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NAB 2014 Wrap-up. Top 10 Products. Kinefinity’s KINEMINI 4K.

The NAB of Cameras. Kinefinity KINEMINI 4K.
By Sean Davis

While NAB 2014 was dubbed the NAB of 4K, with all the new camera announcements and updates to existing camera models it was really the NAB of cameras. Some of it made sense and some of it didn’t, but here’s what we found noteworthy.
Kinefinity00_blgpstThis little Chinese camera company has been around for a few years now. Some of us have taken notice and others have ignored them. They have an impressive product for the sub-$5000 price range that can no longer be ignored.
This year KINEFINITY brought their update to their Kineraw mini which they’re calling the KINEMINI 4K. The camera sports a super 35 CMOS sensor rated at 800 ASA that can shoot 4K in cinema DNG RAW at up to 30fps. It also offers CINEFORM RAW, which in my opinion is one of its strongest suits, unlike all the other 4K camera options that offer either Cinema DNG or prores.

The KINEMINI offers  a compressed RAW codec, and not just any compressed RAW codec but CINEFORM RAW. (Prores is not RAW or compressed RAW, the log recording options offered in prores on other cameras are no comparison to true RAW or a visually lossless compressed RAW.) In camera you get the  option of 2K CINEFORM RAW. But the camera also comes with KINEFINITY’s Kinestation, which gives you the ability to transcode cinema DNG to CINEFORM RAW on the fly.

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Why is CINEFORM RAW important? It’s simple efficiency: it’s a professional visually lossless compressed RAW codec, which translates to having all the flexibility of RAW without the data management and storage nightmares. CINEFORM RAW is the codec that the SI-2K records. (The first digital cinema camera to win an Oscar for cinematography was the SI-2K for Slum Dog Millionaire, which was captured to the CINEFORM RAW CODEC).

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So what else can this camera do? It sports an interchangeable lens mount system with options for the Nikon mount, PL mount, and the increasingly popular EF mount. The guys at KINEFINITY have designed a locking EF mount, essentially making your EF mount photo lenses a bit more cinema-use friendly while giving you the required electronic control of the lenses. It also implements what KINEFINITY calls their sports mode to reduce rolling shutter when shooting fast motion. They had a few shots of helicopter rotors on their demo reel and I was pleasantly surprised at how well it handled this.
Kinefinity02_blgpst The camera also sports a Wi-Fi remote control option with a free app that allows you to control the camera’s menu via your android or iPhone. One thing I noticed while scrolling through the camera’s extremely deep menu was a function that you will find on no other camera in this price range: anamorphic de-squeeze, and not just one anamorphic de-squeeze but an anamorphic de-squeeze for every possible flavour of anamorphic squeeze from 1.33x to 2x. The camera will squeeze the image and output it at the appropriate aspect ratio over its HDMI or HD SDI monitor outputs.

The KINEMINI is also extremely lightweight, weighing approximately 3.5 pounds without a battery or SSD. Speaking of SSDs, KINEFINITY offers their own 2.5-inch SSDs for the camera, which they call the KINEMAGS, but the camera will work with off-the-shelf 2.5-inch SSDs (the same ones who may or may not have been using the Blackmagic cinema cameras).
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For more in-depth technical articles visit Sean’s company Across 100th Media and follow him on Twitter (@across110media).

This is our 4th post on our favorite toys at NAB 2014. The other highlighted products are:

1. G-Speed Studio and G-Raid Studio
2. Grass Valley’s EDIUS 7
3. Syrp’s Genie
4. Kinemini 4K camera
5. AJA Cion camera
6. Blackmagic 4K Film Scanner
7. Livestream’s Studio solutions
8. Edelkrone pocket series
9. Atomos Shogun and Ninja Star
10.NHK 8K Camera

Video

The awesomest feature in Adobe Lightroom 5.

The single hottest, coolest, awesomest, and handiest feature in Lightroom since version 1 is….Smart Previews!

Why? Simply put, we can now edit our images in Lightroom 5 without having access to the original files. (more…)

Video

Adobe Lightroom 4.4 is out. 25 new cameras supported.

