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Japanese court overturns Red RAW video patent

122 points by anigbrowl 2mo ago

dannyw 2mo ago
Thank god. The actual patent (roughly; I researched it myself, but a few years ago so memory fuzzy) involves compressing frames/video before debayering which makes the streams more easily compressible; instead of after debayering, and as part of a camera (internal RAW). Yeah.
- rasz 2mo ago
  Wasnt the patent pretty much "and then I dump raw sensor data to a JPEG2000 codec"?
  - sagacity 2mo ago
    Yes, this is pretty much what REDCODE is.
dabinat 2mo ago
> One possibility the abolition of the license fees reportedly due to Red from users of Apple’s ProRes RAW codec. This would be great but I’m not going to hold my breath.
wmf 2mo ago
This is a terrible patent (it's basically a list of features) and unfortunately Red was able to milk it for almost 20 years.
grokcodec 2mo ago
I've been waiting for this result for a long time - great news!!
looksjjhg 2mo ago
Wow that’s big!
Wistar 2mo ago
In the past 15 years, I have purchased five Lumix cameras including the new L10 (which I have yet to receive). I like their cameras a lot. The dedication to pursue this battle is another reason I am certain to buy more.
- KennyBlanken 2mo ago
  ....what? Lumix and Red cameras have almost no market overlap. Only one model series even comes close to Red's cheapest camera.
  - dboreham 2mo ago
    I think you have your answer right there.
  - Lammy 2mo ago
    > Lumix and Red cameras have almost no market overlap. Wrong, in the sense that market overlap doesn't matter. Here's an example of a Micro Four Thirds camera (system stewarded by Panasonic) that had to nerf its RAW output in a firmware update due to this patent: https://web.archive.org/web/20220828070504/http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/25023/z-cam-is-so-lazy-that-they-violated-the-famous-red-patent-and-will-pay-for-it-soon https://web.archive.org/web/20220828070504/http://www.person... > Z-CAM […] violated the famous RED patent and will pay for it soon > The ZRAW actually stores RAW directly from Bayer sensor and not YUV as claimed (conversion happens in computer software, camera stores real linear raw). It means that they actually store real RAW on Z-CAM E2! https://web.archive.org/web/20250906030132/http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/25185/zraw-is-not-raw-anymore https://web.archive.org/web/20250906030132/http://www.person... > ZRAW is not RAW anymore. > After firmware v0.94.1 it's an AES-encrypted MOV-container-corrupted overXORred shit, that contains only HEVC bitstream.
- dagmx 2mo ago
  Unless I’ve missed it; Lumix has nothing to do with this long standing patent battle. Could you elaborate on the supposed relationship?
decimalenough 2mo ago
Can somebody give a ELI5 of what "RAW video" actually is? I was always under the impression that it's just a dump of the "raw" uncompressed and uncorrected data coming from the sensors, meaning it's hardware dependent and unstandardized, and Wikipedia seems to agree: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_image_format https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_image_format So what exactly is patentable here? Or is this the bone of contention here?
- picture 2mo ago
  It's not the idea of RAW that's being patented, but rather components of "Red RAW" that includes things like compressing before debayering, as the other comment points out. I also remember hearing something about Red having a patent on directly recording to swappable SSDs or something ridiculous like that as well..
- anon48293 2mo ago
  It is. What was patented was the compression: “ The camera can be configured to transform blue and red image data in a manner that enhances the compressibility of the data. The data can then be compressed and stored in this form. This allows a user to reconstruct the red and blue data to obtain the original raw data for a modified version of the original raw data that is visually lossless when demosaiced. Additionally, the data can be processed in a manner in which the green image elements are demosaiced first and then the red and blue elements are reconstructed based on values of the demosaiced green image elements.”
- hebelehubele 2mo ago
  > ELI5 of what "RAW video" actually is Video with high bit count per pixel. A finished video is 8-bit per pixel, but RAW video contains 10 to 14 bits per pixel, often in a camera-specific LOG format which has very low contrast and saturation and looks washed out. All of this helps preserve much of the detail and allows creators to have more flexibility in post-processing.
  - verall 2mo ago
    > has very low contrast and saturation and looks washed out When shown under naive linearization and compression rather than good tone mapping I totally get what you're saying and that is how film people talk about it but as a camera engineer it's annoying that people think washed out low sat is some intrinsic property of log.
jujube3 2mo ago
If it was filed in 2008, wouldn't the patent have expired in 2028 anyway? Or am I missing something?
- pestatije 2mo ago
  yee, welcome visitor from the future
  - tomjakubowski 2mo ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_conditional#Fake_tense https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_conditional#Fak...
strogonoff 2mo ago
"Raw” is not an acronym.
panny 2mo ago
Patents last at most 20 years. So the troll got 18 years out of it, and a great expense to the public and many companies involved fighting it. Trolls and lawyers win again. Everyone else loses.

