Battle of the frames: 30fps vs HDR (30) vs 60fps

[Alexcrist]

No offence, but I'm gonna trust the documentation from the manufacturers, and also the actual results that I also posted at the start. Ghosting all the way. Yes, they ARE distinct, sequential captures.

 

[GPak]

That is not correct, even if some Sony documentation says it is! ............

Wow that is quite a statement...
Do we have a valid reason not to trust Sony on how their own product works?
Or not to trust Viofo, who basically confirmed it, by posting the info?

Here is a link to Sony site:
https://www.sony-semicon.com/en/application/its/drive-recorder.html#section-1

@Alexcrist
In one of the posts Viofo stated that, 60fps was disabled in conjunction with Auto HDR because of stability concerns, perhaps that instability is what you see in your videos.
Since they enabled 60fps+Auto HDR in V1.3 beta firmware, I hope they fixed stability.

 

[Alexcrist]

I doubt that was the cause. They probably just had issues switching the encoding from 30fps to 60fps in (almost) realtime. I don't know and I don't care, I don't want HDR either way.

And I have no clue if those erratic behaviors appear in 30fps mode as well. Never tested it. My guess is that they do, but can't be sure, since the sampling rate is half, so maybe, just maybe, it behaves better in 30fps. Again, I don't really care, I bought an expensive camera exclusively for the promised 60fps capability and I expect it to work reliably. There are plenty of other cheaper options that behave well in 30fps.

 

[Nigel]

Do we have a valid reason not to trust Sony on how their own product works?

Sony's original DOL-HDR information described it as "Quasi-Suimultneous":

• The Dual Sony Flagship Sensors support the underlying DOL-HDR technology on a hardware level, increasing video dynamic range by 4x to that of the conventional HDR algorithm. DOL-HDR This technology enables the quasi-simultaneous synthesis of long and short exposure frames, effectively preventing ghosting artifacts caused by movement.

They are now trying to sell Clear HDR, which is truly simultaneous, so have changed their advertising.

These are rolling shutter sensors, where a frame is captured one line of pixels at a time, starting at the top and working through the image to the bottom.

The difference between conventional HDR and DOL-HDR is that conventional HDR captures the fast exposure frame followed by the slow exposure frame, then combines them. There is a full frame of time interval between the two exposures, so about 1/60th second at night. DOL-HDR captures a slow exposure line of pixels followed by a fast exposure of the same line. So given a 4K image with 2160 lines of pixels, the amount of movement between lines of the DOL-HDR will be roughly 1/2160th the movement between frames of the conventional HDR image. The slow and fast frames are captured simultaneously, but with a 1/2160th frame OverLap delay, which is where the OL in DOL comes from. 1/2160th frame at 30fps is 1/64800th second, fast enough for no visible movement between exposures. Clear HDR doesn't have a fast exposure, only dark and bright, so it does not freeze license plate text at night, it still has image blur.

Or not to trust Viofo, who basically confirmed it, by posting the info?

Viofo did not explain DOL-HDR, they simply said:

Sony's official definitions of the two features, DOL HDR and Clear HDR, are as follows.

Which was perfectly correct!

 

[Nigel]

Clear HDR doesn't have a fast exposure, only dark and bright, so it does not freeze license plate text at night, it still has image blur.

The other problem with Clear HDR is that although it has an extended dynamic range, its dynamic range is limited by the single exposure and the brighter parts of the image have different noise levels to the less bright areas since they are read with a different gain level, so you can get patches of image with extra noise/blur, and the joins can be noticeable. It is good for people who want to make traditional 24fps grainy video, with shutter speeds of 180° so that they get good levels of motion blur to hide the steps between frames. It is not so good for reading license plates.

