X70 Full PP Color Correction settings

[Paul Anderegg]

Sorry, will try to clarify. I shoot with LED lighting at night. If I push to white, it introduces a green shift to counteract the magenta in the light. As the light falls off, the magenta cast is lessened, and anything lit by non LED lighting, even my blacks, will take on a noticeable green shade. As long as the scene you are shooting is lit by the same lighting source as you have pushed to white, you will be fine. If I push to white with my LED, my close in whites and SOT's will look fine. I prefer to use the manual kelvin solution, because it is easier in FCP X to use the color corrector to adjust highlights away from magenta or to green, than to try to fix the entire picture for green blacks and such in the distance.

This is due to the camera not only adjusting kelvin temperature during push to white, but it will also shift towards or away from all colors on the vectorscope, unlike all the broadcast cameras I have ever used. On a broadcast camera (Panasonic HPX2000/SPX800/Betacams etc), if you push to white using a poor CRI LED, you will still see magenta, or green in the case of florescent, unless you modify the color matrix to compensate. This feature of these cameras is either a good thing or a bad thing depending on how you deploy it. If I only carry an LED with me, then I CANNOT push to white at all with it without adding a lot of green to everything. At night on the street, good luck on finding another source of light to push to white off of in a pinch that won't shift colors all over
! :)

Paul

[Christopher Young]

David D. wrote:

"I've already found that they help the problem I had last week with not enough differentiation between blues and purples."

Well here goes for a great dose of humble pie. I owe Paul A. a big apology. So sure was I in my conviction and knowledge of colorimetry of broadcast cameras is that it has led me to make the unforgivable error of taking certain things as being set in stone and to have taken those things as gospel when in fact they are not :( Well at least not on the x70 and who knows on what other modern cameras coming from Sony?

On further analysis of what Paul has stated on the 'Color Correction' aspects of the x70 I now see where he is coming from. With some playing around on this rather unusual Color Correction mode that Sony has included in the PPs on this camera I was in fact totally able to correct the blue / purple spread discrepancy that the camera exhibited and to end up with a pretty decent representation on a blue to purple gradation spread. More experimenting ahead!

To boot as Paul suggested it seems to hold its correction relative to any changes in the overall colorimetry phase change when a white balance is done. I am curious as to how this is happening but will leave that for further investigation as I flagellate myself with something suitable. Maybe Holly. Seems suitable for the season we are in.

Again Paul my apologies for doubting that enquiring mind of yours. Back to school on this camera for me with even more curiosity as to how its CC innards are working.

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney

[Mike McKay]

Usually the most quality people I know are the ones who can just up and say "I was wrong." Props to you! And feel free to share some more settings of how you arrive at this stuff, it's a big help to guys like me who are a long way off from being any kind of technical guru. Your outdoor sunny shots of the boats helped sell me on this camera.

[Paul Anderegg]

No apology necessary Chris. :-)

As I mentioned in my email, I could have been wrong, as this camera has been full of surprises. You may have noticed it took me a long time to post those final CC values, as it necessitated several multiple hour long sessions on the scope trying to figure out what was affecting what and how!

And I found the push to white function works exactly as it did on my CX900, it seems to just move the entire vector image around the scope like a Ouija board! Additionally, that Ouija board movement seems to keep the front/back/depth/apple-core stationary, none of that axial movement you get when you add or subtract incadescant or daylight from a balanced image. I hope that made sense!

Paul

[Wacharapong Chiowanich]

I envy all of you who have this nice little handycam. Mine is the FDR-AX100E, a sibling of yours but this one doesn't allow any color or pp tweaking. Granted, it is bestowed with a "Cinematone" mode which is in practice just a steeper gamma curve in both highlights and shadows. Not even a simple control like there is in my lowly soccer mom US$500 Sony HX400V stills camera that allows the in camera sharpening to be toned down or increased.

Never mind Paul, I will save your settings dear on my computer in case some day I may have the X70.

