Original Mobius night recording with 4mm ~ F1.2 lens (!)

OK, here are the settings I have right now, and they are also the settings I did the video's further down this post. Tell me what I may need to change.

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I noticed that license plates are difficult to read, don't know if it's movement blur, out of focus (@SawMaster ~ Phil), overexposure or something with contrast, or maybe the flippies (YES THEY'RE BACK!! (y) check here: https://dashcamtalk.com/forum/threads/give-your-mobius-some-shades-anti-glare-filter.17674/), I don't know, any and all ideas welcome!



The interesting thing about the Mobius is that the settings available in mSetup are extremely subtle and conservative. The Mobius provides 128 levels of adjustment for each of the parameters in either direction plus or minus. So, increasing the saturation level by only 4 points as you have shown here or increasing the contrast or sharpness by 2 points is negligible. Four points of increased saturation is only about 3% of the available 128 levels and 2 points of increased contrast or sharpness is less than 1.5%. Try increasing it maybe 15% or more and see what happens. In fact, one way to get a good feel for what the potential is with the Mobius is to increase the numbers between 20 and 30% (or more). Even though this may be WAY too much it will help the user get a handle on what the possible range is and you can then re-adjust from there. The main message with the Mobius is to not be afraid to crank the settings knowing you can back off as necessary.

This is why I recommend dramatically increasing the sharpness setting on the Mobius. With most cameras, you can easily boost the sharpness too far and ruin the appearance of the image but with the Mobius there is quite a lot of leeway and opportunity to tweak the image. This is one of the brilliant things about how the Mobius camera/software interface was designed that differs from any other camera available.

Like I say, don't be afraid to really crank the settings and see what happens. You have nothing to lose and possibly much to gain.

You all know about my experiments with the varifocal 2.8mm to 12mm ƒ1.4 lens on a Mobius.

Consider this image sample from my thread about that lens and consider how much I've cranked the sharpness, contrast and saturation settings that were used to capture the image below.

parkinglot_close_up.jpg

9_4.png
 
The interesting thing about the Mobius is that the settings available in mSetup are extremely subtle and conservative. The Mobius provides 128 levels of adjustment for each of the parameters in either direction plus or minus. So, increasing the saturation level by only 4 points as you have shown here or increasing the contrast or sharpness by 2 points is negligible. Four points of increased saturation is only about 3% of the available 128 levels and 2 points of increased contrast or sharpness is less than 1.5%. Try increasing it maybe 15% or more and see what happens. In fact, one way to get a good feel for what the potential is with the Mobius is to increase the numbers between 20 and 30% (or more). Even though this may be WAY too much it will help the user get a handle on what the possible range is and you can then re-adjust from there. The main message with the Mobius is to not be afraid to crank the settings knowing you can back off as necessary.

This is why I recommend dramatically increasing the sharpness setting on the Mobius. With most cameras, you can easily boost the sharpness too far and ruin the appearance of the image but with the Mobius there is quite a lot of leeway and opportunity to tweak the image. This is one of the brilliant things about how the Mobius camera/software interface was designed that differs from any other camera available.

Like I say, don't be afraid to really crank the settings and see what happens. You have nothing to lose and possibly much to gain.

You all know about my experiments with the varifocal 2.8mm to 12mm ƒ1.4 lens on a Mobius.

Consider this image sample from my thread about that lens and consider how much I've cranked the sharpness, contrast and saturation settings that were used to capture the image below.

View attachment 33774

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So... sharpness +20, exp -20, contrast +20, saturation +20, color NORMAL and WB auto?

Does that seem logical to begin with?
 
So... sharpness +20, exp -20, contrast +20, saturation +20, color NORMAL and WB auto?

Does that seem logical to begin with?

Logic is completely irrelevant. The final results are the objective. Of course, an IR lens with extreme RGB color correction adjustments may be different than a lens with an IR-cut filter and "normal" WB settings. The point here is to not be afraid to experiment or push the limits to achieve the desired results.
 
Please allow me to give you a little photography lesson here so that you can possibly achieve some better results. Changing the WB (White Balance) or color option to WARMER has nothing to do with what you are seeing in the daytime video and won't address or cure the problem in any way.

