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May 13th, 2006, 10:50 PM | #1 |
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TrueColor V3.0 available on-line
Hi all.
This is not news since I talked about V3.0 for a couple of weeks but I finally managed to have a short page writtent about it with the complete "recipe" written down. This is, IMHO, the most accurate configuration that I can define. Given the real life situation in which we used it, shooting 3 commercials with lots of vivid colors, skin tones and dark/bright spots, I find this configuration to be one of the most flexible available for our camera. Give it a try and let me know. The description is "Part 3" at the top of http://www.paolociccone.com Oh, and take a look at the "Stilt World" pictures if you have a couple of minutes :) |
May 13th, 2006, 10:53 PM | #2 |
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Thanks for sharing! :)
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May 13th, 2006, 11:31 PM | #3 |
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Very good Paolo. Thanks for doing the work.
PS The settings are very close to PanaMatch now with a couple of extra tweaks. |
May 13th, 2006, 11:49 PM | #4 | |
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May 14th, 2006, 12:08 AM | #5 |
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Thanks...for TC3
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http://www.wizedot.com Last edited by Ram Ganesh; May 14th, 2006 at 01:36 AM. |
May 14th, 2006, 12:21 AM | #6 | |
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May 14th, 2006, 07:02 AM | #7 |
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Thank You!
Hi Paolo,
Thank you very much for all of your efforts! I will send you a private message later with a link to some of the stuff we have been shooting with your settings. Your hard work is very much appreciated. Tom Chaney www.tomchaney.com PS When you say Black Stretch off, do you mean "Normal"? Last edited by Tom Chaney; May 14th, 2006 at 11:43 AM. |
May 15th, 2006, 12:38 AM | #8 | |
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1) Your goal of providing the "most bits into post" is exactly the same approach I describe in my HD100 Handbook. We both use histograms to indicate how well one is doing this. However, unlike Sony's A1, the HD100 has no histogram display. So how are you setting exposure? I think that even if folks get convinced they should use an "engineering approach" -- actually setting exposure in the real world is not easy. I present the "Zone System" in my Handbook, but that doesn't mean much to young videographers. 2) Panasonic talks of the dangers of a knee causing color shifts. I'm wondering if you checked this. Did this lead to your use of 90IRE rather than the 80IRE that Tim and I have suggested? 3) In V3 you switched BS from 1 to OFF. It's clear, by looking at a histogram, that 2 (and especially 3) really alter the mid-levels way too much. But, I'm wondering why you switched BS off. I trust your lab tests -- so I'm wondering why "on location" you made the change. By the way, your DSC colors are spot on. There appears to be no true yellow in any of the other settings! (Again, we both agree that we want to go to post with an exact recording of what the real world looks like.) Folks should look at the shade of the DSC grayscale in Part 1. Your DSC grayscale goes from true white to real black.
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May 15th, 2006, 01:27 AM | #9 | |||||||||
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I believe tha this is truly a confirmation of the value of this camera, that we can tweak and personalize so much at this price point. I believe that, in a few years, we will see the HD100 mentioned in books as a milestone in the evolution of digital film making. Thank very much for the excellent feedback! Last edited by Paolo Ciccone; May 16th, 2006 at 12:47 AM. |
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May 15th, 2006, 03:38 PM | #10 | |
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All my explanations, here and in my book, break down at the point of actually setting exposure. It seems one needs to do three things at once: 1) Get the real blacks under 5IRE. 2) Get the brightest white above 105IRE. 3) Confirm that faces -- which must be exposed correctly -- are correctly exposed. And one must be able to do this in three different types of situations: A) High contrast -- 8 or more stops of light. B) Medium contrast -- 4 to 7 stops of light. C) Low contrast -- under 4 stops of light. To add to this problem, LCD monitors (even an external monitor) are not good at displaying true blacks. So, we really can trust our minitors to set blacks to black. Let's assume we use zebra to monitor face levels. Now we depend on LCD monitors to judge how bright whites are. Once again, LCD monitors tend to be very bad at displaying bright whites. For those who aren't using a WFM or have no way to display a histogram -- we only have zerba to set exposure. Worse, we only have one zebra. I realize with your rig these are not your problems, but they are problems for those of us who shoot alone. I do have one idea -- a tiny box fed by the composite video cable. Logic would light two Green LEDs when "some" of the signal was under 5 IRE and "some" of the signal was above 105IRE. Let's see if we can figure this out.
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May 15th, 2006, 06:30 PM | #11 | |||
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May 15th, 2006, 06:56 PM | #12 | |
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IF the HD100 had a constant ASA sensitivity, it would be really easy to use a lightmeter. But, one might be able to use Zebra -- since it indicates what the camera is registering -- and from it -- know what the low and high foot-candles should measure to ensure all the bits are used. For example, if the Zebra indicated 70IRE on a face, the brightest area on the light meter should be almost 2 stops hotter (110IRE). The darkest area, should be about 3.5 stops lower. (This isn't exactly right because a stop isn't always 20IRE.)
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May 15th, 2006, 07:18 PM | #13 |
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Hi Paolo,
Do you mean Black Stretch "normal"? I can't seem to find "off." Thanks, Tom |
May 15th, 2006, 07:35 PM | #14 |
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Given that HDV is not great for brightening in post due to compression artifacts, I try to get fairly bright without clipping (depending on the subject). But I was wondering what are some good numbers for exposing different subjects at. For instance would you say that the upper limit for skin tones is around 70 IRE? I really wish that there was a waveform monitor or histogram available in the camera, but given the zebra function that we have, what's a good strategy for shooting with them in "the real world" without external equipment?
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May 15th, 2006, 08:10 PM | #15 | |
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And Grazie! I wish I had found your tests before doing my own. Sort of like coming up with the Theory of Relativity anew, only to find out someone already did it :) I also calibrate to the DSC chart (DSC makes a lot of handy charts, I use them all the time), and my HD-100 "broadcast settings" just about mirror your true color settings. Where they differ is: detail (-5), black stretch (stretch1), color gain (-1), and red gain (2) - these are my adjustments based on "after editing" ATSC broadcast ready segs. I also have the skin adjust set to on, and the range set to -2. Turning on the skin adjust feature changes the overall color matrix of the cam somewhat which may also account for the differences. While my "standard" setting is as above, I do adjust the settings as the situation calls for. No one setting is correct for every shooting situation, but your settings are a excellent starting point, and will hold a solid picture in most situations. Thanks for making them available. I'm taking two NTSC HD-100 cams to Cannes tomorrow, we are shooting PAL Digibeta for the most part, but I am shooting some festival atmosphere with the HD-100s for the US domestic broadcast market. We are also taking two Pana NTSC HVX200 cams and a Steadicam Flyer for one of the HD-100 units. I'm curious to see how the Mediterranean and added range of festival colors mix with my standard color settings. Full report when I return. |
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