Is it just me that has this exposure problem?

[Peter Rush]

Hi Chris - Yes I find 100% Zebras in most situations is the best indicator - at the weekend woodland wedding, the bride was quite often stood in a shaft of light where the rest of the wedding party were in darkness - had I ensured that the white dress was completely free of zebras then the rest of the scene would pretty much be in complete darkness.

I try not to let highlights blow but when faced with such stark contrasts it's pretty impossible not to. The other time when I'm happy to do this is when I have too much sky in shot - I'm happy to let that blow out in favour of getting bride/groom/guests etc correctly exposed.

I did a few tests using manual knee settings - I filmed a white toaster in the sun on dark tarmac (god knows what the neighbours thought) and with standard PP3 there was a nice gradation between the shades but using any manual knee setting the highlight area flattened out! (from 75% to 105%) so I've kept it on auto. To be honest when things such as the bride's dress blows out it's not too bad as the gradation seems more natural - I seem to get this awful posterisation on skin tones - strange

Pete

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

Don't beat yourself up over the huge contrasts we get at weddings! You want to try and film a bride I did from Sierra Leone! Her face was really dark with bright eyes and then the snow white wedding dress. Digital media struggles still when faced with a nearly 100% contrast ratio ..I just live with it. We don't have TV studio conditions where Soapie weddings are filmed and everything is controlled so we just have to make the best of what we have. I bet the bride would never see any highlight blowout in her video no matter how obvious it is to you. We just get too technical..it's our nature as videographers!

Did you try a shot using 50P and then 50i on the same subject and drop both onto a timeline but de-interlace the 50i so you have 25P ?? I have always done it that way and to be honest I haven't used my Sony's in 50P mode when faces are involved ...I had too much posterisation with all my Panasonics in 50P ... It only seems to affect faces (mainly the cheekbone area) but I also found it on a nature shot of a multi-branched bush and the centre branches pixelated quite dramatically, it's also evident in closeups

Then again if you really need (or like) 50P then once you have written the data down to 720x576 I also doubt that the bride would even see it. Because 50i technically has a slightly lower vertical resolution (although I cannot see it) I also add just a touch of sharpening in post on the track but it probably not necessary.

When I get a free moment I might also give 50P a spin on closeup faces and see if it pixellates but I can bet it will on my cameras too ...it's the AVCHD format that really needs a faster bitrate to handle double frame formats like 50P

Chris

[Peter Rush]

I think I'm narrowing down my problem a little - I'm noticing more that certain colours over expose more than whites - I definitely have more issues with skin tones than white wedding dresses - also look at this shot - the little girl's white dress is correctly exposed but her yellow top has lost all detail - what am I missing here?

Pete

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

What technical specs did you shoot on there?? Format, Picture Profile, Lens and Settings and what was in Manual and what was on Auto on the camera ??? That yellow top looks like it has been "coloured over" with a yellow highlight pen.. it's really smudgy indeed yet the dress is razor sharp.

It looks to me like the knee setting has gone crazy right up to max or the camera has tried to apply smoothing of some sort to the image BUT only to the yellow top ...very strange indeed.

Maybe a list of your cam settings might solve the issue... I'm not sure? Is that frame grab straight off the raw footage BTW??? I can honestly say I have never seen an issue like that in any of my footage.

Chris

[Peter Rush]

Standard PP3 (colour level 2 steps up) with stock lens, Shutter 100, Gain 0, Iris (not sure but probably F5.6) I do use a Genustech Eclipse variable ND filter so I need to conduct a few tests with and without. The framegrab is straight from the Premiere timeline.

It seems to be saturated colours and skin tones mainly :/

It's not always the case though because here's a still from the same wedding - very strange as this yellow seems fine!

[Steven Digges]

Just another opinion here on what I see. I have no idea what you guys see in that photo/frame grab when you say the white part of the dress is in but the yellow is out? On my monitor it looks like it is exposed for the shadows and all highlights in the filtered sunlight are blown out. Her white dress and the ribbon around her waist are severely blown out on what I see? So are some other areas, all consistently, I don't see any color isolation problems. I am on a Mac Book Pro I am not crazy about at the moment.

Steve

PS Shafts of light coming through trees in a forest? You drew an unlucky straw on that one!!! Especially since viewers are now accustomed to that scene being exposed like it is in the Hobbit movies, 100% CG!!! You might as well turn the groom into a toad to impress them!

[Chris Harding]

Hi Pete

To be perfectly honest I don't have an answer as it looks fine to me apart from the yellow that's gone crazy!! Yep the roses in the second grab look quite normal with no smearing so I have no idea why.

Nothing has occurred in your NLE? That screen grab was actually 1024x576 so it's not the native 1920x1080 but an SD still .... I would just double check the raw footage and pull a full size still from the footage just to make sure than it's not occurring during the downsizing to SD

I rarely use ND's but have only had bad colour casts from them over the entire image (supposedly IR contamination?) so I wouldn't think that the filter is causing any issues unless you accidently put a fingerprint smear on the ND exactly over the yellow top??

Any reason why you edit in SD and not HD ??? Look at the image on the time line in 1920x1080 as well and also check if it occurs from start to finish of that clip.

Chris

[Peter Rush]

No Chris I edit in HD 50p - I resized the image for a quicker upload - I'm testing some 50i footage today with a mix of whites and bright colours!

[Chris Harding]

Ok no problem there! It however doesn't explain the weird yellow top does it? Shooting some footage in 50i probably won't show up anything.

However I have noticed one thing quite different with my footage! I also have PP3 with the colour level up two points and my 50i footage is a LOT more desaturated than your still pics are. Assuming your footage is uncorrected and as it comes out the camera, first check your 50i footage and maybe do a similar shot again (same scene) in 50P and see if your 50i seems to have less colour overall ??? Maybe 50P boosts primary colours whilst 50i is flat ... My footage outdoors even on a cloudy day still needs a saturation boost in the NLE so maybe it is a 50P thing ... I have no idea??

If you can maybe include a garment that was the same sort of yellow as the wedding and see if you can determine if the camera maybe doesn't like it ??? If it goes away in 50i then remember you can also correct colour components in the profile ...if yellow is the issue you can give it a negative profile?

Your results will be interesting to see!

Chris