Wolverine-Hawkeye Telecine

[Bruce Davis]

Hi Stan, settings I used for Nick's capture program (just used defaults to test no white balance etc.) :-
1. Click on "Device" button and select "DFM 72BUC02-ML
2. Under "Video Format" click on "Customise" button change the colour format to RGB24, Width & Height, your preference.
3. Close the "Select Custom Format" window and the "Device Settings" window by clicking "OK-OK".
4.Click on the "Run (view)" button and an image should appear in the "Live display" window. If not then press "Stop" and click on "Run (view)" again.
Options are also available through the "Settings" Button.
My operating system is Windows 7 x64.
Regards - Bruce

[Stan Jelavic]

David, my understanding of binning:
The sensor pixel sizes are continuously shrinking for higher rez. The down side is that the pixel area is getting smaller reducing the light gathering capability.
Hence, poor performance in low light conditions. The binning idea is to add the signal from neighboring pixels so that they act as one. So for 2 pixel binning the area
is equal to 4X improving the low light performance. And, I see that. If I turn binning on the brightness of the scene jumps up significantly giving me better rez in dark areas.

The downside is lower rez. My 2 cents.

[David Brown]

Hey, let me sing praises to the new forum software!! So much better.

Stan, interesting use for binning. Makes sense.

I can see the increased sharpening in the Hawkeye. Watched the Nov 19 version of the same, everything looks better now. Almost everything. I watched those at lunch at work on 1080p monitors. The sharpening helped. At home, a 4k monitor shows more artifacts. Some of that is likely caused by increased sharpening and/or added compression from online servers. I have a slow connection tonight.

I think you are close to declaring your settings default. It's a daunting task to work with all the exposure controls from scratch. It's now a better starting point, even if you have the post-production tools that can do more.

I'm most surprised though by the Wolverine's side of the screen. It should look worse than it does???

[Stan Jelavic]

Thanks David.. It is a good starting point I agree. Tried Fred's sw (thanks for the pointers Bruce) and got it working. The adjustments for the high, mid and low rgb levels help because I would get some reddish shadows and the sky had a bit of red tint, so this helps...........but.......... no adjustment for WDR. Guess it can be adjusted in IC Capture and then run Nick's sw after that. Will play with it more tomorrow.

[Bruce Davis]

Nick's was written some 7 years ago probably before WDR was included in IC capture. Not sure if he would be willing to share his source code with you.

[Stan Jelavic]

Will contact him. Thanks Bruce.
Here is the C mount quote for the cam that we use:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=172...qTP6TiWq6jTftV


And the mechanical:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1iZ...awKcWFfHxKrg8H

[David Brown]

A board mounted c lens? Saves room without the metal housing. Looks like 1 mount with and 1 without a filter. Thought it might need a threaded filter.


Here are screen caps of the November and recent side by sides. I always notice the lady in the white dress. The Wolverine version shows white, the Hawkeye reveals a large pattern.

November

Latest- even the windows look better.

[Kamel Ikhlef]

The registration number of the car is also better defined.
In addition to the artifacts, Wolverine eats the details!
Hawkey winner! ...

[Stan Jelavic]

Thanks David and Kamel. Good observation.
There are other Hawkeye advantages:
Exposure:

[Stan Jelavic]

Wolverine exposure hunting causing flickering.
Faces - Wolverine sharp and artificial looking - yet rocks behind are fuzzy:

[David Brown]

Just a note: Not the best time of the year to make a lot of hobby progress! Happy holidays to all.

To do a 4k/2k test I've found some problems setting up both camera and lens. My macro setups have been with the 8mm film extremely close to the end of the lens, in fact, also attached to the lenses. I have a 20mm reverse mount and a 5x macro lens for DSLR. The 20mm has a better resolution than the macro. Both lenses collide with the Wolverine's stepper motor when trying to fill the frame. It sits about 32 mm above the film.

I also bought a microscope camera in anticipation of soldering the Hawkeye board. I went overboard and bought a 4k with a c-mount microscope lens. I thought it might be also used for Hawkeye captures. Since it's from Amazon, I would just return it if I was wrong. It's a great microscope camera! I decided to keep it, but I don't think it will be good for 8mm capture. The lens alone is 6 1/2" long (165mm). I can fill the frame with the lens 95mm above the film. That is above the stepper motor.

