Sky High

Here is a short demo video of what stabilization software is doing. Just after lift off and when I start to climb out, there is a slight bump. Watch how the software immediately corrects by moving the image upward to counteract that downward movement because of the bump. The push or zoom would normally hide this outer frame area but as I stated earlier it softens the image as well because it is magnifying the pixels. When you have the software set to auto you will see an active zoom in and out according to how much correction is needed and how much it has to hide the edges. The more unstable the image at any given time, the more it has to make dramatic correction and finally the more it has to zoom in to hide those larger corrections. I'll try to post video that is much more unstable to show how wild that frameline can get. If you simply make a frame by holding your hand or a piece of paper around this demo you will notice that the center is stable because you are hiding all of the movement on the edges.

[link=http://www.jefcommunications.com/asx/helo/rcu/DFI/various/FRAMEDEMO.asx]Frame Demo[/link]

TheHindmost

Well, that's certainly an effective demonstration of the technology, thanks!

Sky, I know it's been said before, but I'll say it again: Thank you for all your contributions to this group!

Will

detroitdr

SkyHigh,

Your not using the actual camera (yes I know you have the mount..) that now comes with the savs are you? Why is that quality so bad?

Sky High

They said that they do have a newer one with better firmware but what do you mean about the quality being bad? Are you talking about clarity or color. Remember, that is compressed video that has been partially blown up due to the software. I'm going to have to post an unstabilized version to show the native resolution even though it will be compressed too it is cleaner. If you are viewing at full screen, reduce your player to 200%. That will make the resolution better. Why don't you post some video shot with your new camera so we can see what it looks like. Don't forget to white balance the camera with that switch on the back of the ball.

detroitdr

Sky,

Ya I'm going to try today to get some footage...

Sky High

Can you tell me what you meant by the quality not being good?

detroitdr

Sky,

It appears that you have vibration "buzzing" the camera, almost causing what looks like an interlace issue. The picture in general doesn't look very sharp (perhaps from the buzz?)

color I understand is warm from the setting of the sun......

Your Staples footage looked better then this....

Sky High

Can you describe specific areas where you noticed this? If you are referring to the vibration when the helo is repositioning for a different shot or actually moving straight in one direction, unfortunately I believe that's inherent because the rotors are not just idling as in a hover but pulsing as they must do to change direction of the helo therefore creating high frequency vibration. You can clearly see the high frequency vibration when the lens is flared by the sun because the flare spike waves due to the vibration. The vibrations due to repositioning are not as prevalent or hardly even detectable with stable flight as in a hover with unprocessed video. Because of the push (blow up), any imperfections are magnified. Another issue that I have noticed which is also an issue with the DV format is something called aliasing. This is stairstepping or jagged scan lines in the video of the horizontal lines or surfaces of objects. This is what you see in this video such as the stands and any straight edges from an oblique angle. This is also magnified by processing.

As far as the video being warm, what you said is correct. However, it is important to balance for the light that will dominate the shot. I white balanced in the shade on the ground which has a cooler color temperature of around 6300K instead of the warmer sunnier area that is around 5600K. Because I balanced in the cooler shade, that means anything that is in the sun is going to be warmer than normal. So when I got up in the air I was shooting mostly what the sun was hitting so it appeared warmer than it actually was. I prefer a warmer picture over a cooler one. As you know, any color correction can always be fixed in post.

Below is a split screen comparison of before and after processing. You can clearly see the difference in the aliasing as well as the amount of the push before and after processing.

[link=http://www.jefcommunications.com/asx/helo/rcu/DFI/various/SPLITSCREEN.asx]Split Screen Demo[/link]

Sky High

This is an unprocessed version of the stadium video. There was little to no wind with clear skies. I think the stability of the camera ball is very good except during the transitions of locations but that's always been the case. I removed the more unstable transitions where there were big changes in location or altitude because it was just too unstable even with processing.

[link=http://www.jefcommunications.com/asx/helo/rcu/DFI/various/STADIUM1-CLEAN.asx]Unprocessed Demo[/link]

detroitdr

Yes that looks better.. must be the software 2d3 that makes it look the way it does.. I've put up my first SAVS quad view flight.. check it out

http://media.putfile.com/SAVS-First-Flight

Sky High

Yes, I saw that. I hope that your NLE resolved that quad screen in real time otherwise that would have taken some serious time to render. Can you post the best demo at full screen? What is the data rate for that demo video? Thanks.

detroitdr

Sky,

Yes my system does almost everything real time... I took that video at about 7:30pm tonight...As for the bit rate.. I don't know. I loaded MS Media Encoder 9 on my system for putting a small file on PUTFILE.com as they have to be less then 25mb. I don't know how to check a MS En 9 file for the video rate.. I've only install Special version of it that will work with my VT4.6... it only gives me video res to choose from. I really only use D1 (if I need alpha to stay in) or NT25 for everything else... so MS 9 en.... no idea.

