Harsh Contrast On 5DMKII?
 

I'm excited to have the opportunity to shoot with the 5DMKII more, but I'm noticing that the footage tends to be a bit contrast-heavy. I've noticed it mostly in brighter sun situations, and while I expose for the brightest part, any detail in the shadows seems extra dark and gets lost. When I try to fix it in post, I just seem to blow out the highlights and then it looks like crap.

Could a faster shutter speed be the cause of this? I recently purchased some ND filters and will use those this weekend, but can anybody give me any pointers on get my footage less contrasty?

Thanks in advance!!

-seth

!. First of all, there was some issue with the way Quicktime interprets the footage. YOu may need to update your Quicktime player. Someone else brighter than me can explain the technical terms, but it has to do with reading or interpreting level 0-216 versus another range.

2. On PC side, using NeoScene seems to resolve this problem too.

3. You also can set the camera at another Picture Style. Can remember names, but I think it is Neutral or Natural. Access that through Picture style.

Thanks Chris, I was actually hoping you'd chime in. I just watched a clip you shot in Tahoe and noticed there were some bright sun shots, but the shadows looked nice too.

When using NeoScene, you have to convert/apply that to every clip? I'm renting the MKII on Friday so I'll check out the picture style settings. Thanks!

-seth

Yes. It's easy to set up a batch process that runs on a whole folder or specific group of files. On a QX6600 quad core PC with 2GB RAM and a RAID, it translates the files in real time, roughly. For your first rental, you can use Cineform's 1 week trial. You should buy it the second time you rent. $100 at VideoGuys.

If you aren't running Final Cut Pro, NeoScene is a necessity. You absolutely don't want to be editing the raw MOV files.

On FCP, you can transcode to ProRes HD, though you should look VERY closely at the workflow threads. You will want to avoid the crushed blacks of yore, as well as the more recent QuickTime gamma shift. Being a Vegas user, I can't offer details.

Picture styles are great, but make sure that you use NeoScene or the correct FCP procedure. Otherwise, you risk banding and other problems. Picture styles are for creative adjustment and are independent of a good technical flow.

BTW, if you don't have time to play with the Picture Style Editor, just choose "Faithful" from the menus for a reasonable film-like preset.

Thanks for that info, I'll definitely look into the week trial. What format does NeoScene process them out as?

-seth

nevermind, I just checked out the website :)

-seth