Dragon Non-Linear Color Response?

[Ivan McCullough]

I don't think this is a consideration unique to Red, but either way it is the DP's ass on the line, not the camera. He is required to master his medium. The fuck-up is his. When you waste couple hours or worse, run out of time and lose the talent and the day your Producer will hold you accountable not Red. Your Producer knows that a good DP coukd have executed and would have executed properly with Epic... So what would be your excuse? No. It isn't the camera.

I'll reply to the added part now

If your producer knows you and had the make-up team and have never had a problem with you with another camera then…

Well maybe I have a better relationship with the people I work with.

Besides there are number of other threads like this as proof all over the Internet.

Another question for you, maybe you live in a world where make-up tests are done even for one day jobs but I believe most of us don't. In a world where you can't for whatever reason do tests under the same lighting conditions etc. what camera would you choose if you could choose any?

Maybe the question is what camera would you not choose?

 

[Scott Crawley]

You make a number of presumptions with which I fundamentally disagree, so I can't entertain the question nor do I wish to further monopolize the discussion. Sorry.

I can state uncatagorically that if I had Heidi Klum for one day or just one hour I would do a makeup test as far in advance as possible.

I'll reply to the added part now

If your producer knows you and had the make-up team and have never had a problem with you with another camera then…

Well maybe I have a better relationship with the people I work with.

Besides there are number of other threads like this as proof all over the Internet.

Another question for you, maybe you live in a world where make-up tests are done even for one day jobs but I believe most of us don't. In a world where you can't for whatever reason do tests under the same lighting conditions etc. what camera would you choose if you could choose any?

Maybe the question is what camera would you not choose?

 

[Björn Benckert]

Thanks for this! I'll experiment with it tonight. For my simple mind in the meantime . . . to avoid having a model look sea sick green on Dragon + Tungsten . . . I need to make sure there is some blue content in my lighting source? I need to add blue to avoid a yellow/green tint and to enhance the reds in the skin tone?? Slushie brain freeze!!! ;-)

Not so strange if you think of it... You starve one channel and you only have due tone and 1/3 of the resolution is gone. You starve two channels and your image is black and white, and 2/3 of the resolution is wack. So as the camera is set to be balanced for 5600k the further you get from that the bigger chance that one or more of your color channels get starved. With dragon the greater DR makes that happen later... but there is still limits for how little light you can hit the sensor with without going to loose a channel / 1/3 of the resolution. At 5600k all channels go pretty much black at the same low light. But when shooting in warm light the blue goes first then green, and when shooting in cold light red is starved first... The same for over exposure, if you would have brought up the exposure time or light the red channel would burn first then green then blue.

Best practice is always to try to balance the light going into the camera. filter in front of lens or balanced light. But then again dragon got more DR so if you make sure to have something coming in all color channels without over exposing any of them you are fine, but better / less grain etc if you expose them evenly... that goes for even the scenario where you want a pure red or blue or green image. starved channels on a cmos sensor means poor deabyering so better to use all pixles and shift temprature in grade.

If you shoot in tungsten you can think of it as if your red buckets are filled to 80% then your greens will be at 60% and your blue about 40%... so if you lower the light all these numbers goes linearly down. if you push it they go linearly up and the red goes into the highlight zone and lose resolution / get clipped if you go towards lower light you get noise in blue then green then red. So filter the camera to get an even rgb and then raise the exposure to proper level, thats the only way to get as good result with tungsten as you would with daylight.

 

[Ivan McCullough]

You make a number of presumptions with which I fundamentally disagree, so I can't entertain the question nor do I wish to further monopolize the discussion. Sorry.

I can state uncatagorically that if I had Heidi Klum for one day or just one hour I would do a makeup test as far in advance as possible.

Fair enough but I think Heidi Klums make-up people might be too busy and what are you gonna do then?

Again, this is an issue with RED cameras for some time now.

It is a black mark against RED, those who own cameras should be concerned.

Me,? I don't have a horse in this game, I would just like more reasons to feel comfortable about shooting RED

 

[Björn Benckert]

I'll reply to the added part now

If your producer knows you and had the make-up team and have never had a problem with you with another camera then…

Well maybe I have a better relationship with the people I work with.

Besides there are number of other threads like this as proof all over the Internet.

Another question for you, maybe you live in a world where make-up tests are done even for one day jobs but I believe most of us don't. In a world where you can't for whatever reason do tests under the same lighting conditions etc. what camera would you choose if you could choose any?

Maybe the question is what camera would you not choose?

Well all cmos cameras kind of behaves the same. Some has more range than others. But in general they do the same trick. So if you expose well your camera should not matter much, offcourse resolution, range etc comes into play.


But this thread is started around an image that is clearly suffering from under exposure.

So with your reasoning you should possibly shoot with a camera that bake the image so that black is black and can never be lifted in any way or form... then you do not get to see those lifted starved colors and blotchy skintones, all you get is black RGB = 0,0,0...

