4k Survey

[Chimerix]

Sorry if I'm derailing this thread, but honestly, I'm stunned that 4K is the standard with which current big-budget films are shot. The Arri Alexa series, cameras you can spend a quarter of a million dollars on, peak at a mere 3414 x 2198. But that's enough detail to fill a cinema screen with your favorite Avengers battling each other.

Heck, even the new kid on the block, the Alexa 65, is "only" 6560 x 3102 , with "just" 14 stops of latitude. It's being adopted for use in IMAX. I mean, don't get me wrong, it's an impressive step in terms of technology, but it's still nowhere near the molecular-level resolution and dynamic range of film. (The Force Awakens was shot mostly on 35mm, although that may have been a stylistic thing.)

I try to reconcile that with what I see when I put my HD cameras, NICE HD cameras, on an 8' projection screen. Of course, there are other factors involved. Color subsampling (or lack thereof), sensor size, bit depth, recording format, data rate... there's a lot more to 4K than "just twice as many pixels."

[dlodoski]

....I try to reconcile that with what I see when I put my HD cameras, NICE HD cameras, on an 8' projection screen. Of course, there are other factors involved. Color subsampling (or lack thereof), sensor size, bit depth, recording format, data rate... there's a lot more to 4K than "just twice as many pixels."

That's just it. There are a lot of factors involved.

Color is a big deal. A great way to see the difference is to watch deleted scenes on DVDs. In many cases, the footage is not sweetened in terms of color and/or audio. It's very revealing to compare that 'raw' footage with how the edited feature looks and sounds.