• Members 30 posts
    May 13, 2023, 1:05 a.m.

    One of the cameras caught this very slow (just under 11 km/s) sporadic (according to the UKMON analysis) last night. It was fairly close (~150 km away) so the camera got a fairly good view of it despite it likely not being quite bright enough to be classed as a fireball. Hopefully the embedding will work this time, otherwise the footage can be found here.

    Equipment/settings: Sony a7SII + Sigma Art 28/1.4 @ f1.4 - 1/30s, ISO 16000, 30 FPS - Ninja V recorder/monitor recording in 4K pro-res, Slog2 (vivid setting set on camera).
    vimeo.com/826382240

    I also finally figured out how extract individual frames from footage (tried and tried with CS2 but it didn't like any of the files I tried to open so I eventually got Resolve to do it for me), and was able to make a stack with them using SIRIL
    M230511_2248UT_stack_xl.jpg
    The above event occurred almost to the hour of a spectacular event the same camera (20mm lens) caught last year on the same night in May, so I thought it would be appropriate to mark the anniversary with a stack for that fireball too, now that I know how:
    FB230511_2248UT_stack_l.jpg

    FB230511_2248UT_stack_l.jpg

    JPG, 81.1 KB, uploaded by 1DSmII on May 13, 2023.

    M230511_2248UT_stack_xl.jpg

    JPG, 215.0 KB, uploaded by 1DSmII on May 13, 2023.

  • Members 37 posts
    May 13, 2023, 2:04 a.m.

    Very nice!

    Photoshop (latest version) only seems to save individual frames at 72 dpi for some reason. Maybe that is what MP4 uses. The latest version does allow you to save in several formats including JPEG, PNG, and TIFF. I’ll have to try using DaVinci Resolve to save them.

    I see that your a7Sii has the same greenish tint that my ZV-E10 does when shooting video. It must be a Sony color thing. Some Picture Profiles are worse about it than others. I edited the camera’s White Balance—>Daylight to A-B: 0, G-M: 2.0. Basically, I turned up the magenta to counter the green tint. I’m going to create a lut for this during PP rather than doing it in camera.

  • Members 30 posts
    May 14, 2023, 6:50 p.m.

    Thanks Jack.

    I can only see an option to extract TIFFs with Resolve (top of one of the first pull down menus on the "deliver" tab), but they do the trick nicely.

    I hadn't noticed a green tint, but the monitor is not calibrated. Perhaps related to the fireball which is giving off quite a bit of green light?

    Wouldn't it be easier/better just to set it in camera?

  • Members 37 posts
    May 15, 2023, 4:59 p.m.

    Probably, but I get a green tint shooting video of night sky and an orange tint when shooting images of night sky. The orange image tint is likely due to the horrible brown street lamp on the corner of my yard, but I get that with all of my Sony cameras. I only shoot video with my Sony ZV-E10, but there is definitely a slight green tint of the night sky in LP areas. It might be because I have to shoot at such a high ISO. I haven't tried taking photos of the night sky with my Sony ZV-E10 since changing the white balance green setting internally, so I need to do that to see how it affects the colors in photos. I suspect adding more magenta to an already orange tint will make things worst. That is why it might be better to deal with each issue separately. It is easy to adjust the orange tint in photos in PS or LR during PP, and easy to adjust the green tint in video in DR via a LUT.

  • Members 30 posts
    May 18, 2023, 4:50 p.m.

    Interesting. I'll have to take a few shots to see if there's an orange tint. There is still some low pressure sodium lighting around here, but the nearest street lights are all LED.

    I see your point. It does however seem like LUTs are best avoided if possible, at least according to one poster in this thread I was reading a few nights back.

    Apologies for the sporadic/late reply. I keep finding myself busy, especially if there is good weather (shooting wildlife in the day, and imaging meteors at night). The weather has started to turn here at last. Had 3 clear/semi-clear nights in the last week, and the prospect of quite possibly 4 clear nights in a row (have not had that for a long while!) is looming large, so I'll have my work cut out for me for a while. The next couple of nights look cloudy which gives me a chance to type some replies and get a few other things done.

    I mentioned that I had another a7sII on the way a week or two back - well I managed to order an a7II instead of an a7sII, so sent that back, but I found another used a7sII, which turned up today, and I'll run some tests with it over the next few nights to see if it's a good/bad copy or if I have to return it as well. A good opportunity to get a few images, while the others are in use!

    Hope the weather is getting better for you over there Jack!

  • Members 37 posts
    May 18, 2023, 7:46 p.m.

    Actually I decided to go with PowerGrades rather than LUTs. They seem to be easier to mess with and do work fairly well.