I mentioned Bertoli’s comment because a couple of days ago a participant in this forum said that he thinks that the lens is less sharp, which he doesn’t like, but Bertoli likes the lens because he sees it as having a diffused look. I’m less interested in the technical issue than in the different aesthetic responses to the 13mm video image. I plan to shoot with the lens tomorrow and will settle on a view of my own. I do think that Bertoli knows what he’s talking about. He has some big clients. He’s not just some guy on YouTube.
"I mentioned Bertoli’s comment because a couple of days ago a participant in this forum said that he thinks that the lens is less sharp, which he doesn’t like, but Bertoli likes the lens because he sees it as having a diffused look." Sorry, I commented only after viewing the video. I am now reading the filmmaker's comments on YouTube itself. I'll highlight some comments in a second post. Back in the day, photographers--and I assume filmmakers and directors--often chose lenses--especially portrait lenses--because of a softer "look." And in some cases, even smeared Vaseline™ on lenses to get a softer look. So I get that. (Though Ansel Adams wanted super sharp landscapes. I won't even touch on Diane Arbus.) I'm just saying that in my very limited exploration, I don't see any obvious artifacts in the ultra wide lens, except that it is, in fact, an ultra wide. I used the 10 x zoom this weekend, the first time I've ever used a digital zoom on an iPhone. The result would be fantastic if you needed some information about that one distant detail. But as a photo there were blatant flaws in graininess, just as you'd expect. I don't see any of that in the ultra wide or in shots "between" ultra wide and wide. Apple's clearly doing a lot in software. I took a pano of our gravel drive, distant trees and mountains, our yard and our house with the 13 mm this weekend. I've done the same pano many times in different seasons with my past iPhones. With the ultra wide, I could get a lot more in the shot, but the really impressive thing was the distortion correction. It looked like all the geometry was made to look normal, as if the shot were made in Photoshop with a dozen 50 mm-equivalent images. It might even be too corrected.
From the text accompanying Bertoli's video. "The stabilization is absolutely incredible and I think we got to a point where you don’t need a gimbal anymore, period." "even on the ultra wide angle camera (which doesn’t have optical IS) the software does an amazing job in stabilizing the footage" I think there are many things I might do with a Movi that the iPhone just can't do by itself. To properly test with the 13 mm camera, though, I'll need a better mount system and some counterweighting. And to your point: "To begin with, the ultra wide angle camera is not sharp, at all. And this is why I love it so much." "that’s why cinematographers use diffusion filters so much" Like I said in my last post. I will do some more testing and see if I can see this softness. Note that the YouTube video does use some post processing. Also, I'll add that as I was typing the above, I remembered that we're talking about a 13 mm lens on a whole nother camera that's different in several respects from the 26 mm and 52 mm cameras. It's kind of like the old cinema cameras with three lenses on a rotating mount, but also very different.
I think that it’s helpful to watch the actual shots/camera movements in this and other iPhone videos by Bertoli (this is not the first one that he’s shot entirely handheld) to understand what he means by not needing a gimbal. He’s not talking about walking in a straight line for several seconds as a vlogger might do, which even consumer gimbals have a problem with. Also, he’s obviously not talking about the MCR’s “robot” functions.
I posted this in the other thread, but just to be sure everyone has a chance to see it, I've copied it below: It has been covered already: Freefly Staff does not actively monitor this forum. This forum is a place for users to discuss things amongst themselves. If you have questions for the our staff, you know where to go: https://freeflysystems.com/support Admittedly, we have been a little distracted, with this. I get that this is a hot topic. Apple didn't check with us to see how it would affect our customers, nor did they provide us early release phones to test with. We haven't done any official testing yet (we don't even have the phones yet), and we don't make announcements based on speculation. It is pretty clear at this point, from user feedback that you will see the Movi in frame with the 13mm lens. As someone astutely pointed out, you have the same function with the Movi on an an 11 Pro as you do with iPhone XS and it doesn't block anyone from using the Movi exactly the way they were using it on Sept. 19th. Stay tuned to the Movi Compatibility Page for more information, or feel free to reach out and ask us for support.
Here's Filmic's Blog entry on multi-cam support. As reported elsewhere in the Freefly forum, Filmic 6.10 does allow the user to choose the 13mm ultra-wide camera on the iPhone 11 Pro. https://www.filmicpro.com/2019/09/24/filmic-multi-cam-support-in-ios-13-faq/
Further to Mr. Edmonds’s post from a month ago (two posts up), the question now is whether Freefly has abandoned the product. The iPhone 11 series was launched six weeks ago, Freefly is silent on the future of the Movi Cinema Robot and the moderator of this forum has disappeared. Mr. Edmonds’s sole substantive point was that the Movi Cinema Robot still works with the 26mm and 52mm lenses. No kidding. This company charged top dollar for its product in part on the claim that it is a U.S. company that is more responsive to its customers than its competitors. It’s now clear that that claim was just marketing bumpf. There is little doubt in my mind that Freefly’s main competitor would not be stonewalling the way that Freefly has been for weeks. When do Movi Cinema Robot owners get told the truth about what is going on with the product? Not a complicated question, and getting an answer shouldn’t be like pulling teeth.
“Stay tuned to the Movi Compatibility Page for more information, or feel free to reach out and ask us for support.” they do not monitor this forum, so this post and your post is probably not reaching them. I think the only response you will get is for the iPhone 11, 11 pro and 11 pro max ultra wide lens will be put on the “not compatible” list. They really have no obligation to make this gimbal compatible with every phone that comes out after the gimbal was produced. I used the Movi with my iPhone 11 pro yesterday with filmic pro and my modified case and it worked just fine. as a bonus I was able to attach my osmo pocket via the hoodie so I could have an ultra wide and 24mm view in 4K at the same time. I think what really gets to you and me is they have basically abandoned the software. No new betas, no new software to the App Store in 5 months. I haven’t used it since iOS 13 came out but I find it hard to believe the software didn’t need some tweaking for a brand new os. We were given promises and a “road map” of where they were going and they just stopped.
"I used the Movi with my iPhone 11 pro yesterday with filmic pro and my modified case and it worked just fine." Can you post some photos with details? Last I heard, the Movi CR software folks were working on the Android app. Maybe that's taken longer than expected.
Freefly managers know what’s being said on this forum when they want to know. A few months ago, I asked a question about a product and had an answer within hours from the guy who runs the company. According to Bryan Edmonds’s own post, Freefly knows that people want answers. Over six weeks from the Apple launch, Freefly is completely silent. Edmonds’s “contribution”, now over a month old, was to say that the 26mm and 52mm lenses still work with the MCR. Was that supposed to be a joke? The moderator of this forum disappeared from the forum about two days after the launch and hasn’t been seen since. The software developer has also disappeared. I agree with you that Freefly has no obligation to continue to make the MCR compatible with the new iPhones. I just want them to stop hiding. I am pretty sure that DJI would not do this, DJI being the company that Freefly effectively claimed to be better and more responsive than. I also know that Apple’s announcement of a 13mm lens was not news. Ultrawide lenses were already on certain Android phones. It didn’t come out of the blue. I’m just disgusted at the treatment of customers. Freefly is now acting like a fly-by-night operation.