I am addicted to making my Sony cameras look better by putting them on a vectorscope using my little $130 DSC Camette chart. I have gotten good results, so good in fact, I find myself having more vector adjustments than my chart has color panels!

Regardless, my main problem is lack of technical resources for understanding how to properly set exposure and camera base settings prior to calibrating. The vectorscope I use has "100", "75", and "3X" settings. DSC charts require 2x to get values properly in the box. I typically use the 3x settings, then switch back to "100" (I assume that's 1x?) and see the points around 1/3 of the way on line to the boxes. When using 3X, the test clips I shoot and load into FCP-X look about the same with saturation in NLE set to 100% and vectorscope set to 133%.

Now a few questions. With my ITU709 gammas, I typically turn off the knee, and try to place the black patches at just above 10IRE, and the white patches at 100IRE, as per the little paper that came with my chart indicates. It also gives steps for the 5 greyscale, and 50% grey wants to be at 60% or so. Is this correct? When I put the white at 100IRE, the resulting clip looks way too bright and washed out. Obviously, when I open or close the iris, the vector colors expand and contract accordingly, so setting proper exposure is very important.

As for not having a 2X setting, would increasing in camera matrix saturation 100% bring the 50% saturation levels of the DSC chart to proper levels on a 1x scope? I wouldn't leave the camera like that obviously, but any help getting things in the right spot would help.

If anyone knows some links to setting up cameras on a DSC chart, I would appreciate the assistance! I've been through everything on DSC's website, but require more details. I've heard that blacks should be set at 0IRE, and that whites in ITU709 are better set at 90IRE. These counter what the DSC paperwork states, so I am a bit confused. Below is a typical "calibration" I get (before/after) with my little chart. The reason I said I need a better chart is that all my Sony cameras have greens that sit half way to yellow, and require adjusting matrix values for colors that are not visible as scope boxes. The below example the camera (PXW-X180) identifies and adjusts YL- instead of green. Ugh. :)

Hi Paul-

I've consulted for DSC and helped design some charts, so I can help you out.

The key thing to understand is that these charts are designed with the actual Rec 709 spec in mind. This spec only calls for about 2.4 stops of overexposure latitude and three and half stops of underexposure latitude. Cameras have been way better than that for a long time, but the spec is quite old and once something like that is established it's not a good idea to change it. (This is partially because this spec wasn't official until recently even though it was devised in the 90s, and partially because every piece of equipment from the camera through post is set up to work within this spec.)

There are two kinds of charts. The ones where the gray background is set for a filmic 18% gray should be set up so the gray is at 40%. If you have the traditional Rec 709-spec chart the gray falls at 57.5%.

Beyond that, where white and black fall almost aren't relevant unless you are matching cameras. What the camera can hold as white is likely beyond the dynamic range seen in the chart, and the same with black. I'd focus more on putting gray in the right spot (either 40% for the dark gray or 57.5% for the light gray) and look at color from there.

I'd zero out everything in the camera and turn off knee before you tweak as knee circuits can cause colors to shift in highlights. Then look at color and play with the matrix. What kind of settings are available in the camera? You said something about the camera adjusting a YL control... I'm not familiar with that. The ones I know look like R-G, R-B, G-R,G-B, B-R, B-G.

Adjusting the matrix is always a tradeoff. The one thing you're missing on that chart is flesh tone, and it's the most important color you can look at. Adjusting green and red can throw off flesh tones so you always want to have a way of looking at that when adjusting the matrix. You may find that green is placed where it is because placing it somewhere else destroys flesh tone, and Sony has found that yellowish greens are more attractive than nasty flesh tone. These compromises are made in cameras all the time.

The thing to keep in mind is that the chart is correct. Cameras rarely show the charts perfectly, but that's the fault of the cameras. The charts meet the specs perfectly, as defined by the physics that define what the red, green and blue primaries are, but the cameras rarely do.

I'm not sure if increasing the saturation in the camera will help with the 2x zoom issue. It's better not to do that as color saturation changes the closer it gets to clipping. You can see hue shifts if you increase saturation too much. Give it a try and see what happens.

Also, don't worry so much about putting the colors in the boxes as the spec is VERY saturated and modern sensibilities call for "filmic" color that's much less saturated. Make sure the colors are on the vectors (line between center and their boxes) for accuracy but don't obsess about getting them in the boxes.