There is no exposure control of any kind. Full automatic everything. No depth of field and I wonder how well it would maintain focus across long captures.

I had hoped to be shooting off the Wolverine's gate and use the built-in lighting. That is in addition to testing 2k/4k. I can do a setup outside of the gate and use my own light source. All this takes time.


The microscope camera with clearance above the stepper motor

[Stan Jelavic]

Thanks David, Happy Holidays.
Glad someone else is also working on the project. Going with the microscope camera is a good alternative as long as you get a decent lens with adjustable iris.
Also need a way of triggering the camera and do all other adjustments. Curious to see what results you get.

I am doing some experiments with lighting. Use the daylight, then my old video light and the stock Wolverine light. All tests done by looking at the film through a magnifier.
Still early to say but here are some preliminary findings:

- Daylight - beautiful colors - nice blue sky color.
- my old video light - yellowish glow - the blue color of the sky faded away quite a bit
- wolverine - the sky went to that ugly blue reddish color that I see in the captures and I cannot correct properly

Still not sure why I cannot compensate for the LED. Possibly because the curves have to be non-linear and that would require some type of white balance calibration film that I don't have.
Maybe get the black a white test film. This can be used with Nick Whitehead's sw to create the compensation curves.

Here a a few notes regarding white LEDs:


The led that Wolverine uses is probably uneven, similar to the picture shown above. It is hard to compensate for that since all three colors are driven from the same source.
Here is the discussion:
https://forums.kinograph.cc/t/the-backlight/966/3

I am not sure yet how to come up with the rgb alternative. Was thinking of cutting he bottom out from underneath the LED and placing an RGB assembly there. But then the N8/S8 switch has to come out. I still have not figured out how the switch controls the claw pitch. It is to do with the mechanical claw stop. The electronics is easy since we do not use it (capture frame size adjustable).

[Kamel Ikhlef]

Stan,
Here is my last beta version of the HAWKEYE control panel: Before finishing and order the PCB, could you check if that seems correct to you.
This is my first PCB. I do not guarantee until you have validated (I do not have enough experience in this area).

I have a doubt about the 4 positions switch "speed" and "Start" (RUN) button.
Thanks again for the time you spend on this project. It helps a lot !.

Kicad Files :
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1iV...2KsZzjOfblW7l9

[Stan Jelavic]

Thanks Kamel. Will check your design today. BTW where do you plan to install the front panel?
Regarding Bruce's note:
Nick's was written some 7 years ago probably before WDR was included in IC capture. Not sure if he would be willing to share his source code with you.

I contacted Nick and he had some suggestions:
- The LED is not balanced and going with RGB LEDs is a better solution.
- Maximize histogram but make sure that it is not saturating.
- Balance low end to prevent tinge - in his case it was blue green (blue green shadows)
- use gamma

One thing that I learned from the discussion is that the white balance should not be done by tweaking the camera rgb gains. That is what I did. I tweak the gains until the preview looks correct.
But it is never correct. The sky color is off, the shadows do not look right etc...
Lesson learned - use rgb camera gains to maximize the rgb histograms. In our case the blue color would get saturated and hence red tinge because red is stronger than green. Wolverine have similar issue but red and green are more balanced and we get the cyan/blue sky which actually looks pretty good.
With rgb gain channels adjusted (these are actually camera gains) the gamma set to around 0.8, the low end does not go down low enough due to the camera dynamic range.
If left like that the video will look washed out. Possibly use WDR. Still looking into this.
So all of this is done within the camera programmed by Nick's sw.
Once the frame is grabbed Nick's sw can do the white balance and tweak the low, mid and high tones before saving the file.

I do have his source so that additional enhancements can be added if required.
Really appreciate his help. Saved me lot's of headaches.

One more note - sending a few camera trigger cables to Bob and an older board to David today. My good deed of the day

[Kamel Ikhlef]

Thank you Stan,
I thought I'd put it on the front panel instead of the wolverine screen with a custom designed stand.
It is not yet defined, but I can design around the PCB without problem.
It will be hidden sou hood only buttons and leds will be visible.
it can also be fixed to the metal front of the Wolverine (2 holes on each side of the LCD screen)
with a suitable support printed in 3d. i planned a supsort in same time for a camera fan.