INON and AOI Wide Angle Wet Lenses for Action Cameras

[Nando Diver]

3 minutes ago, Bio said:

I dont see the skipped frames. There were phases where I held the (heavy) rig with only one hand to equalize pressure, maybe thats what you are seeing.

Too me the image looks like it speeds up and then slowdown. 

[Bio]

Well I guess thats because of the frogkick I have a gliding phase, I slow down and then do the next frogkick

[Nando Diver]

Use wide FOV settings, dont use Standard (Dewarp) 

 

its valid for AO4 but it should be the same for AO5 

see this article https://www.tropicalsnorkeling.com/dji-osmo-action-4-for-snorkeling/

[Bio]

Not 100% on topic but here also a video with the AOI UCL-03

 

 

[Nando Diver]

For macro play with settings to remove that distortion and use 4K 

Its really difficult to get good stabilisation and focus without tripod in any action camera 

Edited December 19, 2024 by Nando Diver

[Davide DB]

Many thanks to  @Bio, his clips are perfect in both FOV and the colors in Log have excellent color correction possibilities.
The camera is not skipping any frames: the effect is due to the frog kick. I am familiar with the effect.

 

On a side note, DJI is evil: according to their insane mind, WIDE has a narrower FOV than STANDARD. There should be a special hell circle for them, next to the one for those who decide on camera and lens names 😈

[Nando Diver]

17 minutes ago, Davide DB said:

Many thanks to  @Bio, his clips are perfect in both FOV and the colors in Log have excellent color correction possibilities.
The camera is not skipping any frames: the effect is due to the frog kick. I am familiar with the effect.

 

On a side note, DJI is evil: according to their insane mind, WIDE has a narrower FOV than STARDARD. There should be a special hell circle for them, next to the one for those who decide on camera and lens names 😈

Looks really distort to me.. 

[bghazzal]

Thanks for these @Bio, corners look quite alright in these, and it's really interesting to see this camera and lens combo in action.

 

Your clips also looked quite flat, so I tried a little experience - sorry for the copyright infringement 😁

I downloaded the 1080p clip from youtube, converted it, then dropped in finalcut pro X.
I then manually adjusted the white balance (using the diver's tank as the WB reference) then applied a basic grade - all this took me less than 3 minutes.

Here is your clip white balanced in post (exported to 1080p 60fps with massive compression loss due to the fact that this done with a 3x compressed source)
 

Despite the obvious compression-loss, I'm quite impressed by the data left to work with in post, and look forward to working with original clips, if I ever get this camera, which was the plan until the corner/external lens issue was flagged.
It will also be interesting to combine this with a good filter, which could give even more balanced results between background and foreground.

cheers and thanks again!

Edited December 20, 2024 by bghazzal

[Bio]

1 hour ago, Nando Diver said:

For macro play with settings to remove that distortion and use 4K 

Its really difficult to get good stabilisation and focus without tripod in any action camera 

Yes, I will try different settings. The UCL-03 has a very narrow focus range. Too far and it is out of focus, same for to close. Hard to get the distance right and also hard to stay stable when being so close, having currents etc.

I took the UCL video in 4k but only realised after uploading, that the timeline was Full HD.

 

I now have configured three Presets with Rockstable+ standard, wide and ultra wide and will do some testing with those.

 

I was wondering if 4:3 vs 16:9 would do a difference because of the sensor cropping, as I dont see those corner problems as in posts mentioned earlier.

[Bio]

3 minutes ago, bghazzal said:

Your clips looked quite flat, so I tried a little experience. I downloaded the 1080p clip from youtube, converted it, then dropped in finalcut pro X.

Well, they are unedited flat dlog-m, they are supposed to look flat 😉

 

I will try to share the original file if bandwith here on the remote island permits

[Davide DB]

3 minutes ago, Bio said:

I will try to share the original file if bandwith here on the remote island permits

 

Please, just drop a link to the file. We have limited storage on our server 😇

[bghazzal]

10 hours ago, Bio said:

Well, they are unedited flat dlog-m, they are supposed to look flat 😉

 

I will try to share the original file if bandwith here on the remote island permits

yes, and thanks for that!
In a world where most test clips poste use autosettings, it's very interesting to finally have an example of what the camera is capable of recording out flat.
I'm quite impressed by the data still left on your clip after being mashed-up by multiple compressions in this little experience, and imagine original files will be a real pleasure to work with in post.
cheers

Edited December 20, 2024 by bghazzal

[Bio]

@bghazzalYou should be able to download the original file here:

https://www.icloud.com/iclouddrive/023uOp_AflT0AyJTQOOUl7ANA#waterpixels

 

Ok, seems like iCloud shares are not universally downloadable. Maybe I will have to share it another way, but the upload to my private cloud was painfully slow. Maybe tomorrow

Edited December 19, 2024 by Bio

[DreiFish]

Both the Wide Rocksteady (12mm) and the HorizonBalancing Dewarp crops look decent as far as image quality in the corners goes, though I think I prefer the 12mm. The HorizonBalancing Dewarp introduces a tad too much pincushion distortion in the corners for my tastes which the more fisheye-like Wide Rockstead counterbalances.

