Oh okay, I just thought it was hard to judge lighting without skin in front of the lights. But I can do it.

I was told the Canon T2i was crap before, and to get something better. I was told it was too sensitive when it comes to noise but also when it comes to color grading, as you cannot push anything very far either after. I was told that on here long before as well, so don't people have a point, and that I should get a new camera therefore?

You were happy with it, weren't you? Why dismiss it now based on people's opinions when you have one, and know how it works in low light. The grading issue never was a problem before, was it - only discovered when you wanted to do strange things, and not gentle strange things but radical turn one colour into another stuff.

I just don't see why you don't put the computer away, go and shine some headlights on real people and shoot the results. Skin is optional for what you are doing. Just take a normal person, try lighting them and see what it looks like. Not remotely rocket science here!

It could be awful - but you would then be able to make a better decision on fact, not opinion.

Sure I will wait till night time and do a test with the car lights then.

But as for the camera, I find that not being able to do much grading without their being noise and artifacting is a huge problem, though, unless there is a way to fix that. However, one person told me that with magic lantern, you can turn the camera's codec into RAW and improve the grading from there, if that's true.

No one is telling you not to place a subject in the lighting test.

Again, doing a lighting test with your current camera will confirm the lighting levels with these particular lights and a ball park on how the skins tones look like. It will reveal if the headlights are suitable or not, in the past I would've taken an exposure reading with a meter as the starting point, but you can use your old camera instead..

The production camera on your film is entirely different and decision for the future. Why create unnecessary problems at this stage? If you do that nothing happens and you live in a land of procrastination..

Sure, I will do a test tonight with the car headlights. One of the locations I was planning on shooting in, a car would not be able to physically go into it though. It' s a park, so we would have to walk into it with lights. Maybe the car headlights can be removed? But I will do the test tonight with car headlights and see.

Why have you never in many thousands of posts up till recently never mentioned your noise issue? I suspect it's because you never noticed. You were not really grading were you? You were taking one colour, and trying to create a new one from very little real information in the data? If your colour on screen is nearly white, then there is a sensible amount of all colours in it, so you can increase cyan, or drop yellow a little and all the red green and blue primaries. What you cannot do so simply is take something that is very blue, for instance, and try to turn that green - because there is so little green in the original that bringing it up produce noise you can see. Matching white, something I've been doing for years, never seems to cause me any grief with my equipment - and it is not in the 'special' category at all. You were pushing too far, on unsuitable material. Your camera never bothered you until you discovered the latitude it has for big shifts is compromised. What you were doing was trying to do was a coat of paint electronically - and it failed.

Why have you never in many thousands of posts up till recently never mentioned your noise issue? I suspect it's because you never noticed. You were not really grading were you? You were taking one colour, and trying to create a new one from very little real information in the data? If your colour on screen is nearly white, then there is a sensible amount of all colours in it, so you can increase cyan, or drop yellow a little and all the red green and blue primaries. What you cannot do so simply is take something that is very blue, for instance, and try to turn that green - because there is so little green in the original that bringing it up produce noise you can see. Matching white, something I've been doing for years, never seems to cause me any grief with my equipment - and it is not in the 'special' category at all. You were pushing too far, on unsuitable material. Your camera never bothered you until you discovered the latitude it has for big shifts is compromised. What you were doing was trying to do was a coat of paint electronically - and it failed.

No, I noticed the noise issues before. I said before that when I tried to use the qualifier in Resolve to separate the skin tones, from the rest of the scene, like it shows how to do in tutorials, that separating was causing noise and artifact issues. When I mentioned that noise problem on here before, it was said on here, that it was because my camera was 8 bit 4:2:0, and that I needed a camera that was 10 bit 4:2:2, in order to separate the skin tones, with minimal noise and artifact issues. The noise issues would happen just from separating the skin tones, before I even started any attempts at grading. Now it was said before that having 10 bit 4:2:2 is only part of it, and I still need to do good lighting, but that is still a significant part of it though, isn't it?

When you say I was trying to create one color out of a new one, are you referring to the test I did when I tried to make the wall blue, behind the subjects?

I think you went overboard with the re-colouring on unsuitable material, that's all. We've known about 4:2:0 vs 4:2:2 for a long time, but chroma content is always noisier than the luminance. You were not being gentle - the colour shift from blue to green in that saturation was extreme. It's like when you try to increase contrast beyond a certain point. A little is noise free, push it too much and it goes badly wrong. Colour is less capable than luma changes because the information is not encoded in the first place - hence the differences in the two formats, but you just went too far and tried something too radical. Your format doesn't allow this much shift.