Clear HDR is also limited to 1 exposure with 2 gain settings, while DOL-HDR can have multiple exposures all at different exposure times. For dashcams, it would make sense to use 3 exposure DOL-HDR, so that the bright areas can have a really fast exposure and be really sharp and not overexposed, most of the image can have a reasonably quick exposure so that there is little motion blur and little image noise, and the dark areas can have a slow exposure so that you can see plenty of detail in the darkness even though the darkness is blurred when moving fast or at night. Three exposure HDR is good for low image noise and low motion blur, while with only 2 exposure HDR we tend to get a compromise where most of the image has more blur and noise than no-HDR because the main part of the image is sharing the slow exposure.

The HDR for Automotive sensors for autonomous driving functions works differently, they have two sets of pixels, small ones for the bright part of the image and big ones for the dark part. This can give a huge dynamic range, good LED flicker removal and no motion artefacts, but results in lower resolution, not so good image quality, and like Clear HDR there is no fast exposure for freezing license plates, and there is only a single exposure again, this time with only 2 sizes of pixel.

For reading licence plates, we want DOL-HDR, not any of the other HDR methods currently available, it is the only method that uses a fast exposure for limiting motion blur where possible, without causing ghosting. It does have the disadvantage of recording lamp flicker, since it is the only method that isn't designed to avoid lamp flicker, but we can live with that, and the non-LED lamps with mains flicker are rapidly disappearing anyway, LED flicker is becoming higher frequency and less of a problem.

 

[Alexcrist]

Version 1.3 is finally out. They call it a ”stable” version, I assume.

Used during the weekend.

I am very glad to report that Viofo took care of the extremely important stuff, like adding big-ass useless branding and logo over the video. Because that was the major thing that was missing.

More minor things were ignored, like bugs (the card format warning is still happily beeping at every boot, although I literally just formatted the card 3 times in the camera during the FW update). Also the image quality is exactly the same, same chaotic exposure changes (day and night, no matter), same chaotic white balance changes.

But glad to see Viofo is handling the big important stuff.

10 years ago, this kind of chaotic exposure was unanimously considered a solid reason for a warranty or refund claim. Now apparently it's a feature for expensive dashcams. Oh, how technology evolves.

 

[Karagandinez]

I am very glad to report that Viofo took care of the extremely important stuff, like adding big-ass useless branding and logo over the video. Because that was the major thing that was missing.

You just now saw this, but didn't notice it before?

More minor things were ignored, like bugs (the card format warning is still happily beeping at every boot, although I literally just formatted the card 3 times in the camera during the FW update).

Maybe check the memory card?
I use memory cards from three manufacturers and with none of the A229 Plus I have never asked to format the memory card.

 

[Alexcrist]

It wasn't there before. I'm talking about this magnificent thing:

Not only they added this, they enabled it by default and disabled all other custom text. I had to reconfigure them. At least they had the good sense of making it an opt-out setting...

About the card, maybe you didn't enable the format reminder in the settings? I know, I know, it's my fault for changing the factory settings, they are there just to give a good impression on paper, not to actually work or do anything useful. :lol:

 

[Karagandinez]

It wasn't there before. I'm talking about this magnificent thing:

This has been since the release of A229 Plus.

About the card, maybe you didn't enable the format reminder in the settings?

I don't include this. I don't need to be reminded when to format the memory card.

 

[mentadent]

I would prefer 5fps if it was sharp like a stills camera.

 

[Alexcrist]

This has been since the release of A229 Plus.

Even "better", forcibly disabling settings that I explicitly configured and enabling crappy marketing watermarks. As I said, great way of showing what's important. Great job, Viofo, keep it up!

 

[Karagandinez]

Even "better", forcibly disabling settings that I explicitly configured and enabling crappy marketing watermarks.

Are you holding your first DVR in your life?
Are you aware that after updating the firmware, all settings are reset to factory settings and if you need to,
then you must set the settings to the ones you need?
On all the DVRs from different manufacturers that I have used, after updating the firmware, I need to change the settings to suit myself.

 

[Alexcrist]

Again you are deeply wrong, my friend. Those are literally the only settings that were changed. Even the custom texts were preserved, they were just hidden/disabled. Everything else was intact.

But, by all means, you can continue being rude and aggressive for no reason. By any chance, are you working for Viofo and you feel insulted by the honest truth? Probably not, but you certainly act like that.

