lowlight...

I had gone out two days ago to check out some waterfalls. I did a little shooting there to see how the TrueColor preset looked to me. I had done some test shooting with it the day before outside my house, but I wanted a more natural seeing to see what I thought. At the falls, I used "FACTORY", "AC PREF1", "PANALOOK", and "TrueColor" with no filters except built-in ND and manual white balance.

After I got back from the falls, I reviewed the footage and noticed the the TrueColor did unfortunately have a slight blue cast. The waterfall had a more blue cast than the other presets, but more telling were the greens. The leaves just weren't right, they looked more green-blue. While we were there, I got my wife to take some images with her Canon XTi for comparison. These were a reference for the color. So between our memory and the images from the SLR, I feel that the blue is defiantly the thing that is off.

I think the preset could be very good and accurate if the blue cast effect and blacks could be worked out. I will readily admit that I don't have the knowledge to do this, but would hope that someone who had the skills and time would tackle this preset. It is just so close to being a new standard. I really like idea of having a workflow that allows me to capture the footage neutrally, then give it the look I want in post. I have used "VIVIDRGB" in the past (with a lower color gain), but I've come to think it looks artificial. At this time "PANALOOK" is preset I find is the most useful for now, but I think that a neutral preset would be the best. As a side note, I do not believe "FACTORY" is neutral. Overall it looks too warm to me.

Personal taste, but I think 12db is too noisy to begin with. And then trying to CC it in post showing mucho grain doesn't surprise me...

May I suggest going back to your den where you shot "lowlight", turn on your practicals (tv and what not) and just try comparing 3db and 6db with TrueColor.

Then do the same test with True Color but adjust the blacks so they are not quite so pressed (less Black). Yes it will still be darker than the VX, but I think the colors are way more more full and rich than the VX, and "it is an accurate image of a dark den". But now with almost no noise.

Just my opinion - Lonnie

There was an admitted error on the True Color setting, there's been suggestions on what to change to correct the "blue". And even Steven Dempsey, author of Vividrgb noticed the blacks are too crushed.

I personally think somewhere between True and Vivid lies a great lowlight solution with only 3db of gain that'll still be cinematic and full of non-noisy rich colors...

Dennis,
Tomorrow is my day to put the A1 through some lowlight tests, but I have a technical question... when you are adjusting presets in the camera menu's, and while hooked up to a monitor or computer (on Location), do you get instant realtime feedback with each click of an adjustment?

and if so, i'm assuming most single clicks within a parameter are so subtle, you probably have to go from one extreme to the other just to see what you are looking for (or what this particular button is adjusting) to begin with... is this accurate or make sense?

thanks,
Lonnie

Bill, check your WB again and the settings, there is no blue cast in TC, it's made to be as neutral as possible.

Let me know...

Paolo, the only way I've found to get a correct WB with this preset is to use a warm card... well of course short of tweaking the preset, which I may do once I can find the time.

It seems others have encountered the slight blue cast as well. So I know it's not my eyes getting funky :)

Yes you get real time changes on your monitor

rajiv

Thank you Rajiv... yes I just started playing a little more seriously and I realized while you look at the menu of parameter preset changes, then select one to adjust, the camera intentionally loses the menu grid, so you can view the changes on the little lcd while adjusting... good stuff!

Now to hook it up to a larger monitor and play :)

Thanks for getting back,
Lonnie

I don't really know what I am doing with this yet or whether I have compromised the goal of Truecolor by trying this, but setting white balance to 6000 K certainly gets rid of the blue bias. The granite cliffs, pines, and late winter colors outside my window end up looking pretty good.

Pat

First of all guys, make sure that you check your preset because it was corrected a day after being posted. Pat, setting white balance to 6000K on a sunny day with blue sky sounds about right where it should be. White balance using a DSC chart is as accurate as it gets, so Paolo's WB was almost certainly correct during testing. This showed in my own tests with the Ambi2 where I white balanced to the rear projection screen itself (about 3200K). The blacks in this preset are crushed, and I have not attempted to pull detail in post....there is some room there for tweaking for sure.