 

Corner shaprness is not great, but.. it's not bad. Definitely better than without the wet lens. I guess we can conclude from this thread that the AOI wet lens works best with a ~15mm field of view on the default camera.  Action 4 and 5 don't have a setting that gets you exactly to 15mm, so the 12mm Wide Rocksteady might be the best bet.

 

I've downloaded the raw footage from Bio and I'll try to play around with it a bit to see what flexibility it offers in terms of color correction and post processing. Thank you very much for sharing those files, Bio!

[Wags]

Yes I found too that Rocksteady Wide is the best when using the AOI glass port on the action 4. Will download the raw file too when you get it onto someplace other than icloud. Cheers

[Bio]

Here you go

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/1e49zg88a0kf7oe2gwdla/RockSteady_wide.MP4?rlkey=ek70xivo8rsclnymzz3lufifv&st=3yyt76eh&dl=0

[Wags]

Cheers, got it, yep the lens works really well and the 10 bit pops when you CC it. One would of had to spend big bucks to get this quality 20 years ago. 

[bghazzal]

4 hours ago, Bio said:

Here you go

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/1e49zg88a0kf7oe2gwdla/RockSteady_wide.MP4?rlkey=ek70xivo8rsclnymzz3lufifv&st=3yyt76eh&dl=0

Cheers for that Bio - I downloaded the file on drop box  (max was 1080p?) and did the same quick white balance + quick CC in FCPX, really nice and lots of data to work with - exported it to 1080p 60fps with an old YT setting I had, no further stabilisation applied so as not to alter the fov
 

 

Edited December 20, 2024 by bghazzal

[Bio]

I dont really have experience with dropbox, just have the account. The file uploaded is 4k and I guess you should be able to download the regular file. If the downloaded file has 833 MB that should be the 4k.

[bghazzal]

Interesting - I only get HD download options on dropbox, wonder if it's because I'm not logged in...

 

edit - it's the same logged in - can only download 480p, 720p or 1080p
interface is a little odd, it gives me options to edit, change format etc... I found a 1440p option in there as well, but no 4K - anyway no biggie, there's definitely enough colour info to work with in the log file. Nice one!

Edited December 20, 2024 by bghazzal

[Bio]

I would expect the following button to download the original file:

 

 

 

[Nando Diver]

@Bio free dropbox limit is 1080p 

 

you can use https://wetransfer.com limit is 2GB per file 

[DreiFish]

8 hours ago, bghazzal said:

Cheers for that Bio - I downloaded the file on drop box  (max was 1080p?) and did the same quick white balance + quick CC in FCPX, really nice and lots of data to work with - exported it to 1080p 60fps with an old YT setting I had, no further stabilisation applied so as not to alter the fov
 

 

One question -- is the general unshaprness/blurriness of the background (area 2+ meters in front of the camera) here caused by water clarity, or is it the AOI lens limiting the focus range of the Action 5 to a narrower area right in front of the camera with infinity out of focus?

[bghazzal]

8 hours ago, DreiFish said:

One question -- is the general unshaprness/blurriness of the background (area 2+ meters in front of the camera) here caused by water clarity, or is it the AOI lens limiting the focus range of the Action 5 to a narrower area right in front of the camera with infinity out of focus?

Yes, I was also wondering about that - need to compare results with Wags' test on the DJI4 - I can't remember if there were lens/fov changes between the two cameras.
I'll also check on my AOI lens on GoPro7 test see if it's similar, as water clarity was pretty bad when I tested it as well.

 

 

Regarding the file itself, it seems DJI's dlog M is not a real log profile - you can see the color space (farbraum) is listed as bt709, so it's some form of Rec709.

Looking into it, I found this:

 

Dlog-M is like a wanabee dlog. It has more contrast and more color baked in. Great for those who want a little more latitude than the "normal" color profile produces while not as difficult to grade as dlog.

I also downloaded DJI's dlog to vivid 709 lut and tried in FCPX, but the results were not as nice as a simple re-WB and quick grade- bit too contrasty and flashy for my tastes (prefer more desaturated / pastel colours, which is why I don't like most auto SOOC results I see coming from which usually pump up the saturation and sharpness, which is, I'm guessing, for phones and instagramable flash-bang purposes😁)

That said maybe the DJI lut is not for dlog-m, but actual dlog? Probably better not to use a lut for 709?
There was a bit of a pink/magenta hue on my files which I noticed on the bubbles, but nothing massive - I think this is due to my default presets I normally use on the LX10.
I spent less than 3 minutes on it, and it's very easy to go for a cooler profile, so this isn't an issue.

Anyhoo, I don't have a paid version of dropbox, so limited to the 1080 dlogm file, but it's nice material to work with, clearly - however the background blurryness mentioned by Dreifish should be looked into further.

cheers
ben

Edited December 21, 2024 by bghazzal

[Wags]

Thanks @Bio for loading up your clip for us to play with. 

Downloaded and placed into EDIUS Workgroup, drop the DJI LUT to it, tweaked it some and rendered out.

Yes you can download the 4K version from dropbox just like Bio explained.

Cheers

 

Edited December 21, 2024 by Wags