Picture Profiles

[James Hollingsworth]

I have just shot my first wedding with the EA50 and VG30. Having read a number of discussions on what picture profile to use, I initially started with PP3 but quickly discovered it to be horrible outside. I found that PP4 gave me the best compromise between indoors and outdoors, seemingly giving a better picture in low light than the PP off does as well as nice warm tones when shooting outside. Did find that it doesn't actually match up with the VG30 though. Anyone else preferring the PP4 setting?

[Chris Harding]

Hi James

I found completely the opposite! I find the PP4 and PP5 are very contrasty and over saturated indoors and PP3 really gives me the nicest and easily adjustable profile. Yes PP3 is a wee bit undersaturated for outdoor shoots and the green level is low so grass/trees tend to look a bit grey/green and a bit insipid..However I found it is much easier to just lift the saturation on the outdoor shots using PP3 and the indoor footage can be usually left exactly as it is.

This all depends if you are trying to get a cinematic effect with very contrasty footage and deep saturation..I'm shooting weddings in more of a documentray style so I prefer the natural colour with accurate skin tones ..I found even default tends to make skin tones a bit orange and over contrasty which brides never liked. Correction of PP3 merely requires a saturation lift for outdoor footage while I found that with using PP4 or 5 indoors I had to do gamma correction too to get faces looking real.

I guess it's all to do with the look you want to achieve though...I would also run some of your footage through a regular LCD TV and take a look too ...their default settings are often a lot more saturated that watching the footage on a monitor so rather judge the final result based on a TV output (which is what the bride will see) rather than your monitors.

Chris

[James Hollingsworth]

All good points Chris. When I finally get to the DVD/Blu-ray I will no doubt have a better idea of whether PP4 gives me the look I want. I have found that I have to desaturate the indoor footage a little so you are certainly right about that. Ideally I want to find a profile that doesn't always need to be altered in post. I am going for a cinematic rather than documentary approach so maybe that is why I like the warmer tones that PP4 gives.

[Chris Harding]

Hi James

Noa also likes the cinematic approach and seems to like PP5 as well. As long as it what your bride expects in comparison with samples she has already seen I find that brides are more worried about how they look and how pretty the dresses are!

Noa tends to use the modified PP3 profile from CineAble for indoor footage and I must admit his glass factory shoot looked good BUT there were no people in it ...I might use a Cine profile for a wildlife documentary but for my shooting style with lots of people, skin tones are what I concentrate on and PP3 with saturation lifted tends to brighten the surroundings but doesn't affect skin tones too much.

I accidentally shot the first bit of the guests at a reception on PP1 which isn't as dramatic as PP3 and still found that a gamma and saturation adjustment was essential over all the clips ...PP3 was just a lot easier to adjust in post.

Chris

[Justin Turner]

I have a question re colours. As im a photographer 1st I work on calibrated screens. They are done around once a month using a spyder. This gives me a colour correct workflow, what i see is what i get in print.

My question is with video do you guys calibrate your screens? Or do you just know how it will transfer when viewed on a tv in the final output. I havn't done enough testing to work out if there is much of a shift as my colour grading skills are pretty low at the moment. We shot ( I shoot the stills, my wife shot video) our first wedding with the ea50 last weekend and used pp3 all day. I must admit i felt for the outdoor stuff esp in the shade it didnt look as good as i hoped but it was the first time we have ever shot auto and i think the auto WB is ok but not great, comparing to a second dslr shooting the same scene with a manual WB the ea50 looked too cold. Really didnt notice so much on the day but looking on the computer we will need to keep an eye on WB more next time. I dont know if a different profile like pp4 which does look a little warmer might suit us which would correct the slightly cold feel we got sometimes. Havent looked into custom profiles, so interested in what other people are using outdoors as well?

[Chris Harding]

Hi Justin

AutoWB is actually very accurate on PP3 if you look at a bride's white dress, it is indeed white...All that PP3 gives you in bright outdoors and open shade is quite a flat colour profile...To prove a point just pop a PP3 outdoor clip onto your timeline and lift the saturation a tad and you will find that there is no colour shift at all except the saturation levels lift to correct levels. The colour is accurate to ITU-709

I find that domestic TV's tend to be quite oversaturated as the default setting and that's how the bride will see your video. My only complaint is that the cinematic profiles tend to be a little harsh and over contrasty when shooting indoors.

By all means get the levels looking nice on your monitor but also check it on a domestic TV ...unlike a printed photo, this can change from TV to TV but as already mentioned, even with no custom setup and direct from the factory, chroma levels tend to be a tad higher than normal.

Chris

[Jerome Cloninger]

Originally Posted by Justin Turner

My question is with video do you guys calibrate your screens? Or do you just know how it will transfer when viewed on a tv in the final output.

