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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 :)

skintone

Zakaree Sandberg

Zakaree Sandberg

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really hoping dragon nails skin tone.. something close to alexa would be wonderful...

just watched a little mini doc on the making of hobbit. kinda sad that the make up artists had to use more red coloring in their makeup just to make the skin tones read normal on camera..
 
Zakaree, if you remember at the time we posted on that issue and it was to do with the colour casts through the 3d mirrors not the camera itself. That said, we always look to improve things. I've been working consistently on improving all aspects of our image, and I hope you enjoy the forthcoming results of that research.

Graeme
 
Thats far from the truth... this been discussed many times before. The saturated set ( and faces of the actors) in the hobbit had nothing to do with the MX sensor but much to do with the fact that they shot 3D trough half transparent mirrors. There are however small differences in mid tone contrast between the alexa and epic but that has more to do with color science and with proper luts and color grading the two are extremely close to identical for resolving color tones.
 
Ironically enough, I felt the skins all looked too red on The Hobbit, as if that makeup correction was not really needed...

Before Bruce Allen jumps at a thread with a name made in heaven for him :-) I think that RED and most other digital cameras have trouble with skin tones precisely because one of digital's strengths over celluloid, namely, a much wider color gamut. Film always renders skin tones consistently and predictably because it renders a considerably narrower palette of colors, thus amalgamating all those tones that digital can actually see, and record, into a more cohesive, "universal" tone if you will. RED's capability to record so many gradations near that spectrum is what results in such different looks from person to person, and take to take. Perhaps Alexa's "magic" resides in bunching together those colors? I don't believe Alexa yields better tones, but agree that they are far more consistent than RED's, which is important and welcome.

I don't know, perhaps one of the prices we have to pay for digital's advantages is having to be more exacting with lighting and make up to get the skin tones we want? Funny thing too is that, given today's preponderance for color grading that glorifies orange looking skins, most Hollywood stuff still shot on film that's undergone this sort of standard grading treatment looks actually worse than the skin tones of a RED or any other good digital camera.
 
There's a number of serious flaws with that Sony diagram, not what they have labeled as 709 and DCI are incorrect. If they can't even get the standards right, I don't place any trust in the accuracy of the rest of the diagram.

Graeme
 
Sometimes after a 7 hour color correction session I walk in the street and feel people have strange skintones ;-)

Reality isn't always what we imagine.

Now I hope no professional camera, nor post-process, will make thinks look good just to get weird DPs (customers) happy.

Pat
 
Thanks Kemalettin! Understood Graeme. It's just a Sony spec doc / claim. Will take it all with some skepticism
 
Graeme Nattress said:
we always look to improve things. I've been working consistently on improving all aspects of our image, and I hope you enjoy the forthcoming results of that research.

Graeme
Click to expand...


Don't doubt it for a minute, as you have proven time and again. Thanks G - always look forward to your on going tweaks to make me look better
;)
Stu Aull
SX199
Alaska
 
Rudi Herbert said:
Ironically enough, I felt the skins all looked too red on The Hobbit, as if that makeup correction was not really needed...

Before Bruce Allen jumps at a thread with a name made in heaven for him :-) I think that RED and most other digital cameras have trouble with skin tones precisely because one of digital's strengths over celluloid, namely, a much wider color gamut. Film always renders skin tones consistently and predictably because it renders a considerably narrower palette of colors, thus amalgamating all those tones that digital can actually see, and record, into a more cohesive, "universal" tone if you will. RED's capability to record so many gradations near that spectrum is what results in such different looks from person to person, and take to take. Perhaps Alexa's "magic" resides in bunching together those colors? I don't believe Alexa yields better tones, but agree that they are far more consistent than RED's, which is important and welcome.

I don't know, perhaps one of the prices we have to pay for digital's advantages is having to be more exacting with lighting and make up to get the skin tones we want? Funny thing too is that, given today's preponderance for color grading that glorifies orange looking skins, most Hollywood stuff still shot on film that's undergone this sort of standard grading treatment looks actually worse than the skin tones of a RED or any other good digital camera.
Click to expand...

