Blackmagic color

[tomsemiterrific]

With all the hoopla about the new Blackmagic I want to ask opinions on EOSHD about how good their color science is.

I've never use Blackmagic myself, so I'm really curious. I tried the GH5---and really didn't like a WHOLE lot of things about it.

So, how would you compare Blackmagic color to Canon--Panasonic---Nikon---fer instance???

[jonpais]

Let me ask - did you check out the videos on YouTube and Vimeo before posting? Lots of comparisons there as well. Because what others think is probably less important than watching actual videos yourself. 

[tomsemiterrific]

4 hours ago, jonpais said:

Let me ask - did you check out the videos on YouTube and Vimeo before posting? Lots of comparisons there as well. Because what others think is probably less important than watching actual videos yourself. 

Jon, I've seen a few videos, but not any direct comparisons.

Frankly, the larger Blackmagic cinema cams are not interesting to me.

But a smaller cam would be great---as long as the color science is workable. I get good results with Canon--I was just never satisfied with the skin tones with Sony and Panasonic---probably my lack of editing and grading skill.

[Rinad Amir]

has there been any footage posted by bm yet ? 

Sorry am slow at catching up busy this days 

 

 

 

 

[Inazuma]

I've never used or even seen a BM camera myself but I've seen plenty of videos and they have the highest proportion of "omg this looks good" of any videos from consumer cameras I've seen. 

[Anaconda_]

@Rinad Amir There's no official footage yet.

@tomsemiterrific It's hard to say with this new camera, since there's no official samples, but things look like it's going to be great. That said, if you're struggling with grading skills, I don't think this is the camera for you. Unless you're eager to learn grading.

From my understanding, it will need a lot of post processing to get the best out of your image, unless you bake in a LUT. While that's the quickest way to use this camera, in my opinion, it defeats the point in using it in the first place. 

[Axel]

7 minutes ago, Anaconda_ said:

 

@tomsemiterrific It's hard to say with this new camera, since there's no official samples, but things look like it's going to be great. That said, if you're struggling with grading skills, I don't think this is the camera for you. Unless you're eager to learn grading.

I don't think so. I am "struggling with grading skills", but therefore I look forward to getting the BMPCC4k with it's new, improved color science. Because I do love beautiful colors. Take this old Ursa 4k wedding (12 stops DR, shot mostly in 1080 ProRes 60p,  basic CC and a popular BM LUT):

 

[Anaconda_]

@Axel Fair enough. I did say unless you're eager to learn grading. 

But yes, you can do nice things with simple grades too, nice one for sharing that video.

[Bioskop.Inc]

@tomsemiterrific BM's colour science is really good, especially on the P1 & I assume that they will have gone the route of their URSA set of cams for the P2. When recording in their Film Mode (or Log if you prefer) you could pretty much do what you wanted, you don't have to be a genius at grading - just add some contrast & saturation, or whatever your taste is. After numerous firmware updates, their Video Mode was really good if you were in a hurry & just wanted their baked in look (you could push it). One thing I will say is that after shooting loads with the P1, I didn't bother filming in RAW beyond a few tests & some tricky lighting setups. This is because the ProRes HQ coming from the P1 was absolutely stunning - if you didn't have enough latitude in ProRes HQ you simply weren't filming properly, as all you had to do was nail the exposure & in post you could push it by 3 stops either way. The other reason for not shooting RAW was that it produced more noise, M&A, took up way too much HD space & grading took longer. I hope that answers your question & you don't need to be a genius at grading, just shoot/capture your subject properly and the rest is child's play.

[Vision]

@Anaconda_ am thinking to preorder ,i got question ive been editing with Premiere pro since i received my GH5 h264 codec 400mbps etc

will raw workflow be different to my current use with Premiere?

will i have to take extra steps etc? sorry for bein so noob 

 

[Anaconda_]

(Not the new P4K) http://fil.io/FL5i5/Blackmagic Cinema Camera

Years ago, @PeterF shared this link, where you can download RAW files that are straight out of a Blackmagic camera. The workflow will be more or less the same, although filesizes will be bigger due to being 4k. Try playing around with them in Premiere and see how you like it. Although the new camera will give you different images, the workflow will be the same.

As Bioskop.Inc said though, I imagine most of people using this new camera will be shooting in ProRes, which will be usable in any editing suite - perhaps not if you're on windows, but I don't know.

Here, PeterF has shared some 4K ProRes files, but I don't know which BM camera it's from. http://fil.io/FL5kj/Samples from Grant Petty

[Django]

BMD color science has evolved as i believe they were advertising "Color Science 4.0" or something during their launch event.

It's worthy to note they use differently sourced sensors on just about every cam & have had color cast issues with certain sensor batches.

In the end color science isn't really an issue since BMD users mostly shoot Film/Log or Raw and go nuts in DaVinci which is highly optimized for their cams.

[zerocool22]

Yeah apparantly color science 4 is the closest color science to the alexa. I wish they would release it for the UMP already. Its already very close right now though as you can see in the following comparison video. 

 

[cantsin]

BM's color science is top-class because of the camera+Resolve workflow - on the one hand. On the other hand, color science matters less with a 10bit-Log/12bit-Raw camera since you have no baked-in look as with 8bit footage.

The best thing you can do is buy a Color Checker Passport, use it as a clapperboard/reference for every shot that is in different light conditions, and use Resolve's automatic color chart matching function to make colors look 100% natural. 

[heart0less]

To be honest, I really often use Resolve's Color Space Transform effect to change S-Gamut3.Cine to Blackmagic Design Broadcast Film and this makes Sony's Color Science more tolerable, at least to my eyes.

 

 

[Laurier]

The color science is great, a lot of blackmagic footage online is poorly graded or with a bad color balance.

It s good out of the box, with only two main options rec 709 or film if you plan to post produce the shoots, its not like sony where you have a lot of profiles but none are great.

[deezid]

2 hours ago, heart0less said:

To be honest, I really often use Resolve's Color Space Transform effect to change S-Gamut3.Cine to Blackmagic Design Broadcast Film and this makes Sony's Color Science more tolerable, at least to my eyes.

 

 

Try ARRI and it will blow you away then. :D

But indeed. Blackmagic color science is great. Put a curve after the REC709 over it and you're good.

[PannySVHS]

bmcc 2.5k mft mount version will fall even more once bmpcc2 is out. best starter cam for testing out blackmagic color science. put some vmount battery to it and some molltone for shading the monitor and you are set:) I imagine a bmccameras 2.5k with cage and ssd can be found on ebay soon for less than 500usd.

[tomsemiterrific]

Thank you all for your  responses. They are very helpful to me. I'm very comfortable with grading and see that as no concern to me.

What appeals to me is the size of the camera, the Pro Res (I edit with FCPX), and of course it's image capability. I really wish the sensor was super 35

but MFT is not, in and of itself, a deal breaker.

[jonpais]

2 hours ago, tomsemiterrific said:

but MFT is not, in and of itself, a deal breaker.

are you sure about that?

Quote

I tried the GH5---and really didn't like a WHOLE lot of things about it.

such as? 

Quote

a lot of blackmagic footage online is poorly graded or with a bad color balance.

@Laurier why do you think that is?

This seems to contradict what @Inazuma has observed:

Quote

I've seen plenty of videos and they have the highest proportion of "omg this looks good" of any videos from consumer cameras I've seen. 

Quote

Yeah apparantly color science 4 is the closest color science to the alexa.

the colors look way different to my eyes. as in night and day different.