Chad Hucal
May 15th, 2009, 01:15 PM
Hi everyone, I read through many forums, blogs, etc, from around the web and can't find a singular fix for the Mac gamma shift that occurs with the H.264 codec rendered movies. The problem I refer to is the washed out or brightening of the file that doesn't match your FCP canvas image.
I have tried several fixes suggested online;
- The "QT Pro - blend-transparency-straight alpha" option.
VIDEO COPILOT | After Effects Tutorials & Post Production Tools (http://www.videocopilot.net/blog/2008/06/fix-quicktime-gamma-shift/)
- The x264 codec option.
ProVideo Coalition.com: Creating Motion Graphics by Chris & Trish Meyer | Founders (http://provideocoalition.com/index.php/cmg_blogs/story/brightness_issues_with_h264_quicktime_movies/P0/)
- The "tiff trick" option.
START QUOTE.
"by Andrew Stewart January 11th, 2009 @ 11:58 pm
Hi all,
I have a quicktime gamma workaround that works for exporting h264s and other codecs that have the gamma shift issue. We use it at work for sending h264’s of telecine color grading reference to some very fussy clients, and so far no complaints :)
The blend/transparency/alpha trick comes close, but the blacks are still a little bit grey and dosent give the same results on both mac and pc. The trick we use has been coined the ‘tiff trick’ and works by tricking quicktime into using default tiff image gamma before an export.
How to do it:
1) Create a small (32×32 pixels or so) tiff or bitmap - dosent matter what color, just make it 8bit and RGB
2) Open a new player and ‘Open image sequence’ and select the tiff/bitmap. set the frame rate to whatever you’re going to be working in
3) Open your desired quicktime in another player, ’select-all’ and ‘copy’ the clip
4) Back in you ‘tiff/bitmap’ movie hit ‘add to movie’ - this will add the video over the top of the tiff/bitmap on a second video layer
5) Export using your desired codec
All going well the gamma will match your original video very closely"
END QUOTE.
So, I've tried all of these options and none seem to do the job. Someone else mentioned doing a gamma 1.1 or higher shift in Compressor and I would like to know how to do this? I can't see any options for gamma adjustments in my Compressor display. Normally I export from FCP using QT conversion and the H.264 codec. That's where the .mov's look washed out. I tried importing one of those .mov's into Compressor but as I mentioned, I can't see any gamma options.
Can anyone offer any guidance or perhaps other options for fixing the H.264 gamma shift?
Thank you.
p.s. Running FCS 2 on Leopard (non-Intel MBP)
I have tried several fixes suggested online;
- The "QT Pro - blend-transparency-straight alpha" option.
VIDEO COPILOT | After Effects Tutorials & Post Production Tools (http://www.videocopilot.net/blog/2008/06/fix-quicktime-gamma-shift/)
- The x264 codec option.
ProVideo Coalition.com: Creating Motion Graphics by Chris & Trish Meyer | Founders (http://provideocoalition.com/index.php/cmg_blogs/story/brightness_issues_with_h264_quicktime_movies/P0/)
- The "tiff trick" option.
START QUOTE.
"by Andrew Stewart January 11th, 2009 @ 11:58 pm
Hi all,
I have a quicktime gamma workaround that works for exporting h264s and other codecs that have the gamma shift issue. We use it at work for sending h264’s of telecine color grading reference to some very fussy clients, and so far no complaints :)
The blend/transparency/alpha trick comes close, but the blacks are still a little bit grey and dosent give the same results on both mac and pc. The trick we use has been coined the ‘tiff trick’ and works by tricking quicktime into using default tiff image gamma before an export.
How to do it:
1) Create a small (32×32 pixels or so) tiff or bitmap - dosent matter what color, just make it 8bit and RGB
2) Open a new player and ‘Open image sequence’ and select the tiff/bitmap. set the frame rate to whatever you’re going to be working in
3) Open your desired quicktime in another player, ’select-all’ and ‘copy’ the clip
4) Back in you ‘tiff/bitmap’ movie hit ‘add to movie’ - this will add the video over the top of the tiff/bitmap on a second video layer
5) Export using your desired codec
All going well the gamma will match your original video very closely"
END QUOTE.
So, I've tried all of these options and none seem to do the job. Someone else mentioned doing a gamma 1.1 or higher shift in Compressor and I would like to know how to do this? I can't see any options for gamma adjustments in my Compressor display. Normally I export from FCP using QT conversion and the H.264 codec. That's where the .mov's look washed out. I tried importing one of those .mov's into Compressor but as I mentioned, I can't see any gamma options.
Can anyone offer any guidance or perhaps other options for fixing the H.264 gamma shift?
Thank you.
p.s. Running FCS 2 on Leopard (non-Intel MBP)