Also, get a flesh tone reference and work on making that perfect... then see what other colors you can make perfect without screwing up flesh tone. Red and cyan tend to be the hard ones to get right, but it may be less disturbing if a Coke can is a little orange than if flesh tone is a little green.

Let me know if you have any other questions.

Thank you for the response Art. I read somewhere that the RED vector should be the first and most important color to get accurate, for fleshtones. I have a non DSC chart with a lot of colors including multiple fleshtone patches, but I have always had very good luck with those the way I have been calibrating. The cheap Sony cameras seem to want to have yellow/green fleshtones, it is very irritating! I like when I vectorscope an interview clip, to see the little fleshtone line occupied by a vector. :-)

As for saturation, the scope from FCP-X below are set to 133% with a maximum (100 Apples) saturation boost, but still not in the boxes. The resulting video was VERY COLORFUL indeed! See below for a set of clips shot with those colors. I love them, but back to back with the cheap JVC's at my station, the look black and white by comparison. I am also pushing the limits of the capability of my X180's 1/3" chips to handle that level of color without getting some pretty noticeable video noise. I am retaining the settings, but doing a 15% matrix-wide saturation decrease. My concern currently is that I have adjusted 6 primary colors, but the other 12 adjustments available in my camera are unaltered. Worried I am pumping up certain colors (primaries) while leaving the in betweens at unmatching levels.

And YL meant Yellow. My camera has a matrix menu for those R-G, R-B etc, then a multi-matrix for each primary plus a + and - of each primary (Green+, Red -, etc) on each side of the vector box, so 18 in total for that secondary menu. I had poor results trying to use the R-G, R-B matrix, the multi-matrix was much easier.

YouTube

Paul - you really scored in this post with getting Art to come by and comment!

To chime in with one of the areas Art hit on, was the skin tone and how it looks. Just a few hours ago I was looking at a video that was referenced in another thread "Big doubt - Canon x Nikon" by Rafael Lopes. In Post #9 by Chris Joy, there is a link to a camera comparison at https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=EsZtUZvoeO0

The reviewer, MichaelTheMentor, compared numerous aspects of the two cams but when he got to one part, how skin looks, [ @ 19m:13s ] he had an interesting approach. Rather than state his opinion of which is the best cam for the purpose he said to get out a pen and paper because he had a test, or quiz. With 12 sample pictures under various conditions, bottom line, it would be up to the viewer to determine which cam was best

The test shuffled the pictures and there was no indication of which cam took the picture, a very interesting approach, I think, to eliminate bias. The preverbal "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" approach.

Art - thanks very much for the informative post as that was a lot of interesting information.

Since there is a dearth of calibrating references online, I will take some time and compile my list of favorite links on the topic and place them in this post for future Google searches.

Anyone have an old used expired ChromaDuMonda chart they would be willing to sell cheap? :-)

Paul

Actually Paul, I have an expired Chroma DuMonde in excellent condition. If you're serious about wanting one, I can probably make you a good deal. But, it might have to wait until after NAB.

Perfect Chris! :-D

My Hamlet MicroFlex vectorscope has a "Choma DuMonde" screen, says that on it, and has all the extra boxes. In the past I paid $300-$500 to align my 3 chip broadcast cameras, simply due to the hours involved. Now I have the scope, and the time, plus the settings, just need the colors for my boxes. Most people don't appreciate or realize the difference calibrating a camera can make. Most expensive broadcast cameras are really good out of the box, but cheaper cameras are often intentionally "off" to avoid things like noticeable noise on certain colors, like blue. These cheaper cameras can have a night and day difference from a few key adjustments! The "stock" X180 scope on the left up top is a good example. That green was a shade of neon "lime" before being swung into the correct position.

Paul

Found a Tektronix link with some good information. I liked this part! :-O

"Today’s modern camera has advanced multi-matrix settings
and it is possible to line-up each primary to be in the
vectorscope boxes, but inadvertently reduce the overall
color gamut."

www.tek.com/dl/25W_21309_0.pdf

Mine is a standard (21 x 13) Chroma DuMonde 28R with the cavi-black option and resolution trumpets & bowties. It's going to be 10 years old soon, but it's in pristine condition and hasn't seen the sun in years (and has only rarely ever been outdoors). Still in the original ziplock with paperwork.

