New ND-adjustment feature?

[Ola Christoffersson]

I just upgraded to 1.1 and found a new menu-setting: ND adjustment.

Anyone who has a clue as to what it does? Is it a gain adjustment or some kind of colour balance tweak?

[Giuseppe Pugliese]

its to correct for the color difference with ND filters, some can have different color hues, this corrects for that.

[Ola Christoffersson]

But the feature refers to ND clear, ND1 and ND2 which implies that it would affect internal ND-filters. If there are colour shifts in these filters wouldn't it be better to just compensate for this automatically without involving the user? It does not really make sense. I guess I will have to try out the feature when I have the time...

[Ola Christoffersson]

I just did a very quick test and recorded two clips with ND off. One with an ND-adjustment of about 500 and one without any adjustment (0). The two clips appeared to have the same colour tone but the one with the 500-adjustment was considerably brighter. To me it seems like some kind of fine tuning of the gain. Can't see what I should use it for though.
Giuseppe - where did you hear that it is to compensate for colour shifts? Or where you just guessing?

[Michael Palmer]

I read the Abel Cine post describing the ND Adjustment feature that was unlocked within the firmware update 1.10.
"ND Adjustment – They have also enabled a slight color adjustment for the different ND filters. By adjusting these values, you can compensate for any color shift introduced by the ND filters."

This seems ridiculous as the F3 has plenty of color adjustment. I asked Joseph Schimizzi at Cine Gear and he said the USA Sony people don't even have an updated manual for the new firmware release. Joe is looking into this for me.

I believe it adjusts/increases the amount of gain/ISO. The setting can dial up from Zero the 999.
I believe it is a Master Gain and adds about a stop when dialed to 999.

[Erwin van Dijck]

I have seen this menu setting with other SONY cameras as well. From the manual of the F350:

"ND Comp:
Makes settings related to ND filter color compensation. Although the differences are very slight, each of the built-in ND filters has different color characteristics. When you switch between ND
filters, the white balance may be disturbed. You can correct for these slight color differences automatically by registering compensation values
for each filter. "

regards,
Erwin

[Doug Jensen]

According to the updated F3 manual that I have, the purpose of this setting is to adjust the sensitivity of the ND filter. It makes no mention of color.
I assume it must be adjusting the gain somehow, because how can you adjust the gain of a glass filter? However, I'm not going to waste time trying to figure out exact what it does because according to the manual:

"ND Adjustment does not operate at present."

I see no reason to bother with it until it is operational. I have the feeling this adjustment is related to setting up the camera for 3D link. When 3D link is enabled, I'll bet this menu will be too.

[Andrew Stone]

Is the updated manual that Doug has available for download yet or could someone post it for download?

[Michael Palmer]

Doug, I believe it is active now with the update. It wasn't even illuminated with the original release and now it is. I found it to add gain.

Doug can you hook it up to a scope and tell us what this does.

Thanks

MP

[Doug Jensen]

No time this week. Maybe next week if someone else hasn't done it by then.

[Giuseppe Pugliese]

The color shift happens with the ND filters built into the camera. I have noticed that my 4x4 ND filters have a different hue than my built in sony F3 filters.

I believe they have recognized that there is a difference in color temp happening and the allowed you to correct for it...

Also Able has posted thats what the option is for as well. I'll get the answer directly from Sony then, I'm meeting up with them tomorrow.

[Michael Palmer]

No one from Sony had a clue of this feature, I'm not sure anyone does. At NAB I asked the Japanese Sony Engineer for the F3 and he said it was a gain adjustment, but he didn't give me anymore than that. I didn't get his name either.

[Alister Chapman]

It appears to be a gain compensation adjustment that allows your to ensure that each ND filter reduces the sensitivity by exact T-Stops. Once tweaked you should be able to use a light meter for exposure setting and be sure that when you use the ND's your exposure will still be accurate as you can fine tune the cameras gain to compensate for small differences in the ND filters.

[Ola Christoffersson]

I think Alisters explanaition sounds most resonable. It is also in line with my observations. Nice talking to you in Stockholm Alister...

[Michael Palmer]

Alister, Good of you to follow up on our discussion at the CD booth last weekend at Cine Gear, it was a pleasure to have met you there with Mike Schell. I still would like to know how much of an adjustment this gives at 999. I really think having this gain adjustment is a nice added feature to the F3. Using a light meter can be very useful, I'm sure it will help with the S-log feature.