Resource for HDR Shooters

[Jon Pais]

I’ve tried to make this the most comprehensive resource for those wanting to shoot and grade HDR for YouTube.

https://daejeonchronicles.com/2021/...3-hdr-10-in-davinci-resolve-studio-17-part-i/

 

[Tom Gleeson]

Jon,

Fantastic detailed work and thankyou for sharing. If anyone is interested in the bigger picture the Australian Cinematographers Society made a video where we talked to cinematographers and colourists about their experience shooting HDR mainly from the perspective of cinematography. We shot tests in HDR and followed productions finishing in HDR. Many industry players such as Netflix, Dolby and Panavision supported the project.

I am a little surprised that one of the biggest and most important changes to how cinematographers work is presented to audiences does not get more attention.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbK7mHG3lF8

 

[Jon Pais]

Jon,

Fantastic detailed work and thankyou for sharing. If anyone is interested in the bigger picture the Australian Cinematographers Society made a video where we talked to cinematographers and colourists about their experience shooting HDR mainly from the perspective of cinematography. We shot tests in HDR and followed productions finishing in HDR. Many industry players such as Netflix, Dolby and Panavision supported the project.

I am a little surprised that one of the biggest and most important changes to how cinematographers work is presented to audiences does not get more attention.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbK7mHG3lF8

I watched it and shared on my blog and facebook group. It is really great. Followed that up by watching the StEM 2 videos.

 

[Tom Gleeson]

I believe it might have been a mistake to "label" the new imaging standards such as Rec 2100 and ST 2048 under the banner of HDR. The word "HDR" seems more associated with consumer devices? These new standards plus Metadata to control the final displays are game changers yet it doesn't seem to fire the imagination of many cinematographers. One other possibility for the low interest is that HDR finishing is mainly being done by the larger streaming projects and Features but this will inevitably filter down to smaller projects over the next few years.

 

[Phil Holland]

These new standards plus Metadata to control the final displays are game changers yet it doesn't seem to fire the imagination of many cinematographers. Another possibility for the low interest is HDR finishes are presently only being done for the larger streaming projects and Features but it will inevitably filter down to smaller projects over the next few years.

There is a fairly interesting gap between general commercial filmmaking and those pushing ahead. When I refer to commercial filmmaking I'm talking about work that lives under a general production banner. HDR as well as finishing at higher resolutions has been in that emerging trends category for a long time and has taken a while to adopt.

In the case of HDR, delivery, and display. I began with HDR back in 2013 before standards were hard pinned. In 2014 and 2015 they were released, but it has taken a while for the most accessible tools (Resolve and Adobe) to handle HDR and handle it well. The first 5-7 years of HDR weren't exactly filled with joy from a post perspective. The key thing was to get all of the pieces of the pipeline into existence from monitoring, software, as well as camera (though this was thankfully done a long while back). We released a very, very wide release DolbyVision project to the global market early on and much was learned in that process when it came up to the x-factor variable of "many different displays". Thankfully much of that chaos has been sorted late 2010s.

I've certainly seen an uptick in HDR delivery for a while now, but I would say the majority of content is still SDR. Somewhat similar to 4K and 8K delivery for that matter.

I will say we got to an interesting place with display technology, but HDR displays are a bit all over the map. There have been a few Monitor Days at the ASC over this span of time. Having 30 or so displays all hooked up to the same SDR and HDR signal all at once was something to behold and reflect on. Particularly what occurs from about 18% gray up to the highlights in terms of color, saturation, and accuracy. This has also been very interesting to observe in consumer facing displays like televisions and monitors. Remains the same now as we are undergoing major technology moment with some generational improvements across OLED, QD-OLED, QLED, Mini-LED, and MicroLED. And we'll likely be seeing further leaps from there at a fast rate now as things are buttoned up further.

I create work for a variety of companies pushing out new display tech and it's been extremely exciting being on the bleeding edge for over a decade now. Emissive displays have undergone massive developments and improvements since the earlier days of what we would consider a premium television. But there are technology hurdles that come with all of this newness. Sometimes producing displays with undesirable artifacts or handling of certain content, particularly in HDR. That's still being worked on now aggressively.