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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 :)

NEW TO RED? A few things to think about

Thanks!

Thanks!

This is my 1st post as I am eagerly anticipating my 1st RED. I pre-ordered the Scarlet-W back in December and this information is very helpful. Thanks to you and the entire RED community!!:seeya:
 
David Battistella said:
In terms of white balance, if you forgot to white balance, no problem, you can always white balance after the fact with no penalty. What do I mean by that, well, if you shot something Tungsten on another camera and really wanted Daylight, you have to move the whole color matrix of colors in a burned in file. With RED you can select the white balance as the last phase of post if you like.
Click to expand...
Speaking as a colorist who's done this nutty job for more than 35 years, I would caution newcomers not to do this and instead light and shoot at the correct desired color temperature. If you try to force white balancing after the fact, the image tends to spike in different directions and winds up with a lot of ugly noise issues and contaminated color.

The native color temperature of the camera is 5000°, and the best pictures I've seen from Red generally are those that lean more in that direction -- as with standard 5400° film lighting gear. When in doubt, shoot tests and see for yourself.
 
here is the only place im confused and im doing tests to figure out what means what really and it stemmed from me wanting to shoot only the prores option for a client that wanted to walk away with just prores basic colored footage, not flat log footage…so when i really got into the menus im like wow, whats doing what?

probably a simple explanation but im not really getting it from anyone, until my next shoot where i can get the dit to break it down but it will be also confusing for the new red owners.

so, first you keep mentioning redlogfilm, but my camera is defaulted to redgamma4, i did a test in QT only and obviously redlogfilm is way flatter, but is redgamma4 flat enough for the normal commercial production, why would you go with one and not the other?

then let me skip back, in the video look settings you have 3 things: graded, dragoncolo2 and redgamma4 defaults

so graded, im not sure what turning that to something different does.
dragincolor2, i guess that is what im looking at, what im sending out to clients, etc.
redgamma4, that is what im capturing the files as, right? so this is the only one that matters for capturing right?

then what is the best settings for shooting redcode+quicktime and the monitor display looks good and the QT is flat log
what is the setting for redcode only and the monitor looks good and the raw is flat log
what is it for QT only and you want flat log for heavy grading
what is it for QT only and you want a bit of color for just a basic correction

funny, ive been shooting with red for 10 years and as a dp this was just always set up by my dit.
all i cared about was lighting and the histograms :)
 
Last edited:
Marc Wielage said:

Speaking as a colorist who's done this nutty job for more than 35 years, I would caution newcomers not to do this and instead light and shoot at the correct desired color temperature. If you try to force white balancing after the fact, the image tends to spike in different directions and winds up with a lot of ugly noise issues and contaminated color.

The native color temperature of the camera is 5000°, and the best pictures I've seen from Red generally are those that lean more in that direction -- as with standard 5400° film lighting gear. When in doubt, shoot tests and see for yourself.
Click to expand...

I always wanted to inquire about this Marc. I sense that one would not get the best results lighting with Tungsten lights and a Red Camera. Do you think that's an accurate statement? I am still waiting for my Scarlet W. I generally like to use Tungsten and I am really worried about that with RED. I've seen some test footage online that made me believe that. You're input would be appreciated.
 
Marc Wielage said:

...

The native color temperature of the camera is 5000°, and the best pictures I've seen from Red generally are those that lean more in that direction -- as with standard 5400° film lighting gear. When in doubt, shoot tests and see for yourself.
Click to expand...
Maybe you or Jake can talk about this as colorists, but I've had trouble grading when the lights I was using had "spikey" spectrums. With Phil's help I've moved to Hive Plasma which is just making everything so clean, but as a newb I've ran into all sorts of pitfalls on aligning the lights spectrum to red sensor - making it hard to correct in grading.
 
Mark,

thats a bit different than the point I am making so let me clarify. I think you are saying that it is best to light and shoot red at daylight color temperatures because the native color balance of the sensor is 5000kelvin. I agree with this approach.

What I was getting at was more the fact that if you shot on another camera at 5600k in a 3200k environment, then your web would be burned in and you'd have different color spikes thing to correct for that.

if you did this with RED you could White balance after the fact. The Tungsten/daylight argument went away with the dragon sensor as the dragon performs really well under tungsten lighting compared to previous models and color science.

This said, I can see the two sides of the coin and the sensor and color science is sharper and crisper and a bit more accurate under daylight, but I would no longer say you can't shoot tungsten.

David


Marc Wielage said:

Speaking as a colorist who's done this nutty job for more than 35 years, I would caution newcomers not to do this and instead light and shoot at the correct desired color temperature. If you try to force white balancing after the fact, the image tends to spike in different directions and winds up with a lot of ugly noise issues and contaminated color.

The native color temperature of the camera is 5000°, and the best pictures I've seen from Red generally are those that lean more in that direction -- as with standard 5400° film lighting gear. When in doubt, shoot tests and see for yourself.
Click to expand...
 