Adobe just released a new Lightroom update making this version 4.4. Lightroom now officially supports over 25 different RAW file formats. Here is the complete list.

This version adjusts the White Balance for a number of Nikons, includes a correction to the demosaic algorithms for Fujifilm cameras with the X-Trans sensor, and adds support for new lenses like Canon’s EF 24-70mm f/4 L IS USM and Nikon’s AF-S NIKKOR 70-200mm f/4G ED VR are included. Unfortunately the Panasonic Lumix lenses are still missing.

According to Adobe, users are now (finally!) able to add contacts from their Address Book to email (on Mac). I’ll try this ASAP.

Fujifilm X-Trans sensor.These are the main improvements added and bugs fixed:
• The crop overlay tool resized incorrectly when used in conjunction with the “Constrain to
Crop” checkbox in the Lens Correction panel
• Background graphics were not correctly rendered within the Book Module
• Reading metadata from file would sometimes result in keyword and and GPS metadata to
not save for video files
• Updated the “Missing File Icon” for HiDPI / Retina dispalsy
• The supplied lens profile for the Sony RX-1 did not contain vignette information
• Preview in Develop Module was not updated with the latest adjustments
• Square tile artifacts while painting with brush
• Previews of photos in portrait orientation were blurry when viewed in the filmstrip in the
Develop module. (Mac only)

Click to keep reading  (more…)

Photography

Streamlining Adobe Lightroom • NEW Weekly “Tips and Tricks” Series.

 
The more photos we take, the more photos we need to edit, and the more we need to retouch, back up, search and find. Digital imaging has been great in many ways, like instant review and approval, but it is not making our lives any easier when it comes to time spent in front of the computer.

Photographers need constant access to our photos; we need them to put portfolios and proposals together. After every assignment we need to retouch and deliver the files. Clients will invariably request changes, other versions or different resolutions. When a job is completed, we often need to update our website and blog and start putting new proposals and presentations together.

To make things event more interesting, with recent developments in telecommunications, our clients are expecting that we deliver files right away, and from any location. That is a challenge that we did not have before. All this put together is what I like to call the “constant image cycle”.

Challenge 1
• The more photos we take the more tools we need to manage, organize, and find them.

Challenge 2
• Need to constantly access images to get assignments (proposals, portfolios, presentations, etc.), edit shoots (select best images, retouch, etc.) and deliver final assets.

Challenge 3
• Photographers are expected to deliver images almost instantly and from any location.

All these “challenges” rely on the same non-renewable resource: Time.

Using Adobe Lightroom as a database
I have been a Lightroom user, beta tester, instructor and evangelist since version 1. Actually, I remember beta testing the very first version under the secret code name “Shadowland.” I now use the software almost every day.

After all these years and playing with the app almost every day, I have discovered many great ways to streamline my workflow, mostly by using Lightroom as a database. Starting next week, I’ll be sharing a weekly tip on this blog. Some tips might be familiar to veteran Lightroom users; some approaches might be entirely new. Some will help you to get things done quicker, while others will entirely replace outdated steps. I hope you join me on this project, and as always feel free to ask questions, comment on the tip of the week, and suggest improvements.If you are interested in other topics, please let us know here (and get a chance to win a $100 Amazon Gift Card!).

UPDATE 20130115 Tip & Trick #1, and Tip & Trick #2.

UPDATE 20130214 Tip & Trick #3, and Tip & Trick #4

If you have specific questions or want to learn more, we are now offering vir­tual one-on-one ses­sions to give you cus­tomized solu­tions and per­son­al­ized train­ing no mat­ter where you are in the world. Sign up now!

Photography

Bye Bye Phocus. Hasselblad gives Lightroom away.

 
In about two weeks, Hasselblad will start including Adobe Lightroom when you buy an H4D system. Currently only the H4D-60 is fully supported, and there are many lens profiles missing. It is also unclear if the offer extends to Lightroom 4 when it starts shipping or not. Stay tuned.

Hasselblad camera and Adobe Lightroom