At this point RED has beaten the drum very loudly regarding higher resolution, and when you're dealing with single sensor cameras that lose resolution due to interpolation (not every pixel represents red, green, and blue, thus it has to be created), it does make a lot of sense. But that's not all that's important in image quality (not by a long shot), and the DRAGON is beginning to prove that you're getting more than just 6K with the new sensor, you're also getting a great image that is tremendously malleable. John Marchant of KipperTie already showed off a little bit of his footage playing around with DRAGON, and now we've got even more, including his thoughts on the situation.
Here is the original clip, followed by an extended version:
If you missed it, here is Gunleik Groven's NSFW short Sweet shot with DRAGON, where he tries to really push some of the highlight handling of the camera:
Here is John talking about RED and working with 6K:
I think the extended sample from John and Gunleik's short are great tests for the camera as there are some really difficult shots that show this sensor isn't kidding around in the dynamic range department. From all of the RED footage I've seen, the thing that often bothered me the most was not skin tones, but the way highlights were handled in non-daylight situations. Very often they skew towards a sickly yellow when you're correcting for the rest of the frame. This look can work for certain projects, but it feels a bit unnatural in anything other than science fiction. With the new DRAGON footage, I'm not really seeing the yellow -- orange is staying orange, which is already a major improvement in my mind. With new color science, I imagine we're going to see even better color separation in mixed or below-daylight situations.
When people finally get to grade this stuff, that's when you'll know for sure what is there in the "negative." I have a feeling based on what I've seen that the information is there, and you'll be able to do whatever you need to it without breaking other things in the frame.
If you want to read more about Gunleik's shoot, check out the REDUser discussion beginning here.
Links:
