What's a good 7D setting for those who don't want to color grade?

[Corey Benoit]

i have a 28-135mm f/3.5, a 28-300 f/3.5, and 18-55 f/3.5

i usually shoot 24p shutter 50....during sunlight iso100, in shade i go to 320, and sometimes 640....when its really low light i like 1000 or 1600...

edit:also why does everyone bring the sharpness down?

[Sam Matthews]

I have a similar range of lenses, 18-55 3.5-5.6, 18-135 f3.5-5.6 but my absolute lifesaver is the 50mm f1.8 prime. If you are happy with the shallower depth of field, you are able to reduce your ISO by 2 full stops, pretty significant. I would definitely recommend grabbing that lens its only about $100! I use it to shoot all sorts of night scenes with no additional lighting and the footage looks fine.

As for the sharpness, (and the same goes for contrast) my understanding of why people, myself included, like to crank both right down in camera is this gives you more flexibility in post. Also, bringing the in camera sharpness down will instantly get you closer to the 'film' look. I was amazed the first time a DoP grabbed my camera and did that.

The contrast should be brought right down to allow you to bring out a higher colour depth in post, otherwise the camera will just apply its own fairly crappy contrast methods (boost shadows and highlights) which are hard to then alter down the line (because as your shadows get closer to black they lose what colour information they had, same for the highlights getting closer to white) .

I think the short answer is by minimising what your camera does to the footage as it records it, you give yourself more flexibility to adjust it how you want it down the line in something like after effects. Its similar to shooting stills in raw, in that you do it like that to have more control over colour correction, white balance etc.

have you looked into any of the downloadable camera settings at all? such as marvel cine or superflat?

[Corey Benoit]

yea i usedsuperflat and shot at 640 iso close to sunset,and shutter was 50, it looks to me like line noise, (banding) what do you think?

YouTube - 7D Possible Banding + Noise?

[Sam Matthews]

I dont think the highlight tone priority would help with those edges, I'd say just leave as many image processing tools off as possible in camera, and worry about them later. I don't think the actual image looks too bad though. 640 is not the end of the world, but I can't emphasize enough how much you will love having that $100 50mm f1.8 prime lens. When its dark with only available light it will always become the first thing you grab out of your camera bag. I read that guys online reviews about lenses for a 7d,and he said that in video the sharpness between the best lenses you can get and the cheapos is virtually unnnoticeable, and you should focus on just getting the fastest lenses you can afford.

[Corey Benoit]

i agree what about the canon 50mm or 24mm, 1.2?

so my video didnt have bandin? it seemed it had vertical noise(lines)...

[Sam Matthews]

I didn't really notice think the only real problem was it was that highlight setting you had, made edges look weird. I'll put it this way, if you take all the on camera "image enhancement" settings right down your camera's images up to about 640 iso will look amazing.

Im not sure how much is the 50mm 1.2? If it a similar price to how cheap the 1,8 is then id say go for it, but I know that the 1.8 is ridiculously cheap for how good the glass is. I wouldnt recommend paying significantly more for a 1.2, by the time you go that wide open your depth of field starts to get ridiculously shallow and unless your really LOVE that look I'd rather avoid it to be honest. It starts to be like, the front of a face is in focus but teh back is not... it gets pretty extreme.

Id recommend putting the difference in price towards another cheap wide prime, something in th e20-28mm range. Probably closer to 20. Its really just a matter of the focal length you feel you use the majority of the time. Between 35 and 50 are very common, hence the name "nifty fifty". It is really versatile. I'd probably go 20 with your other one. 28 is kind of a nothing focal length IMO, its not wide enough to get a good shot of a room, or punched in enough for most mid shots. noticed that when i fist got my camera with teh kit lens (the 28-135) So I went out and got the 18-55 which I use a LOT.

so I'd say 50 and 20 are your good lengths, and go faster than 1.8 if you want but I think beyond 1.8 the shallow DOF gets a little ridiculous

[Bart Wierzbicki]

I'm also using the Philip Bloom setting, but when I'm capturing my movies onto
my computer and I just watch them on screen without colorgrading I'm going "OH MY GOD this looks bad !"
Do you have the same feeling or do you already have great results with that setting ?
There is a total lack in blacks and mostly it looks washed out.
Or am I missing something ?

[Norman Pogson]

I stopped using the flat settings and went back to a color style, I don't want to spend a lot of time adjusting levels, saturation etc. I'm trying to get as much done in the camera.

[Jon Fairhurst]

The contrast setting should be labeled the "risk control."

Ideally, the contrast and exposure will be perfect for your end result. But what if you over or under exposed by 1/3 stop? Having a slightly lower contrast will allow you to recover.

Also, the ideal contrast setting really depends on the shot. On a front lit, overcast day, you can turn the contrast up. On a sunny day, or with a backlit subject, you will want to turn the contrast down.

So, rather than a "flat" style, maybe we should consider contrast yet another dynamic setting, along with WB, shutter, aperture, ISO and ND. It would be interesting to shoot some outdoor stuff in the sun, shade and under clouds and try different settings to find the optimum contrast for each situation. But to lower risk, err on the low end of the scale.

[Sam Matthews]

yeah Bart in terms of in camera picture superflat is like its name suggests, SUPER FLAT = dull lifeless image, so its not something you want to be shooting in unless you want to dedicate the time to colouring in post. Mr Fairhurst is right about the risk control, having any amount of colour information in the shadows and highlights (as opposed to what would just be considered white or black at higher contrasts) lets you pull a scene back from over or under exposed with much better results.
for a nice in camera picture i'd recommend the marvel cine setting. It looks really nice in camera and has a gamma curve similar to that film stock. It's just a nice picture with a bit of flexibility, as opposed to superflat which is not a nice picture at all in camera, but maximum flexibility in post.
Also "neutral" with sharpness and contrast right down is quite a nice starting point for a film look. I see it used a lot, but again the implication is you'll colour grade at least a little bit, so probably stick with marvel cine

[Sam Matthews]

and just quickly bart so you're not confused about why people use superflat if it looks so bad in camera, my understanding is it preserves the most possible colour depth. In other words an orange might be one of 10,000 shades of orange instead of 1000. This keeps subtle difference between colours so when you then try to saturate them to get this kind of effect:
YouTube - Kelis - Acapella
they don't all just become really cheesy colours again, ie bright orange, bright red etc. Its just a way of trying to keep up with the RED for colour depth.
And a nice side effect of that is the foolproofing like Jon said with the exposure.
So in other words it serves a very specific purpose and is used with an eye towards more extreme colour correction, but not really an everyday in camera setting

[Brian Luce]

Originally Posted by Jon Fairhurst

The contrast setting should be labeled the "risk control."

Ideally, the contrast and exposure will be perfect for your end result. But what if you over or under exposed by 1/3 stop? Having a slightly lower contrast will allow you to recover.

Cool. Nice way to think of it...