Lenses and Distortion

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‌Lenses and Distortion ‌

Match-moving aims to electronically replicate what happened during a live-action film or video shoot. Not only the camera motion must be determined, but the field of view of the shot as well. This process requires certain assumptions about what the camera is doing: at its simplest, that light travels in a straight line, but also a number of nitty-gritty little details about the camera: whether there is distortion in the lens, how big the film or sensor is, whether it is centered on the axis of the lens, the timing of when pixels are imaged, and many more smaller issues. It is very easy to take these for granted, and under ideal conditions they can be ignored. But often, they will contribute small systematic errors, or even cause outright failure. When the problems become larger, it is important to recognize them and be able to fix them, and SynthEyes provides the tools to help do that.

You should always be on the lookout for lens distortion, and be ready to correct it. Most zoom lenses will exhibit very substantial distortion when set to their widest field of view (shortest focal length).

Similarly, you should be on the lookout for de-centering errors, especially on long “traveling” shots and on shots with substantial distortion that you are correcting.

Focal Length vs Field Of View Zoom, Fixed, or Prime Lens? Introduction to Lens Distortion Determining Distortion With Check Lines Calculating Distortion While Solving Distortion, Focal Length, and the Field of View Cubic and Quartic Distortion Correction Anamorphic Lens Breathing Lens Distortion Profiles What About 2-D Grid Corrections? Accurate Presets from Lens Grids Match-moving with Lens Distortion Basic Lens Distortion Workflows Delivering Undistorted Imagery Delivering Distorted Imagery Undoing the Lens Workflow Script Zero-Pass Workflow Lens Distortion Models vs Lens Correction Models Lens Distortion Interchange via Image Distortion Maps The Reference Image Bit Depth, Color Space, and Resolution Unmapped Pixels and Blue vs Alpha Inverse Maps Writing Image Distortion Maps Writing Image Distortion Sequences Applying Image Distortion Maps Exporters and Future Work Lens Distortion Interchange via Projection Screens Lens De-Centering Working with Zooms and Distortion Summary of Lens Issues

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