I just eyeballed a gretamacbeth ColorChecker Color Rendition Chart, via EX1 HD-SDI out into a Sony LMD-2450WHD monitor, applying Alister's Black Gamma and Noise settings, coupled with Bill's colour settings, and the colour squares in the chart appeared better colour matched using Bill's colour values, as opposed to leaving R-G, R-B, G-R etc, at 0. No science, just a quick subjective observation while testing Alister's noise settings.

I just eyeballed a gretamacbeth ColorChecker Color Rendition Chart, via EX1 HD-SDI out into a Sony LMD-2450WHD monitor, applying Alister's Black Gamma and Noise settings, coupled with Bill's colour settings, and the colour squares in the chart appeared better colour matched using Bill's colour values, as opposed to leaving R-G, R-B, G-R etc, at 0. No science, just a quick subjective observation while testing Alister's noise settings.

Christopher,

As I don't have any sw/hw to "objectively" assess that - did you try Cinema Matrix at +35 (or the Standard one, also boosted) - against the Hisat with Bill's pair tweaking?

As I don't have any sw/hw to "objectively" assess that - did you try Cinema Matrix at +35 (or the Standard one, also boosted) - against the Hisat with Bill's pair tweaking?

Piotr,

Yes, I modified Bill's PP. I changed Matrix Hisat to Cinema, and increased the Level value to +35. This increase in Level does put some of the saturation back into the Cinema Matrix which is rather flat. I am yet to do some practical test shots and review the footage. Then I continued to use Bill's values below in the Matrix, such as Phase -5, R-G +75, etc.

In the Detail section, I applied Alister's adjustment to Level -8, Frequency +30 and Crispening +20.

Back to my comparison, I was looking at the macbeth chart and then looking at the monitor, and changing between two similar PP's (PP1 and PP2), the combo of Bill and Alister's settings I mixed, PP1 having Bill's phase/colour settings, and PP2 phase/colour settings (R-G, etc) set to 0. A/B flicking between PP1 and PP2 to the monitor. Comparing the colour squares and monitor, PP1 (Bill's values) looked to me, to be closer in colour, as opposed to PP2. Just my observation, no particularly controlled environment, no DV Rack scopes.

Piotr, perhaps Alister will provide his complete PP settings in due course.

Edit: BTW, Gamma setting I used was Cine4.

Considering that I used a DSC Labs color chart to set up the one of the set of PP settings I posted, I'm not surprised at your findings. I would note, however, that if you don't properly set your white balance, your observations may be questionable.

There are, generically speaking, 4 data categories available for adjusting an image, 1-luma, 2-chroma 3-sharpness 4-gamma.

The luma settings, pretty much, define the dynamic range on an image, The chroma settings define color balance, and gamma defines how the luma values change with the intensity gradients within the image. While I attempted to define the chroma settings, my luma settings were done rather rudimentary, and I think, Alister gave these more attention than I. Sharpness, of course, seems to be a rather subjective condition. I prefer to sharpen in post, as in camera sharpening tends to decrease camera bandwidth for recording other information(such as motion), because of compression limitations. Finally, selecting a gamma setting is really difficult to do without an understanding of the dynamic range of the scene recorded. The additional variable of "auto-knee" in the EX camera series confuses the results, when one is attempting to carefully record the scene. As with any auto setting, using automatic takes control away from the cinematographer and defaults to some in camera algorithm, not always guaranteed to be the best choice.

Funny, I was shooting last week a concert and used exactly the same settings as Christopher (including the cine4 gamma for low light). The combination between Bill's settings and Alister's really compliment each other and produced very good results.
It's my first post on this forum so I'll just say thanks to all the input you folks share and give.

Bill, thanks for the explanation above, and for the PP you shared with the community a while ago. I have always used it, or part thereof.

Jonathan, similarly, I have been working on a low light project for a while and prefer to use Cine4, and may also very mildly use Neat Video plugin, if the noise is too much for my liking.

Thanks Chirstopher for mentioning the neat plugin. never heard of it before (I use FCP). checked it out on their web site and they made a version of it last month for FCP. I was really impressed by this relatively unknown plugin (at least for FCP users). I was so impressed I got it. it really makes a difference and excels where other more known plugins fail. It really challenges my Anti "fix it in post" views. Really does a good noise reduction, even with footage shot at +18 gain.

Neat Video is great

Neat Video is great

Agreed.


Dennis

I just eyeballed a gretamacbeth ColorChecker Color Rendition Chart, via EX1 HD-SDI out into a Sony LMD-2450WHD monitor, applying Alister's Black Gamma and Noise settings, coupled with Bill's colour settings, and the colour squares in the chart appeared better colour matched using Bill's colour values, as opposed to leaving R-G, R-B, G-R etc, at 0. No science, just a quick subjective observation while testing Alister's noise settings.

