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X5R Video "The West in Winter" filmed entirely with the X5R. Links and download provided.

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All,

I would like to share with you a bit about my experience with the X5R. DJI was gracious enough to allow me access to an X5R, and I embarked on a 2 week roadtrip around the western United States to test it out. We logged 7300 miles, an average of 8 hours driving every day, and traveled to some of my favorite landscapes in the US to put the X5R through its paces. For those of you who are interested in specifics and details, I'll try to provide a bit more in posts that will follow below. But the most important thing I can show you is, of course, image quality. So, here are a number of different links for you:

The first link below is a Vimeo link to the final edited piece "The West in Winter". It is shot entirely using the DJI X5R using the Zuiko 12mm, 17mm, 25mm, and 45mm. It was uploaded in 4k at 100mbps H.264 with a 2-pass encode at max render quality from Adobe Premiere. I have made the file available to download on Vimeo. Please ensure that you're logged into Vimeo in order for the download option to appear. Although compressed to H.264, this 2-pass encode at 100mbps should still show a good approximation of the quality of the X5R footage. There are a couple of scenes that display a bit of H.264 compression that is not found in the original source RAWs. And a couple of scenes where I didn't fully nail focus (user error). Other than that, I hope this upload, with its variety of locations, lighting, and environments, will allow you to get a good sense of the image quality that the X5R is capable of:

If you prefer to watch on YouTube, the following link should serve you:


Now, please carefully note the next two links. These are ALSO Vimeo and YouTube links to "The West in Winter". HOWEVER, for this particular render, the LEFT half of the frame shows the original footage WITHOUT any color correction. The RIGHT half of the frame shows the footage WITH a color grade pass. This is so that you can see an example of pre/post graded footage. The links are as follows:

Vimeo:

YouTube:


Yet another way I'm going to try to make this footage available is via direct-download from my personal server. Please use this option LAST. Please first try to download from Vimeo, because I'm not sure how long my server will be able to allow downloads for this footage since each link is a 3.5GB file.

FINAL GRADE:
www.iancresswell.com/downloads/x5r/TheWestinWinter.mp4

LEFT HALF PRE-GRADED/RIGHT HALF GRADED:
www.iancresswell.com/downloads/x5r/TheWestinWinterHalfGrade.mp4


I wanted to first and foremost make this footage available for people to hopefully get an idea of the X5R's level of quality. In the following posts below, I will try to go into some more specifics about using the X5R, how well it performed on the Inspire 1, and what it was like to transcode, edit, and export the footage.
 
Here's a bit of a review/thoughts mixed with a little bit of behind-the-scenes about the "The West in Winter" trip. It's a bit long, and a lot of it is just me talking straight to the camera, but hopefully it will be helpful to some.
 
Last edited:
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I am so used to the X3/X5 artifacts it was like an out of body experience viewing this and not seeing them on an aerial video shot on DJI gear.

And that was on YT.

Downloading the MP4 file now to view on my "you can run but you can't hide" wall-sized 4K Sony TV. This is the TV that I used to highlight the X5 problems days after it shipped, got several thousand views and likely killed many DJI X5 sales.

Standby for analysis....
 
It looks great and I want one. My biggest fear...... all those $'s on a quadcopter not known for it's fly aways and crashes. Lose a prop and boom!
 
All,

I would like to share with you a bit about my experience with the X5R. DJI was gracious enough to allow me access to an X5R, and I embarked on a 2 week roadtrip around the western United States to test it out. We logged 7300 miles, an average of 8 hours driving every day, and traveled to some of my favorite landscapes in the US to put the X5R through its paces. For those of you who are interested in specifics and details, I'll try to provide a bit more in posts that will follow below. But the most important thing I can show you is, of course, image quality. So, here are a number of different links for you:

The first link below is a Vimeo link to the final edited piece "The West in Winter". It is shot entirely using the DJI X5R using the Zuiko 12mm, 17mm, 25mm, and 45mm. It was uploaded in 4k at 100mbps H.264 with a 2-pass encode at max render quality from Adobe Premiere. I have made the file available to download on Vimeo. Please ensure that you're logged into Vimeo in order for the download option to appear. Although compressed to H.264, this 2-pass encode at 100mbps should still show a good approximation of the quality of the X5R footage. There are a couple of scenes that display a bit of H.264 compression that is not found in the original source RAWs. And a couple of scenes where I didn't fully nail focus (user error). Other than that, I hope this upload, with its variety of locations, lighting, and environments, will allow you to get a good sense of the image quality that the X5R is capable of:

If you prefer to watch on YouTube, the following link should serve you:


Now, please carefully note the next two links. These are ALSO Vimeo and YouTube links to "The West in Winter". HOWEVER, for this particular render, the LEFT half of the frame shows the original footage WITHOUT any color correction. The RIGHT half of the frame shows the footage WITH a color grade pass. This is so that you can see an example of pre/post graded footage. The links are as follows:

Vimeo:

YouTube:


Yet another way I'm going to try to make this footage available is via direct-download from my personal server. Please use this option LAST. Please first try to download from Vimeo, because I'm not sure how long my server will be able to allow downloads for this footage since each link is a 3.5GB file.