Completely disagree on all accounts, respectfully (where are you getting this information from?). Only thing I can agree with here is that I'm sure Graeme is working feverishly to improve the color science, perhaps the largest obstacle in the RED "look". I hope we see these improvements on the next gen sensor.
 
It would be amazing if RedColor4 would work on the current Epic and Scarlet and Red One MX sensors as well. But I don't know much about it. Skin tone is definitely the Red Cameras's Achilles heel, and got many people to consider the Alexa for their shoots. Red Color 3 is quite great - I'm pretty happy with it. But yes, if the skin tone could naturally land on the flesh tone line on the vectorscope with minimal adjustments. But I'm no engineer or anything of that sort and I appreciate the constant improvements Red makes to improve its camera. It's quite amazing.
 
For whatever reason the Alexa has better skin tones and seems to deal with reds much differently (better) than Red cameras and is a big reason a lot of DP's dont like the Red camera, in addition to that damn fan.

I really hope the color rendering, heat management and the black shading process are a big part of the improvements Red is focusing on.
 
I couldn't agree more everyone. Also Red will have to compete potentially with a next generation Alexa camera - so the Dragon hopefully will allow the Red Epic to hold its own in that essence as well. And of course there is 35mm film, which I still crown the king over the Alexa and the Red Epic any day of the week. Too bad most people don't seem to think my way :(
 
Ed David said:
I couldn't agree more everyone. Also Red will have to compete potentially with a next generation Alexa camera - so the Dragon hopefully will allow the Red Epic to hold its own in that essence as well. And of course there is 35mm film, which I still crown the king over the Alexa and the Red Epic any day of the week. Too bad most people don't seem to think my way :(
Click to expand...

Well Ed, you've got one supporter here with me in that. Of course I'm hoping the color science improves greatly very soon here.
 
I'm not going to claim that RED has the best skin tones of all camera formats, it's subjective based on a number of factors anyway. But I would like to see people's comparisons with Alexa, RED, and Sony. And I need RAW files, not DPX (like on cinematography.net) so that it's a fair comparison. So of all the people who feel that these other cameras make better skin tones, please do post your tests. Again, need ArriRaw, R3Ds, and Sony RAW files. Also will need details on lighting and color charts should be included in the files. It's not enough to say that one show looks better than another because you again have a number of factors that go into creating the final look. Since the "Alexa has better skin tones" is stated so many times, I suspect that many people have these tests handy to prove this. Some of the tests I have seen have rendered RED images that look foreign to me. I am not declaring RED a winner here. I just have not seen many people post real comparative tests that include the RAW samples. And one of the reasons I'm asking for ArriRAW is that I believe that if you are going to make it a fair test, you put the camera's best foot forward, so give us ArriRAW.

Anyone have a test like this? Anyone want to go on the record with evidence? Calling Mr. Cioni. Let's get scientific about this. Maybe even let Graeme have a shot at it, to play around with the files and shed some light. This and highlight rolloff are the two things I hear most often about the Alexa's advantages when I'm out in the field, aside from the usual workflow statements.
 
I grade from the R3D RAW files only... not colour baked DPX, not colour baked Pro res, not colour baked H264... I can grade exactly and quickly any skin tone I desire.
People saying they can't get perfect skin tomes from RED is something of a mystery to me.
Not sure why this subject comes up all the time. I can only assume people are trying to grade from compressed color baked codecs and not from the actual RAW files.
 
Mark Toia said:
I grade from the R3D RAW files only... not colour baked DPX, not colour baked Pro res, not colour baked H264... I can grade exactly and quickly any skin tone I desire.
People saying they can't get perfect skin tomes from RED is something of a mystery to me.
Not sure why this subject comes up all the time. I can only assume people are trying to grade from compressed color baked codecs and not from the actual RAW files.
Click to expand...

Somewhat off topic, but how do you handle vfx? Do you grade the r3ds prior to any vfx work? I'm trying to figure out a good workflow.
 
I'll make sure the EFFECT shot is graded from RAW (minus graduated power windows) 3d effects applied to the shot, then final windows vignettes etc re-applied.

If Im working out of ADOBE products (for eg: AE) I'll stay in RAW through all levels of effects & compositing for ultimate control.
 
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