Have you ever had the need to electronically repaint a room before? I think you've read about the technique used to separate the skin tones, by pushing the complimentary colours, and instead of using it to increase the colour contrast, you're using it radically to change colours to totally new ones. Not subtle pushes, but huge great nudges!

Oh okay, but the thing, is that the noise and artifacts was not caused from changing the colors. The noise and artifacts appear right when I separate the skin tones from the rest of the scene. So I haven't even applied any color changing from one color to another yet. The separating of the skin tones is what is causing the noise and artifacts, before any color changing.

Regarding car headlights, you don't need to go to the same location in order to test a light, something similar will do.

If it works, you can buy headlights from written off cars in the junk yard.

You don't need to grade shots for a lighting test, the ungraded pictures will tell you more about the light.

Okay sure. I wasn't planning on going to the location to do the test, I just meant I wonder if car headlights would be doable, if the location does not allow cars in. But I will do the test and see.

As for buying a new camera, can I still separate the skin tones using qualifiers in Resolve with only 8 bit 4:2:0 then, without noise? It was said before that decorating the background with different colored options would help, but would it really help that much without 10 bit?

Lol. Paul you’re right it’s that whole crazy colorization thing he’s been banging on. I didn’t make the connection with skin tone and noise. Here I’m thinking insufficient light is the cause of the noise but instead the problem turns out to be Ryan. He has this odd way of not disclosing what he is really doing and then when you figure out what’s going on he denies it. Truly idiotic. Honestly it’s hard enough to film and he figures out a way to complicate it further. Madness!

Detach the light from the car? lol

Like I said before he’s not buying the camera.

But the noise and artifacts was not caused from changing one color to another. It's caused from separating the skin tones, not the coloring that follows afterwards. I think it was incorrectly assumed that it was the color changing causing the noise, when it was in fact, the qualifier.

As for detaching the light from car, it was suggested to use car headlights, so I am trying to work with that suggestion. Is that bad?

There is no need to separate the skin tones.

You’re doing great. Detaching the car light is genius.

Well the car idea was suggested to me, so I am just asking about a variable in that suggestion. I cannot get a car into the location. So I would have to take the headlights in separately, if I am to use car headlights.

It depends if detaching the light works for the owner?

Look - this skin tone obsession - if you carry out the process you've read about and watched the tutorials, you are changing the colour of the scene by shifting the balance of some colours vs others, and the most contrasting result is when one bit goes pink and another goes blue green (your teal colour) That's changing colours. Nothing else - just changing the colours and this is where noises comes from, so don't do it.

I bet you have not even thought about the reason you would want to do it? What is the problem with the material out of the camera that even needs it? You have heard of a technique, so want to use it, no matter if your camera and eyesight cannot manage it.

When your telephoto shots wobbled - did you read up about the mechanics inside real quality heads that make long lens work possible, and go out and buy one? Nope. Yet you have transferred your fly-by-wire obsession with focus onto colour changes.

What can we say? I cannot dance. Wanting to dance is not enough to make it happen. Spending money on lessons is futile - I cannot do it! So I don't.

Write a good script. Hire decent actors. Find a person who can operate a camera properly, and then find somebody who can record the sound properly too. Then you will have a decent product that you can try to edit. If you mess that up, the original material is still available and still decent and somebody else could edit it.

I note you never ask questions about end credits? I don't suppose you ever get that far?

It depends if detaching the light works for the owner?

Look - this skin tone obsession - if you carry out the process you've read about and watched the tutorials, you are changing the colour of the scene by shifting the balance of some colours vs others, and the most contrasting result is when one bit goes pink and another goes blue green (your teal colour) That's changing colours. Nothing else - just changing the colours and this is where noises comes from, so don't do it.

I bet you have not even thought about the reason you would want to do it? What is the problem with the material out of the camera that even needs it? You have heard of a technique, so want to use it, no matter if your camera and eyesight cannot manage it.

When your telephoto shots wobbled - did you read up about the mechanics inside real quality heads that make long lens work possible, and go out and buy one? Nope. Yet you have transferred your fly-by-wire obsession with focus onto colour changes.

What can we say? I cannot dance. Wanting to dance is not enough to make it happen. Spending money on lessons is futile - I cannot do it! So I don't.

Write a good script. Hire decent actors. Find a person who can operate a camera properly, and then find somebody who can record the sound properly too. Then you will have a decent product that you can try to edit. If you mess that up, the original material is still available and still decent and somebody else could edit it.

