Myster of Presets

[John Whiteway]

Hello.

I was wondering if there are any wise souls out there who might be able to answer my question.

I can think of several great shows, documentaries that produce an amazing image on the TV screen - blacks are saturated, whites not over exposed, while detail, gradation and saturation exist in all the colors in between.

Simply put, like everyone else I suppose, I'm anxious to find out how they do this. I've read of many custom presets that seem designed to give this kind of look, to create an image without the kind of blue flatness one often gets in video, but I'm beginning to wonder if that's all there is to it.

Elsewhere I was reading about another approach that relies on post-production. Here it was suggested to set the presets to greatly reduce contrast to capture maximum detail in light and dark, then produce the saturation and contrast you want in post. And this seems to make some sense to me, for one thing I always note in these shows I love is that the dynamic range between dark and light seems controlled.

So am I on to something here? Is there a custom preset out there that's designed to be used along with post-production to produce this elusive and beautiful effect found in some of these great documentaries. (Any North Americans out there might be familiar with the series Departures. How just to they get their amazing colour and control?)

Thanks.
Canada John