8 Cinema DNG shots from Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera raw

[thedest]

10 chars!

[jgharding]

There are some good tips there but these are controversial:

 

Those are some stuff they are doing wrong:

 

- STOP using LUTs, Colorista, Magic Bullet, Film Converters etc. Thats for lazy people. If you are investing a lot of money in that awesome camera, please take some time to learn how to use it. Those stuff are useful SOMETIMES, to create a "look" or something like that. Basic color correcting is a FAST process and will ALWAYS give you better results.

 

- Learn how to use the available dynamic range. People are simply throwing away good dynamic range because they cant recover shadow and highlight info.

 

- Learn how to create REAL BLACKS AND WHITES. People are posting videos with only shades of grey. Thats why their videos look like old and faded movies.

 

- Learn how to show your details. Most BMPCCs videos look soft (specially the ProRes videos). This camera captures LOTS of details, but they are not sharpened by the camera - you have to do that in post. Some guys use the "sharpening" tool and some use the "unsharpen mask". Personally I think that both of them suck. There is a better way to do that.

 

- And the most important thing. Stop saying that you "did that because you wanted a cinematic look". Bad grading is not cinematic look. There are only a couple of guys posting "Believable/Natural looks".

 

And thats it! Its pretty easy. You can grade a clip in like 20 seconds once you get the hang of it. And its NOT guess work, its just a matter of bringing back the info. REALLY EASY!

 

Some alternative thoughts:

 

*** The first point i must strongly oppose. Those are tools, and can be used to create any grade or look, from natural to extreme. Looks presets for example are over the top cheese and pretty lazy agreed, but the toolset is incredibly powerful.

 

The fast colour corrector cannot solve all practical issues. You cannot mask, saturate or de-saturate individual tones or areas, re-balance Lift/Gamma Gain, or be subtle with it.

 

The idea that a complicated, full-featured tool with a huge variety of options is for "lazy people" is astounding and I can only assume the judgement comes from looking at amateur uses of these brilliant tools on YouTube and so on, and judging these tools on that. They are all in daily use where I work, all over the place, and to great effect. Blending small amounts of each can create pleasing non-linearities.

 

The tools don't make the look, the user does, within the confines of the tools. Fast correcter is extremely restricted. That confines the look, along with the talent and experience of the user. A combination of Colorista, Looks, Film Convert and LUTs lets you make anything. Don't write it off because some people can't use it. 

 

*** On dynamic range: just because a camera can capture 12 stops or whatever, doesn't mean it's needed in the shot. Sometimes dark shadows are nice. Sometimes high contrast is good. Washed out, un-natural HDR shots are an aesthetic, but not a very nice one if you ask me. 

 

The video you've posted doesn't make good use of dynamic range in my humble opinion. The horses and cars and people and so on are glowing with HDR-style halos. This an example of dynamic range extended with an un-natural aesthetic for its own sake. It isn't believable or natural, or aesthetically pleasing, which appear to be your goals. They're valid goals but they aren't achieved here.

 

Also on the grading monitor I'm watching on, the white isn't that consistent. I think it's close enough personally, I'm not too picky really, but if you're going to criticise the rest of the world...

 

*** Real blacks and whites are uncommon with vintage film stocks. These are popular emulations now. People like emulating film stocks because film stocks look nice and powerful, if they are doing this, "real" black and white are kind of un-necessary.

 

*** The camera does not sharpen itself, but excessive sharpening can lend a camcorder digital feel. Sometimes softer is nicer.

 

*** Some people don't want believable, it's possibl;e to have nice but not "believable" as such.

 

As a final note, many films are intentionally graded with a "print limit" LUT. That is to say, one that removes a huge amount of information because it looks nice. That's what film convert does too. Most blockbusters use this trick. Even ones shot on Kodak film (Man Of Steel is an example).

 

The solution is practicing with all the tools, but if one writes em off or limit your looks to one type, I think one learns slowly.

 

Please don't take offence though, there's room for more than one opinion  B)

[maxotics]

Yes, thedest, please don't take JGharding's post the wrong way!  I know a musician who was very famous a while ago.  About 30 years ago we were talking about the latest synthesizer, I think it was the Yamaha DX7, or something like that, if memory serves.  Anyway, he made a sarcastic comment about Van Halen doing a song that started with the settings the DX7 played with right out of the box.  His point was, how could they spend so much money for the latest equipment and use the canned/auto setting?  My thought was, 'how cool they were find a way to make a great song with what they had and not overthinking it.'  

 

There are so many means and goals in using all this equipment.   Even if one method is the best, you have to remember, that if it takes time away from someone's main focus it reduces the quality there; in short, no matter how much time/expertise you have, compromises are a FACT of creative life--always.  I've NEVER read any artist who said, "I love looking at that thing I did 20 years ago, it's perfect."  Actually, they usually sound like what they did was the worst piece of crap ever!