PatrickFaith said:
Maybe you or Jake can talk about this as colorists, but I've had trouble grading when the lights I was using had "spikey" spectrums. With Phil's help I've moved to Hive Plasma which is just making everything so clean, but as a newb I've ran into all sorts of pitfalls on aligning the lights spectrum to red sensor - making it hard to correct in grading.
Click to expand...

plus 1 on this.

There are a plethora of cheap lighting that contributes to these kinds of problems and weird color spikes, lens coatings and filters can be problematic as well.
 
David,

Here's another thing to think about: the RED camera offers more degrees of freedom than most people have experience using. A new RED owner who is confident and capable with regard to one set of skills may have forgotten how long it took to develop those skills, and naïvely assume that all the other options will work as easily as when they are solidly in their wheelhouse. This is not the camera's fault: skills take practice and patience to build. Knowing how to get good slow-motion footage (by balancing frame rate, shutter angle, compression ratios, etc) is as much a skill as reading and responding to a histogram display or balancing lighting ratios or choosing the right lens.
 
Marc Wielage said:



The native color temperature of the camera is 5000°, and the best pictures I've seen from Red generally are those that lean more in that direction -- as with standard 5400° film lighting gear. When in doubt, shoot tests and see for yourself.
Click to expand...

As much as this is absolutely true for the MX sensors, not so for the Dragon sensors. I don't know what they put in the secret sauce in the sensor, but weather you light with tungsten or daylight, you will have the same result now. The Dragon sensor has definitely been improved in the tungsten side of things.
 
Daylight is always a bit crisper with digital sensors because they tend to be natively around 5000K and above. But what Daniel says is true and in my first Tungsten tests with Dragon it was a huge difference from MX and RED ONE M before that.

David
 
any answers on this???

jordan levy said:
here is the only place im confused and im doing tests to figure out what means what really and it stemmed from me wanting to shoot only the prores option for a client that wanted to walk away with just prores basic colored footage, not flat log footage…so when i really got into the menus im like wow, whats doing what?

probably a simple explanation but im not really getting it from anyone, until my next shoot where i can get the dit to break it down but it will be also confusing for the new red owners.

so, first you keep mentioning redlogfilm, but my camera is defaulted to redgamma4, i did a test in QT only and obviously redlogfilm is way flatter, but is redgamma4 flat enough for the normal commercial production, why would you go with one and not the other?

then let me skip back, in the video look settings you have 3 things: graded, dragoncolo2 and redgamma4 defaults

so graded, im not sure what turning that to something different does.
dragincolor2, i guess that is what im looking at, what im sending out to clients, etc.
redgamma4, that is what im capturing the files as, right? so this is the only one that matters for capturing right?

then what is the best settings for shooting redcode+quicktime and the monitor display looks good and the QT is flat log
what is the setting for redcode only and the monitor looks good and the raw is flat log
what is it for QT only and you want flat log for heavy grading
what is it for QT only and you want a bit of color for just a basic correction

funny, ive been shooting with red for 10 years and as a dp this was just always set up by my dit.
all i cared about was lighting and the histograms :)
Click to expand...
 
jordan levy said:
here is the only place im confused and im doing tests to figure out what means what really and it stemmed from me wanting to shoot only the prores option for a client that wanted to walk away with just prores basic colored footage, not flat log footage…so when i really got into the menus im like wow, whats doing what?

probably a simple explanation but im not really getting it from anyone, until my next shoot where i can get the dit to break it down but it will be also confusing for the new red owners.

so, first you keep mentioning redlogfilm, but my camera is defaulted to redgamma4, i did a test in QT only and obviously redlogfilm is way flatter, but is redgamma4 flat enough for the normal commercial production, why would you go with one and not the other?
Click to expand...

I don't have my cameras right in front of me, so cannot answer some of the following questions below with a specific sequence of menu selections, but I can answer the question above. RedLogFilm will preserve most of the dynamic range your sensor has to offer. It will also preserve most of the precision your sensor has to offer. RedGamma4 (and other gamma choices) will dramatically reduce dynamic range and precision as it finalizes the image to best fit what the end-user's eyes want to see on a conventional 8-bit display. Delivering RedGamma4 clips to a client is not a whole lot different than what most video people have been delivering to video clients for years: a relatively final product ready for legalization and broadcast. It is not, however, what digital cinema clients have come to expect however. Digital cinema folks want lots of room to grade, whether for creative or corrective reasons. RedLogFilm (and most other LOG formats) deliver that.

then let me skip back, in the video look settings you have 3 things: graded, dragoncolo2 and redgamma4 defaults

so graded, im not sure what turning that to something different does.
dragincolor2, i guess that is what im looking at, what im sending out to clients, etc.
redgamma4, that is what im capturing the files as, right? so this is the only one that matters for capturing right?
Click to expand...

