UPDATED: CINEMODE HV20 softness
 

UPDATED:

Please shoot cinemode with custom setting contrast +1 and there will not be any loss in detail but still less contrasty and slightly softer then TV mode. It appears to be more accurate and no loss in detail.
If u shoot cinemode with custom setting and contrast 0 there is definitely a loss of detail.

That would be great, will test this today thoroughly! I'm sceptic though, as I notice such a huge loss of detail in some cases, it would be amazing if it'd all come back by upping the contrast.

I would appreciated to a see a comparaison between these 2 settings:

Cinemode with:
- Contrast +1 (to call back some details sharpened by the too high low contrast of the Cinemode),
- Sharpness +1 (to call back some details not enhanced between the raw sensor caption and the sharpness digital processing of the final picture),
- Brightness +1 (to call back some details in the dark areas, and because I think, IMHO, that the highlights are too much down giving a 'too much sad' image).

'Normal' mode with:
- Contrast -1 (to minimize the too much video style of the picture and to approach (just a little...) the Cinemode),
- Sharpness -1 (to approach too the Cinemode; people willing the more details as possible can stay at Sharpness 0),
- Brightness -1 (to avoid the lost of details as much as possible in the burned highlights of the 'normal' mode, and to avoid to much noise in the dark areas).

In every case, these 2 settings will not avoid corrections in post-prod, but maybe, depending of the personnal tastes of each of us, they will be more close to what can expect the majority of us, and they will permit us to spend less time in the post-prod process...

PS: It would be interesant too to test these settings in 24p and in 60i (or 25p and 50i) to see the real impact of each of the 'p' mode vs the 'i' mode, because I think that a part of the too strong softness report by some people are due too to the 'progressive' mode. But in which proportion?

You can look at my tests to see all -1. I didn't do all +1 at once, but I did do them individually.

If you want to do post, +1 should be avoided. It's quite artificial in all modes.

http://www.12south.com/video/hv20/modes/index.html

Also,
I did some tests of P versus I, and the sharpness was essentially the same, BUT, it took the camera much longer to focus.

Thanks a lot for the screenshots. I wonder why are these sizes 856x879? Sorry if this was already answered in the other thread.

There's also a color depth setting and not sure what it does (probably gamma which probably would result in loss off mid-tone detail).

- They've been cropped to include just the chart, but they are full resolution, no scaling.

- COLOR DEPTH is essentially SATURATION. It's not directly related to gamma.

I just did a quick test and the +1 contrast DOES seem to bring back most, if not all of the detail.

However, this makes CINE MODE a lot less useful since the resulting image looks almost identical (at least on my cheap test monitor) to the TV mode -1 contrast image.

I don't see the individual case Cimode with brightness +1.
And I woukd like to see all at +1 (to compare withe AE normal mode all at -1).

I many of us (I think...), I would like to have a 'not perfect but quite good' setting to minimize the time spend in post-prod for the majority of the footages, and, why not, to avoid any post-prod for the non important footages.

- I didn't do comprehensive tests with all of the image settings, just sharpness and contrast.

- "-1" is the most natural for ALL settings. "0" usually looks natural enough, "+1" looked artificial in every case to me. I'm saying more most cases leave the settings at -1, and for cases where you feel you need to emphasize, go up to 0.

If you don't like the +1 settings on the Cinemode I understand that you don't want to spend time on it.

Can somebody-else do a test with the 3 setting at +1 on the Cinemode (on comparaison on the same scene in Normal AE mode with the 3 settings at -1)?

Could be done not on colored charts but on real scenes...

Thanks by advance.

Which three settings? I did SHARPNESS and CONTRAST.

+1 yields ugly, artificial results in every case, I'd pretend it doesn't exist.

Joseph H. Moore,
You have provided +1 with Sharpness and Contrast, but separated, not combined.
And, personnally, I found test "Cinemode Sharpness +1" less sharp than the -1... (and I don't know on which basis, you can qualify this +1 as 'artificial').

So it's why I would like to see something else than charts, prefering real situations...

I'm going to do a better set-up today. Just for illustrative purposes I'll include all settings on +1 ... but it ain't gonna be pretty! ;-)

Here's the new set-up. It's got a little bit of everything in it, strong highlights, rich shadows, subtle textures, bold colors, subtle colors, etc.

I shot every different custom image setting through -1,0,+1 in both Tv and CINE mode.

I'm going to put them all together as one layered in Photoshop file, as that seems to be about the easiest way to compare.

(FYI, I'm heading out of town, so I might not be able to post it until late in the week.)