Connecting the camera to a monitor is a great way to play with presets, but don't forget that dynamic contrast and calibration are important. Using a program like OnLocation (on one of the newer 1920x1200 pixel laptops) which displays color bars and has a blue function will allow you to calibrate the display reasonably well.

Bill, my one suggestion would be to check with Patrick Moreau over at stillmotion.ca as they've been using 2 or 3 XH-A1s extensively over the last year for primarily wedding work. They've got a long list of awards using the XH-A1 with our Brevis adapter. (http://www.cinevate.com/website/index.php/showcase) The XH-A1 in low light is noisy and is at 12db, in my opinion, terrible. Definitely look at using NR1 in your preset, or adding it to this one. It will have no effect at all on color, exposure, or WB. Don't use NR2 unless your subjects are motionless.

Definitely look at using NR1 in your preset, or adding it to this one. It will have no effect at all on color, exposure, or WB. Don't use NR2 unless your subjects are motionless.

Actually Dennis, you've got it backwards. It's NR1 that causes ghosting... in all three settings. NR2, I believe, can be just as destructive if set above the 1 setting. Anything higher & it's similar to applying skin detail on the whole frame.

The XH-A1 in low light is noisy and is at 12db, in my opinion, terrible.

Just a note, all HDV cameras show quite a bit of noise in dark situations, the compression at 4:2:0 creates a lot of "dancing pixels". This is true for cameras that costs several times the price of the A1, like the XDCAM. Gain, IMHO, should almost never be used. In fact I completely disabled the gain on my HD100 since it was too easy to flip the external switch by mistake and have the footage ruined.
If you are shooting something fairly static, last week I taped a user's meeting, basically talking heads, and there is no way of adding lights of your own, you can use slower frame rates, 24fps instead of 30, and drop the shutter at 1/24. The easiest way of getting clean "boosted" signal. Be careful with those pans :)

I finally got to try this preset out, and it has become my new favorite. Low light was great. Also, I did not notice the issue with the Blue as others have mentioned. I did a short shoot last night, indoors and outdoors in overcast here in Portland and it looks wonderful.
Thanks!!!
Luke

Hi Luke, glad it works for you.

I find that I still prefer leaving Gamma at CineGamma 2 for projects that I like to treat as film (I use Gamma 1 for "film footage" going to someone else for their project, as Gamma 2 does require some correction for tv viewing). I also leave the master pedestal at 0, as I don't want to risk clipping -- but do have the set-up level down to -4, and sharpening at -4.

However, what I glean from this preset is the colors themselves. I have never seen such great looking footage from this camera as I have when using these colors. True to form, no exaggeration -- I believe this IS the film look; natural colors. Video is infamous for exaggerating reds and blues, and this gets it just about right.

For me, that is the attraction of this preset. No need to tweak anything, because I want real colors in the first place. Any tweaks in color I want I'll achieve with color temperature adjustments in white balance and lighting.

So which preset is the one without the blue cast?

There is only one version and it doesn't have blue cast, not in my tests and in several people's results. I don't think we have found why some cameras show that phenomenon. Skintones are actually the reference point for TrueColor, see my description of the process in the 3 articles about the HD100 version. Regardless the type of camera the procedure is the same for all versions and it starts with setting the skin tones as a reference (red and yellow chips in the vectorscope). Natural skintones are probably the strongest feature of TrueColor.

Pat, the white balance should be set using the usual method of manual WB with a white card. There should be no compensation for blue as TrueColor is meant to be neutral. White balance is not affected by TrueColor so that is something that has to be adjusted shot by shot.

Paolo, is there a color or two in the preset I can adjust to try and get the slight blueness out I'm seeing? I'm not sure which ones to even try to experiment with. I really like this preset, btw. If I could work out the slight blueness, it would be my go-to preset.

Christopher, did you WB balance the camera using a neutral card?