I read you wanted to teach me a "little photographic lesson to get better results", so I hoped my teacher would tell me exactly what to do with this new lens in mind :sneaky: since I'm just a hauler in a truck that don't have tons of time for freeballing, so any tips are welcome, but no matter, I'll try some settings to get it better, although I do already like the way it is now except for the license plates being a little unsharp.

The latest one with the camera up the windshield (instead of on the dashboard) and flippies here:

 
Did I understand correctly that this lens is letting more IR light in than the original Mobius lenses?

That may explain the color difference to what I initially called washed out colors..... yes/no?
 
I read you wanted to teach me a "little photographic lesson to get better results", so I hoped my teacher would tell me exactly what to do with this new lens in mind :sneaky: since I'm just a hauler in a truck that don't have tons of time for freeballing, so any tips are welcome, but no matter, I'll try some settings to get it better, although I do already like the way it is now except for the license plates being a little unsharp.

The latest one with the camera up the windshield (instead of on the dashboard) and flippies here:

I was just trying to give you some tips and guidelines that might possibly assist you in getting better results than you could ever get by simply making the color balance warmer. So, for example, to adjust for over-exposure, you need to change the exposure settings, not the color balance.

Unless I had the same Starlight ƒ1.2 lens in my hands to work with there is nothing I could possibly do to advise you about what settings you need or don't need to get better results. That's up to you. It's your lens and your camera.

And why would you think I would have the time to do "freeballing" on your behalf anyway? I am a busy person too. Hopefully, the tips already provided will help get you where you want to be with this interesting new lens.
 
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Did I understand correctly that this lens is letting more IR light in than the original Mobius lenses?

That may explain the color difference to what I initially called washed out colors..... yes/no?

No, your lens has an IR-cut filter so your lens is not letting more IR light in than the original. The example I posted is from a lens without an IR-cut filter on my camera where I have manually adjusted the color balance to accommodate for the IR light passed to the sensor. Your colors are washed out because your ƒ1.2 lens is causing the camera to over-expose the image. That is what you need to compensate for to improve your results. This is because the default (built-in) lens profile embedded in the camera's firmware is for the very different lens that comes with the original camera.
 
My point is its amazing how far we have advanced pushing limits

The Mobius offers an unusual amount of control but there is nothing unusually advanced about the principles involved. Many cams give you a few basic EV settings, contrast settings and color balance settings but Mobius gives you the whole thing. Either way this is and has always been built into all digital cameras whether the camera gives you access to this level of control or not.

All RGB images use a scale of 0-255 steps of gray between pure white and pure black to create an image. The RGB color scale is related in that it too uses a 0-255 step scale. On the Mobius, rather than zero as is the typical designation it is designated as 1-256 instead so that the first number has a value to allow for an adjustment.

Basically, what the Mobius has done is to break down each adjustment parameter of each setting into the 256 step scale since that how it works. So, if you have 128 steps of minus adjustment and 128 steps of plus adjustment you get 256. (128 x 2 =256)

As for the RGB colors you will see the same thing here using @dirkzelf's mSetup example. The RGB values of the default standard settings of 256 (0-255) results from the 8 bit color model.

These are the basic fundamentals of how dash cams and (other digital cams) create an image using the RGB color scale, black levels, etc., using 8 bits of data.

8 bits of data gives you 256 different storage combinations because 256 is 2^8 which means 8 bits of data, with each bit having 2 possible values which will give you 256 possible combinations that the 8 bits can be in. This means you can distinguish between 256 different levels of grey in each pixel if you have 8 bits of data per pixel.

Schermopname-(1515).jpg

Here you can see a standard gray-scale chart showing the steps from zero t0 255 between pure white and pure black. Note that 128 is exactly in the middle.
graychart.jpg
 
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No, your lens has an IR-cut filter so your lens is not letting more IR light in than the original. The example I posted is from a lens without an IR-cut filter on my camera where I have manually adjusted the color balance to accommodate for the IR light passed to the sensor. Your colors are washed out because your ƒ1.2 lens is causing the camera to over-expose the image. That is what you need to compensate for to improve your results. This is because the default (built-in) lens profile embedded in the camera's firmware is for the very different lens that comes with the original camera.

