AE Blows out Whites at DVinfo.net

Peter Rush · November 6th, 2013, 03:21 AM

Is it just my EA50 or does everyone have this issue using automatic exposure - it has a real bad habit of blowing out the whites and highlighted areas of skin - I use AE for fast moving parts of the wedding day - notably that 20 minutes or so outside the church after the ceremony when there's tons of stuff happening.

Thankfully I have one of the assign buttons set to AE shift so I can quickly dial in a -3 or -7 dip to get over it.

The attached example is typical - I never had this issue with my old Z1 or FX1

Pete

Noa Put · November 6th, 2013, 04:11 AM

I never had that issue but I also never let the camera handle exposure, allways do that manually :)

Chris Harding · November 6th, 2013, 05:27 AM

Hi Pete

I'm real lazy so I use AE 99% of the time and the whites never blow out! I would say it might be the picture profile you are using so you may need to make a few tweaks there??

I use mostly PP3 that is modified so that colour level is up two points which is slightly under saturated in bright light but awesome indoors so I just boost saturation a bit in post.

I would expect that the PP5 or PP6 profiles might not like AE too much as they are high contrast and knee settings are also quite high. What profile did you use in that shot??

Chris

Peter Rush · November 6th, 2013, 05:55 AM

Ah Chris you've cought me out - I'm currently not using a profile as I got frustrated at constantly switching between profiles (and constantly forgetting) as i'm quite often indoors and outdoors. I mean to get a grip of this for next season (this season is slowing down now) and experiment over the winter months. I did use PP3 in the early days of getting my EA50 but find it too washed out for outdoor use - a profile good for indoor and outdoor would be great - it's been a while since the thread asking what people are using - might be good to revive it as there are a few new people on the forum now.

Chris Harding · November 6th, 2013, 06:13 AM

Hi Pete

I must admit I found also that "no profile" was also a bit contrasty and way too saturated for use indoors ... If you get a moment try filming someone in bright sunshine (if it exists in the UK) and wearing a white top and then switch to PP3 and compare them but also push the saturation a bit on your PP3 one so it's to your liking. I think you might find that the white blow outs disappear after that. Try PP3 with the colour level taken up two points and you will find that a really nice profile in Churches or indoors but outdoors you still need a bit more saturation! (I have PP2 set to the same profile as PP3 but with the colour level lifted 4 points) However I usually end up being too lazy to change it but if I did switch to my custom PP2 outdoors it works pretty well

Chris

Noa Put · November 6th, 2013, 07:35 AM

I use no colour profile outside as I like the punchy color and contrast, only inside I use pp3 as that helps when it gets too dark. I also think you can't expect no blown out area's in your footage when you use auto exposure, that's like saying your footage is unsharp if you use auto focus as well, you cannot expect the camera to know what needs to be exposed right. The only way to get it right is to deal with it manually and use at least zebra's and as long as you don't do that you just have to live with this "issue" as it's not the camera but the operator that is causing it.

Peter Rush · November 6th, 2013, 08:05 AM

You're right of course Noa - I only use AE when things are happening fast around me such as I described - I have zebras on and ride the AE shift but I agree - not as good as manual exposure.

Noa Put · November 6th, 2013, 08:26 AM

Ae shift is actually not designed to control exposure like you do, a Sony camera in general has a tendency to overexpose a scene bit in automode, then the ae shift comes into play where you can tell the camera that whatever it thinks should be right has to be over- or under exposed a bit, this works great if you are shooting dance performances with constantly changing light conditions, only if you want correctly exposed skin a lot more can come into the picture, you can have the ae shift set to underexpose but if there is a lot of black in one frame the camera will over expose and if there is a lot of white it will underexpose depending on the lightconditions, ae shift also has limitations to how many stops you can adjust, so a very bright backlight will give you a underexposed image anyway in automode. The camera looks at the whole picture and set's it's exposure to that but it can't know that it should expose to that one face if that is just a small part of the frame. That you can only get right if you ride the exposure wheel manually and use the zebra's.