I've got to work sunday 7:30 so I'll do a full screen tomorrow if it'll fit under 25mb.

nite

Sky High

The windows media player should tell you what the data rate is when it loads the video and scrolls through the information. It should show up near the audio slider. You can also just roll your mouse over the file and a text box should appear and tell you the specifications of the file. When I said full screen I meant not a quad screen. That shouldn't affect the file size too much.

FL_PI

Hello Sky.

I imagine that by now you have seen my two or three posts, since you seem to be VERY on top of things here. I am assuming that you have seen that I am a VERY NEW member and owner of a DF V TI Pro, which I haven't YET turned on to attempt a flight.
My interest in this subject of posting, is whether I am doing something "wrong" on this board, as I seem to not be able to view very many of YOUR videos. I have been assuming that perhaps since so many of your videos have been posted well over a year ago is the reason I can not view them, but yet I see that you still makes posts referring to the older videos.
When I try to pull up your videos, my windows media player loads and attempts to load your video, then gives me an error that there is no video to load, or sometimes a message that says there is no page at the address.
So that is why I have assumed that because the videos were (by the dates on the posts) older than a year, that was why I couldn't view them.
I usually have no problem with VIEWING most of the other users' videos, although I notice also that most are posted in flash format and are difficult to save to a hard drive for viewing later.
I do also appreciate your posts as I have seen so many remark to you, and these many MONTHS of studying this board and it's posts have really been an education on the subject of DF machines. It has also been of great use of what to ask when I did speak with DFI and in ordering my machine. I am currently trying to find various posts in which to ask my other questions in regard to the DF.
thanks again for your information.
Ed - # 1 NEWBIE/Rookie DF'er

Sky High

Can you name a specific video that is not playing so I can test it? Are you using a PC or Mac? What version of Windows Media Player are you using?

FL_PI

Hello Sky,
OK, I went towards the top of the page of this thread and attempted (again) your video of "framedemo". I am using a PC with Windows Media Version 8.00.00.4477 on Windows XP.
I am going to TRY to post a document with the screen shot of the failure notice. I hope that it works! Nope! It won't accept a .doc file or a htm file. I'm at a loss how to convert the screen shot to an image to upload.
Thank you for your interest. the message I was trying to show you says "There is no connection established with the Windows media Server. The operation failed."
which is the error I get on most all of YOUR videos.[&:]

Sky High

That's me, always difficult. I just tried that link and it is functional. I would recommend upgrading your media player to the latest version. But before doing to that, open the media player on your PC. Then choose tools > options > file types and at least make sure that .asf, .wma & .wmv files are checked. If they are and those were the settings when it failed, let me know and I'll show you a workaround.

FL_PI

Ok then. I did check the options and it SAYS that it includes all of those files plus more.

I did attempt to install Windows Media version 11, but it says I can't until I install Service Pak 2 first......

FL_PI

Oh yes.... One more thing I just remembered, is that I am using Firefox, but that should NOT make any difference, because it DOES call up Windows Media Player properly.......

Sky High

Firefox? Now I'm going to have to charge you! Try the video links using Explorer and see what happens.

FL_PI

OK, I have tried at least four different videos of yours with Explorer and get the identical error message........[&o]

Ed

Sky High

Are you double clicking on the link or right clicking, saving and then clicking on the file once downloaded? Try double clicking ONLY on the link if you haven't already.

FL_PI

Well, up until NOW, I had been SINGLE (left) clicking the link, and it will start Windows Media Player as I said. I have also single right clicked and tried to save the file to my hard drive but still NOTHING downloads.... I just now tried the double click and all that does is start the Media player just like a regular click does and I still get the same error message.

NOW I am beginning to wonder about security issues... perhaps I have the security level too high? That is usually just a cookies issue though........[]

BB_DF

I've been fooling around with Virtual Dub and picked some raw video I'd shot previously with the standard camera mount and lots of bobble. Large smooth motions, such as someone walking and shooting a video, seems to work best with Deshaker. It has more of a problem with jitter and vibration. It did a good job removing the bobble, but I'm not very pleased with the overall quality. There's a detailed description on the video of which filters I ran...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sy8FAmvZL2o

Sky High

Ohhh, SP2. I remember that install took forever. You've got to do it sometime though.