This chart is now known as the CDM 24+4R and sells for more than $1500 new with the cavi-black. I also have a standard (21 x 13) Multi-Burst SquareWave, same age, same condition, that sells for $587 new. I can let go of one or both for a fair but very generous price.

I need to take photos and get them posted in our classifieds board but I'm absolutely swamped right now with NAB prep.

>I read somewhere that the RED vector should be the first and most important color to get accurate, for fleshtones.

Not always the case. If you look at Canon cameras they sacrifice red in order to make flesh tones look better. Canon reds are orange, which helps blend red blemishes into flesh tone. I don't really like this approach but it's part of the Canon "look." It certainly doesn't work with every camera and has to do not only with the dyes they use on the sensor but the spectral filters on the OLPF package, the matrix setup and possibly a LUT.

I wouldn't intentionally do that on a camera that wasn't from Canon; just point out that if you try to place a Canon camera's red on that vector you're going to screw up flesh tone in a big way. Anything red on a face will shift toward magenta and look purple, like lips.

So... that's the long way of saying "It's not that simple." :)

>I have a non DSC chart with a lot of colors including multiple fleshtone patches, but I have always had very good luck with those the way I have been calibrating.

Hopefully not the Macbeth chart. :) If you don't have the money to go out and by a different chart (the next step up would probably be DSC's OneShot Plus, which does have flesh tone patches) cover over all the patches on the Macbeth that aren't flesh tone and put it next to the DSC chart, in the same light. That's not a perfect solution but it may work. (Not sure how accurate Macbeth colors are... it's a $70 chart printed on cardboard that's meant as a still photography reference from the 1970s.)

>The cheap Sony cameras seem to want to have yellow/green fleshtones, it is very irritating! I like when I vectorscope an interview clip, to see the little fleshtone line occupied by a vector. :-)

Is that before or after your tweaks? It looked like the default mode was for green to pull toward yellow, which may be their way of sacrificing green to get decent flesh tones. You're less likely to notice that tree leaves are a little yellow than flesh tone being a bit green.

>See below for a set of clips shot with those colors.

I get a message that says "This movie is private."

Once again, saturation isn't really in style now. I'd pull it back a bit. No camera ever puts all the colors in the boxes at the same time, and when they do they rarely look good. Nearly every camera has some sort of color issues and the more saturated the image the more those show up.

I wouldn't worry about the secondary adjustments too much. The primaries are the main ones to worry about. Secondary adjustments are just more math. At some point you'll stress the matrix (seen when the color dots smear like crazy) and that starts compromising color on its own.

>I am also pushing the limits of the capability of my X180's 1/3" chips to handle that level of color without getting some pretty noticeable video noise.

That's the other issue with matrix adjustments: they increase noise. All the color channels overlap somewhat, which is where secondary colors come from. The only way to make a primary pure is to subtract the other color channels from it (which is why R-B, for example, literally means "red minus blue.") A certain amount of this is already happening just to create basic color science, but the user matrix allows you to do more. The problem is that subtracting one channel from another increases noise, because subtracting a signal from another signal also means subtracting random noise from that signal. Essentially, you're leaving holes in the second signal due to noise in the first signal... which increases noise.

Extreme matrix adjustments are never good. Those controls are meant for finessing.

>I had poor results trying to use the R-G, R-B matrix, the multi-matrix was much easier.

Yeah, I'm not sure how those work--they're set up a bit different. Alister Chapman has a great video showing how standard matrix settings work. If I recall correctly, using G-R as an example, increasing that value makes green more saturation but shifts red's hue toward green. Going the other direction decreases green's saturation and shifts red the other way. The first letter changes only in saturation, the second in hue.

Anyone have an old used expired ChromaDuMonda chart they would be willing to sell cheap? :-)

If you're going to be at NAB DSC Labs will often sell charts at a discount on the last day so they don't have to ship them back to Canada.

In the past I've worked their booth but I'm going to be at Sound Devices this year showing off their new PIX-E line of recorders. Adam Wilt will be at DSC Labs, though.