Again, I don't have my camera in front of me, but DragonColor2 is what video people know as the color matrix. RedGamma4 is what they know as the gamma curve.

then what is the best settings for shooting redcode+quicktime and the monitor display looks good and the QT is flat log
what is the setting for redcode only and the monitor looks good and the raw is flat log
what is it for QT only and you want flat log for heavy grading
what is it for QT only and you want a bit of color for just a basic correction
Click to expand...

"Best" setting for recording flat log to QT is the appropriate color matrix (DragonColor for less saturated, DragonColor2 for more saturated, especially blue), and a RedLogFilm gamma. You choose whether you want ProResHQ or ProRes4444 XQ depending on how much compression you want.

REDCODE is not a color matrix or a gamma curve, it is a compression setting. REDCODE 8:1 should be fine; REDCODE 5:1 is exceptional. REDCODE 10-13 can work well, if you are not shooting a highly detailed scene.

For QT only and heavy grading, you still need to pick a color matrix and a white balance, but RedLogFilm is again the best gamma. Exposure is important, but you can miss by a stop or so without terrible results.

For QT only and light grading, you need to pick a color matrix and a white balance, and you need to be very dead-on with exposure, and start with RedGamma4, choosing other settings if you prefer other gamma curves.
 
Michael Tiemann said:
I don't have my cameras right in front of me, so cannot answer some of the following questions below with a specific sequence of menu selections, but I can answer the question above. RedLogFilm will preserve most of the dynamic range your sensor has to offer. It will also preserve most of the precision your sensor has to offer. RedGamma4 (and other gamma choices) will dramatically reduce dynamic range and precision as it finalizes the image to best fit what the end-user's eyes want to see on a conventional 8-bit display. Delivering RedGamma4 clips to a client is not a whole lot different than what most video people have been delivering to video clients for years: a relatively final product ready for legalization and broadcast. It is not, however, what digital cinema clients have come to expect however. Digital cinema folks want lots of room to grade, whether for creative or corrective reasons. RedLogFilm (and most other LOG formats) deliver that.



Again, I don't have my camera in front of me, but DragonColor2 is what video people know as the color matrix. RedGamma4 is what they know as the gamma curve.



"Best" setting for recording flat log to QT is the appropriate color matrix (DragonColor for less saturated, DragonColor2 for more saturated, especially blue), and a RedLogFilm gamma. You choose whether you want ProResHQ or ProRes4444 XQ depending on how much compression you want.

REDCODE is not a color matrix or a gamma curve, it is a compression setting. REDCODE 8:1 should be fine; REDCODE 5:1 is exceptional. REDCODE 10-13 can work well, if you are not shooting a highly detailed scene.

For QT only and heavy grading, you still need to pick a color matrix and a white balance, but RedLogFilm is again the best gamma. Exposure is important, but you can miss by a stop or so without terrible results.

For QT only and light grading, you need to pick a color matrix and a white balance, and you need to be very dead-on with exposure, and start with RedGamma4, choosing other settings if you prefer other gamma curves.
Click to expand...

Thank you michael, very very helpful.
so no matter what, if im shooting raw redcode then i will have a raw flat image in the r3d and any settings in this menu only are effecting the QT file. right?
and the default setting redgamma4 is so that when i am shooting raw and QT, my QT file will have some what of a corrected look, just ready to edit with no LUT needed really.
and if i do want the prores to be flat, then change that to redlogfilm.
right?
and i wonder what the first selection does, its defaulted to "graded"
thanks a million, i bet this helps a lot of people!
 
Bryan Coward said:
This is my 1st post as I am eagerly anticipating my 1st RED. I pre-ordered the Scarlet-W back in December and this information is very helpful. Thanks to you and the entire RED community!!:seeya:
Click to expand...


Welcome to REDUSER. Hope to see you around here for a while. Enjoy !

David
 
I think that you might see the ability to burn in LUTs to QT files in a future release. Still I think it would be a bit safer to burn in REDGAMMA 3 as it leaves a bit of room compared to RG4.

David



jordan levy said:
Thank you michael, very very helpful.
so no matter what, if im shooting raw redcode then i will have a raw flat image in the r3d and any settings in this menu only are effecting the QT file. right?
and the default setting redgamma4 is so that when i am shooting raw and QT, my QT file will have some what of a corrected look, just ready to edit with no LUT needed really.
and if i do want the prores to be flat, then change that to redlogfilm.
right?
and i wonder what the first selection does, its defaulted to "graded"
thanks a million, i bet this helps a lot of people!
Click to expand...
 
Quick question - is there a way to delete individual clips one by one on the camera or must you always do a full card format? I'm a newbie to RED so wasn't sure, thanks in advance
 
You cannot delete individual clips. The only way to delete clips is to format the whole card.

As to the reason why, I know it has something to do with the way the data is formatted but someone more knowledgable than me can fully answer that.
 
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