This is half a test post and half another excuse to post a short video to see if my do-it-yourself video setup can handle 8k video properly.
We spent a week in Whistler, BC late last month in an attempt to get out of the Seattle rain. It was a nice change of pace, swapping US rain for Canadian rain. We were hoping for snow, but only a few flakes fell the whole time we were there and nothing stuck. Still, it was nice being away from home, and there was interesting scenery in every direction, for the brief periods when the weather cleared enough to want to leave our rental.
As I’ve said a few times, one of my recent photography hobby persuits has been creating videos for use as backgrounds in Zoom meetings. The goal is to produce a landscape that moves, but not enough to be distracting. Sometimes I have water running in the frame, and sometimes it’s more subtle. This specific video ended up being at the extremely subtle end of things; you can see the moss in the trees blowing if you watch long enough,Look near the top of the cedar in the foreground on the right, for one example of moving moss.
and a couple of the ferns wave in the wind, but it’s a very nearly static picture that goes on for 5 minutes.
This is also a beautiful example of extreme overkill. Most Zoom meetings are either 720p or maybe 1080p; this video was shot on a Blackmagic Pyxis 12k at 12,288x6,912 at 30 frames per second, and it should stream at up to 8k here if you have a computer (and monitor) that can display it. There’s a full resolution JPEG available if you really want to pixel-peep at an image from the highest-resolution 35mm sensor on the market today.Blackmagic’s 12K sensor works out to 98 MP if you shoot using the whole frame and don’t crop down to a 16:9 image like I did this time. Other than two Blackmagic cameras, the highest resolution 35mm-format cameras are a few Sony, Leica, and Sigma models with 61 MP sensors in them (probably all made by Sony), so weirdly the highest-resolution 35mm camera on the market today is actually a video camera, not a still camera. This wasn’t shot with the sharpest lens on the market, but it was close enough to make the sensor (and trees) look good.
I think I can safely say that no one needs an 8k video backround for meetings today, and frankly attempting meetings in even 4k will probably always be bad idea unless the subject has a sideline as a professional model.
Most importantly, though, I just like the way the image came out. We were driving down a back road near Squamish and I literally just pulled over to the side of the roadSomewhere around here
because the moss on the trees looked awesome. I do that with annoying frequency, and it rarely works out as well as I’d hoped, but I’ve had a few successes. I love the way that the trees and moss look here, and the light gives everything a slightly creepy vibe. I wish the background light was better, but the rain rolled back in 15 minutes later so this was all that I could get.

scottstuff.net

A photographer shares their experience shooting 8K video with a Blackmagic Pyxis 12K camera (12,288x6,912 resolution) for use as Zoom meeting backgrounds. The video captures moss-covered trees near Squamish, BC, demonstrating extreme technical overkill since most video calls run at 720p or 1080p. The piece discusses the camera's 98-megapixel sensor, making it the highest-resolution 35mm format camera available today, and reflects on the creative process of capturing subtle, non-distracting landscape footage.

Trees in 8K