I note you never ask questions about end credits? I don't suppose you ever get that far?


My reason for wanting to change the color of the background, was I wanted more color contrast to separate the actors from the background. Plus different color grading for the background helps create, mood, tone, atmosphere. If color doesn't matter, and it's all about story and acting, then why do people even bother shooting in color, instead of black and white then?

When the telephoto lens wobbled I thought that was me and my hands moving it on the tripod. I thought it was me who needed more practice on moving the camera. I didn't think it was the lens that was causing the wobbling.

You can shoot orange and teal if you want to, it's now a bit of a cliche, but no one is stopping you. There are a lot of other grading options that are used in thrillers, but the choice is yours.

With long telephoto lenses you need a good tripod and head.

Okay thanks, I have a fluid head tripod, which I have been using for the long telephoto lens. But I still thought it was my movement on the tripod that was causing the wobbling, not the lens itself. But I see that it was the lens, when it was suggested.

I don't want the teal and orange look exactly. What I what is a more neutral skin tone look, with either teal or blue in the background. I would have to try both and see, but I just want neutral skin tone, not orange.

So it's similar to teal and orange, but just teal or blue, with neutral skin tone. I also did find a way to push color further without noise. If you separate the skin tones, and then make the rest of the scene, apart from the skin, black and white, you can then tint a color over the black and white. This causes to change a color drastically without near as much noise, cause you can change to black and white and then tint a new color over top of the black and white, rather than pushing a color too far. If that's a good alternative. Seems to work better than changing an entire color into another.

You are such hard work Ryan. Your lens you reported as having stabilisation turned on and people told you that this and your jerky head was the problem. Selective memory now?

You want your subject to stand out from the background by changing the colours - this is an effect. Blue to green. Not shades, but a green top changing to blue is an effect - it's not real, it's manufactured. You want to use locations with colours you don't like and change them without introducing noise? That's impossible. Whatever noise is there will get worse.

If you want a real face colour, but want to change the background colours, that is a LOT of processing - what do you expect?

In your martial arts thing - why was the colour important? It was their location, and their choice of clothing. Why bother messing with it?

We're not really talking about specifics - we use your history as examples, that's all - you take everything so literally it is almost impossible to communicate. You never seem to understand and we're getting exasperated with you again.

We genuinely have no idea what on earth you are trying to achieve any longer.

Yes I remember how people told me about lens. I turned it off and it's all good since then.

I was using the martial arts footage to do color tests. It was not the video I gave them. I was using it as a location example, to do my own tests.

Well in the Resolve tutorials they say in order to get a look, where the background is a separate color, they say to use the qualifier effect in resolve to separate the skin tones from the background.

Now it was said on here to choose locations that look good in the first place, but I thought the qualifier could still help some.

I guess I just don't understand that if lighting is important, and to forget about color grading, than why do other movies bother to grade at all then, if it's all about the lighting and performances and story? Why do those movies bother to grade in post then if that doesn't matter and it's about story, lighting and performances? Doesn't grading in post help too?

What if I produced and directed a whole movie, with no grading, or at least no skin tone separation in post? If the story and acting was good enough, will it really not matter? If you want the movie to get into festivals and actually be worth the budget spent, will people look at it and feel that the lack of post grading is an issue, even if the story, acting, and lighting is good?

If you don't have the story, great acting, lighting, good camera work and sound you won't even get into festivals because no one goes to watch a movie for the grading effects, because that's what orange and teal is. You can have a well graded film with a tough look without going for an over used effect.

Okay thanks. I just don't want to get everything else right, such as the story and acting, but then in post, have people say the color looks bad, cause I didn't care enough about it, or pay enough attention to it, compared to everything else.

Ryan - you just don't get it. Grading is done to as perfect a product as possible - like mastering in audio studios. Nobody would master a recording that contained wrong notes. get the basics right for goodness sake, then apply the tiny improvements. You have everything around the wrong way,

They're going to notice the stuff we do, but as EVERYONE has said - you MUST get the basics right or they won't even watch it. The public is not even supposed to know what grading even is!!!!

He’s still in the planning stage and he’s worried about the grading! The story is so salacious and unpalatable it got him banned from a writing forum.

That may have been the forum’s “diplomatic” reason. Seems weird...movies have been made with content like that before (whatever it was), dont know why that would get someone banned.

He’s still in the planning stage and he’s worried about the grading! The story is so salacious and unpalatable it got him banned from a writing forum.