Christopher,
Could you please list what your exact PP settings were so there's isn't any confusion for the rest of us? I would like to test them out myself.

Thanks,
Mike

Matrix Setting ON
Select Cinema (Bill Ravens PP set to Hisat)
Level +35 (Bill Ravens PP set to 0)

Phase -5
R-G +75
R-B 0
G-R -18
G-B -32
B-R -27
B-G +13

Color Correction Setting OFF
Area Detection
Area Indication
Target Phase
Target Width
Level
Phase

White Balance Setting OFF
Offset <A>
Offset <B>
Offset <ATW>
Preset White

Detail Setting: Alister Chapman's suggestion in this thread: set to ON (Bill Ravens PP set to OFF)
Level -8
Frequency +30
Crispening +20
H/V Ratio 0
White Limiter 0
Black Limiter 0
V DTL Creation Y
Knee APT Level 0

Skin Tone Detail Setting OFF
Level
Area Detection
Area Indication
Saturation
Phase
Width

Knee Setting: N/A when Cine1, 2, 3, 4
Auto Knee
Point
Slope
SAT Level

Gamma Level 0
Type Cine1, 2, 3, 4

Black Level 0 (Bill Ravens setting -12)

Black Gamma Level 0

Low Key SAT Level 0

___________________

Michael, the above represents PP settings, combining Bill's PP, with Alister's Black Gamma and Noise settings discussed in this thread. For me, I shoot and tweak in post. To my knowledge, Bill Ravens has provided the community a PP which was created under controlled conditions and has been adopted by many EX1/EX3 users. Tweak to your own liking. My Black Level has been left at the default 0, then I tweak in post, but that is just me.

The Picture Profile Settings sticky, some 32+ pages now, is worth a look if you have time. To my knowledge, Bill's original PP had a few minor tweaks, and I understand Steven Thomas published the final combo that makes up Bill's PP, here:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/819952-post133.html

Personally, my Detail setting will now be switched back to OFF. Whilst there is improvement to reducing noise, thanks to Alister kindly providing the information in this thread, I will continue to use Neat Video plugin, as much of my low light footage is somewhat under exposed and certain levels of noise appear in the footage and the NV plugin has provided best results in my situation.

great. thanks a lot Christopher. I have read all 32+ pages of the PP thread and I was waiting to see if Bill R was indeed using a Black Level of -12 or -3. it doesn't matter anymore. i've done enough testing to figure out what works for me.

thanks again for your post.

-Mike

I'm about to try the Bill+Alister combo settings since Alister never did answer which matrix settings he uses with his cinema +35 setting.
But I have 3 settings of Bill's settings here. One is the one Christopher Barry posted above and the other is:

Hi-sat
level: 0
Phase -4
R-G +75
R-B 0
G-R -17
G-B -31
B-R -26
B-G +12

and another which is totally different:

Matrix select: cinema
Level: 0
Phase: -29
R-G: +31
R-B: 48
G-R: -2
G-B: -32
B-R: -38
B-G: +4
Color Correction ON
Target Phase: 274
Target Width: 0
Level: 91
Phase: -18

I don't remember exactly where I got them from but it was said to be Bill's as well. Anybody know these two profiles and have tried them?

The original PP setting I developed did not use color correction/cinema. What I found was that it was very difficult to get the RED levels down to the same levels as the GREEN and BLUE channels. In an attempt to resolve this problem, I tried the Cinema setting which you've posted. While it helps the overall channel balance, by artificially raising the GREEN levels, it does reduce the bandwidth available in the red channel.

The CINEMA settings will work, but with limitations. I use the original settings, exclusively. So much for matrix settings for chroma content.
When one starts adjusting black level/black gamma, you move out of the chroma regime and begin to change luma "pedestal" values. The lower one makes the black level, the less footroom you leave yourself for black detail. Under very controlled conditions, low contrast like stage lighting with no deep shadows, this will be OK. If you move to uncontrolled lighting or conditions with deep shadow detail that you want to preserve, you need to raise the black level to -8 or -3, or less, to keep from inadverttently crushing your shadows.

This is all the science of exposure. At some point, skill and, yes, ART, begins to be the consideration.

Thanks Bill.
Which one of the TC is the latest? The one Christopher posted or the first one I posted, above the cinema one?

The two profiles vary by 1.....or did I miss something?
I don't think 1 point makes any noticeable difference.

My matrix settings other than level at +30 or +35 when using the cinema matrix are all at 0.

Can someone confirm if the negative value on the crispening setting really decrease noise, I have been trying it and it seems so, although it´s only a visual aproach and if it does how this setting is affecting detail. The thing is, that is completely the other way around from the information in Sony literature however it seems to work.

A negative crispening setting will increase noise. A positive setting raises the threshold of where detail is applied, thus less detail is applied to small amplitude picture changes such as noise.