Christopher, did you WB balance the camera using a neutral card?

I used the white area of a Photovision One Shot Digital Target to manually set my white balance. I zoomed in enough for that area to fill my entire view.

A question for Paolo. Could you tell as you were setting up the preset if the Knee, Black, Pedestal, and Setup parameters had any effect on the preset's color?

I know these parameters *should* only affect luma and not chroma but I don't necessarily know that that's the case. The reason I ask is because I'm very interested in the accurate, neutral color of your preset but would like to tweak it for more dynamic range (Black stretch, low Knee etc). I would test this myself but I don't have accurate charts.

Thanks in advance.

Juan

Hi Juan.
While the pedestal and knee usually work only in the "extremes" of the luma, extreme adjustments will affect the colors. For example, setting the knee too low will affect skin tones and colors that are in that range, like beige.
For the pedestal you risk to wash out the image when you go too far. Part of the film look is the richness of the blacks, that is my bias in setting these scene files.

Paolo. I'v been playing around with your preset for several days now and like many other people I like it. But I also notice the following:
I am trying a few tweaks via shooting, capturing, rendering, burn it to DVD and look at it at my LCD TV. Result: Pictures on the LCD screen of the cam look bad, pictures on my copmputer screen look very good, playing the DVD on an old CRT screen looks to red and playing the DVD on my LCD TV looks good for the colors but a little to dark. I would like more brilliant pictures and it could be somewhat softer for my likings. Newscast on that same LCD TD look very brilliant and naturally. What should I do?

Paolo, is there a color or two in the preset I can adjust to try and get the slight blueness out I'm seeing? I'm not sure which ones to even try to experiment with. I really like this preset, btw. If I could work out the slight blueness, it would be my go-to preset.

Does anyone have an idea of how to deal with the slight blue cast? I really have no idea of what settings to even try to experiment with. Should I just use it as is and try to warm in post? Any suggestions of how I might begin adjusting the preset?

Also while I'm at it, any thoughts on the Black and Knee? Are the current settings looking good for most people?

Any feedback would be appreciated.

When I use the True Color preset I don't get a blue cast. I really believe in order to get such a blue cast you are either not WB correctly or often enough. I know id you are shooting outdoors the color of light changes continuously and you have to stay after the WB. I mean really stay after it if you want correct or perhaps consistent colors in your video. I don't know a lot about these presets bt this True Color one is simply great for me, always consistant and allowing post changes to be applied uniformally to all video shot using it. As for the crushing of the blacks, I just don't see a big difference when adjusting this preset as some have suggested. White balance is a friend and will save you a lot of grief if you use it often.

When I use the True Color preset I don't get a blue cast. I really believe in order to get such a blue cast you are either not WB correctly or often enough. I know if you are shooting outdoors the color of light changes continuously and you have to stay after the WB. I mean really stay after it if you want correct or perhaps consistent colors in your video. I don't know a lot about these presets but this True Color one is simply great for me, always consistant and allowing post changes to be applied uniformally to all video shot using it. As for the crushing of the blacks, I just don't see a big difference when adjusting this preset as some have suggested. White balance is a friend and will save you a lot of grief if you use it often.

When I use the True Color preset I don't get a blue cast. I really believe in order to get such a blue cast you are either not WB correctly or often enough.

Maybe saying how you white balanced as an example would have been helpful. As I stated earlier, I used the white portion of a Photovision One Shot Digital Target to fill the screen.

About a hour ago ago, I went outside and did some testing. I white balanced with the target using the white area only, next grey area only, and finally the entire target. Next I brought the footage into Vegas to see the results. The white only still had a very slight blue cast, but the grey and the combo looked correct. That made me happy. I would be curious if someone could give a reason on why I got those results. Why would the grey work better than the white?

As far as the blacks are concerned, I appreciate your feedback on that. I think they did look ok. I did another test changing the Black from Press to Middle. I liked the results and thought that it allowed the image to look not as dark. Also, it seemed to let me open the aperture a little more.

