More on the PP3 profile settings

[Chris Harding]

Hi Guys

Well I have found that if I push the colour level in PP3 from zero up to +4 for outdoor shoots it's really a nice profile and not necessary to lift saturation in post... as it stands, PP3 is great for indoors with maybe a tad of a saturation lift (+2 maybe) but what I still really need to discover is how to increase the dynamic range in the profile when shooting outdoors ... the camera exposes for the bright sunshine which brings shadows very dark and the whole image becomes very contrasty indeed ... I have a cure in post by changing the gamma a little but it would be nice to have it preset in a profile too.

Does anyone know what to change in PP3 to stretch the DRS a bit?? It uses the 709 gamma so maybe that's the problem?

Chris

[Noa Put]

the camera exposes for the bright sunshine which brings shadows very dark and the whole image becomes very contrasty indeed

There is only one cure in getting a more balanced DR with pp3 and that is to handle the iris manually, if you let your camera decide the exposure it will never be right, no matter how good the preset is.

[Peter Rush]

This is a thorny problem indeed and for me as a solo shooter one I have never resolved - at this time of year I am constantly in and out of the church as guests are mingling inside and outside - the same at the reception - guests in the gardens or in the bar - I don't have time or often (in the heat of battle) forget to be constantly changing picture profiles - regarding Iris - in a fast moving environment such as this I quite often have it on auto but kick in the AE shift when needed.

Still using PP3 but is too washed out for outdoors - I can boost the saturation and contrast in post however so it's sort of working for me - I was going to experiment over the last 2 weeks but I've 2 Asian wedding edits that are turning into a monsters!

Noa can you post your settings for the JR45Cine2 profile please :)

[Noa Put]

Noa can you post your settings for the JR45Cine2 profile please :)

Those can be found in my blog in the "Porting Abel cine profiles from the Sony fs100 to the Sony nex-ea50" topic, I only changed the color level to -3 and changed the detail to -4, I found that setting the detail to -7 to reduce moire makes the image to soft to my taste. I made some modifications in post by increasing the chroma value and by lowering the whitebalance contrast (in edius) to flatten some of the highlights. I also apply 20% sharpness.

I find that preset a good starting point to be used throughout the day, it does need some post modification but i don't mind doing that because I have more controll in such a way a a flat enough profile that gives me sufficient DR.

[Chris Harding]

Thanks Noa

Very good point there cos it's simply all about exposure especially where you have bright sun and deep shade the camera will naturally expose for the bright part of the picture. Using Exposure shift is probably the easiest way to do it when you hit a bright area ...just touch the button and go 1 stop under should do the trick!

Peter, seriously try PP3 with colour level upped to +4 and PP3 becomes an awesome outdoor setting ...I just modded PP2 do that's my outdoor setting and then PP3 (again with level upped to +2 instead of zero)

However I can see your point about coming out of a dim Church following the couple into bright sunlight!! There really is no time to change profiles in that instance ...I do like Noa's settings too but there is still an awful amount of post work involved and that's something I'm trying to avoid on edits!

Chris

[Peter Rush]

Trying it now chris - 3 back-to-back weddings this weekend - I'll have a look now and may try it on tomorrow's wedding!

[Chris Harding]

Hi Peter

Ouch you guys are getting rather busy!! We are heading towards Winter so it's tailing off for us..I have a double next weekend then just one in July so it's my quiet time. It start again in August however !

I would be dubious about experimenting with PP's at weddings .. I tend to play with them on non -essential shoots so my last one was stock standard PP3 .... I will have enough time however to put the modified PP3 profile through it's paces tomorrow on a Realty shoot which isn't too colour critical as it's only an inspection report as such.

However lifting colour level on PP3 certainly is a minor adjustment and I think it will save heaps of post edit adjustments too. I will also try some under-exposure on outdoor bright shots on the weekend too I think the over-contrasty issue might just work by creating the camera and shooting a stop under.

Let us know how you go?

Chris

[Peter Rush]

Will do Chris - I'm also using my Metabones speedbooster for the first time as well - big weekend!

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

Some feedback once you recover will be very useful. I'd be interested to know your thoughts especially doing handheld shots on the big Canon zoom too ...with my Sigma 24-70 I find that I wobble way too much even at 50mm so I only use that cam/lens on the tripod for the A-Camera during speeches ...The super wide Tokina 11-16 works very well for run 'n gun at the reception ...it has such a huge DOF that you hardly need to touch the focus ring at all ... I just watch the peaking and adjust when I have to.