 

[Karagandinez]

Again you are deeply wrong, my friend. Those are literally the only settings that were changed. Even the custom texts were preserved, they were just hidden/disabled. Everything else was intact.

But, by all means, you can continue being rude and aggressive for no reason.

Where did you see rudeness?
Is it that I disagreed with you and pointed out that there was something in the firmware that you didn’t notice?
If you still have some old settings, it means you didn't do a factory reset. Although all manufacturers recommend doing this after updating the firmware.

By any chance, are you working for Viofo and you feel insulted by the honest truth?

I don’t work for Viofo, but I responded to your posts because I didn’t see the truth in them.
I don't like unfair accusations.

 

[Nigel]

Again you are deeply wrong, my friend. Those are literally the only settings that were changed. Even the custom texts were preserved, they were just hidden/disabled. Everything else was intact.

But, by all means, you can continue being rude and aggressive for no reason. By any chance, are you working for Viofo and you feel insulted by the honest truth? Probably not, but you certainly act like that.

With Viofo firmware updates, it is recommended to use the reset to default option in the setup after a firmware update, normally it is not necessary, but a few people had various issues with incorrect settings after the last set of firmwares, so definitely recommended. Not sure why they don't reset to default automatically, except that some people like you complain if they do, and normally it is not necessary. Seems like this time some configuration memory got moved around due to extra settings.

That logo was there in the previous version, and was enabled by default, nothing there has changed. Just a few of the settings have got corrupted for people who don't follow the advice to reset to default.

Karagandinez has been correct in what he has said, while you have got several things wrong. I haven't seen any rudeness or aggressiveness in his posts, maybe not the most polite English, but clearly this is not his first language.

 

[Alexcrist]

Who's making accusations? I said the format reminder option is not working, Karagandinez said it does, although he doesn't use it - doh!

I said some settings were forcibly changes, he said they're not, he said everything is reset automatically:

Are you aware that after updating the firmware, all settings are reset to factory settings and if you need to,
then you must set the settings to the ones you need?

He didn't initially mention anything about additional manual steps, he only later mentioned that, when I pointed out that he was wrong - again, just like with the format reminder option.

I'm describing exactly what's happening. I don't care about any off-the-record advice and procedures, I don't dig on forums to find out how to update the camera. I have too little time and interest for that, I just want a product that works, that's why I paid for it.

The firmware page says it simply:

How to update firmware:
Format the card first and then download the bin file to the the card and power the camera with card inserted.

That's it! If that is wrong, it's again Viofo's fault. Not mine, I followed the official instructions. If they need additional steps and they can't/don't want to automate them, they need to be specified in a single place. So again, who's wrong making accusations here?

And how about anyone discussing the bugs I mentioned? Nobody cares about that, as usual, it's of course my mistake because I changed settings and didn't leave them at factory default. So it makes sense why Viofo craps all over them as well, because the buyers will keep buying, regardless of the crappy firmware.

Anyway, I feel like we're circling around to no end. I've said my mind, Viofo obviously doesn't care, anyone else here can't help (regardless if anyone agrees with me or not), so... maybe I'll post back when some newer version comes out, just to point out the bugs are still present Or maybe I can find a replacement in the meantime. Which won't be from Viofo.

 

[Nigel]

I said the format reminder option is not working, Karagandinez said it does,

I suggest that you use the "reset to defaults" option, since you don't appear to have followed the advice to use it yet, and maybe the format reminder will start working...

Yes, it is inconvenient to go through all the settings again, but that is quite normal after a firmware update.

And how about anyone discussing the bugs I mentioned? Nobody cares about that, as usual, it's of course my mistake because I changed settings and didn't leave them at factory default. So it makes sense why Viofo craps all over them as well, because the buyers will keep buying, regardless of the crappy firmware.

You don't need to leave the settings at default, just use the reset to default and then set it up as you wish.
You also don't need to be rude about it, being polite might have got you more/faster help than you have been receiving!