Chris, I am talking about white balancing with a white card placed in the light that will light your shoot. I believe the card you are referring to, the Photovision One Shot, allows you to white balance as well as metering and exposure monitoring by viewing the camera's histogram function. However I would try WB using a card or bright white piece of paper placed in the light falling on the subject. The histogram won't help you here but if you learn to rely on it and use for example this true color preset your results will be predictible as well as consistant. At least I believe so.

Phil

Phil, are you suggesting that the photovision target will not work? I would trust the target far more than a random piece of white paper.

BTW, what white card do you use? Can you give me a link? I'm curious if Paolo Ciccone could recommend a target that would work well with his preset.

Side Note: I had been considering getting the WhiBal Gray card.

This is the kind of card I was referring to. http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?A=details&Q=&is=REG&O=productlist&sku=300868

The grey cards tell the camera how much to expose to get a representation of 18% grey. The WB tells the camera what the color of the light is that is lighting your subject. I'm not suggesting the Photovision will not work. I have never used one but I will say the colors I have managed over the years have been pretty spectacular and accurate (Outdoor Documentaries) and my efforts have relied on WB using a card and balancing often. I'm simply saying try a white balance the way I have suggested and see if it doesn't solve your blue cast problem. I'm betting it will.

Greetings Everyone,

I am using a professional WB chart and manually white balancing. I am still getting a slight blue cast. I was able to remove some blue via the custom presets. This blue cast is noticable in ALL color temperatures except under tungsten lighting......which makes sense.

Lou, would you mind sharing what presets corrected the blue cast?

in rereading this it sounds like I actually know what I'm talking about - that's highly unlikely
No, that's exactly it. I suggest to look also at my post about 32-bit color manipulation to get a confirmation of why the process works. Our cameras capture at 8-bits per channel. Setting the camera to capture a neutral image causes the device to use the most out of those poor 8 bits. Once in post you gain in using this approach by being able to tweak those colors, in 32 bit mode, extensively. On the other hand, if you create the look in camera you will not be able to modify much because the look has removed some parts of the spectrum that you cannot re-gain. I'm gonna post something to clarify this concept later on my blog.

All right, there are enough posts about the blue casts. If there is anyone in the SF bay area, I live in Santa Cruz, that has an A1 with blue cast please contact me via PM. We can arrange a meeting and calibrate the A1 to avoid that shift in color. It seems to me that there are two versions of the color matrix in this camera and one is not the same that I used to create TrueColor.

I just looked at the count. We had more than 6,000 views for this thread in a little more than 10 days! Holy cow!

Paolo,
I think it still could be the erroneous first posting of the preset, that is still plaguing people...

I see. OK, so, if you are using the premade files please verify the parameters after you load it with the version that is posted on my website. Is there a way of deleting the first file posted?

Is truecolor the new king? After Vividrgb?
No it's not, you tried to bring the A1 in color to the JVC. Like the German settings tried to bring the A1 in color with the Sony pd150. Over the top with correcting (+ 40 0r -50..) and looking at the scope, but with black press on.

I don't like this approach, maximal latitude is not with compressed blacks. You really think they have no scope in Canons laboratory? You think that true color is something that exist?

A hype.

I
... you tried to bring the A1 in color to the JVC.

No, that was not what I did. I used an radio-spectrometer calibrated chart to obtain an objective reading of the camera and made adjustments from there. There was no connection with the JVC HD100.


I don't like this approach

Nobody is forcing you to use it. I gave this to people to freely use it and test it. Part of doing this and using the Web is to gain peer review. So far you are the only one who had anything negative to say about it.


You really think they have no scope in Canons laboratory?

