R4-Video Samples

[Smithwood]

Can someone that owns a R4 please post some samples of video in addition to commenting on your satisfaction.

 

[Johnny Nilsson]

In my opinion, it's useless. But that didn't come as a surprise. Just tried it once and got my worst belief confirmed.

TZ-1 has a much better video, but I preferred the compactness of R4 and WA.

I had a S1 before and took lots and lots of video for my shooting site. Still shoot a lot of video, but with a 3 CCD compact camcorder instead.

Regards
iron9

 

[Smithwood]

Thanks for your reply. It's a shame that more people are not responding to this question.....as if the apparent flaw in the camera personally reflects a poor purchasing decision. I'm aware that main function of camera is to shoot stills, but now that video capabitlites are improved and in all of the competing cameras it becomes more of an issue in my opinion. Hope to still hear from others.

 

[allejandro]

Well, it could have been at least 640 * 480. Then i would not complain.

But the video's are now more as the 'sound'function: nice in some situation to capture the ambiance.

Every camera has got his comprimises. The rest of the camera is great!

--
----------------------
Ricoh R4
Probably the best (P&S) camera in the world!

 

[brianj]

I don't have access to a website to host such a large file, otherwise I would post it for you. As I have never used the video mode, and probably never will, I cannot comment on its lack of quality.

Brian

 

[Prognathous]

I don't have access to a website to host such a large file,
otherwise I would post it for you. As I have never used the video
mode, and probably never will, I cannot comment on its lack of
quality.

You can send me a video sample and I'll be happy to host it (as bandwidth allows).

My email address is: [email protected]

Prog.

 

[brianj]

I don't have access to a website to host such a large file,
otherwise I would post it for you. As I have never used the video
mode, and probably never will, I cannot comment on its lack of
quality.

You can send me a video sample and I'll be happy to host it (as
bandwidth allows).

I have just emailed a small one to you taken at 320x240 30fps. It looks average when viewed at its native resolution.

Thanks
Brian

 

[Prognathous]

Thanks, Brian. No matter how I tried to combine those file fragments, I couldn't get anything useful with the result (and I did try three email programs, command line tools and more). So here's just the first one:

http://test.prognathous.mail-central.com/ricoh_r4/R0012097.AVI

It's only a 3 seconds clip, but I guess that’s better than nothing.

BTW, you might want to look into a more flexible mail service, especially since the best two services (IMHO) are from Australia - bluebottle.com and fastmail.fm. I'm using both (actually paying fastmail.fm yearly) and I wouldn't dream of using the likes hotmail, gmail or yahoo.

Prog.

 

[brianj]

Unfortunately that fragment is not working for me.

If you are using Outlook Express, it should recombine the fragments automatically as they are received, so the whole mess is transparent.

This limit was set by my supposedly reputable ISP!

Brian

 

[Prognathous]

If you are using Outlook Express, it should recombine the fragments
automatically as they are received, so the whole mess is
transparent.

Yes, one of the first things I did was to check the mail headers of your emails and I did notice that you're using Outlook Express, so I configured it too, but nothing special happens. I just see six separate emails, being handled separately by the program.

This limit was set by my supposedly reputable ISP!

You won't have to deal with such limits if you use a different service for the mail. Another upside to that is that it makes switching between ISPs easier, as threre’s no need to switch to a new mail account.

Prog.

 

[brianj]

If you are using Outlook Express, it should recombine the fragments
automatically as they are received, so the whole mess is
transparent.

Yes, one of the first things I did was to check the mail headers of
your emails and I did notice that you're using Outlook Express, so
I configured it too, but nothing special happens. I just see six
separate emails, being handled separately by the program.

What if in Outlook, you select all 6, then right click and combine. Does that work.

Brian

 

[Prognathous]

Outlook 2003 just seems to freeze when I even click one of those emails.

I think I'll go to bad now (northern hemisphere here), we'll continue this tomorrow

In the meanwhile, feel free to try bluebottle.com. Their free account allows sending attachments up to 10 MB and their anti-spam solution is a killer.

Prog.

 

[Prognathous]

Bluebottle did the trick. Here's the longer file

http://test.prognathous.mail-central.com/ricoh_r4/R00120971.AVI (8.5MB)

Please download only if you must, as my bandwidth is limited

Thanks!

Prog.

 

[Prognathous]

Actually, it was gmail. Either way, external services are usually better than ISP email.

Prog.

 

[brianj]

What's the verdict on the quality?

Brian

 

[Prognathous]

It's pretty close to what I thought it would look like. Useful for capturing ambiance, but not for much more than that. Ricoh really should catch up with other brands. VGA is the standard nowadays.

BTW, the 30fps is a big improvement over the 15fps I had in my Caplio G3. This camera was also limited to 30 second clips (R4 is unlimited), yet I did use its video mode quite a few times on a trip to China a few years ago. The clips are low-res-low-framerate, but they do serve well to bring back the memories.

All in all, the video mode wouldn't stop me from buying an R4, but I'm in no hurry. I just started thinking about buying a pocket camera last week, when my C5060 grew to a DSLR-size due to a few accessories I bought for it.

Prog.

 

[Smithwood]

Thanks to both Brian & Prog. for your feedback.