Wolverine-Hawkeye Telecine

[Stan Jelavic]

OK I retested it with the new FW Kamel. In the 3rd position there may be not enough torque to pull the film through. I tested it with the lead and that one we know is thicker and the motor did not have enough torque to do it. I do not have damaged film to try so maybe you can test that. If it cannot do it from the 3rd position you maybe can try the 1st position. But for that the cog pulley has to be perfectly aligned otherwise you get the film wobble.
Here is what the FW does:
- If the rewind switch is on, slow speed on, and run on, and the film advances normally without jam the capstan stays off.
- If the jam is detected the capstan will tug on the film and sound the sonalert briefly. If the film moves even slightly the capstan and sonalert will turn off. The stepper will keep spinning. It will retry in 10 seconds again and again.
- If the film is so tight that the capstan cannot budge it, it will keep the motor on and sonalet on for a longer time (will have to check if the motor heats up). The stepper is shut down.

Tested the complete jam i.e motor not able to budge the jam. In that case the motor stays on continuously without moving and it can get hot after a while which is not very good. The alert also stays on but still I think it is a safety issue. Can look into implementing a timeout but still have to be careful.

[David Brown]

I spent the day trying to find the cause of the UX226 camera "lockup" This is not an issue with USB. If the usb connection to the camera drops out, there is an error message shown below the menus and above the image. That can happen, but it not my complaint. The "live" image freezes, the software continues.

2 things provided a workaround. Changing the capture resolution (that can be messy) and activating/deactivating the external trigger. There was no menu action that caused the lockup repeatedly. Sometimes no activity at all still caused it.


Watch the Frame counter, it's faster feedback than blocking the lens. FRAMES 63 Delivered, 8/0/0/0 Dropped. Frame counter keeps incrementing while live mode is on, except if the external trigger is on and the claw is not moving, or if any menu is opened.
Also stops when something unknown happens.



I tried shutting down Anti Virus software and the internet. I used another computer, and I switched to a usb2 cable. ONE TIME today this lockup occurred and everything was frozen. There was no usb error message. I had to reboot.

It is less tedious now that the external trigger can usually fix the problem. Without being able to create the problem on demand, tech support might not be able to help.

Stan I never had this lockup time out and resume, I am impatient maybe?

"HDR1 (single exposure) - no changes to the MSP. I got some support from TIS Germany and can save the 64 bit tiff images now. Working on the HDR single exposure app and will try to generate 2 images right from the app with the gamma correction done right in the app."

How do you save 64bit tiffs?

[Stan Jelavic]

I will send a message to the TIS support. Perhaps they know something about it. Maybe it is caused by the live mode not being able to deliver the image due to the bandwidth or some other issue. In that case an exception would be generated and that could pause the live display.

For 64 bit TIS save I use a CurrentBuffer.SaveAsTiff(imFullpath1) call.
The mode has to be changed to 64 bit:
IcImagingControl1.MemoryCurrentGrabberColorformat = ICImagingControlColorformats.ICRGB64

I actually would not recommend using the single exposure HDR. In some scenes it is OK but in some 2 exposures work much better and since postprocessing is needed anyways I would go with 2 exposures.

UPDATE:
Sent message to TIS support regarding live display freeze.
Updated the MSP430 FW with Kamel's 2 second alert:
https://github.com/vintagefilmography/msp430

Capstan operation:
- If the rewind switch is on, slow speed or fast speed, and run on, and the film advances normally without jam the capstan stays off.
- If the jam is detected the capstan will tug on the film and sound the sonalert briefly if the film moves even slightly. It will retry in 5 - 10 seconds again. Any time the film moves it will repeat the procedure
- If the film is so tight that the capstan cannot budge, it will go into a stuck mode cycle. The capstan motor and sonalet will be turned on for a few seconds every 5 - 10 seconds of off state. This way the motor will not overheat and the pulsed operation has a better chance of removing the jam.
Here is the video showing the operation:
https://photos.app.goo.gl/xvauwwSyDzs4qUJH7

[Kamel Ikhlef]

Thank you very much Stan,
I didn't expect to have the new firmware so quickly.

[Stan Jelavic]

That little MSPis is getting pretty busy
Also received the camera but will give it a day or two before I try it. Hope it works.

[David Brown]

Yes, I also thank you Stan. I'm sure IS support will be asking all the usual questions! I found a good scene for testing hdr, then this problem became too tedious to continue.

I switched back to a bright film during the bug hunt. I did have the bandwidth error message at least once. Now that I know what it means, it's easy to drop the resolution. That might have been after I switched back to usb2? The camera keeps operating even with exposures that go beyond the available capture time with blurred images. Some exposures were in seconds before I added gain!