Most expensive broadcast cameras are really good out of the box, but cheaper cameras are often intentionally "off" to avoid things like noticeable noise on certain colors, like blue.

Yup. They cheat on colors that they hope you won't notice in order to preserve the ones that you do. Yellow or green flesh tone is pretty obvious, but blueish or yellowish grass or orangeish reds often skate by. They'll compromise on the latter to get the former.

"Today’s modern camera has advanced multi-matrix settings
and it is possible to line-up each primary to be in the
vectorscope boxes, but inadvertently reduce the overall
color gamut."www.tek.com/dl/25W_21309_0.pdf

Tektronics has a ton of great information on their website. It's aimed toward the broadcast market but still relevant to us.

DSC Labs make the best charts in the world but their expertise is in making charts, not teaching people how to use them. They're a little behind the curve when it comes to how cameras are being used outside of broadcast. Still, they're awfully nice people and answer questions as best they can.

That's how Adam and I came to work with them: we can explain the stuff they can't and make it relevant to the digital cinema crowd.

Actually Paul, I have an expired Chroma DuMonde in excellent condition. If you're serious about wanting one, I can probably make you a good deal. But, it might have to wait until after NAB.

They have expiration dates on them but they tend to last a lot longer than they should. DSC has a new program where, for a subscription rate, you get a new chart every few years at a significant discount and they send you color chips to check and see if your chart is off or not.

I know a lot of people who put a label with their name on it across the expiration date so no one notices. Not ideal, but... I've never seen a DSC chart shift a crazy amount. The shifts do happen, and they happen with every chart, but DSC is honest enough to say so.

If I'm not mistaken, it's sunlight and intense studio lighting that can damage the color chips over time... my impression was that charts stored in the dark tend to last a lot longer. Hope that's an accurate assumption. Mine stay in a portfolio stored in the closet.

I've always wondered, though, if there's any off-gassing degradation involved from the ziplocks that I keep mine in all the time.

I learn more and more every time I do this kind of stuff. I don't have a way to calibrate my cameras before hand, but what I've found is that using a DSC Labs one shot chart allows me to match my Sony, Canon, Nikon, and GoPros in Adobe Speedgrade CC in post. I can get them looking nearly identical (close enough for my wedding video needs anyway).

I have been using the primary layer to neutralize white balance and put gray at around 40 on the RGB parade.

Then I do an individual secondary layer for each of the 6 color swatches (RGB,CMY) where I use the magenta/cyan slider or color temp slider to move the vectors towards the right boxes. I'll also adjust saturation as necessary.

I have no idea if that's the correct way or not, but it seems to be working for my cameras. lol

For some insane reason I cannot explain, I have not taken the time to do this same approach to the 4 skin swatches but I'm guessing if I did, they'd match up even better.

I don't know about the ziplocks but I like that idea. I'd say sun and heat are the worst. Pigments do change chemically over time, and the energy that strikes them the faster they'll change.

Might be a good thing to ask Adam about at the DSC booth at NAB... after you come visit me at Sound Devices. :)

For some insane reason I cannot explain, I have not taken the time to do this same approach to the 4 skin swatches but I'm guessing if I did, they'd match up even better.

What's funny is that most colorists do this the opposite way. In fact, most of them will say they grade the footage first and then go back and make the chart match. (They don't trust charts because a lot of DPs don't know how to shoot them. That amazes me!)

As for the rest of your technique... if it works, keep doing it. Orange/blue and magenta/green are the most basic controls in color correction. You can do a lot with them.

In Resolve I'll use the hue vs hue curve to tweak errant colors as needed.

Might be a good thing to ask Adam about at the DSC booth at NAB... after you come visit me at Sound Devices. :)

Yes, looks like Monday is going to be a *very* full day! :-)

My station recently upgraded to a $10,000 scopey thing that will do 2x vectorscope gain...I put in an order for a DSC Handy Camette chart, and will blast it with a pair of Lowel Omni halogen lights in the studio, until I get my stations X320 and my Z90 to look as close to perfect as possible.

For calibrating to gammas other than REC709, should I calibrate to REC709 with REC709 color, then switch the gamma after for the field...as long as the color matric\x stays REC709 the gamma shouldn't matter too much?

Paul

Looking forward to the results on this in particular the Z90 which I use.
Lately I've switched to Cine 2 with Cinema Color with good results.