November 6th, 2013, 03:21 AM	#1
Peter Rush Inner Circle Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: UK/Yorkshire Posts: 2,069	AE Blows out Whites Is it just my EA50 or does everyone have this issue using automatic exposure - it has a real bad habit of blowing out the whites and highlighted areas of skin - I use AE for fast moving parts of the wedding day - notably that 20 minutes or so outside the church after the ceremony when there's tons of stuff happening. Thankfully I have one of the assign buttons set to AE shift so I can quickly dial in a -3 or -7 dip to get over it. The attached example is typical - I never had this issue with my old Z1 or FX1 Pete Attached Thumbnails

November 6th, 2013, 04:11 AM	#2
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,509	Re: AE Blows out Whites I never had that issue but I also never let the camera handle exposure, allways do that manually :)

November 6th, 2013, 05:27 AM	#3
Chris Harding Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 8,441	Re: AE Blows out Whites Hi Pete I'm real lazy so I use AE 99% of the time and the whites never blow out! I would say it might be the picture profile you are using so you may need to make a few tweaks there?? I use mostly PP3 that is modified so that colour level is up two points which is slightly under saturated in bright light but awesome indoors so I just boost saturation a bit in post. I would expect that the PP5 or PP6 profiles might not like AE too much as they are high contrast and knee settings are also quite high. What profile did you use in that shot?? Chris

November 6th, 2013, 05:55 AM	#4
Peter Rush Inner Circle Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: UK/Yorkshire Posts: 2,069	Re: AE Blows out Whites Ah Chris you've cought me out - I'm currently not using a profile as I got frustrated at constantly switching between profiles (and constantly forgetting) as i'm quite often indoors and outdoors. I mean to get a grip of this for next season (this season is slowing down now) and experiment over the winter months. I did use PP3 in the early days of getting my EA50 but find it too washed out for outdoor use - a profile good for indoor and outdoor would be great - it's been a while since the thread asking what people are using - might be good to revive it as there are a few new people on the forum now.

November 6th, 2013, 06:13 AM	#5
Chris Harding Inner Circle Join Date: Jul 2009 Location: Perth, Western Australia Posts: 8,441	Re: AE Blows out Whites Hi Pete I must admit I found also that "no profile" was also a bit contrasty and way too saturated for use indoors ... If you get a moment try filming someone in bright sunshine (if it exists in the UK) and wearing a white top and then switch to PP3 and compare them but also push the saturation a bit on your PP3 one so it's to your liking. I think you might find that the white blow outs disappear after that. Try PP3 with the colour level taken up two points and you will find that a really nice profile in Churches or indoors but outdoors you still need a bit more saturation! (I have PP2 set to the same profile as PP3 but with the colour level lifted 4 points) However I usually end up being too lazy to change it but if I did switch to my custom PP2 outdoors it works pretty well Chris

November 6th, 2013, 07:35 AM	#6
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,509	Re: AE Blows out Whites I use no colour profile outside as I like the punchy color and contrast, only inside I use pp3 as that helps when it gets too dark. I also think you can't expect no blown out area's in your footage when you use auto exposure, that's like saying your footage is unsharp if you use auto focus as well, you cannot expect the camera to know what needs to be exposed right. The only way to get it right is to deal with it manually and use at least zebra's and as long as you don't do that you just have to live with this "issue" as it's not the camera but the operator that is causing it.

November 6th, 2013, 08:05 AM	#7
Peter Rush Inner Circle Join Date: Nov 2008 Location: UK/Yorkshire Posts: 2,069	Re: AE Blows out Whites You're right of course Noa - I only use AE when things are happening fast around me such as I described - I have zebras on and ride the AE shift but I agree - not as good as manual exposure.

November 6th, 2013, 08:26 AM	#8
Noa Put Inner Circle Join Date: Jun 2007 Location: Belgium Posts: 9,509	Re: AE Blows out Whites Ae shift is actually not designed to control exposure like you do, a Sony camera in general has a tendency to overexpose a scene bit in automode, then the ae shift comes into play where you can tell the camera that whatever it thinks should be right has to be over- or under exposed a bit, this works great if you are shooting dance performances with constantly changing light conditions, only if you want correctly exposed skin a lot more can come into the picture, you can have the ae shift set to underexpose but if there is a lot of black in one frame the camera will over expose and if there is a lot of white it will underexpose depending on the lightconditions, ae shift also has limitations to how many stops you can adjust, so a very bright backlight will give you a underexposed image anyway in automode. The camera looks at the whole picture and set's it's exposure to that but it can't know that it should expose to that one face if that is just a small part of the frame. That you can only get right if you ride the exposure wheel manually and use the zebra's.