AI compression tech could deliver 50x smaller files than technologies like H.264. According to flatplanelshd, ‘the team behind the MPEG standards is currently developing an AI-based codec with the aim of releasing it before the end of this decade.’ Read the story here.
The Nobel Prize in Chemistry Awarded for Discovery of Quantum Dots
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 2023 to: Moungi G. BawendiMassachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA, USA Louis E. BrusColumbia University, New York, NY, USA Alexei I. EkimovNanocrystals Technology Inc., New York, NY, USA “for the discovery and synthesis of quantum dots” They planted an... Continue Reading →
Bad Timing
Not sure when the marketing department over at Blackmagic Design decided to use a Sandisk Extreme Pro to illustrate the ability of their new full frame Cinema Camera to record to external disks, but it seems like unfortunate timing, given that Western Digital is facing multiple class-action lawsuits over its defective portable SSDs.
“We can no more shoot for HDR and SDR simultaneously without serious compromise than we could shoot for 16:9 and protect for 4:3.”
Steven Poster, ASC, President, International Cinematographers Guild IATSE Local 600 Presentation to the ICS at the ASC Clubhouse on 2018-06-07 (excerpt from the presentation, incl. a powerful, incontrovertible statement about the aesthetics of HDR) Little has changed since Steven Poster’s impassioned presentation five years ago. Few are monitoring HDR on set. And at NAB 2023,... Continue Reading →
Anything Above 100 Nits Is HDR
“The more accurate presentation of specular highlights is one of the key distinctions of HDR.” ITU-R BT.2390-8 Yoeri Geutskens, in a dreadfully misguided article entitled We Need to Talk About HDR, published a few years ago over at FlatpanelsHD in response to Vincent Teoh's scathing critique of The Mandalorian, whose highlights peak at 200 nits,... Continue Reading →
These numbers may surprise you
Many decried SMPTE's revision calling for a 5-nit surround as being too stringent, while Charles Poynton maintained the new standard was too lax. "SMPTE ST 2080-3 calls for a surround luminance of 5 nt (that is, 5% of the 100 nit reference white luminance of ST 2080-1). ST 2080-3's Annex A provides a highly questionable... Continue Reading →
Kodak hired more psychologists than chemists
“For a long time, many people have thought, 'Well, film has this S-curve kind of thing, it must be some sort of limitation of the photochemical process'. It isn’t. It was designed into the photochemical process. Eastman Kodak for years actually hired more psychologists than chemists for a period of time. They would go around... Continue Reading →
Short Takes: Remote Review From A Bathtub
From an interview with Anastas Michos, ASC, GSC, about his work on “The Autopsy”, from Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities Phedon Papamichael, ASC, GSC: I have a question. Just real quick about the DI, because you keep mentioning it. I was at the ASC clubhouse, and we were talking about agents and DI time and all... Continue Reading →
Gareth Edwards Talks Shooting The Creator With FX3
“There’s always been this promise with technology with Moore’s Law. The difference between shooting on film making it a very expensive film, and what you might call a consumer, a prosumer, like the stuff you can buy in stores, is getting narrower and narrower. That gap is getting indistinguishable to some extent. We shot the... Continue Reading →
LG update fixes auto-dimming on 2022 OLED TVs (C2, G2)
“After fixing the issue with auto-dimming in dark scenes on its 2023 models earlier this year, LG is now also rolling out a firmware fix for its 2022 OLED models, C2 and G2.” source
4,000-Nit Display: Viewers Experience Little To No Eyestrain, Prefer Even Higher Luminances
A study where participants watched video content on an HDR display under various ambient lighting conditions and asked to complete questionnaires to document their observations and subjective preferences as well as any visual fatigue they might have experienced found that subjects reported experiencing little to no visual fatigue. Test Setup Researchers used a Dolby 37” prototype... Continue Reading →
RED’s Output Transform LUTs: Highlight Roll-Off Comparison
Really liking DaVinci Resolve's Video Collage effect. It might be best to avoid Very Soft and Hard highlight roll off when using RED's output transform LUTs. https://youtu.be/Gmg21dc7_JI
The blocking by Netflix of shared accounts works: in the US, subscribers have not grown like this since the days of COVID
The Italian tech website DDay reports: "Antenna's analyst report seems to confirm that Netflix's new policies are working. The number of new users registered to the platform in the USA has in fact skyrocketed, surpassing the peaks reached during the pandemic. Netflix's policy to combat shared subscriptions is working, at least in the US. This... Continue Reading →
“Exposing to the right is one of the best ways to set yourself up for success in your color grade”
It turns out that Cullen Kelly's a big fan of exposing to the right. Below, screen shots of an image that's been underexposed 2 stops and one that's been exposed to the right by +2 stops. Photo: Cullen Kelly. Underexposed 2 stops Photo: Cullen Kelly. ETTR +2 stops Kelly’s video on ETTR is remarkable for... Continue Reading →
Brace yourselves: HDR is coming to the skies, folks.
In an article entitled "4K OLEDs arrive on planes. United will bring 300,000 screens and 67W USB-C to high altitude," Italian tech website DDay.it reports that, "By 2025, United Airlines will install 300,000 4K OLED screens on its aircraft....When Panasonic Avionics introduced Astrova, 4K OLED screens were only available in 13” or 16” cuts. In... Continue Reading →
ARRI “Impressions” & Signature Lens Showreel 2023 (HDR and SDR Back-To-Back)
Technical note: "The clips were graded in HDR and require the appropriate EOTF to be viewed as intended. For a correct viewing of HDR content on YouTube, we strongly suggest one of the following display devices/ hardware: Apple Pro Display XDR, MacBook Pro with XDR Display, MacBook Air with XDR Displays & iPad Pro with... Continue Reading →
Everything we know about timeline color space in one post
We just revised the section on working color spaces in the Monster Guide, so we're sharing it here. When it comes to post-processing, using the fewest number of transforms and working at the highest available bit depth in a native color space greater than the display color space are key to preserving the greatest image... Continue Reading →
“We don’t actually know what the ones and zeros that we’re putting on the drives are actually telling us”
Patrick Inhofer, CEO, Mixing Light, on the perils of grading with today's reference displays: "We're in a situation now where the color volumes we're working at, the nit ranges we're working at, the brightness values we're working at, exceed the ability of any modern display to reproduce. When HDR came out, the specifications were designed... Continue Reading →
Flanders Scientific XMP550 55″ QD-OLED HDR Mastering Monitor
Flanders Scientific has announced the XMP550 reference mastering monitor featuring a UHD QD OLED panel with a peak brightness of 2,000 nits. The display is equipped with a waveform and vectorscope as well as an adjustable false color mode. The XMP550 also features Auto Calibration: simply plug in any supported probe and the monitor will... Continue Reading →
The Daejeon Chronicles 