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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

filter for reducing high contrasts?

R

Rainer Fritz

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Hi Guys !

Wanted to ask if anyone has a suggestion for reducing the hard contrasts when you are shooting in bright sunlight, with hard contrasts, specially on the skin.
We tried softcontrast, but that is not really reacting on the high lights. so it should be a filter which is rolling off only the highlights and nothing else. Has somebody a suggestion ????

thx

best regards

rainer
 
Ranier,
I don't think that there's a filter which will work on the highlights only but you might want to try an ultracon filter which will lift your blacks and make your picture lower contrast.
You might also look at a black promist which will help your skin highlights.
Regards,
Shane.
 
thanks for advice shane.... thought also first on a black promist.....

any more ?????

thx
rainer
 
Promist makes the highlights glow. If you are into a 80ies look, fine...

I think the secret lies in a clever colour correction and the believe that in 4K RAW the Red will hold underexposure (say 640 ASA) well enough that burning highlights on the skin won't happen. If that happens desaturating the higlight will clearing the videoish look of oversaturated skin tones which are close to burn out.

Otherwise shoot film. There are still many reasons why film is around (shooting in a park in bright sunlight, for instance).

Hans
 
Thx Hans for the advice... so shooting on film is no way solution :)

we allways then try to roll off the highlights, but I thought, that there is probably a filter or filter combination which works fine on reducing high contrasts and only that..... and you have not the only solution, that the shadows gets noisy.... its sometimes not easy to deal with the bright sun which is shining on the skin and shooting digital....

:)

thx
rainer
 
I'd vote for the Ultra Cons as well. I've only used them with film, but it's amazing how subtle and effective they can be depending on the situation...
In my experience, they help more in raising the shadows when the majority of the scene is bright (person under a tree in a wide shot of a landscape for instance) and less so in a dark environment with a hot spot you're trying to hold (a dark room with a small hot window)
Overdone, they can milk it up, and they do nothing to help the highlight rolloff (which was not a big problem with film) but a solid choice nonetheless.
I'd be curious to see how they work with the Red...
Cheers,
Harry
 
Schneider Digicons!
There are some tests on CML but don't think I should be linking those here (?)
 
Lowdown said:
You might also look into a digicon from schneider, I haven't used it but it seems to be what you are looking for.
If you use only an 1/8 or 1/4 BLACK promist it'll avoid the "80's look".

Shane.
Click to expand...

I agree with Shane. I almost always use 1/8 or a 1/4 (depending on scene and black promist), but only black promist.

It softens the tones a little and gives a nice "beauty" look to it, but it's important that it's done so you don't directly notice it and be careful with using it in extreme "highlight" situations (talking about large blown out proportions of the frame - it will "halo" then).
 
thanks guys a lot.... the digicon from schneider sounds very interesting.....
 
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