OK, thanks for the help and tips, I will do as I mentioned before as to the over exposure and will let you know here what came out.

It is good to know that it isn't the ir filter doing something different from the original, although I do know there are various ir filter values in nm, light's wavelength, I suspected that had something to do with it.

Interesting also to see that you could correct the colors that were influenced by the ir filter...!
 
BTW, since this is not a wide view lens, I chose to use the A - lens setting, I believe that is the best way to go?
 
OK, thanks for the help and tips, I will do as I mentioned before as to the over exposure and will let you know here what came out.

It is good to know that it isn't the ir filter doing something different from the original, although I do know there are various ir filter values in nm, light's wavelength, I suspected that had something to do with it.

Interesting also to see that you could correct the colors that were influenced by the ir filter...!

Just have fun with it. Even of you are busy you can take your time playing around with it a bit at a time. Sometimes that is even the best approach since it gives you time with each new setting to figure out what to do next.
 
Just have fun with it. Even of you are busy you can take your time playing around with it a bit at a time. Sometimes that is even the best approach since it gives you time with each new setting to figure out what to do next.

Yah, thanks, it is kind of a hobby too, but there's so little time... Well you know that yourself, as you mentioned rightfully so....!

However I'm not depending on the Mobius anymore since I have the A119S now, so it's like you said, bit by bit gets me there too.....!

Well, that gets me thinking that this nifty little camera is still surprising us again and again.....
 
BTW, since this is not a wide view lens, I chose to use the A - lens setting, I believe that is the best way to go?

The A-B-C settings actually have nothing to do with the focal length of the lens. They are the profiles supplied with each Mobius lens within the firmware and the settings control the default color balance and exposure. Do some simple tests using each setting and you will see what I mean. One setting may be warmer and another setting may be cooler but they definitely have nothing to do with the FOV of each lens.
 
Ok so that has just to do with how fw corrects the color balance of each individual lens. Got it.
 
Ok so that has just to do with how fw corrects the color balance of each individual lens. Got it.

Mobius doesn't bother to explain any of this so I finally did some experiments and figured it out myself. Other than that the A-B-C settings are confusing and even misleading if you don't know what they actually do. If anyone wants to install an aftermarket lens on a Mobius and the colors don't look quite right, the first thing to try are the different A-B-C lens settings regardless of the FOV of the aftermarket lens you are installing. Each lens has its own unique color balance and other characteristics, hence the need for a default lens profile. Sometimes you can get lucky and find a good color balance match to the new lens without having to do anything else.
 
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Mobius doesn't bother to explain any of this so I finally did some experiments and figured it out myself. Other than that the A-B-C settings are confusing and even misleading if you don't know what they actually do. If anyone wants to install an aftermarket lens on a Mobius and the colors don't look quite right, the first thing to try is the different lens setting regardless of the FOV of the aftermarket lens. Each lens has its own unique color balance and other characteristics, hence the need for a default lens profile. Sometimes you can get lucky and find a good color balance match to the new lens without having to do anything else.

When we connect the Mobius in a webcam setup, we can not change the contrast in, say, AmCap. I've tried that and the controls show up, but are not accessible, as opposed to the SQ11 (the little cheap cr@p cube cammy) that actually can.....

But if we change the settings for these functions (exp/contr/satur/sharp) is the result to be seen in the live view in AmCap? Or do we really have to record to see the result?
 
When we connect the Mobius in a webcam setup, we can not change the contrast in, say, AmCap. I've tried that and the controls show up, but are not accessible, as opposed to the SQ11 (the little cheap cr@p cube cammy) that actually can.....

But if we change the settings for these functions (exp/contr/satur/sharp) is the result to be seen in the live view in AmCap? Or do we really have to record to see the result?

I don't use AmpCap so I wouldn't know but it is unlikely to be adjusting the camera in any way. The AmpCap app is probably just changing the values you see on your screen. The only way to adjust the color on your Mobius is via mSetup which is adjusting the values within the camera via the firmware.
 
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