I have no idea how Canon works or what kind of procedures they use in calibrating the cameras. I know this though: when I released TrueColor for the HD100 it got immediately adopted worldwide by hundreds of shooters. The results they got where much more improved compared to the standard settings. And you would think that JVC has vectorscopes as well. When the HD200 came out JVC asked me to make a TrueColor configuration for the new camera, which uses a different processor. You would think that they have enough expertise, people and equipment to do it themselves and they do but there are evidently other consideration or they would not have provided a full HD250 plus lens to me for a month to come up with the configuration.

It's a well know fact in the industry that all high-end cameras need calibration. See the DSC website for articles about it. In fact ,the DSC Labs charts are used in the industry, both TV and Film, exactly because cameras require calibration. Even expensive ones like the Varicam or the F900. See also "Digital Moviemaking" by Scott Billups for detailed information why this is a reality. You would think that a camera that costs $100,000 would be perfectly ready to go out of the box. If that was the case than DSC would not have any business.

Also, you would wonder why Canon spent time and effort in providing an adjustable color matrix if the factory settings were just fine. It would be much easier and cheaper to not provide any adjustability at all. Canon knows better and provided an incredible amount of adjustability at this price point because it simply makes sense.

TrueColor for the A1 has been verified by other shooters to be a good solution that gives natural skin tones and vivid colors. I gave it away for free. Use it or not, it doesn't make any difference to me but I hope that this effort contributes to the ability of shooters to obtain better images. It's just another tool available to you.

I used an radio-spectrometer calibrated chart to obtain an objective reading of the camera and made adjustments from there. There was no connection with the JVC HD100.

Yes, you used a DSC card and a scope that is available in almost any studio.
I read on your log that you did it for a client, you do not have an A1, and you did the same on the JVC. I understand that it was not to achieve the same look.

Nobody is forcing you to use it. I gave this to people to freely use it and test it. Part of doing this and using the Web is to gain peer review. So far you are the only one who had anything negative to say about it.

I read a lot of negative about blue cast. You ask people to consider a donation via paypal. Nothing wrong there.

I have no idea how Canon works or what kind of procedures they use in calibrating the cameras.

Yes, you can calibrate camera's to your personal taste or to match another camera or the circumstances you are working in. You can do that on line in the studio or off line in a memory file you can share with other cam operators. That is normal behavior for many years in professional cams.

Also, you would wonder why Canon spent time and effort in providing an adjustable color matrix if the factory settings were just fine. It would be much easier and cheaper to not provide any adjustability at all. Canon knows better and provided an incredible amount of adjustability at this price point because it simply makes sense.

see above, why it is good to have adjustable color.

TrueColor for the A1 has been verified by other shooters to be a good solution that gives natural skin tones and vivid colors. I gave it away for free. Use it or not, it doesn't make any difference to me but I hope that this effort contributes to the ability of shooters to obtain better images. It's just another tool available to you.

Don't get me wrong, always happy with a free meal! Cook you own meal that will taste best.
But 'true color' does not exist, light temperatures are changing during the recording and so shift the colors. Specially if you alter color in a high area -like you did in the red/green matrix (+40) - you see color shift in a scale like the blue when the temperature is changing.

If you want a setting that gives you 'room to play with' in post CC, better do not crunch the blacks, make that setting in the correction, same with the white roll of, to obtain the max result. Try to maximize the available latitude.

If there was a setting that gives you 'truecolor' it was a setting that was part of any camera, it is not.

But 'true color' does not exist, light temperatures are changing during the recording and so shift the colors.
It seems to me that your main objection about this is because of the name and I understand that it might sound a bit pretentious but I do have something in defense of it. When I released the first version of my configuration I didn't give it a name. I sent to Tim Dashwood, one of the trusted moderators of this board, for review and he posted it on DVInfo.net with the moniker "TrueColor". I didn't claim that my configuration was the one to give you true accuracy, other people used the term and it stuck. I find it just convenient because it defines the intentions of the scene file. Not to create a "look" in camera, something that I find being the wrong approach, but instead to cause a given camera to be as close to 1:1 as possible.
Regarding the blacks I already mentioned before that the original configuration was calibrated by using the reflectivity of the black chip on the chart, something that is close to the darkest object that you can have in the scene but that is not as dark as cavity black. It's very easy to apply a simple correction and raise the pedestal to 1-1.5IRE. Basically 1 or 2 clicks higher than the config that I gave. That's all you need to get a little more definition in the black. There is also another consideration here. Many times the result that we see from the NLE, without adjustments, is not completely accurate. I found that many clips that I shot looked too dark at first but after applying a color corrector, like Colorista, AE's levels or FCP 3-way CC, you can gain definition in the blacks. If this is the case then there is no crushing, the software cannot retrieve what's not there but if it does bring details back then the scene file has capture those dark tones as expected.

