Feeding Blender my Camera Data

Support Compositing and Post Processing
1

I need help to determine the sensor data for Panasonic HMC80 and SONY HXR-MC2000.

What I have been able to gather is:

SONY it has 1/4" Exmor R CMOS Sensor and 12x G-Lens 29.8-357.6mm (35mm Equivalent, 16x9 mode), f/1.8-3.4.
Panasonic HMC80, it has 1/4" 3MOS Sensors and filter diameter is 43mm.

So what should I feed Blender in the camera data in the sensor width, pixel aspect ratio and optical center? Also, does anyone have data for Canon 7D, 5D Mark II and 5D Mark III?

By the way, I am not going to be using all of them at the same time, but my choices are going to be around those cameras. Also, I don’t know yet what lens I will use if I use Canon, but SONY and Panasonic cameras have fixed lenses.

2

1/4" = 0.635cm
I guess that’s sensor diameter. So you need to do some triangle-math to account for Aspect ratio.

I suppose you need this for Movies? Exact Zoom Position values are pretty much impossible to get, if you aren’t on minimal or maximal zoom… You would want to enter the value before “35mm Equivalent” - usually this should be written on the Lens.

For 5Ds, sensor size is available in mm, just enter that. And as Focal length what your Lens is. (Note: most lenses are not exact - a 50mm can easy be an 47-53mm - some Producers write the real value in Manual.

PS: “Fixed Lens” is not optimal word… Fixed Lens can mean either built in, as you use it, but more often as Fixed Focal Lens = No Zoom.

For your Purpose you’re better off with a fixed Focal Lens aka No Zoom Lens.

3

blender has also a great set of preset camera sensor sizes. for the canon 5d use the !full frame 35mm camera" the 7D should be a APS-C camera

take a look of any of the other camera in the preset list have the same sensor size as your models, then you can go with that

4

bashi, it is for a little music video. I love Prime Lenses and I hope some will be available for this project. The two cameras, Panasonic and SONY are the ones in my hand and yes, they have built-in lenses and not prime lenses. So I suppose if I stay on the minimum side for a SONY camera, the sensor value to feed into Blender will be 29.8?

And the PAR, do I need sensor information to calculate it or is it simply a case of knowing my frame size ex. 1920*1080=16:9=1.7778? Sorry your post kinda gave me more questions than answers.

pingking23, I appreciate the info. I am still trying to figure out the sensor size for those two cameras.

5

29.8 should be correct.

You need the correct Sensor data, which should be 3.2mm width and 2.4mm height (According to wiki for 1/4 Sensor).
But that’s not the correct aspect ratio for the sony? I think Blender has automatic function in Camera - Camera. So you just need to enter the width value and the correct aspect ratio gets calculated from your Render Size (Resolution) - 1920 x 1080 for example.

optical center would always be none, unless you use shift Lens or cropped video source…

I strongly advise you to do some serious testing for your setup and for your recording “parameters”. (Parameters in that sense means Lighting, shot movement… )

Camera Tracking can be tricky - in Blender even more so.

PS: Pixel aspect ratio depends on your final usage… Afaik it’s usually is 1:1 but for television 1.4:1. I think you might want to use 1:1…

I hope this helps a bit.