"High Light" instead of Zebras?

[Steve Phillipps]

Agree Serena, some times you just have to accept ugly clipped highlights. I think the best way to go is use zebras at around 95-105% and get used to what they show you, use them to get a general idea of what is going on, and if the scene is not too extreme get rid of them so you know nothing is clipped, but if it's too extreme then just use your eye and common sense to make the neccessary sacrifices. I think there are many situations with really bright skies or white birds in bright sun where you just know that it'll clip unless you basically make the whole rest of the scene black, then it's just judgement. I think the EX1 does a pretty good job here as the DR is pretty good.
Steve

[Paul Kellett]

Originally Posted by Steve Phillipps

Agree Serena, some times you just have to accept ugly clipped highlights. I think the best way to go is use zebras at around 95-105% and get used to what they show you, use them to get a general idea of what is going on, and if the scene is not too extreme get rid of them so you know nothing is clipped, but if it's too extreme then just use your eye and common sense to make the neccessary sacrifices. I think there are many situations with really bright skies or white birds in bright sun where you just know that it'll clip unless you basically make the whole rest of the scene black, then it's just judgement. I think the EX1 does a pretty good job here as the DR is pretty good.
Steve

Scenes such as these ?

Paul.

[Serena Steuart]

Originally Posted by Paul Kellett

Scenes such as these ?

Paul.

Yes, they're excellent examples of scenes where the highlights must not be blown out and deep rich blacks are important. "Don't be afraid of black", as Pieter de Vries ACS advises in this elementary presentation:
http://www.sony.com.au/articles/arti...articleId=3500
Dark areas add drama to a composition, but I'm generally averse to glaring holes. I prefer to under-expose, provided this doesn't result in noisy blacks when I balance in post.

EDIT: I should add that I expect to grade my material in post, so in shooting I'm more concerned with getting the data than in getting it spot-on in camera. Once data is lost (choked blacks and burnt highlights), there is no recovery.

[Paul Kellett]

I shot those scenes,,well the whole play actually with Bills settings but with Cine 2,am i correct in thinking that Cine 2 limits the highlights ?
I tried Cine 1 and it had quite a bit of 100% zebras all over the lcd,but as soon as i switched to Cine 2,most of them dissapeared,this made the whole exposure easier to control.

Because of the placement of spotlights and the other lights that follow the actors i had to allow some slight 100% zebras throughout most of the performance.

Clips on vimeo if anyone wants to see,link below

www.vimeo.com/paulkellett

Paul.

[Serena Steuart]

Yes, Cine 2 limits at 100. So you can't over expose, in a sense, but high lights can be all 100 and so not differentiated. Intended for delivering material within standard, but I think it of little use. But was effective in your video.

[Paul Kellett]

Yes,i usually use Cine 1 but went with 2 for this because of the highlights.
it was just a better Cine for the situation,actors where running around the stage,exposed correctly then blown then correctly then blown etc,because of the spotlight's. It would've looked terrible if i was trying to follow that with the iris/another gamma.

I also find Cine 2 is good for outside on very bright days,ie bright sun and white window frames on houses in the background.

Paul.

[Mike Stevens]

Originally Posted by Serena Steuart

Yes, Cine 2 limits at 100. So you can't over expose, in a sense, but high lights can be all 100 and so not differentiated. Intended for delivering material within standard, but I think it of little use. But was effective in your video.

You can see this in the flatness of the girls white shirt that looks blown because it has no detail

[Craig Seeman]

Whites/hot spots/peaks can show detail up to 109. When picking a Cine setting think about not only the peak but how it rolls off.

For broadcast you can pull them in in post being careful about retaining detail. Much of people's work is not for broadcast so one might not want to sacrifice the detail up to 109.

[Paul Kellett]

Was this my enexperience showing ?
What would've you guys done on a shoot like this ?

Thanks,Paul.

[Serena Steuart]

Stage lighting is difficult for videography and if your client was happy then you did well. The portions of clips I watched (slow download) looked quite acceptable, good colour and adequate latitude. There is clipping (choking, really) in the highlights and you could have gained some there by not using cine 2. Perhaps your best approach would have been to rely on Z2 only and adjust iris for small bars in peak highlight. If the key light stayed at near constant intensity you might have used a constant iris set for highlight exposure. The brightness measurement is valuable, which is the same as the exposure meters familiar to those who've worked with film. Very likely I would have been relying on the histogram and Z2, but I wasn't there. I think your clips look fine.

[Mike Stevens]

And just to add, for dark scenes like you have you would better use Cine4 - what Sony calls the "brighter cine". And don't forget to adjust the master black and to open up the shadows with black gamma. With the black gamma go easy or you will get noise especially if you are using much gain.