Well I thought I would plan it till post. What I can do is hire a DP and art director to help with the color and leave it to them then, and forget about grading in post, until then.

That may have been the forum’s “diplomatic” reason. Seems weird...movies have been made with content like that before (whatever it was), dont know why that would get someone banned.

Well I posted some of the script to get opinions on it, and then after I did that, I got a message saying I was banned because of the content of the script. Maybe they just didn't like the type of material.

Well I did a test with the car headlights in front of me. I can get my legs exposed enough for the camera, but not my face. The legs are good though, if I shoot at 1/50, f5.6, so the DOF is not too shallow and the ISO at 1600.

So that's the settings I need for my legs to be exposed, but my face is still too dark. For a master shot, where you see a whole character, the headlights will not work if they attached to a car perhaps, since the actors lower body will be lit a more than the upper body and face.

Options:

#1. Run the car front wheels up on some blocks of wood and use high-beams

#2. If #1 isn't high enough, put front end on jack stands.

Block rear wheels of course.

Of course car headlights (if fitted to the car0 won't light faces, they designed for lighting the road. You're meant to be testing to see if the lights themselves are suitable. As mentioned earlier, you should've sat down for your face test, If suitable you should buy some headlights from a car breaker or check out if they sell sealed beam lamps at the auto part syore.

BTW you'll need some car batteries to run them, The breakers yard could be a cheap source.

However, unless the scene is short, I would tend towards power, other than batteries,

If there's no power available from nearby buildings, I would check out the generators, park it on the other side of a building, with a 100ft ((or longer if needed) cable run of heavy duty cable to the Lights, The larger towed generators used on building sites or outdoor events aren't that loud and if shielded behind buildings they may not be picked up on the sound, You can ask the plant hire company to run their kit as a test.

I would also check out audio software for removing any remaining generator sound in post, The sound recordist records a reference track for this software, so it knows what to remove. It's not my department, but a fussy professional recordist was happy doing it with a noisy small generator.

Oh okay thanks. Yes I think the headlights will work, as long as they are not on the car yes. I think I would need a few of the on stands to light the actors evenly.

As for removing the sound in post, whenever I've tried doing that in the past with background noises, such as furnaces, not allowed to switch off, or things like that, a good portion of the audio quality in the dialogue went out with it. But as long as it will be acceptable still.

One thing I mentioned before though was using 1000 watt lights for lighting. A 1000 watt headlight is 8000 lumens. A car headlight is only 700 lumens. Wouldn't this mean that a 1000 watt light would be brighter than a car headlight or no?

Higher wattage mains lights will usually be brighter than car headlights. Since you've got the figures I'm not sure why you're asking the question.

There are a number of battery powered LED lights that you can hire from plant hire companies, they won't be designed for photographic work, but in the context of a thriller they could be interesting.

For example:

Smith Light - YouTube

Remember that optics apply to lighting as well as lenses. If you look at at old fashioned arri Fresnel. The photometric data shows it is very bright when on narrow angle but quite dim on fully wide. The intensity of the actual light source can be quite meaningless if it’s an isotrophic point source. As soon as you concentrate output in one direction the figures change!

One thought on your script and the banning. Forums are wide and classless containing a huge variety of people. If your script content troubled them then would not your movie do so too? If subject matter limits audience groups is that good?

Oh okay thanks. When I did the car headlight test, I stood in front of the car and tried to go at the distance, where the lights seem to be the brightest on me, unless that was the wrong angle to go?

Well I wanted to make a script that I found interesting, and struck a cord as well. Cause if I make a script that is too 'safe', I felt there is a good chance it would be forget-able, especially if it's a micro-budget indie film, from a newcomer.

So I thought if I produce and direct something that struck a cord, it would leave more of an impression after in comparison. But I've also been a fan of darker stories usually as well.

You have to know the audience that you're aiming for, so if you're going for festivals, you may be limited to those for a particular genre.

From what I've heard so far, it doesn't really leap out at you. I've caught a few minutes of a low budget revenge movie on the horror channel called "Nude Nuns with Big Guns" and it pretty much does what it says on the box, so leaps out at it's intended audience. I gather it was the subject of one of the largest copyright lawsuits in California. I didn't know there was a sub genre called nunsploitation, but think of priests as gangsters dealing in drugs and you get some sense of the film.

To stand out in that crowd you need a really strong one line hook and I'm not sure you've got that.

Yeah I haven't got a hook line yet. I remember seeing the trailer for Nude Nuns with Big Guns a while back, now that you mention it.