 

I love your enthusiasm!  I'm so happy you've come to this forum!  Just try to keep in mind that whether some of us are dull in purpose, or just can't help it, we don't want to feel stupid for doing something the wrong way!!! :) :) :)

[thedest]

The fast colour corrector cannot solve all practical issues. You cannot mask, saturate or de-saturate individual tones or areas, re-balance Lift/Gamma Gain, or be subtle with it.

 

The idea that a complicated, full-featured tool with a huge variety of options is for "lazy people" is astounding and I can only assume the judgement comes from looking at amateur uses of these brilliant tools on YouTube and so on, and judging these tools on that. They are all in daily use where I work, all over the place, and to great effect. Blending small amounts of each can create pleasing non-linearities.

 

The tools don't make the look, the user does, within the confines of the tools. Fast correcter is extremely restricted. That confines the look, along with the talent and experience of the user. A combination of Colorista, Looks, Film Convert and LUTs lets you make anything. Don't write it off because some people can't use it. 

 

 

I only use the fast color corrector to do my WB - nothing else. My color correction is made mainly with tonemapping tools - and its far more powerfull than any of those options combined. If you want masks, if you want to saturate or change individual tones, play with gamma/gain you dont need any of those tools. All of that can be made with the stock software. Programs like Premiere Pro have tons of stock plugins.

 

I have yet to see something on Colorista, Looks, Film Convert and LUTs that cannot be done with the basic plugins. All of those tools are made by smart people that want your money. They use the same engine and algorythms of the original software to create easy pre-sets. And most people just add those pre-sets with no fine-tune. Pre-sets will never be optimized for 99% of your scenes - and if you know how to fine tune, you are better off with the basic plugins.

 

 

 

The video you've posted doesn't make good use of dynamic range in my humble opinion. The horses and cars and people and so on are glowing with HDR-style halos. This an example of dynamic range extended with an un-natural aesthetic for its own sake. It isn't believable or natural, or aesthetically pleasing, which appear to be your goals. They're valid goals but they aren't achieved here.

 

Also on the grading monitor I'm watching on, the white isn't that consistent. I think it's close enough personally, I'm not too picky really, but if you're going to criticise the rest of the world...

 

 

 

I may have 3 shots with HDR halos, and that was my mistake - barely noticeable for those that have never played with HDR image. Its pretty easy to remove 100% of the halos. Its just a matter of increasing the shadow/highlight radius. I really like that look though - I can see 2 scenes where I would change it though, because they create a highlight over the subject. Since thats just an exercise, its acceptable. And most of the shots are extremely natural and organic.

 

 

The first thing that I fine tune on all of my videos is the lumma. I always use the full range, so in every single shot I have real whites and blacks. And you dont need a calibrated monitor to tell, just open your Y-Waveform. If your whites are off, there is no doubt that your monitor is not calibrated.

 

 

 

*** Real blacks and whites are uncommon with vintage film stocks. These are popular emulations now. People like emulating film stocks because film stocks look nice and powerful, if they are doing this, "real" black and white are kind of un-necessary.

 

Whats the point of buying a high-end camera in 2014 and simulate a vintage look on 100% of your videos? I can see someone doing that once in a while, but if you do that with all of your videos, I think its just an excuse for those who have no idea how to correct a video. And again, those "film stocks" can also be created with the basic plugins. Those guys create those softwares using basic tools. They just add a new interface - there is nothing new.

 

 

 

*** The camera does not sharpen itself, but excessive sharpening can lend a camcorder digital feel. Sometimes softer is nicer.

 

 

 

As I said, there are lots of tools for sharpening a video. Some of them are better and some are worse. One important thing is that there is no point on delivering a ProRes without sharpening. You are just hiding detal. I have added a great amount of sharpening in my video and its still very organic. And BTW, Im not using "shapening tools" or "unsharpen masks", im using a  "local contrast" tool for the job.

 

 

*** Some people don't want believable, it's possibl;e to have nice but not "believable" as such.

 

 

I agree. I have lots of videos with artistic looks, far from reality. They can have a purpose. But please, 99% of the BMPCC videos look like this:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AzTqbex_YO4

 

That looks like a broken camera. People post this and say: "cinematic grading".

 

If you search for iphone video samples you will see better stuff.

 

 

 

Please don't take offence though, there's room for more than one opinion  B)

 

Not taken. ;)

 

Sorry, but I had to remove my last post. I was invited to do some stuff on another site - the guy who invited me wants to repost some stuff there.

[mtheory]

Hey thedest, I missed the video you posted, can you send me a link through PM?