Just found out the Phabrix scope when set to 2x vectorscope gain removes the target pattern from the scope display....like seriously...TFW. I emailed the company, they are working to provide an update that provides 2x gain with targets :-|

Paul

So I purchased the DSC Labs publication (87 page book) called Imaging Technology: Advanced Guide blah blah blah. Comes with a few charts, including Camalign chart. I was hoping that this $130 book would have something, anything, related to instructing on calibrating a camera to a DSC chart. It doesn't...it reproduces the leaflet you get with the chart, and for $130 I got the instructions, and I quote..."Adjust matrix controls to position all signals in their respective boxes". Really...that is all your going to give me for $130????????

The only other info I managed to get from the book is to adjust RED first, followed by YELLOW, and for luminance (color depth on cheap Sony cameras), pay more attention to the 40IRE colors than the 80IRE colors...the 40's make up more of the important colorimetry, and the 80's are harder to get right anyway.

Now time to draw targets on a screen protector to lay over my vectorscope 2X targetless scope :-P

Paul

About to purchase a used Leader LV5700A waveform/vectorscope with adjustable gain. Can anyone recomend an alternative low priced used scope? Several Leader 5700A's for around $500USD online at the moment...not bad for HD-SDI.

Paul

5700A multi monitor ordered.

So, starting to get my to do list in order.

1: Reset camera to 0.45 gamma rec709 all the extras truned off, knee turned off.

2: Perform white balance to DSC Camwhite chart.

3: Set camera preset white balance to kelvin indicated by auto white selection in step 2.

3: Adjust white preset RGB off-sets to bring RBG parade on waveform even.

4: Using flare menu, adjust RGB values to black balance the camera following the Tektronixs instructional video below.

5: Remaining in preset white, perform white shading adjustments to white balance the camera following Abelcine video below.

OK, so acording to my onnline learnings, becaue onlinez teaches learnings bestest, these are the steps necessary to properly setup the camera that mst be performed prior to adjusting the color matrix or any other adjustments. Any thoughts on this?

https://youtu.be/dnT-zRhWVK4

https://youtu.be/Mi0BBVqmUgs

Looking forward to the results on this in particular the Z90 which I use.
Lately I've switched to Cine 2 with Cinema Color with good results.

For the Z90 you may wish to try the following settings. Z90's are a bit trickier to adjust as they don't have a standard 360 degree SMPTE Matrix or Multi Matrix. Their whole color adjustment setup is basically derived from the A7 range which is totally alien to the Paint settings seen in most broadcast cameras.

We have been using Z90's in conjunction with FS7s and PDW XDCams with success after coming up with the following settings after much time on the scopes and charts for alignment purposes. Even used these settings live to air for sports broadcasts using Z90's as ringside and corner cameras in boxing bouts.

Using the following. We overwrite PP1.

Gamma ITU709

Black Gamma MIDDLE and 0
Except in extreme harsh sunny conditions outdoors, beach, snow and situations bathed in full sun with deep shadows where we often go anywhere up to HIGH and +7

Knee MANUAL, POINT 87.5, SLOPE -2
Expose for maximum highlights for between 90 and no more than 95 and you should not clip and roll highlights on this little sensor quite nicely.

Color Mode ITU709 MATRIX

Saturation -7
This setting is related to what we do in the Color Depth menu

Color phase -3 to -7
Often -6 to help with skin tones

Color Depth
R +1
G +3
B +5
C +3
M +2
Y +3

Generally all client and network observations so far have been very happy with these settings and of course has made inter-cutting between cameras in post about 95% easier and faster because of smaller color differences and when they are there so much easier to correct.

Chris Young

Thanks Chris for the detailed pic profile on the Z90.
I'm now two weeks into using cine2 with cinema color in HD with no tweaks in camera and I'm having excellent results, just shot 32 vids for a client and have to say, for me this has been an excellent combo along with a basic color grade in FXPC, couldn't be happier.

Thanks mate

I forgot to mention as you have, don't blow the highlights out and you'll be fine and have great results.

I will give those Z90 settings a try this week. I tend to stay away from HIGH +7 because workign at night, at gains of 27db being pretty normal, it causes a lot of grey out of shadows and extreme visable noise, which turns ugly when it hits a few 8 bit edits.