[Christopher Young]

Originally Posted by Mike McKay

Usually the most quality people I know are the ones who can just up and say "I was wrong."

My parents drummed into me there is no other way when you are wrong. Still feeling pretty humble though. Reminds me of a colleague of mine who says with a smile "I was wrong once. It was June 22 1982."
I'm glad the marina / boats shots were of some help in making your decision Mike.

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney

[Christopher Young]

Originally Posted by Paul Anderegg

No apology necessary Chris. :-)

Then I shall not fall on my sword :)

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney

[Mike Griffiths]

Thanks to you both, Chris and Paul, as was said earlier, your experience and work on this camera is a great help to those of us who don't have the skill or knowledge to work all this out. I really hope you keep up this dialogue, but don't think about charging for it :)

[Christopher Young]

Charging for it? Now there's an idea. Thank you Mike :) Used to get paid to teach it once... long time ago.

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney

[David Dixon]

Just read that Sony announced yesterday (as a side note in the CES press release for their new 4K consumer camcorder) a firmware update coming in March for the AX100 4K XAVC-S to 100Mps from 50 or 60 or whatever it currently is. No mention at all of the 4K upgrade for the X70, but surely this means it will be 100mps at the very least.

[Paul Anderegg]

I may have botched one of the color correction settings for ITU709. I am updating it here as the board will not allow me to edit the original posting. The saturation level may exhibit neon green hue in certain conditions, although it may make foliage look really pretty in the day. :-)

ITU709 (ORIGINAL POST)
color phase: -2
memory 1 color: 10, 4, 0
memory 1 revision: +8, 0
memory 2 color: 19, 7, 0
memory 2 revision: -14, +5 <---

ITU709 (RECOMMENDED CORRECTION)
color phase: -2
memory 1 color: 10, 4, 0
memory 1 revision: +8, 0
memory 2 color: 19, 7, 0
memory 2 revision: -14, 0 <---

[Rob Hargreaves]

Thanks Paul, I actually shot with that original profile is lower light condition at the telephoto end of the Clearview zoom and it did look a little green, which I had to correct in post, so thanks for this!

[Paul Anderegg]

Because the GREEN vector cannot be brought all the way to it's box (it wants to stop part way to the yellow box at max phase adjustment), it ended up putting too much green into the YELLOW at that saturation level. As the YELLOW is on the WB vector, it becomes more apparent as your white balance is off towards the lower kelvin area.

Paul

[Lou Bruno]

I own both cameras. All is not lost with the Ax100.

Press the manual button but hold it until a short menu appears. You will see two settings in the bottom. These settings allows the use of adding blues, reds, greens etc via scrolling the wheel. You can also adjust color temp etc. Granted that it does not allow changing gamma and black levels but does a better job than using the usual color balance button methods. Really tweaks the colorimetrics precisely and even on the fly for mixed colors such as electric lighting and different bulb colors or mixed inside vs. outside color temperatures that never balnce right in manual or auto button settings.

Originally Posted by Wacharapong Chiowanich

I envy all of you who have this nice little handycam. Mine is the FDR-AX100E, a sibling of yours but this one doesn't allow any color or pp tweaking. Granted, it is bestowed with a "Cinematone" mode which is in practice just a steeper gamma curve in both highlights and shadows. Not even a simple control like there is in my lowly soccer mom US$500 Sony HX400V stills camera that allows the in camera sharpening to be toned down or increased.

Never mind Paul, I will save your settings dear on my computer in case some day I may have the X70.

[Paul Anderegg]

I previously owned a CX900, and posted a color correction list for it using these settings in the XAVC forum. My main intent was to provide very basic WHITE BALANCE correction for INDOOR and OUTDOOR presets using tungsten 3200k and daylight lighting.

These AX100/CX900 adjustments can be thought of as "manual FAW" adjustments, as that is the function they perform, the colorimitry doesn't change, but the whole vector image will move across the scope just as it does when you push to white.

Paul