KinoRaw

Finished 19 / 06 / 2012
Accomplished!
Received
£ 3,561
Minimum
£ 3,147
Optimum
£ 4,720
38 Co-financiers
Channel
  • Contributing £ 4

    Credit on the project’s website

    If you’re not looking for a reward and want to help us, you can donate a symbolic amount. You’ll have our most sincere gratitude ¡thank you! Your name will appear as a co-financer in KinoRaw’s website.

    > 06 Co-financiers
  • Contributing £ 25

    KinoRaw T-Shirt

    Wear yourself our special T-Shirt and help us develop the open source cinema. Exclusive design, available in several sizes.

    > 13 Co-financiers
  • Contributing £ 50

    Product: “Cycled-Doll” + T-Shirt

    If you want to support us but think you’ll never approach media production using open hardware and software, we’ve thought about you and the smallest :) Support us and we’ll reward you with a doll made using recycled technological materials, or a rag-doll if you prefer. You can have a look at user estoyhechountrapo in flickr.com to see some examples or submit us your own design to customise your doll. Plus, you will also get a KinoRaw T-Shirt!

    > 09 Co-financiers
  • Contributing £ 166

    digital video recording services

    KinoRaw proposes to generate a symbiosis between cinematographic projects. We’ll shoot what you need :) Based on 6 hours long sessions (transportation not included). With experimentation and testing goals, you have the opportunity of seeing how the camera responds in your environment. You will also have our suggestions about the camera expansion possibilities in your scope. The footage generated with the camera belogs to the cofinancier (you), so you can use them freely in your work, be it commercial or not, and of course, cite which fragments of your piece have been shot on an open hardware camera ;) If you are interested, and opt for this financing method, we’ll get in touch with you to see how to integrate the KinoRaw workflow into your project, and keep you informed during the development. Plus, we’ll bring you two KinoRaw T-Shirts to your set.

    > 00 Co-financiers
  • Contributing £ 1,242

    Workshop - Introduction on collaborating institutions

    Workshop / seminar about Elphel and Blender. Institutions who decide to support our project can do so via a once in a time contribution of 1,500€. This includes the special mention as “mecenas” (sponsor) in every published materials (videos, manuals, etc) We also offer a limited number of four workshops held at the institutions who support KinoRaw. Participants will be able to record and personally test the Elphel camera capabilities. The workshop is 12 hours long. Travel and accommodation expenses not included.

    > 01 Co-financiers

About this project

Free Libre software and hardware for film and audiovisual documentaries

Needs Task Minimum Optimum
CODE
Development and documentation of software to ease the video editing workflow in Blender. “Jump to cut”, for example is a video editing toolset for Blender. We want to improve it and develop other addons that let you ingest footage and manage projects inside the program; create image echoes or mute channels, for example. These addons will also let us have an easier workflow for beginner editors and users of other NLE’s. Moreover, we will create several scripts, little programs to easily manage media editing and postproduction tasks.
£ 828
Manuals and Videotutorials
Pleasant and well-documented manuals related to the camera. Informative videos also technical issues that can be used as a teaching material. Obviously, we do not know the exact contents, but some ideas are: - Install the Elphel camera software and set up peripherals - Shooting with Elphel 353 - Timelapse with Elphel - Conversions with FFMPEG - Video Editting with Blender and the addons use (Workflow) -Tutorials and documentation of developed applications. The development of the whole experience will also be documented in the Blog (kinoraw.net)
£ 1,325
research
Study and documentation of the technical and artistic possibilities Elphel with Blender.also investigate Taxation on the importation of free software and hardware. Also on the impact of open hardware in audiovisual production and distribution.
£ 580
Research for Phase 2 of KinoRaw
Once we finish the first phase, we propose a second in which we can add and expand other uses and the Elphel cinematic possibilities.
£ 580
Reward for collaborators
This amount is reserved to reward contributors to this project, who made ​​valuable contributions to the development of KinoRaw. Cost will be the first to assign it to get beyond the minimum in Drip.
£ 414
Needs Material Minimum Optimum
Accessories and consumables
In order to test some of the possibilities of the camera lenses, need adapters, filters, hard drives and others.
£ 414
Extra supplies and WEB
To record in all conditions need a SSD hard drive. Another part will be available for the purchase of parts for building a DIY stand. We also could use a little help to improve the website.
£ 580
Total £ 3,147 £ 4,720
Necessary
Supplemental

General information

KINORAW is a project that focuses on research and development of open hardware and software in the audiovisual context. We seek your support to experiment and develop an Elphel-Blender workflow.

