# Shifting paradigms... The future of sports and photojournalism photography..



## TheLost (Apr 18, 2013)

What would you do with a 8mp camera that can shoot 80fps (with no buffer limit)?  How about a 33mp camera that can do 120fps?

Could Nikon be about to enter digital cinema market? | EOSHD.com
NHK develops 8K camera sensor with 120FPS video | Electronista

With all the new interchangeable lens 4k cameras being announced our way of shooting sports is about to change.   Soon we'll be pushing the button twice during an event... once to start recording.. and once to stop.  Then its off to PP where we'll scan through millions of frames to find the best shots.

I'm kind of excited...   a 33mp camera system (8k video) with good lenses is going to be sweet!  

Nikon better pull its head out soon or its going to be left behind..  the future is now! 






What do you guys think?  Are you ready to switch from being a Photographer to Videographer?


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## ronlane (Apr 18, 2013)

whole new meaning to "spray and pray". I think he said it best, that you are going to use up a lot of resource and pictures with motion blur to get that one shot (not that some don't do that anyway.) That being said, I think it is an option for some given that it is a top of the line body and requires basically L glass, so the images should be really good if done correctly.


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## Derrel (Apr 18, 2013)

As he stated--you lose a lot of frames to motion blur...and you're basically just letting the camera run and HOPING to get a useable frame. The shutter speed being in the 1/50 second range...ummm, terribly slow, and unable to stop many kinds of sports motions. Not really much of an advantage for sports or action. He didn't even feel it was much of an advantage for commercial photography.

Actually, we have had access to this type of very high-speed capture for years now, albeit in high-end digicam form. Olympus premiered this probably eight years ago, and others jumped on, but the lure of 100 frames in one second has never really been compelling.

As far as Nikon being poised to enter the 4k camera market; ummm....they COULD BE, I suppose, but their recent neglect of video doesn't make it seem like they are. The era of the video d-slr...well, it seems like that market has already peaked, and the REAL foot traffic is now directed toward video-specific cameras from other makers--makers who are catering SPECIFICALLY to making good, small, compact and light, affordable video cameras. Like the new BlackMagic *Pocket Cinema Camera*, which premiered at the National Association of Broadcasters trade show last week and was awarded Best of Show, 2013. Priced at wait for it,wait for it...$995, with an active m4/3 lens mount...whoa!!!!

http://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/blackmagicpocketcinemacamera

The whole d-slr as video camera was a short-lived phase; d-slr as a video platform really cannot compete with dedicated video cameras. And dedicated still cameras have advantages. That's why the two camera types have remained separate for decades. Consider the very restrictive National Football League rules on video...having a still camera that is a video camera could actually be considered a negative...same with other sports leagues where VIDEO images from games are regulated VERY strictly, and can only be allowed on the web for literally hours before they must be pulled down.


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## TheLost (Apr 18, 2013)

Think about filming an NFL game 10 years from now (if the NFL is around 10 years from now  )... 

1) Drone's / Quadcopters following the action from above.
( First 4K Canon 1DC drone flight (and FS700 / C300 also gets airborne) | EOSHD.com )

2) Automated camera arrays positioned around the field sending high quality (33mp / fast shutter / 60+fps) video to the production room.

The 'photographer' just scans through the action pulling out the images he/she wants.

The NFL will finally have total control of all its images


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## ronlane (Apr 18, 2013)

I can agree with Derrel about the video and stills part. My T3i has video and I've only used it about 3 times and that was with action shots of my kids and they weren't all that great. Not bad but I don't think that I'd want a still pulled from them.


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## ronlane (Apr 18, 2013)

That's what dictator Gooddell wants is total control. His ego is so big that he actually thinks he ca be judge, jury and executioner.


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## TheLost (Apr 18, 2013)

Derrel said:


> As far as Nikon being poised to enter the 4k camera market; ummm....they COULD BE, I suppose, but their recent neglect of video doesn't make it seem like they are. The era of the video d-slr...well, it seems like that market has already peaked, and the REAL foot traffic is now directed toward video-specific cameras from other makers--makers who are catering SPECIFICALLY to making good, small, compact and light, affordable video cameras. Like the new BlackMagic *Pocket Cinema Camera*, which premiered at the National Association of Broadcasters trade show last week and was awarded Best of Show, 2013. Priced at wait for it,wait for it...$995, with an active m4/3 lens mount...whoa!!!!



I have no hopes for Nikon in the future... they seem to be stuck in the past.  Canon is doing a good job staying 'current'.

But its the new/start up companies that will define what comes next.  Take a look at RED.. Their first camera came out in 2007(?) and has been gaining acceptance at a staggering pace (Movies, Television, and Magazines shot on RED Digital Cinema cameras and equipment).

8K video will kill the sports photographer as we know it


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## imagemaker46 (Apr 18, 2013)

Still comes down to the person holding the camera.  It will always come down to the creative and educated mind to produce images.   If cameras are just set up and the thousands of images are being sent to one person, that person will not be a photographer, but simply a computer tech.  I know all kinds of photographers that are moving towards video already.  I've started working on shooting more video myself, but find using a live view screen on the dslr is a pain in the ass to focus using longer lenses.


