Rendered out 2k from AE brought into FCP and Gamma is way off

[HD Hildebrand]

Hi there,

I rendered out 2k Prores 4444 out of AE and brought that quicktime into FCP to string a number of segments together and sync to audio. Unfortunately doing that caused the Gamma to shift. By bringing it back into FCP the footage is now probably 3 stops too hot. Colour grading looked great coming out of AE, but bringing it back into FCP is where it all fell apart. What the hell? Anybody come across this and is there a solution?

Thanks,
Dale

 

[HD Hildebrand]

anybody?

 

[BradWright]

Hi there,

I rendered out 2k Prores 4444 out of AE and brought that quicktime into FCP to string a number of segments together and sync to audio. Unfortunately doing that caused the Gamma to shift. By bringing it back into FCP the footage is now probably 3 stops too hot. Colour grading looked great coming out of AE, but bringing it back into FCP is where it all fell apart. What the hell? Anybody come across this and is there a solution?

Thanks,
Dale

Try bringing the shot in as Pro Res 4444 to AE then export. If you brought it in as R3D, you might have issues.

 

[Bruce Allen]

I had that problem back in the whole 2001-2007 time period. Got frustrated that Apple didn't care and predicted they wouldn't fix it for a while. Moved to Avid and never looked back.

I think you can fix with a combination of:
- setting FCP preferences right (in multiple places)
- setting Quicktime preferences right
- setting After Effects preferences right
- using different codecs (RGB codecs such as Animation vs YUV codecs vs image sequences sometimes give different results, depending on FCP version)
- editing the clip properties

This combination of settings you needed to get things right kept changing with every version of FCP. In the end I just gave up, bought Media Composer and used DNxHD.

Anyone care to step forward with a solution?

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Daniel Crooks]

also make sure you're working in at least 16bit in AE. 8bit and Prores can sometimes play wierd.

 

[Daniel Crooks]

and also remember to select 'none' in the automatic gamma correction output settings from AE

 

[HD Hildebrand]

Exporting ProRes 4444 out of AE seems to be the culprit.


4444 has a gamma shift and is brighter
Animation has a gamma shift and is brighter (as bad as 4444)
PJPEG has a gamma shift and is brighter (as bad as 4444)
Uncompressed has a slight gamma shift and is slightly brighter
422(HQ) with 444 checked gamma seems good (if not spot on)
422(HQ) (444 unchecked) is the same as 422(HQ) with 444 checked