Improving the Camera: The Image

[Wayne Morellini]

Is the second photo is from your product Hrvoje? It looks fairly boosted.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Is the second photo is from your product Hrvoje? It looks fairly boosted.

What exactly looks boosted on the second photo and what is your reference ?

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Helium.

(Beta)


Jason Han.





ISO 800
6500K, Tint -11

ISO 640
5600K

 

[Wayne Morellini]

From normal experience of those colors it does. Let's look at the reds for instance. I mean, a lot of these samples you are showing look good. But I don't know what you are meaning by that photo. Maybe the file display is coming out wrong on this phone? Most of the rest I've looked at are pretty good.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Well I don't know what you are seeing on your phone but I have the references to judge and referent monitoring so I'd say it's your phone screen.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

Well I don't know what you are seeing on your phone but I have the references to judge and referent monitoring so I'd say it's your phone screen.

All the photos would be similar then. Might be some unsupported coding setting, as its not on your end.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

All the photos would be similar then. Might be some unsupported coding setting, as its not on your end.

Just to clarify - on that Alexa SXT shot you are looking at tungsten lit scene with warmer tone and first generic LUT transformed image has bright colors loosing saturation plus reds deviating to magenta.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Primers for Dragon are updated.

Found more stuff to improve.
Update headed to fellow creatives today so check your mailboxes.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

That would explain a few things. Resolve seems to be trying to normalise the color in compensation to the tungsten, but over shifting the reds. The other one has more scene color, but the tungsten makes it look like it has a hazy cast over it reducing definition between the red and green channels, even yellowish is the grey surface. So, it is difficult scene lighting to blame. Thanks for that. It looked like test scenes I've seen of DV cameras 18 years ago, but I wasn't going to sat that. You should note on the sample that it is an example of a difficult tungsten lit scene.

Well thanks Hrvoje, I was going to reply it was just a distraction and don't worry about it before.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

Hate Bayer, I wish the 3 layer technology was used (they say more data rate, but 4:4:4 is more compressible.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Sony FS7

Few test shots I took last fall.


Shot in Cine EI mode, S-Log3, S-Gamut3.Cine
10 bit XAVC-H

 

[Wayne Morellini]

Except for the blue sky and maybe the tomatoes that generic Sony lut us pretty good for eng work. Yours is aimed more at the deeper cinema look.

Two things Hrvoje, the Tomatoes and the golden hair, and the first leaf, don't be afraid not to go too far in boosting some of the extremes. The golden hair, I think the human eye expects something in between the Sony generic and your out. Is there a control to tone down the saturation, particularly with a separate control for the restored waged out areas? That would allow people customise areas brightness independently on s global basis. Say separate controls related to how bright, dark and mid saturated areas are handled, and another dark, mid, and bright desaturated areas. These six controls could act is simplified ways to rebalance the scene, and handle restoration of desaturated areas (the mid desaturated control is not really needed, as it has full detail by nature, unless you wanted to do a bit more work on a fairly pale leaf etc). But really, I think the blue skies probably need to be pull back a little, which would highlight the other color work better with the contrast between the saturated and the mildly pastel sky (sort of in between).

 

[Wayne Morellini]

Hrvoje, there are literally millions of H264 4:2:0 cameras out there with crappy 8-12 stop sensors, and free resolve. Most of these cameras they don't seem to try to stuff up image balance, they generally are pleasing though often contrasty and a bit too colorful (though some have controls to soften the image and turn down saturation. Though mostly an old market, there are many people with cheap stills, mobile and action cams. .Any chance you could help these people with a generic solution to at least handle the bright and dark areas and saturation?

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Except for the blue sky and maybe the tomatoes that generic Sony lut us pretty good for eng work. Yours is aimed more at the deeper cinema look.

If one disregards the destructive tendencies of generic LUTs, visible here in messed up tomatos in Sony's LUT and deviations in Resolve LogC LUT...yes there is a reason behind the original "Sony look".

The interpretation of "deeper cinema look" is mostly affected by accurate and harmonized color response after the image is fixed on micro levels by the Primers. You are used to seeing crappy digital colors from ENG imaging and this associates to "filmic" because colorimetry is improved and image in some ways "de-digitalized".