FINAL GRADE:
www.iancresswell.com/downloads/x5r/TheWestinWinter.mp4

LEFT HALF PRE-GRADED/RIGHT HALF GRADED:
www.iancresswell.com/downloads/x5r/TheWestinWinterHalfGrade.mp4


I wanted to first and foremost make this footage available for people to hopefully get an idea of the X5R's level of quality. In the following posts below, I will try to go into some more specifics about using the X5R, how well it performed on the Inspire 1, and what it was like to transcode, edit, and export the footage.
Big big bravo for the pro work, it's amazing beautiful and it's showing to me that I made e very good step to buy the X5R.
Thanks Ian
 
I am so used to the X3/X5 artifacts it was like an out of body experience viewing this and not seeing them on an aerial video shot on DJI gear.

And that was on YT.

Downloading the MP4 file now to view on my "you can run but you can't hide" wall-sized 4K Sony TV. This is the TV that I used to highlight the X5 problems days after it shipped, got several thousand views and likely killed many DJI X5 sales.

Standby for analysis....

Ok. Completed.

First, Ian, great work. Great shots and great landscapes. I wish I could have been there :)

The criticisms:

1) Under exposed in general, I see where you had to really push things to get a decent exposure in post.
2) Some blown out highlights, likely as a result of the first point.
3) Some noise in the darker areas, again likely due to the first point and/or the 100Mbps render.
4) Your color grading selections weren't to my taste (Kodak-Old-School-LUT base), but that's a personal thing

However, I saw your post on RCG about the histogram being wired to the SD card output. Agree the histo should be wired to the SSD output for X5R.

The praise:

1) NO ARTIFACTING - VIRTUALLY PERFECT on the 4K Sony wall-sized TV.
2) See #1!!!!
3) Color info was deep and rich. No "color pixel blocks" inherent in 4:2:2 or 4:2:0 .

Overall, the X5R output I see here is simply gorgeous. TWO THUMBS UP.

Glad I pre-ordered. Now the wait. :)
 
Ian, this footage is fabulous; thanks for posting it.

I would love to see a detailed description of your work flow. Specifically, did you use the DJI Cinelight software to process the footage? And what effects/adjustments/LUTs did you use in Premiere Pro?

Thanks!
 
Where can I find the behind-the-scenes video that is mentioned in the intro card?
I just finished posting it to YouTube. It's honestly more of a review than it is behind-the-scenes, and a lot of it is just me talking straight to camera for quite some time. But there's a little bit of behind-the-scenes about the trip, and a bit of info at the end about using CineLight and DNGs in Adobe Premiere. Here's the link:
 
I just finished posting it to YouTube. It's honestly more of a review than it is behind-the-scenes, and a lot of it is just me talking straight to camera for quite some time. But there's a little bit of behind-the-scenes about the trip, and a bit of info at the end about using CineLight and DNGs in Adobe Premiere. Here's the link:

Thanks for your willingness to share! Having just finished a year-long, 30,000 mile shooting trip I can relate :)
 
Great work. Nice to see virtually zero compression blocking.

It looks like you ran into some clouds at a few locations? Some of the shots look a little flat despite the color work.

Also, the last shot is curious as it's the only one in low light. Not a lot of details in the shadows. What ISO did you use? Some of those desert environments have the most incredible color shifting from golden hour into dusk. Surprised not to see more of that here.

Did you use proxies from the SD card or create them in post? How long did it take to process one flight's worth of footage?
 
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It looks like you ran into some clouds at a few locations? Some of the shots look a little flat despite the color work.
The trip was almost entirely unplanned and completely at the mercy of the weather. We actually lucked out a lot, and thankfully my Prius didn't get caught in any deep snow anywhere :). But, since we were literally driving an average of 8 hours per day, and dashing out here and there to get footage, we couldn't be choosy about golden hour light. Sometimes we could wake up and get it in the morning, sometimes we were lucky enough to get it at sunset. But often we had afternoon direct light, sometimes fairly overcast. All things considered I think we lucked out.

Also, the last shot is curious as its the only one in low light. Not a lot of details in the shadows. What ISO did you use? Some of those desert environments have the most incredible color shifting from golden hour into dusk. Surprised not to see more of that here.
There's not much detail in the shadows because that's precisely how it looked while we were shooting it. We got there too late to shoot sunset that night (had to get sunrise the next day) and it was already quite dark. The absolute last bit of light was eeking over the horizon and I decided to just see what we could get. I liked it as a closing shot with the silhouetted look and a sort of nightime/closing feeling to it. I'll have to go back and check ISO.

Did you use proxies from the SD card or create them in post? How long did it take to process one flight's worth of footage?
I often looked at the microSD card H.264 files while we were on the road because I didn't have time to play with the DNGs. But as far as editing/grading I just pulled all the DNG sequences straight into premiere, graded with lumetri, and exported right from premiere. I'm sure better colorists than I could get better results with DaVinci Resolve, etc.
 
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I can relate to being at the mercy of weather and schedule. Good work. Must have been fun!

Curious to see more low light shots.
 
The BTS video was very informative; thanks for doing that and posting it.

I am curious about the 512GB SSD. How much footage fits on it?

Thanks!
 
Excellent, beautiful, in-depth explanation and variety of shots. You sir are a gentleman and a scholar, this is an excellent test and many thanks for sharing the original file so we can see what you see in the edit suite.
This has convinced me that I need to get this camera... But I would also be very curious to know what your ISO was set to on that final shot, I would love to be able to get a usable image at 800 iso, I feel that is not asking a lot for a camera of this price and specs, but look forward to your response.
Thank you again.
 
Awesome video Ian, well done!

No flickering, compression artifacts and a nice highlight roll off. The video quality is so good with the X5R, I can't wait to get one!
 

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