122 points by anigbrowl 2mo ago

Thank god. The actual patent (roughly; I researched it myself, but a few years ago so memory fuzzy) involves compressing frames/video before debayering which makes the streams more easily compressible; instead of after debayering, and as part of a camera (internal RAW). Yeah.

rasz 2mo ago
Wasnt the patent pretty much "and then I dump raw sensor data to a JPEG2000 codec"?
- sagacity 2mo ago
  Yes, this is pretty much what REDCODE is.

dabinat 2mo ago

> One possibility the abolition of the license fees reportedly due to Red from users of Apple’s ProRes RAW codec. This would be great but I’m not going to hold my breath.

wmf 2mo ago

This is a terrible patent (it's basically a list of features) and unfortunately Red was able to milk it for almost 20 years.

grokcodec 2mo ago

I've been waiting for this result for a long time - great news!!

looksjjhg 2mo ago

Wow that’s big!

Wistar 2mo ago

In the past 15 years, I have purchased five Lumix cameras including the new L10 (which I have yet to receive). I like their cameras a lot. The dedication to pursue this battle is another reason I am certain to buy more.

KennyBlanken 2mo ago
....what? Lumix and Red cameras have almost no market overlap. Only one model series even comes close to Red's cheapest camera.
- dboreham 2mo ago
  I think you have your answer right there.
- Lammy 2mo ago
  > Lumix and Red cameras have almost no market overlap. Wrong, in the sense that market overlap doesn't matter. Here's an example of a Micro Four Thirds camera (system stewarded by Panasonic) that had to nerf its RAW output in a firmware update due to this patent: https://web.archive.org/web/20220828070504/http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/25023/z-cam-is-so-lazy-that-they-violated-the-famous-red-patent-and-will-pay-for-it-soon https://web.archive.org/web/20220828070504/http://www.person... > Z-CAM […] violated the famous RED patent and will pay for it soon > The ZRAW actually stores RAW directly from Bayer sensor and not YUV as claimed (conversion happens in computer software, camera stores real linear raw). It means that they actually store real RAW on Z-CAM E2! https://web.archive.org/web/20250906030132/http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/25185/zraw-is-not-raw-anymore https://web.archive.org/web/20250906030132/http://www.person... > ZRAW is not RAW anymore. > After firmware v0.94.1 it's an AES-encrypted MOV-container-corrupted overXORred shit, that contains only HEVC bitstream.
dagmx 2mo ago
Unless I’ve missed it; Lumix has nothing to do with this long standing patent battle. Could you elaborate on the supposed relationship?

decimalenough 2mo ago

Can somebody give a ELI5 of what "RAW video" actually is? I was always under the impression that it's just a dump of the "raw" uncompressed and uncorrected data coming from the sensors, meaning it's hardware dependent and unstandardized, and Wikipedia seems to agree: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_image_format https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raw_image_format So what exactly is patentable here? Or is this the bone of contention here?

picture 2mo ago
It's not the idea of RAW that's being patented, but rather components of "Red RAW" that includes things like compressing before debayering, as the other comment points out. I also remember hearing something about Red having a patent on directly recording to swappable SSDs or something ridiculous like that as well..
anon48293 2mo ago
It is. What was patented was the compression: “ The camera can be configured to transform blue and red image data in a manner that enhances the compressibility of the data. The data can then be compressed and stored in this form. This allows a user to reconstruct the red and blue data to obtain the original raw data for a modified version of the original raw data that is visually lossless when demosaiced. Additionally, the data can be processed in a manner in which the green image elements are demosaiced first and then the red and blue elements are reconstructed based on values of the demosaiced green image elements.”
hebelehubele 2mo ago
> ELI5 of what "RAW video" actually is Video with high bit count per pixel. A finished video is 8-bit per pixel, but RAW video contains 10 to 14 bits per pixel, often in a camera-specific LOG format which has very low contrast and saturation and looks washed out. All of this helps preserve much of the detail and allows creators to have more flexibility in post-processing.
- verall 2mo ago
  > has very low contrast and saturation and looks washed out When shown under naive linearization and compression rather than good tone mapping I totally get what you're saying and that is how film people talk about it but as a camera engineer it's annoying that people think washed out low sat is some intrinsic property of log.

jujube3 2mo ago

If it was filed in 2008, wouldn't the patent have expired in 2028 anyway? Or am I missing something?

pestatije 2mo ago
yee, welcome visitor from the future
- tomjakubowski 2mo ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_conditional#Fake_tense https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counterfactual_conditional#Fak...

strogonoff 2mo ago

"Raw” is not an acronym.

panny 2mo ago

Patents last at most 20 years. So the troll got 18 years out of it, and a great expense to the public and many companies involved fighting it. Trolls and lawyers win again. Everyone else loses.