Chris

[Peter Rush]

Well I've used PP3 for a few weddings now with the colour level set to +4 and it seems to do the job - contrast needs boosting in post but that's preferable to coping with over contrasty footage.

One thing I notice using PP3 is that in sunlight or in rooms with sunlight landing on a person, and using auto exposure I have to set AE shift to -0.7 or -1 otherwise skin highlights blow out - anyone else get this?

Pete

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

Thanks for the feedback..I have just done two weddings (Saturday and Sunday) so I'm not yet in the mood to edit as it's a holiday today (good for recovery!) I shot a little bit of outdoors on PP3 with +4 (I have set my PP2 preset to this) and then for indoor reception I dropped to +2 which I think should be enough under lighting. I'll let you know what I think soon as I tackle the edits tomorrow but I thought that PP3 at +4 might just be a tad too much saturation indoors ...I will find out later!!!

Now what I find with the EA-50, especially indoors is that exposure seems to be set using the entire screen so if you have a dark background and a brightly lit person yes, the cam will over expose the skin tones. I find at weddings if you let the camera expose and use a video light it tends to think that it's a very dark scene and it pushes ISO/gain way up so naturally the persons face is overexposed badly.

What I find is good (and it works on non Sony lenses too! as I use my Tokina 11-16 to interview guests and leave the lens at F2.8 and let the camera change iso/gain for me) My method, be it right or wrong is to limit my gain in auto to 21db ...(that's about ISO2000 I think) so the camera will look at the scene and try to push the gain to 30db cos all around is mostly dark BUT it limits at 21db ..that seems to make a nice noise free background and then I use my on-cam light for the person's face and go up to zebras at 90% and then back off the light. That way the person is nicely exposed and the background is deep and rich.....Works for me... and is easier than having to apply EV correction ... At speeches on the A-Camera I had the same issue as my bounce light doesn't extend that far so I set that cam to 24db limit and with my CFL light it keeps the background clean.

Chris

[Peter Rush]

Thanks for the tips Chris - I haven't started to edit the footage from my recent weddings yet so all I've got to go on is how I found it on the day (sometimes hard to tell with zebras and peaking all over the place) so I'll probably comment more in coming weeks.

For the speeches and ceremony I've started to use my Metabones and Canon 24-105 @ F2.8 - it keeps the gain down nicely and gives the image a quality different (and nicer) than the kit lens.

Have you experimented with the detail settings? I haven't had the time (getting very busy with shoots now) but I would like to sharpen the image up slightly.

Pete

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

Noa is the guy to talk to for that! It seems strange to me but he pulls detail right down to -7 and then sharpens the softer image in post. I'm not really sure if that is the way to do it but Noa's clips certainly look good!! I'm sure Noa can explain why he shoots with a negative detail and then does the post sharpening.

I had a quick look at my ceremony footage with PP3 and sat at +2 and it certainly looks nice enough to me. (My ceremony on Sunday was after dark with CFL lighting ..the Saturday wedding was just in Church lighting so I can also see if those clips have enough saturation.

These two are my last for the season so that's all I have to work with! I start again late July early August with the new season and a pre-Spring start to 2013/2014.

It's getting cold and wet here so July weddings are few and far between!!

Chris

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

This is my indoor wedding done under 4 x45w CFL lights bouncing back into an umbrella. The first is the PP3 profile with the colour level at +2 and the second is the PP3+2 and I lifted saturation in post a tiny bit more ...if I do it any further then the skin tones start to turn yellow and un-natural so with Sony Vegas I lifted saturation from the zero position of "1" to "1.250" which is about 2 position on PP3's colour level so it would be close to PP3 with a +4 colour level

Which do you think would be your saturation choice??

Chris

[Peter Rush]

I like the warmer look of the second image chris - I'm impressed you can use lights for the ceremony - a big no no over here!

I've also found that using Premier Pro I have to adjust the colour corrector input levels to bring back the contrast - usually by boosting the black input and reducing the white input by about 20 and -20 for outdoor scenes.

I'll post a couple of my images when I start to edit the footage shortly

Pete