Last time I scoped my Z90, I was focused on slightly adjusting R, because the REC709 color mode tends to make red fire trucks and lights a bit orangish, and then B as secondary, because it is pushing up towards magenta and extremely oversaturated compared to the other colors. I gave up on trying to do anything with the G control...Sony seems to think G should be half way between Y and G and half saturation on all their cameras. As for the color depth, I gave up after whiting out colors into static while showing them at 40 or 80 on the waveform...obviously I need more training.

Been using Cine 4 from Doug Jensen minus the black gamma and black drop...it looks really sweet and handles highlights, but even with the knee OFF, faces tend to start looking weird and compressed at like 60IRE...makes it difficult at times to expose a dark backgroud in the night shooting I do.

Do you have any tips or alterations to how I am going to begin my scoping process? there really is no guide online that I have found that runs someone through the process...was hoping this thread could serve that purpose, seeing as you can buy a brand new baby Camalign chart for $130USD...I hope my Leader LV5700A scope is up to the task for $400.

Paul

For the Z90 you may wish to try the following settings. Z90's are a bit trickier to adjust as they don't have a standard 360 degree SMPTE Matrix or Multi Matrix. Their whole color adjustment setup is basically derived from the A7 range which is totally alien to the Paint settings seen in most broadcast cameras.

We have been using Z90's in conjunction with FS7s and PDW XDCams with success after coming up with the following settings after much time on the scopes and charts for alignment purposes. Even used these settings live to air for sports broadcasts using Z90's as ringside and corner cameras in boxing bouts.

Using the following. We overwrite PP1.

Gamma ITU709

Black Gamma MIDDLE and 0
Except in extreme harsh sunny conditions outdoors, beach, snow and situations bathed in full sun with deep shadows where we often go anywhere up to HIGH and +7

Knee MANUAL, POINT 87.5, SLOPE -2
Expose for maximum highlights for between 90 and no more than 95 and you should not clip and roll highlights on this little sensor quite nicely.

Color Mode ITU709 MATRIX

Saturation -7
This setting is related to what we do in the Color Depth menu

Color phase -3 to -7
Often -6 to help with skin tones

Color Depth
R +1
G +3
B +5
C +3
M +2
Y +3

Generally all client and network observations so far have been very happy with these settings and of course has made inter-cutting between cameras in post about 95% easier and faster because of smaller color differences and when they are there so much easier to correct.

Chris Young

Thanks Chris for the detailed pic profile on the Z90.
I'm now two weeks into using cine2 with cinema color in HD with no tweaks in camera and I'm having excellent results, just shot 32 vids for a client and have to say, for me this has been an excellent combo along with a basic color grade in FXPC, couldn't be happier.

Thanks mate

I forgot to mention as you have, don't blow the highlights out and you'll be fine and have great results.

Another one that works pretty well is Cine 4 with Pro Color if you want something simple to setup when camera matching isn't an issue. Also works pretty well on the A7III.

Chris Young

I will give those Z90 settings a try this week. I tend to stay away from HIGH +7 because workign at night, at gains of 27db being pretty normal, it causes a lot of grey out of shadows and extreme visable noise, which turns ugly when it hits a few 8 bit edits.Paul

Paul that's why I specified that setting or a variation on it for extremely bright high contrast sun conditions only. Generally those would be at '0' dB I think you would agree. Anything else Middle and 0 or maybe even lower. Operator's choice.

Chris Young

Yes used Cine 4 for ages on the Z90 and A7III, worked really and had great results, now I find Cine 2 with Cinema matches cameras right out of the box and I like doing a grade, also I use a Fujifilm XT2 and using the Eterna Film Simulation with highlights and Shadows at minus 2 matches the Cine 2 remarkable well.

That Z90 PP is very undersaturated, with a very high black level (master pedestal), had to lower black -5 to get black to 0IRE, and raise saturation 150% in FCPX to look normal.

I will be trying to create best for live straight from camera REC709 once my scope arrives.

Paul

Yep that's true, the blacks are high however a rough grade and I'm ok with this, yeah saturation is low and yes I also use FCPX and have to raise the color right up there. Cine 2 is not perfect however in our bright sunny days here in Australia I find it's handles the conditions rather well, I'm shooting a lot of Caravans and Camper Trailers throughout the day in 30 plus heat and very bright Skys so rather than Log Cine 2 with cCinema is going ok for now.
Previous to this I was using Cine 4 with good results.