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## TheLost (Apr 18, 2013)

ronlane said:


> I can agree with Derrel about the video and stills part. My T3i has video and I've only used it about 3 times and that was with action shots of my kids and they weren't all that great. Not bad but I don't think that I'd want a still pulled from them.



Your T3i is only shooting 1080p video (2.1mp)... Im talking about 8K video (33mp).


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## Derrel (Apr 18, 2013)

The ability to pull stills from high-quality video has been around for a long time. Maxim ran a cover photo of Kelly Brock (??) or Kim Kardashian (??) a few years back, made from a still image pulled from a 4k video camera. And yet...that practice has still not become the norm. Not sure why...but it just...has...not...become...the...norm. Maybe because medium format digital backs are still so much higher in resolution? Or because motion pictures require so much continuous lighting, as opposed to lightweight, cheap strobe flash power? Did you notice in that video, he had both a 1k and 2k quartz light + ambient daylight, just to get decent images in sunny southern california between 2 and 4 PM???

I dunno...

We often see technical innovation that never catches on, never comes to fruition...it's an interesting subject.


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## TheLost (Apr 18, 2013)

Derrel said:


> The ability to pull stills from high-quality video has been around for a long time. Maxim ran a cover photo of Kelly Brock (??) or Kim Kardashian (??) a few years back, made from a still image pulled from a 4k video camera. And yet...that practice has still not become the norm. Not sure why...but it just...has...not...become...the...norm.



Those are studio shots... 

I'm talking about sports and photojournalism.  When you have 5 seconds to capture that moment wouldn't you rather have 600 frames then 50?  The (outdated) Nikon V1 can do 30FPS @ 8mp (3872 x 2592... or 4k video).  Granted it can only do it for 1 second... but that's from a ~$300 camera.

I asked Thom Hogan a few months ago what he thought the best 'soccer mom' DSLR was...  


> _The soccer mom's D4 is&#8230;wait for it&#8230;A V1 or V2. Really. As long as you stick to faster lenses on the FT1, it's actually quite a reasonable facsimile (V2 is 15 fps in continuous focus with Nikon 1 lenses, up to 60 fps without focus shift). Your 70-200mm becomes essentially a 510mm on the V1/V2. With care, it produces very good results. _



If a low-end camera can do that now... In 5 years we'll be shooting video and pulling out the stills in post


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## imagemaker46 (Apr 18, 2013)

TheLost said:


> Derrel said:
> 
> 
> > The ability to pull stills from high-quality video has been around for a long time. Maxim ran a cover photo of Kelly Brock (??) or Kim Kardashian (??) a few years back, made from a still image pulled from a 4k video camera. And yet...that practice has still not become the norm. Not sure why...but it just...has...not...become...the...norm.
> ...



Skill and experience allows a good photographer to capture those moments in sports, in around a 500th of a second.  Why do you need 5 seconds and 600 frames, when only one frame will do it?


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## rexbobcat (Apr 18, 2013)

Indeed, because it's not like 8K video will be prohibitively expensive to the average photographer or anything.

A 128GB SSD hold something like 30 minutes of 1080p 24fps RAW video.


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## KmH (Apr 18, 2013)

Pro sports shooters and PJ's usually don't have a lot of time and are required to send JPEGs ASAP.

It's the kind of business that 'if you snooze, you lose', and sifting through several 10's - 100's of thousands of video frames to cherry pick some stills likely won't feature.

If they shoot video, it will probably be shown as video.


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## TheLost (Apr 19, 2013)

KmH said:


> Pro sports shooters and PJ's usually don't have a lot of time and are required to send JPEGs ASAP.
> 
> It's the kind of business that* 'if you snooze, you lose',* and sifting through several 10's - 100's of thousands of video frames to cherry pick some stills likely won't feature.



Have you ever worked with high-end video editing equipment?  The production team would just quickly scan through the video stream to find the last play... pull out a few frames as 'stills' and move on...  You'd actually get images out faster.  



KmH said:


> If they shoot video, it will probably be shown as video.


That is my point exactly... They are already shooting video... It won't be hard to pull stills from that video feed that are 'print' quality.  Who needs a 'still' photographer any more on the sidelines.


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## imagemaker46 (Apr 19, 2013)

TheLost said:


> KmH said:
> 
> 
> > Pro sports shooters and PJ's usually don't have a lot of time and are required to send JPEGs ASAP.
> ...



If you have to ask the question, "who needs a still photographer anymore on the sidelines" Then you haven't shot too many professional football games.


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## Derrel (Apr 19, 2013)

The idea that the development of 4k and 8k video capture will automatically lead to a paradigm shift in sports and photojournalism is not borne out by the past. I watched a film called "The Paradigm Shift" about a decade ago; it focused on the relatively *rare *paradigm shift phenomenon. Paradigm shifts are not common, and the odd thing about them is that they are often predicted--but they seldom actually happen. And when they do happen, almost always, the shift comes from ideas brought forth by people or companies that are OUTSIDE of the industry in which the shift occurs. For example, the movie examined the case of a high-miles-per-gallon car design contest offering a large monetary prize was announced.