I use colorbars to calibrate my computer screens and home TV's. Some of them have a "blue only" mode for calibration and that is great to get accurate calibration. Those that don't have it, I use blue gel "glasses" to use in calibration as well: http://www.costore.com/thx/producten...87&pid=2875999 (This is for US, but go back to the main page and they have Canada and International shipping versions.)

The trick with the gelled glasses or "blue gun only" is to get the color bars as even as possible.
How to calibrate your equipment using color bars - Production Apprentice

NOW, with all that said, you can have all of your devices calibrated BUT your end viewer (client's TV, broadcast, etc) EVERY ONE OF THEM will have their TV's set differently and I'll almost guarantee you 90% or more of them won't be calibrated. I'm fine with that, because they are used to seeing stuff not correct anyways and its something that you can't control. My take is to do it right and if they complain, then go into calibrating their TV with them. Every now and then, I'll have to go through this with a client and their previews I send. If they're local, I'll run by their office and do it for them.

[Justin Turner]

Have been taking some more test shots today and feel outdoors I was getting best results with pp turned off and indoors pp3 still the best. Will try next wedding on those settngs and see how it goes.

Regarding white balance the auto is too easy to trick. Its good most the time but it doesnt take much to trick it, eg bride againt sandstone wall in shade. Camera see a warm scene with the sandstone dominating the scene and the wb over corrects it making it too cold. I think we will monitor the wb and use auto when we can and shoot kelvin where it gets confused.

Still trail and error with a new system.

[Chris Harding]

Hi Justin

That's what I used on my last wedding ... It was a very bright day here and it was an outdoor ceremony and I still found with PP turned off, that my skin tones were still a wee bit over done. The problem with changing PP's is that I forget to do it so the first half of the reception is shot with the outdoor setting until I suddenly realise I haven't changed it. When you have time, try modifying the PP3 setting to the CineAble parameters which uses Cinetone colour profile and some tweaking too on other bits and pieces...I'd like to find something that works well for indoors and outdoors that needs minimum correction!

Chris

[Chris Harding]

Hi Guys

I just dropped home after a wedding ceremony to dump off some gear before heading to the reception..I shot that all on PP3 (both cameras) so I'll post a screen grab tomorrow with the original PP3 and the saturation boost one and you can judge from that.

Chris

[Justin Turner]

Hi Chris,

I think thats good advice about trying on the the CineAble presets I will try it and see how they look. It would be ideal to have one preset for the whole day. I think the flat looking pp3 is a safe option as its easier to add contrast and colour then to remove it.

Will be interested in your screen shots from todays wedding. I dont know how you have time to go home during a wedding though!!!

[Chris Harding]

Hi Justin

Here are two screenshots from the wedding yesterday. I chose a wide shot just to show how the colour saturation level is low and very noticeable on green bushes etc etc. On the second grab, all I did in Sony Vegas 10 was add the Colour Corrector Plugin and ONLY raised saturation from the default (no adjustment of 1.00) up to 1.500 and it lifts everything nicely without giving abnormal skin tones. Indoor shots on PP3 are great as they are...it's only a bit unsaturated on bright sunny days outdoors.

Of course if anyone feels differently, please voice your opinions !!

Chris

[Marlon Martins]

you can use AAV ColorLab plugin for Vegas (its free) so you can adjust saturation independently (R-G-B-C-M-Y) for better results. (can increase more the green and reduce reds for example)

[Chris Harding]

Thanks Marlon

I have the plugin already .... looking at the saturation adjust what do you think?? On PP3 I find that the overall saturation is low on all colours that's why I simply push saturation a tiny bit to lift it overall. Based on the overall scene in real life, the colours are reasonably accurate and simply a bit low on all channels to me rather than needing individual adjustment the levels thruout needed to be lifted. Using PP3 the greens are not "wrong" they are only low so areas like grass and trees look a little washed out and if you lift all channels equally they seem to come up to true colours. You can see the bridemaid's dresses are also a bit washed out but also come out to true levels with saturation lifted. The one thing at weddings is the BM's dresses have to be "correct" ...you can have out of wack scenery but if the bridemaid's dresses were pink then the bride wants them to be pink and nothing else!!

This is only with outdoor shots ...Indoors at venues the balance looks pretty good as it is.

Chris

[Marlon Martins]

i can't judge the saturation for now cause im without my editing system (lightning killed pc/tv). but looks like 1.4~1.5 saturation looks about right.

I'm very "OCD" about color. i did a "color profile" (Using AAV ColorLab) with my cameras utilizing colorchecker and photos taken with DSLR in the same instance. i do a lot of selective adjustments (like remove the blue tint on the bride dress)

some colors have hue shift, low saturation, low brightness... more the "low end" the camera gets, more "imprecise" they become :(

my AE50 will arrive in a few weeks, after that, i will need a week just for testing and adjusting ;)

you are right about dresses colors, skin tones and dresses are the main target. here (brazil) almost all weddings are at night, so people use very colorful night dresses, strong, saturated metallic colors... so a little shift in white balance alone can make a metallic blue/cyan become a greenish one. :P