Please enlighten me on some basics

[Phil Bates]

Now that I finally have my camera, I find myself trying to play catch up with understanding color space issues that I have not faced before. I am trying to make sense of the Red histogram, Rec 709, Linear vs. Log, etc. Here are my questions:

1. From my understanding, the histogram and traffic lights shown on the LCD monitor do not really represent what is clipping on the sensor, correct? Also, that same histogram represents a Rec 709 interpretation of the of the raw data, like a curve applied to give a more workable color representation to work from. Am I right so far?

2. So, when I import the clips into RedCine, I see the same basic color space that I saw on the monitor when shooting, and it defaults to the Rec 709 gamma curve. I understand that I can see the actual raw sensor data by clicking on the "Color" button on the top bar. And, as I would expect, I see that the highlights don't clip as bad as I thought. So, my question is this: If I determine that I don't like the clipped highlights that are built into the metadata, and would rather color correct from the untouched raw image, how do I get there? I can't seem to color correct from the image I see when selecting the "Color" button. The only way I know of to restore the lost highlights is to use the Exposure control. Is this correct?

3. What is the maximum number of clips I can have active in Redcine?

4. When I see film reels instead of thumbnail images, does that indicate a broken link? How do I re-link?

5. When I look at the Shot metadata, it shows 24fps. Nothing I shot was at that frame rate. Is there an actual record of the real frame rate? Where is it?

Thanks for your patience and your help.

Phil
www.artbeats.com

 

[Cail Young]

1. From my understanding, the histogram and traffic lights shown on the LCD monitor do not really represent what is clipping on the sensor, correct? Also, that same histogram represents a Rec 709 interpretation of the of the raw data, like a curve applied to give a more workable color representation to work from. Am I right so far?

Correct; more accurately all the on-board monitoring is post-LUT which is by default Rec709 but can be modified through the Video menu.

2. So, when I import the clips into RedCine, I see the same basic color space that I saw on the monitor when shooting, and it defaults to the Rec 709 gamma curve. I understand that I can see the actual raw sensor data by clicking on the "Color" button on the top bar. And, as I would expect, I see that the highlights don't clip as bad as I thought. So, my question is this: If I determine that I don't like the clipped highlights that are built into the metadata, and would rather color correct from the untouched raw image, how do I get there? I can't seem to color correct from the image I see when selecting the "Color" button. The only way I know of to restore the lost highlights is to use the Exposure control. Is this correct?

It's the easiest way. If you're looking to save highlights, expose down and use the curve or the Brightness/Shadow sliders to get the rest of the exposure in the right place.

3. What is the maximum number of clips I can have active in Redcine?

Lots. I haven't hit any limit yet (loading 100+ clips), but depending on how much RAM you have (theres some black magic involved here) you might have trouble rendering out projects with more than 50000 frames or so. YMMV.

4. When I see film reels instead of thumbnail images, does that indicate a broken link? How do I re-link?

Yes, it's a broken link. There is no re-link function at the moment; hopefully that's fixed in the new build of REDCINE coming "soon". It is possible to rename hard drives etc to get the R3Ds back where they should be.

5. When I look at the Shot metadata, it shows 24fps. Nothing I shot was at that frame rate. Is there an actual record of the real frame rate? Where is it?

Another bug. Did you shoot 25fps? or 23.98? Or are you talking about varispeed? As far as I'm aware varispeed rates aren't recorded (I'd love to be wrong!) but if you were shooting with a base rate of 25fps REDCINE ignores that. The correct rate is in the camera-generated proxies if you need to double-check.

 

[Phil Bates]

Thanks Cail!

On the last question, yes I was using varispeed. That's probably why the frame rates aren't captured.

Thanks again,
Phil
http://www.artbeats.com