If the problem isn't enough power for the lights with one car, ask the crew if they have cars where the battery power can be borrowed for a while.

Save one car that doesn't use it's battery along with a set of jumpers to use in the event someone can't start their car.

You should have a hook line by this stage, how can you get people to work on your film or sell it to anyone if you can't pitch it?

That's true I should be pitching it in a single line, rather than a paragraph or so. I will talk it over with others and come up with one. Thanks.

Why are you asking other people? You really must grow a set Ryan and not always ask other people on every subject on earth. Sometimes you will be wrong - that's life, but committees are always the groups who organise disasters.

On the light front - why add this line, because it shows you to be again looking for a rule "unless that was the wrong angle to go?" We cannot answer this - we weren't there. Upllighting looks different to downlighting. Especially shadows - you might find somebody with a 4X4 with roof spotlights might be useful?

What would be really good would be one post from you saying something like this....
"Ok, thanks, but I considered everything and went with this XXXXXXX and it was pretty good apart from ZZZZZZZ which I'll easily sort in the next one. Thanks for your help"

Normally, you post Ok, thanks, then ask another question - have you noticed?

Oh I just thought it was a good idea to ask other people's opinions on a hookline. Is that not what others do to get opinions and feedback on it?

Yes I noticed that I ask other questions after I say thanks. I ask follow up questions to advice. Is that not good? This for example:

Oh okay thanks. When I did the car headlight test, I stood in front of the car and tried to go at the distance, where the lights seem to be the brightest on me, unless that was the wrong angle to go?

Well I wanted to make a script that I found interesting, and struck a cord as well. Cause if I make a script that is too 'safe', I felt there is a good chance it would be forget-able, especially if it's a micro-budget indie film, from a newcomer.

So I thought if I produce and direct something that struck a cord, it would leave more of an impression after in comparison. But I've also been a fan of darker stories usually as well.

I just asked a follow up question to the advice. Is that not good?

Oh I just thought it was a good idea to ask other people's opinions on a hookline. Is that not what others do to get opinions and feedback on it?

Nonsense, if you don;t know what it is, why should anyone else care? You're the writer.director/producer it's part of your job. You may get suggestions that you might "steal" but you need to have your own first, otherwise people may suspect that you don't really know what your film is about.

Oh okay. But isn't a good idea to get people's input on my hookline once I come up with one, instead of just sending it out there with no prior opinion on it?

If you haven't come with one how can other people respond to it? They tend to evolve with time as you finesse it, but having one enables you to really understand what your film is really about and not just the plot.

What I meant was, I will come up with some, and then give it to others for opinions.

The rule for me is to tell people what you intend - as in I'm calling it bla bla bla - and then if they think it's stupid, they will tell you, but DO NOT ASK for their opinion. Your opinion needs to be strong enough you dilute it. If you ask other people's opinion, remember everyone has one, if pushed, and do you really even want to consider their preference for titles when they don't have the attachment to the project you do.

You really need to learn to be decisive and make decisions - considered ones and gut reaction ones.

Oh okay thanks, I will try to do that and think about that.

Well as for deciding a camera, I tested some out and I think the one I will go for is the Black magic pocket camera, as it seems to have a combination of features which I like. It may be a jack of all trades, and master of none perhaps, but maybe a combination of things I like is better, rather than being a master in just one or two areas.

I could go for the 4K or 6K, but since there are no 6K TVs, it seems like an odd feature. Is that just for zooming in post, if you have to?

6k is there because Bayer sensors don't have a true resolution that matches the number of photosiites, so if you want a true 4k resolution, you need to over sample on the sensor. This is what you'd record if shooting RAW,.

This is standard on a number of high end cameras like the Arri Alexa and the RED cameras.

https://www.dpreview.com/articles/3560214217/resolution-aliasing-and-light-loss-why-we-love-bryce-bayers-baby-anyway

6k is there because Bayer sensors don't have a true resolution that matches the number of photosiites, so if you want a true 4k resolution, you need to over sample on the sensor. This is what you'd record if shooting RAW,.

This is standard on a number of high end cameras like the Arri Alexa and the RED cameras.

https://www.dpreview.com/articles/3560214217/resolution-aliasing-and-light-loss-why-we-love-bryce-bayers-baby-anyway

Oh okay, so when you say that is what I would record when shooting RAW, you are saying that RAW is 6k?

Is there any advantage of 6K over 4 that most viewers or distributors looking at your work, will care about?