The usual suspects, the auto companies' engineering departments, as well at MIT and RIT and Cal-Berkeley engineering groups, and other associated engineering "geniuses" came up with...the same old chit...same-old,same-old...it took outsiders, and neophytes, to win the competition.

The winners? A group of high school students who used a car that looked like a dragster...huge rear tires, small front tires, and a small engine to get the car moving--and then, in a true paradigm shift, they had a propulsion system based upon hydraulic cylinders that could store tremendous amounts of energy. ALL the other groups focused on small displacement internal combustion engines. But...did this amazing, over 100 mpg car ever develop into a paradigm shifting reality....uh....no.

I recall reading old, 1950's copies of Popular Mechanics in the early 1970's; issue after issue predicted air-cars in 50 years. That was the paradigm shift the experts just KNEW would be *the next big thing* in automobiles....*personal "air-cars"*. I mean, we had decent aircraft then...aircraft had been around since the early 1900's, so, 40 years or so...what the heck happened?


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## Tony S (Apr 19, 2013)

> When you have 5 seconds to capture that moment wouldn't you rather have 600 frames then 50? The



  Nope, I'd rather have good timing from experience and get one frame.


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## imagemaker46 (Apr 19, 2013)

There are dreams and there are realities, they don't always end up being on the same path.   People make predictions based on the expert knowledge they have at that time.  I can predict that it is going to rain when it's already raining.  Currently all the weather change experts are predicting that in 50 years the polar ice caps will have melted and flood all the coastal cities, and yet these same expert people can't get the weather right two days from now.    Will camera technology change, yes it will, will video grabs continue to get better, yes they will, will drone video cameras take over what skilled photographers are doing, nope.  Maybe when the polar ice caps melt.


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## rexbobcat (Apr 19, 2013)

TheLost said:


> KmH said:
> 
> 
> > Pro sports shooters and PJ's usually don't have a lot of time and are required to send JPEGs ASAP.
> ...



Ask any sports news outlet if they use 4k cameras to shoot game video.

My bet is that none of them do. What good does an 8k camera do if they industry doesn't even use the "lesser" resolution of today.

Also; might I reiterate that 8k video would take enormous storage and processing power? 

Sports Illustrated doesn't have time to wait for some sports network to pull frames when they can go to a wire service or their own staff right after the game?

What you're suggesting, with today's technology, is both inefficient and expensive.


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## runnah (Apr 19, 2013)

It's like any new tech. There will be early adopters and stubborn holdouts. 

Same old story. But yes in the future dslr and video cameras will be one in the same.


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## vintagesnaps (Apr 19, 2013)

If there was a practical or feasible use for it I think it would have been done already. There's been the capability to use one frame from a strip of video film footage for some time now. 

I know for example that SI wants their photographers' media cards turned in directly from the camera; from what I understand their editors want to see what the photographers are getting in camera. I think the purpose for that is to have photos that don't need much editing - many teams and media outlets want the photos on their websites by the time a game is done. They don't have time or don't want to have to spend a lot of time editing their photographers' work. 

I think with sports and/or news there's a need for being able to shoot photos efficiently, and it doesn't seem like recording 2-3 hours minimum of footage to search through to find good photos for publication is a workable option.

(And I don't think where I live they can predict the weather two hours from now much less two days!)


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## TheLost (Apr 20, 2013)

I think a lot of you are missing the.. "IN THE FUTURE".. part of this thread.

case in point..



rexbobcat said:


> Ask any sports news outlet if they use 4k cameras to shoot game video.
> 
> My bet is that none of them do. What good does an 8k camera do if they industry doesn't even use the "lesser" resolution of today.
> 
> ...




4k video is getting more main stream... a 50inch 4k LCD for $1500? Seiki 50-Inch 4K TV Eyes-On: How the Hell Is a TV This Beautiful So Cheap?
8k (33mp) video moving forward.. 

10 years ago was anybody using a tablet computer? Smart Phone? How things are done TODAY will not define what happens TOMORROW.


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## imagemaker46 (Apr 20, 2013)

How things are done today will always influence what happens tomorrow.


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## Derrel (Apr 20, 2013)

TheLost said:


> I think a lot of you are missing the.. "IN THE FUTURE".. part of this thread.



Where is my doggone air car???? Those were supposed to be here 10 years ago, dangit!

Why am I not living on Mars, in the Mars Colony we read about as kids in the early 1970's?

Why are we ALL not equipped with comfortable,affordable, chic, wearable eyeglasses/computers/micro entertainment systems?

Where is that doggone 'cure for cancer' I have heard we are so,so close to...since the 1980's...?

I'm sorry, but I have heard/seen/talked about all kinds of "in the future we will have ________________" things, for far too long to have faith in ANY projections.

               :hug::


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## TheLost (Apr 21, 2013)

"Abraham Joffe captures stills from 4K video with the EOS-1D C"
Canon Professional Network - Abraham Joffe captures stills from 4K video with the EOS-1D C

I cant wait to wear my google glasses while filming 16k video of my grand-kids playing sports on mars


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