highlights may seem too thin.

Raw has good flexibility whether you nail the exposure or are over/under in combination with the tools available in DaVinci Resolve, especially the 6 HDR log primary correctors.
Rick Lang

Return to Cinematography

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: ConnecTED, vivoices and 93 guests