Well red does not do that, as it works red show noise when you bring the levels up even if you shoot with the lens cap on... but that does not mean that shooting with the lens cap on or even shooting with too little light is good practice...

 

[Ivan McCullough]

What other cameras make skin go green with certain make-up?

I have personally never seen it on any other camera.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

I can state uncatagorically that if I had Heidi Klum for one day or just one hour I would do a makeup test as far in advance as possible.

Theoretically...you could...if you are really good with the model or her agent, or paying for that extra time, since proper make up takes time and the more famous they get the less of it they have.


Regarding this topic, there seems to be some generalization about sensor color performance while make-up quality/choice/purpose/skill and light source color properties are variables floating in air.

 

[Zeb B]

If anyone out there can give me a list of the top 3 specific make-up products that break the RED sensor (and where to buy them) - I would be more than happy to do a Dragon/model test and find a fix via filtration, perhaps soft blue LED fill light or any other ideas you might have.

Send via PM or email: Zebtao at gmail

"Wisdom is the fuck-ups you understand and remember"
-ZEB

 

[Stacey Spears]

Here are a couple links that mention some makeup.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/94d8fde6-109a-11e3-b291-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2x19P6MIO

http://epicmakeup.tumblr.com/

 

[Matt Ryan]

This one looks good:

These not so much and need far more work (but also they are color balanced around 2300k, so very low and pretty much no blue channel) The noise difference is massive:

My personal opinion is to always shoot as close to daylight as possible. If that means using tungsten lights then use an 80c. Starving the blue channel is ugly...

 

[Zeb B]

Not so strange if you think of it... You starve one channel and you only have due tone and 1/3 of the resolution is gone. You starve two channels and your image is black and white, and 2/3 of the resolution is wack. So as the camera is set to be balanced for 5600k the further you get from that the bigger chance that one or more of your color channels get starved. With dragon the greater DR makes that happen later... but there is still limits for how little light you can hit the sensor with without going to loose a channel / 1/3 of the resolution. At 5600k all channels go pretty much black at the same low light. But when shooting in warm light the blue goes first then green, and when shooting in cold light red is starved first... The same for over exposure, if you would have brought up the exposure time or light the red channel would burn first then green then blue.

Best practice is always to try to balance the light going into the camera. filter in front of lens or balanced light. But then again dragon got more DR so if you make sure to have something coming in all color channels without over exposing any of them you are fine, but better / less grain etc if you expose them evenly... that goes for even the scenario where you want a pure red or blue or green image. starved channels on a cmos sensor means poor deabyering so better to use all pixles and shift temprature in grade.

If you shoot in tungsten you can think of it as if your red buckets are filled to 80% then your greens will be at 60% and your blue about 40%... so if you lower the light all these numbers goes linearly down. if you push it they go linearly up and the red goes into the highlight zone and lose resolution / get clipped if you go towards lower light you get noise in blue then green then red. So filter the camera to get an even rgb and then raise the exposure to proper level, thats the only way to get as good result with tungsten as you would with daylight.

Thank you guys. In retrospect it's face palm simple. Just look at the color wheel to see if you don't supply one side then the other side will be boosted. Doooh!

Still would like to get as much Pro MUA input on this as possible. What specific make-up fails bad when combined with RED sensors?

 

[Ivan McCullough]

Thank you guys. In retrospect it's face palm simple. Just look at the color wheel to see if you don't supply one side then the other side will be boosted. Doooh!

Still would like to get as much Pro MUA input on this as possible. What specific make-up fails bad when combined with RED sensors?

I never asked what the make-up artist on my gig was using, i think it was one of the "HD" ones she had used without issue on D-21 and Alexa jobs. Life is too short in my opinion plus there is another problem.

I think there would be an issue posting the specifics you are requesting. ie. legally its a bit shaky to make claims about the technical suitability of certain brands or lines on a public forum.

Someone might PM you or start an email correspondence. (come to think of it if someone did do this I would appreciate a shout out too.)

 

[Stacey Spears]

legally its a bit shaky to make claims about the technical suitability of certain brands or lines on a public forum.

How is it any different making claims on cameras? Or reviews of anything for that matter?

 

[Scott Crawley]

Theoretically...you could...if you are really good with the model or her agent, or paying for that extra time, since proper make up takes time and the more famous they get the less of it they have.

If your client has the inclination and the resources they pay her for the test, otherwise you use a stand in of approximate skin color. Done.

 

[Ivan McCullough]

How is it any different making claims on cameras? Or reviews of anything for that matter?

Making claims based on opinion or reviewing are subjective.

If you were to say "don't use the "x" brand camera because it is impossible to get a clean key from European skin against chroma green" that is a statement to be read as fact not opinion.

In the context of this discussion naming brands or lines to be avoided could result in legal action against the publisher (reduser and its owners) for loss of potential revenue.

