Jannard
Red Leader
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This info has probably gotten lost somewhere in the archives, although I have posted it more than once. This example uses RED Alert! but also applies to other grading programs. It assumes a high range scene and working in REC 709 (for this example) and you have set the White Balance. The examples below are not designed to be pretty... it was to show RED ONE footage in the most difficult situation. Make your subject the darkest object in an extremely high range scene... and hold tone everywhere.
1. Expose footage properly (another discussion for Build 15 and easy with Build 16).
2. Open your file in RED Alert! and reference your histogram while you get all important highlight info inside the right edge with the Exposure Control (in case you missed slightly). If you missed a lot, you will quickly run into trouble down the road. Which means your footage will either be noisy or your highlights will be clipped. The more you missed it, the more trouble you will have.
3. Use the Curve Control to make the image look right. You can control almost everything right here. Leave the Black and White points (bottom left and top right) alone.
You DO NOT want to move, cut off, or throw away highlight info... at any point in the process with any application. If you do throw away highlight info, it should be a conscious decision.
Below are two examples from RED Alert!
The 1st is exactly what I described for Build 15. Notice REC 709 is selected as the Output LUT/Gamma. Also notice that Chroma Denoise is OFF.
The 2nd example is the same file but opened in REDspace instead of REC 709. You will see that they look is virtually identical, but no curves were added. Build 16 RED Alert! adds REDspace (as does your camera) and still maintains all the other Output LUT options.
The final example (shown on another Recon thread "9.5 Stops") is a "very mildly adjusted" image from the same file. I incident metered the scene with a Sekonic Cine. Both the bright and shadow areas were very evenly lit so the metering was accurate. T32 outside (at ISO 400) and T1.7 for the heavily shaded doorway.
Tungsten lighting will never yield as good of results as Daylight. The sensor is Daylight balanced. If I shoot tungsten, I still work with a daylight setting in RED Alert! and correct later. Low light will also not yield as good of range. But you knew that.
Jim
1. Expose footage properly (another discussion for Build 15 and easy with Build 16).
2. Open your file in RED Alert! and reference your histogram while you get all important highlight info inside the right edge with the Exposure Control (in case you missed slightly). If you missed a lot, you will quickly run into trouble down the road. Which means your footage will either be noisy or your highlights will be clipped. The more you missed it, the more trouble you will have.
3. Use the Curve Control to make the image look right. You can control almost everything right here. Leave the Black and White points (bottom left and top right) alone.
You DO NOT want to move, cut off, or throw away highlight info... at any point in the process with any application. If you do throw away highlight info, it should be a conscious decision.
Below are two examples from RED Alert!
The 1st is exactly what I described for Build 15. Notice REC 709 is selected as the Output LUT/Gamma. Also notice that Chroma Denoise is OFF.
The 2nd example is the same file but opened in REDspace instead of REC 709. You will see that they look is virtually identical, but no curves were added. Build 16 RED Alert! adds REDspace (as does your camera) and still maintains all the other Output LUT options.
The final example (shown on another Recon thread "9.5 Stops") is a "very mildly adjusted" image from the same file. I incident metered the scene with a Sekonic Cine. Both the bright and shadow areas were very evenly lit so the metering was accurate. T32 outside (at ISO 400) and T1.7 for the heavily shaded doorway.
Tungsten lighting will never yield as good of results as Daylight. The sensor is Daylight balanced. If I shoot tungsten, I still work with a daylight setting in RED Alert! and correct later. Low light will also not yield as good of range. But you knew that.
Jim