Two things Hrvoje, the Tomatoes and the golden hair, and the first leaf, don't be afraid not to go too far in boosting some of the extremes. The golden hair, I think the human eye expects something in between the Sony generic and your out. Is there a control to tone down the saturation, particularly with a separate control for the restored waged out areas? That would allow people customise areas brightness independently on s global basis. Say separate controls related to how bright, dark and mid saturated areas are handled, and another dark, mid, and bright desaturated areas. These six controls could act is simplified ways to rebalance the scene, and handle restoration of desaturated areas (the mid desaturated control is not really needed, as it has full detail by nature, unless you wanted to do a bit more work on a fairly pale leaf etc). But really, I think the blue skies probably need to be pull back a little, which would highlight the other color work better with the contrast between the saturated and the mildly pastel sky (sort of in between).

I understand what you mean. However, if I did more accentuation past this point it would be stepping into creative look. That is not the goal with these. This part is left to the colorist.

Primers fix the deviations of the digital signal (to a possible extent) giving the Creative a more natural & neutral basis for creative work.

That "in between" desire is a normal tendency of an analytical part of mind. You see only two options so your mind tries to find the balance between them. Relying on that part is a problematic and may be misleading in this case, because a) you have no reference and b) one of those is "not that good"*.

When you see a scene in front of you and the outcome of a transformation, or signal diagnostics, you get to see which one is "not that good"*

* - euphemism.

Hrvoje, there are literally millions of H264 4:2:0 cameras out there with crappy 8-12 stop sensors, and free resolve. Most of these cameras they don't seem to try to stuff up image balance, they generally are pleasing though often contrasty and a bit too colorful (though some have controls to soften the image and turn down saturation. Though mostly an old market, there are many people with cheap stills, mobile and action cams. .Any chance you could help these people with a generic solution to at least handle the bright and dark areas and saturation?

I already did that last year with Sony compact cameras and developed the methodology starting on fragile h.264 4:2:0 material. So far I have covered and individually tested and optimized A7R2, A7S1, A7S2, A6300/A6500.

There are two versions of Primers.
Primers EQX are designed for 10bit + cameras and harvest the advantage of more "thicker" material.

Who is interested in improved colorimetry and more natural imagery out of his imaging tool and helping with r&d in the same time the project is here:


http://omeneo.com/primers/

 

[Wayne Morellini]

If one disregards the destructive tendencies of generic LUTs, visible here in messed up tomatos in Sony's LUT and deviations in Resolve LogC LUT...yes there is a reason behind the original "Sony look".

The interpretation of "deeper cinema look" is mostly affected by accurate and harmonized color response after the image is fixed on micro levels by the Primers. You are used to seeing crappy digital colors from ENG imaging and this associates to "filmic" because colorimetry is improved and image in some ways "de-digitalized".

I don't think ENG is ideal, just to use it for filming you have to be careful production, and then you have a look set in production externally (depends on how adjustable in camera). But, I mean by ENG standards it is good.

I understand what you mean. However, if I did more accentuation past this point it would be stepping into creative look. That is not the goal with these. This part is left to the colorist.

Primers fix the deviations of the digital signal (to a possible extent) giving the Creative a more natural & neutral basis for creative work.

That "in between" desire is a normal tendency of an analytical part of mind. You see only two options so your mind tries to find the balance between them. Relying on that part is a problematic and may be misleading in this case, because a) you have no reference and b) one of those is "not that good"*.

When you see a scene in front of you and the outcome of a transformation, or signal diagnostics, you get to see which one is "not that good"*

* - euphemism.

You are already into creative look, those parts don't look neutral compared to real life, and look overdone. The Sony footage is underdone, I was being polite. Creative parts of the mind require analytic mind to guide the creativity. These seem to be normalised to cinema look instead. The mind conditionings itself based on experience and expectations, the same reason people have trouble reasoning, as they see anything past their own coloring as colored, reinterpreting reality to their experience and expectations, reinterpreting and blocking out according to desires. The failings of humans, the con man's paradise. There is neutral and there is what people think is neutral.

I know a singer who listens to horrible degraded, distorted, low fidelity recordings and who's brain fills In this missing details, subconsciously, smoothing over from experience and memory, proclaiming how great the recording was, as if I should hear it like that too. Not putting the memory/experience and the actual hearing side by side in his mind.