But that's just a guess. ;-)

 

[Zeb B]

Attn All: Have your Pro MUA email / PM me the CMOS & HD make-up watch list . . . and I'll personally take my chances with the law. They can't do shit about professionals discussing and identifying incompatibility between products. Lots of case law on that subject protecting free trade speech. Won't be an issue.

Would like to move from anecdotal "RED + MU = Bad" . . . "Alexa + MU = Good" to something more insightful and instructive to all of us.

 

[ericyoung]

There is one scenario where changing makeup is not an option - an advert for a specific brand of makeup!

I do agree makeup tests for every other scenario would be useful - maybe Red should run some more comprehensive tests themselves, including comparable Alexa, Sony, Canon cameras as comparison, and with a range of skin tones.

These probably should NOT be done or announced publicly as they will want to fix any issues without feeding FUD !!

 

[Eric Haase]

I understand now.

Again, I don't think this is unique to Red or that a particular camera can even be singled out as the culprit. Presently I believe it is a combination of; lights, camera, makeup with skin tone possibly contributing. I have not encountered this at all, but since it is usually quicker and easier to switch out a concealer than the camera or all of the lights I would concentrate there.

Scott, several of us have encountered this specific issue only on RED sensors and we are trying to help shine a light on the issue. You can choose not to believe it. I wish I had collected frames of the many times this has happened on my shoots to give you some real proof and some side by sides with other cameras.

As far as testing beforehand, that is a luxury we are almost never afforded, especially on commercials. I always talk with the makeup artist before the shoot (when shooting on RED) and I try to get a stand-in the morning of the shoot to test some tones if we agree the tones fall into the problem area. This has saved me a couple times. BUT we RARELY have time for this and most likely production is not going to pay for an additional day of DP, AC, makeup, and any lights or personnel to do a makeup test for a job because the camera behaves in unpredictable ways with certain makeup tones. When I shot Ms. Klum I had the RED SENSOR MAKEUP discussion with her makeup team before the shoot and luckily the tones her skin requires and products used were not problematic. But they very easily could have been. It's hard to predict when the issue will pop up. We did not have an additional day for testing and had very little time in the morning to test makeup on a stand in. The shoot went really well- she looked fabulous and wanted to know the filter combo I was using as she and her team were very pleased and wanted to pocket that info.

Yes, it's my ass on the line and there are ZERO excuses, which is precisely why I want this problem to be addressed. I'd love to finally get Graeme some samples from a test... should have some time coming up and I'll get started on it.

The safe choice is to shoot another format, which is totally valid. However, I believe RED (and especially Dragon) to be a superior system in many ways to the competition at this moment in time. So I prefer it, but I'd prefer it a lot more and feel safer using it if this issue were solved at the sensor/color science level. There's no harm in trying to improve a problem that some of us have encountered several times, specifically with RED sensors and color science. It can only help others to discuss it and hopefully make it better for the future.

 

[Scott Crawley]

I did not point out the fact that I have not personally encountered the problem to suggest that it doesn't exist. I mentioned it to acknowledge that while I have my own ideas on how I would address it that they are only theories, not hard won experience. I know that others have experienced it but no convincing explanation for the phenomenon has yet surfaced that I know of.

I understand that you have not experienced this with other cameras, but so far I am unconvinced that other systems are impervious to it. I would love for Red to find the answers whether this is a Red specific issue or not so shine a light, push and assist them. It's all good with me so long as we are not assigning blame prematurely, or where it does not exist. If it turns out to be a Red thing and it gets fixed... Just as good.

Your side by sides would be good to see. I can attest than I have shot hundreds of makeups with 5D stills and not encountered the problem.

Thank you for sharing your experience with Ms. Klum and the difficulties you faced. It illustrates what a responsible professional should do and that is what I was trying to promote. Someone brought her up as an example, so I went along. My remarks were not meant as a criticism of your work with her. I hope you understand.

You bring us back to the discussion at hand that is dragon color science. I'm with you, Blair and John. Let's wait for the official release.

edit: looking back I see it was you who brought up the Klum example. I took it as rhetorical
and apologize for misunderstanding. with that in mnd kindly allow me to rephrase an earlier remark. If I were you in that situation, with her in front of me and no makeup test... I might have quietly shit myself.

 

[Ivan McCullough]

Ok, so if we are done calling people "DP"'s if they did not do a make-up test can we talk about what is important.

If this is still an issue on Dragon i really don't care about the "how" or the "why?"

I am looking at this with a producers eyes for a minute, I want to know if this can be fixed by RED.

So i guess its a question of if this is an issue inherent in the hardware or if firmware/colour science can deal with it.

If it can be fixed by firmware or colour science then the questions are 1. when can we expect this fix, 2. how RAW is RAW if processing etc in camera is used to alleviate it , and 3. why was this not done for MX if it is fixable.

My gut is that this is not something that can be fixed on the software/processing side (in camera), mainly due to how RED does RAW.

Maybe we need a new slider in Redcine, "greenaway"....