So 64 bit is handled with the hdr app. That seems like it will be a crazy file size. The files now captured at 64b are large, but maybe they will be a lot larger when saved as TRUE 64bit! Seems like it might be beyond the sensor's range. Even Photoshop only uses 32 bit for hdr blending multiple files.

The capstan beep cycle sounded good, not like a relentless alarm.

I can certainly test this myself; just wondered if when the film is stuck, does the camera keep saving the same frame every time the claw cycles?

[Stan Jelavic]

Hi David, so is the problem caused by long exposure time? I will be revising the hdr app to include the bit depth selection. Do you think we need other formats other than tiff?
The claw will cycle a few times if the capstan pulls the film and then will stop. If the film does not move or the motor is turned off then the claw will go into a dead stop. The capture happens every time the claw cycles because the camera gets the trigger.

[David Brown]

The live problem is not caused by long exposure times. Watching the image advance in a streak is my first alert to increase the gain!

Two formats are worth having are JPG and TIF. JPG for those who will not do any post or need to keep down the file size. TIF has been around a long time and seems to keep on ticking. Adobe's attempt to standardize camera raw files as DNG says that DNG is really a TIF.

A TIF option for lossless compression would be nice, if that is not already being used by default. Can a 32 or 64 bit TIF be used by all the possible post apps we have discussed? I've not had any problems with RGB32 or RGB64bit, but I don't know if they are really that large.

[Stan Jelavic]

Updated the hdr app with the bit depth selection and picture format selection added.
https://github.com/vintagefilmography/hdr



Check the readme file because there are some changes in operation.

File sizes for 2560x1920 overscan:

Jpeg - 2.95 MB
Tiff 32 bit - 12.5 MB
Tiff 64 bit - 37.2 MB

Note that Tiff uses LZW lossless compression.

[Kamel Ikhlef]

Stan,
At the moment, I haven't flashed the new fW yet.
So sometimes on some films I don't want to use HDR.
with IC Capture SW (without vb hdr.exe) . Will I have a single capture as before or the msp will trigger 2 scans in all cases ?

[Stan Jelavic]

HDR is active in slow speed mode only Kamel in the latest FW. You can still run single trigger in fast speed 1 FPS and 2 FPS with turbo.

Run	Speed	Turbo	Rewind	Mode
Off			Off	Off
Off			On	Rewind
On	Low	Off	Off	0.5 FPS HDR
On	Low	On	Off	1 FPS HDR
On	Hi	Off	Off	1 FPS
On	Hi	On	Off	2 FPS
On	Low	Off	On	0.5 FPS HDR + Capstan
On	Low	On	On	1 FPS HDR + Capstan
On	Hi	Off	On	1 FPS will add capstan
On	Hi	On	On	2 FPS will add capstan

[David Brown]

Well, the post testing moves forward. Maybe it was just luck, but I spent several minutes adjusting the exposure in IC capture without Livelock.

Then I realized I was still using USB2 and switched back to USB3. The software did not recognize it even after disconnecting and reconnecting the camera and software. The image was ok, just the framerate was stuck in low.

When I switched to USB2 there was a big fuss, and eventually I selected IGNORE. That must have hung on since yesterday? So I did a factory reset.

Welcome back USB3.

The rest of the time I spent tweaking exposure, LiveLock never happened. Wonder if the factory reset helped? I also did not load a saved configuration.

Captured a few seconds of a scene using only IC WDR with reduced gamma and gain. Finished in Vegas where I cropped, noise reduction, sharpening, and more contrast. Looks ok. I think it will look even better with HDR. A birthday cake lit only by window light.

I want to try AVIsynth for scratch removal and sharpening. Update the FW and HDR app. then Enfuse for HDR.

That should take a while!

PS The mask really helps with dark scenes, DON'T forget to shield the Hawkeye from ambient light too.

[Stan Jelavic]

Good progress David. Thanks for the tips.

[Stan Jelavic]

Tried the new 13MP camera today with the RPI. Ran into an issue with the driver (documentation petty poor). Posted the issue in Arducam forum but while I was there I noticed a note saying that the lens should not be changed due to lens shading (pink glow).
https://www.arducam.com/forums/search/ar1335/

That is exactly what I was my concern was. But I will still try to get it going and then probably just return it.

[Kamel Ikhlef]

Thanks Stan for your tests.

There is two models of this camera. one with lens M12 mount.

https://www.arducam.com/product/ardu...12-mount-lens/

according to your last switch hawkeys chart, we cannot yet have 0.5, 1 or 2 fps without hdr but with capstan ?
(if I understood correctly).

Thanks again for all your hard work to improve this telecine. What a road traveled!