Being angry about about the TRUCOLOR preset is like being angry about the AVGFILM film preset "Average film stock? It would be impossible to emulate the average film stock...lighting....chemical....DOF...Hulk smash!".

Paolo made a preset. He showed us how he achieved it. He suggested how it could be used. He didn't say "all you suckers better use this preset or else you footage will smell like fish".

Paolo,

Whether I use the preset or not I just wanted to say thank you. I do like the look it gives. I am, like others, experiencing a slight blue cast but nothing that wasn't taken care of by a little CC in FCP.

Thank you to you and all that post your presets. I always feel bad for guys who post little shareware/freeware things on the web and then get flamed about them.

If you don't like it, don't use it. Easy-Peezy

my footage is gonna smell like fish?!

Now - that's funny.

Paolo,

Whether I use the preset or not I just wanted to say thank you. I do like the look it gives. I am, like others, experiencing a slight blue cast but nothing that wasn't taken care of by a little CC in FCP.

Thank you to you and all that post your presets. I always feel bad for guys who post little shareware/freeware things on the web and then get flamed about them.

If you don't like it, don't use it. Easy-Peezy

Discussing on the web and fundamental critics are not the same as flaming, and it is not the name that was the fundamental part of my criticism's. Good things happen on the web in good collaboration.

Blacks: to see definition in the blacks on your [good] broadcast monitor, it is better to have it in the material. You can easily compress it later during CC, it's common sense to preserve the blacks in the recoding.

But indeed you can change the settings in truecolor , you can change a lot settings to make it into something you like and trust. Thanks for your addition.

What do we eat for free today? Smoked Salmon?

One more time. I do not get a blue cast when using this preset. A few here do but I and I believe most users do not get this blue cast. Perhaps its in the eye of the observer or perhaps the blue cast problem (if there is a problem) is cause by something else! If I knew how, I would run a poll of users here to see how many do or do not get this blue cast. Anyway I wish to thank Paolo Ciccone again, and as he stated if you don't like it don't uses it. He never professed it was the Holy Grail of presets, he just offers it (free) for those who might like it.

Haven't tested the preset extensively but I did shoot a short clip of a Sunday School egg hunt indoors. There was a mix of outdoor light coming in through a window and florescent fixtures on the ceilings.

I manually dialed in WB to get a slightly warmer look and the footage came out looking great. The skin tones looked natural and softly-warm as I wanted them to be.

The thing that I love most about this preset is that it negates the redness that seems to pervade the A1's footage on most of the other presets.

My only advice would be to set BLK to Medium, PED and SET to -6. This way you retain slightly more information in the blacks.

my footage is gonna smell like fish?!


I'd really like truecolour with B.O. or old socks

"what's that smell?"

"it's the new preset I'm using"

Coming up next: TrueFish!

BTW, what white card do you use? Can you give me a link? I'm curious if Paolo Ciccone could recommend a target that would work well with his preset.


I use the small DSC chart, the grayscale portion of it as it is guaranteed to be neutral. I found that other white cards can have a bias toward cold or warm, usually "warming cards" are slightly blueish. Since we are on the subject I just want to throw a reminder to include a few frames with the white card at the beginning of the tape. That will make adjusting the white balance in post a snap. For example using FCP 3Way CC you can simply click with the eye dropper. Same thing for Colorista.