Now, yours is a certain creative cinema choice, with too much saturation in places. Your mind may well be comparing it as neutral to that cinema look, rather than the scene. The yellow light through the hair is definitely something most unusual, as is the type of yellow. The level of back light might be rather dull for the eye to see that, or an awfully heavy filter.

However, as below. A lot of people are non cinema and will shot, and it will not go to a colorist apart from themselves, if at all. So, the idea I suggested to adapt the basic look would help those people avoid steps, and even enthusiasts to avoid grading completely. Creative looks are a bit of a red herring, a good neutral/look is all that is needed.

I already did that last year with Sony compact cameras and developed the methodology starting on fragile h.264 4:2:0 material. So far I have covered and individually tested and optimized A7R2, A7S1, A7S2, A6300/A6500.

I was suggesting more generic, that could he used with charts to generate the lut.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

You are already into creative look, those parts don't look neutral compared to real life, and look overdone.

There is no creative look.
Great effort is invested into maintaining neutrality.

I cannot comment to what it "looks" like to you. Put 100 people in the room and you will have 100 interpretations and satisfying each is impossible. These do not even attempt to do that.

I can say what these do and what they do is create a more neutral starting point (4 of them) with improved colorimetry and the rest is up to the colorist.

These seem to be normalised to cinema look instead.

There is no "cinema look" reference to be normalised to.

You are seeing the results when the signal is corrected from deviations. Where reference is measurable colorimetry.

The mind conditionings itself based on experience and expectations,

And you expect something by looking at those images and comment on what it seems like based on what you expect.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

There is no creative look.
Great effort is invested into maintaining neutrality.

I cannot comment to what it "looks" like to you. Put 100 people in the room and you will have 100 interpretations and satisfying each is impossible. These do not even attempt to do that.

I can say what these do and what they do is create a more neutral starting point (4 of them) with improved colorimetry and the rest is up to the colorist.




There is no "cinema look" reference to be normalised to.

You are seeing the results when the signal is corrected from deviations. Where reference is measurable colorimetry.



And you expect something by looking at those images and comment on what it seems like based on what you expect.

Oh Hrvoje, Hrvoje. I'm one of those people that can put my desires to one side and qualitatively look at the image side by side with the original image. That aspergers thing, probably from the 100:1 bumps on the surface of folds of the brain, so store and localise specialist functions (I believe). To us, measurable fact matters, hence truth matters, as place matters. So the truth is the place you hold, the right place. For the wrong, the truth maybe the wrong place they hold. It is interesting that we supposedly have instances where aspergers people identify a place the furniture is located in their minds, and find it upsetting if it is moved. So, the place of the location of truth is important to is.

So, I'm comparing what the scene is compares to the color. Where as everybody that grades a lot might be adjusting to their expected norm. But it right come down to simply how the scene is measured. A simple compare on light color values is not enough, as the eye adjusts to the scene, which changes from scene and over time, and the job of the camera interprets the scene to a way we would see it, as a starring point. So, there is that camera step colorist don't really know., as its some for them.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

Oh Hrvoje, Hrvoje. I'm one of those people that can put my desires to one side and qualitatively look at the image side by side with the original image.

This has nothing to do with you in particular or your abilities.

There is no "original" image you have at hand to compare or particular colour you can use as example. Original image is real life scene few months ago which you have never seen. You have no way of knowing what was the actual color of elements of those scenes. Few minutes later it changed as the sun moved.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

Yet I have often seen the color of the sky, having also regularly looked at the sky to forecast weather (important fojr the business I was in) and am very familiar with the 'genetic' colors of, tomatoes, some plants, fruits, vegetables, some grass, hair skin tones, eyes, certain regulation man made colors, decaying leaves.

But one can reproduce the exact spot checked color and most of the time be wrong, as a scene depends in the dynamic interplay with the accommodation of human visual system and light sources and temperature. Designing a good camera accommodates to making the scene more neutral to the color seen, rather than the color measured. If you shift everything to measured generically, it will look unnatural, instead of how the scene looks as the starting point.

Sorry for the repeats and message last time. I was literally falling asleep during sentences trying to finish it often last night on sleepers.

Thanks for the productive conversation.

 

[Wayne Morellini]

It all has a slight yellow cast to the last batch. As you are in late winter high latitude, mostly low angle of sun, I suspect some yellow ting from light, but not as much once the eye normalises it and different hue of yellow. The blue tarpaulin color shows it.