Source: News Shooter
When Nikon released Firmware version 2.0 for Z9 back in April, there was a lot of excitement around the ability to record in N-RAW, Nikon’s new compressed 12-bit RAW format that promises files the equivalent of “half” in size. them in ProRes RAW — with no loss in quality. . Now, professional cinema camera maker RED is claiming its data compression technology has been illegally copied by Nikon — and they are suing.
The lawsuit, filed in a southern California federal court on May 25, asserts that the Japanese company and its subsidiaries in the United States illegally infringed on no less than seven patents. involves compressing video data in a “lossless visual” manner. RED details the patented compression that the Z9 uses:
The camera can be configured to convert blue and red image data in a way that enhances the data’s compressibility. The data can then be compressed and stored in this form. This allows the user to reconstruct the red and blue data to obtain the original raw data for a modified version of the original raw data without visual loss when decoding the data. Alternatively, the data can be processed so that the green image elements are de-lit first, and then the red and blue elements are reconstructed based on the values of the image elements. de-lighted green image.
Interestingly, the Z9’s highly efficient compression is the result of Nikon’s partnership with intoPIX, whose TicoRAW RAW recording codec is built into full-frame mirrorless cameras. While RED is recommending the Z9 record RAW internally similar to how RED’s patented scheme works, it’s more after Nikon than into PIX. Plus, it’s all complicated by the fact that intoPIX has also been patented for TicoRAW. The filing of a claim for damages and/or royalties for the alleged infringement as well as an injunction against Nikon further infringes. But since the firmware update has been around for more than a month, completely removing compression would be impossible – even if Nikon agrees to do so.
Maybe, if this goes to court, it won’t be as fun as Depp vs Heard, but let’s hope it gets more civilized, and RED and Nikon end up doing better—we love digging up compact 8K video files of the Z9 and it would be a shame to see the feature come to life. Needless to say, stay tuned to the DPG to find out what happens!