Hey on a side note, do you or anyone else know where I could email Sony with a future firmware idea?
I would like the Z90 to have an electronic level like they do with their A7iii etc...
Not sure if this is doable or even if they would respond however it's worth a crack.

Yep that's true, the blacks are high however a rough grade and I'm ok with this, yeah saturation is low and yes I also use FCPX and have to raise the color right up there. Cine 2 is not perfect however in our bright sunny days here in Australia I find it's handles the conditions rather well, I'm shooting a lot of Caravans and Camper Trailers throughout the day in 30 plus heat and very bright Skys so rather than Log Cine 2 with cCinema is going ok for now.
Previous to this I was using Cine 4 with good results.

Yes, looks fine when graded, just a warnign for live or direct from camera users. Grading is as simple as pulling down the shadows slider and increasing saturaion in post.


Paul

Yeah that's right, grading is a breeze as you mentioned, pull blacks down, add some saturation and the images start to look great, don't blow the highlights out when shooting on the Z90.

My Leader scope arrived today...I excitedly set it up with my new DSC Camalign and a small 35 watt halogen light. Set the scope up to 75% 2x gain, and began fiddling with the color correction menu on the Z90. When I was done, I had put yellow and blue in their boxes, and left red alone, it was already proper in it's box. The end result was...yellows on scope, in the box, yellows on viewfinder and recorded video...green. I remember I had this issue the first time I messed with my X70, where I would put the red in the box and it would either be magenta or orange, never box/target colored.

So obviously, I don't know how to adjust the color corrections on the Z90...I previously (years ago) assumed these were designed to be used without scopes in the field to just point at something and change it's color to what you want it to look like on the LCD. Uggy.

So...I am wondering about the other scope settings...RGB, Ycbcr, those are options, they produce slightly different images. Maybe the scope isn't setup properly, a lot of options.

Before and after scope images attached.

Here is what the REC709 (knee off) with color corrections looks like in FCP...scope was set to 133% to simulate 75% color bars, and saturation slider was set to 100 (200% level) to simulate 2x vectorscope gain. I can confirm these levels and targets match the vectorscope at 75% 2x. Am I imaging it, or does the yellow patch look green? Maybe my eyes are just tired from staring at the scope.

Chris, if I wanted to go in and adjust the color depths for 78% and 41% (41's more important), do you have any advice on doing that? My scope doesn't have a high pass, so it's either all luma or luma and chrome...gets messy seeing the color lines on the waveform. Decrease color depth raises the lines on the waveform, right? Also, there are two saturation sliders in the color correction menu on the Z90, the second one stretches the vector color out, the first one does I don't know what.

Paul

709 settings CC1 Y 15,22,0 -7, +3 CC2 B 1, 22, 0 . +6, -2

Great work Paul, I do hope you share your findings, this is something I've always wanted to do with cameras that I own and owned.

I will try to post all of the links I have come across, and pdf files from DSC , Panasonic, etc relating to calibrating cameras.

I just took another pass at my Z90, this time, I decreased the range that was being adjusted in the color correction (multi-matrix) system, so as to not let my phase adjustments skew colors in the in between relm (CDM zone) that I cannot see on the scope. Got much better results, not seeing the geen in my yellows.

I also hit my color depth settings. Going only on the researched advice to pay attention to the 41% color depth targetting, I did that, and aligned everything at 41 and completely ignored luminance at 78%...simply allowed them to go wherever adjusting the 41% range left them. The results seem very good...everything I point my camera at, every color, seems to match in hue as well as in richness and depth, luminance etc...so basically, I point at a banana, and it looks like a banana, point at weird cyan colored Logitech box, not too light, not too dark.

So, now that I undertstand my scope and chart a bit better, time to move on to the X320 with full matrix. I don't know how or if color depth can be set in the Pro Sony cameras...hmmm. I also scoped my old DCS Camalign which expired 2016...it was obviously not color accurate, and was visibly off on all color chips, especially red, which was several degrees into orange...so yeah, charts don't last that long.

Paul