Elphel (www.elphel.com) is an open source hardware and software camera used in scientific research, because it allows both the development for, and the adaptation, to each of the investigation specificities. We will contribute our efforts to develop it for cinematographic usage.

We work alongside the Apertus open source cinema community (apertus.org), which develops software using the device as a digital film camera. three of their lines of work are the stereocam, the DNG converter and the Elphel Vision software. We can benefit from the progress made by the community, like others may do so when we have developed tools that are open to extract all the juice out of Blender (www.blender.org).

What changes does the use of open hardware introduce in the media field?

We are bound to cameras using proprietary hardware and software, and will not free ourselves from the dependency of the media production industry until we unlock and claim the control of the entire filmmaking process.

And this is a great opportunity to break that dependence. We also try to contribute through this proposal to the re-implementation of creative techniques and technical knowledge that proprietary workflows try to hide out to end users, capping out unsuspected possibilities.

With the development of Elphel hardware we intend to expand the technological independence and creative freedom, in addition to cultivate the visual commons, both in the content and in the tools needed to produce those. We want this tool to help develop and expand the community, connecting it with other communities and users who share this knowledge of cinema and filmmaking.

The project has the invaluable help of Telenoika (www.telenoika.net) who have supported us in order to kickstart the project with a grant of 2000 €. With this grant we bought an Elphel camera, but taxes and duties put us out of budget. ... (more on this topic will follow latter).

Main features and goals of the crowdfunding campaign

The Elphel camera has extensive technical capabilities, which are not present in any other commercial cameras unless you know how to hack it. The idea of ​​using the Ephel goes further beyond hacks like the Magic Lantern for Reflex Canon Powershot or the CHDK for developments for Panasonic GH-1.

The possibilities that Elphel allows include a wide range of exposure times, settings, continuous configuration values, analogisation of devices, millimeter adjustments. This means a lightweight filmaking equipment, competitive costs and ultimately represents a change in the conception of film tools.

Our plan at the KinoRaw project is what follows:

  1. Extensive testing of the camera (you can subscribe to participate :)
  2. To research linking Blender with Elphel for easy editing
  3. Code development based on the above premise
  4. Technical manuals for use
  5. Filming footage exploiting its full potential (accepting ideas!)
  6. Editing and postproduction of filmed contents
  7. Presentation and dissemination of results

Elphel Technical Specifications:

The camera it’s a modular device which can extend its capabilities. One of it’s technical characteristics is the IP connectivity over LAN, ie it broadcasts streaming video on ethernet, and therefore can be controlled remotely.

  • Filter Aptina CMOS Bayer (Bayer Pattern) sensor with an optical format of 1/2.5 "(5.70mm x 4.28mm) and a native resolution of 2592x1944 (5 megapixel). Has a 12 bit ADC
  • Optics: The camera has a C-mount, but comes with an adapter ring that also allows to use CS mount lenses (which allows reuse old lenses 16 and 8mm)
  • Variable Frame-rate (up to 300fps at 320x240), including the possibility of ramps
    and shutter speed.
  • Variable resolution (from 16x16 up to 2592x1944 (5 megapixel))
  • Variable Data-rate: 144Mbit/sa a SATA or 100Mbit / s ethernet streaming
  • Customizable gamma curves
  • Recording in RAW. In JP4 RAW format that requires a decoding process (DNG
    conversion)
  • Codecs free, lightweight, high-quality (MPEG, ogm)
  • Connectors: SATA, Ethernet: 100Mbit Network with POE (48V), USB 1.1 with 5V power supply,
    IDE 232: Access to Console and debug output.

Why this is important

This project is directed to those who want to contribute to the return of cinema to it’s original creative freedom, because, due to the free hardware developments, we believe now that it begins to be possible.

  • Filmmakers and other visual artists
  • Software developers
  • Teachers of audiovisual content and in particular photography
  • 3D Animators
  • Hardcore moviegoers
  • retired directors of photography
  • Amateur home video directors
  • Multimedia researchers

Goals of the crowdfunding campaign

  1. Spread the word on the project and contribute to the creation of a community
  2. Raise funds to test the camera and develop software tools
  3. Search partners for the process
  4. Provide economic stability to the project at the beginning

Team and experience

Carlos and Simon have extensive experience in various areas of film and the audiovisual such as: management, production, photography, research and teaching. In this project, they join forces and knowledge through www.kinoraw.net to contribute to the development of open source cinema through the professional use of free software and hardware tools.

Carlos is in charge of the Elphel-Blender workflow development and coaching, while Simon is responsible for production and project documentation.

Social commitment