This short filmed with the Red Monstro 8K is just so damn beautiful. https://youtu.be/u4NP8ozjpLw
The HDR Effect
"One of the things I've noticed over the years with HDR is once the DP sees the look with the added range they think they may have wanted to adjust the framing. The added levels on highlights and added saturation to highlights pulls the eye around in different ways than when we have a small... Continue Reading →
Light the Talent Last!
https://youtu.be/VasxLZl4YyU While we didn't end up using the boom arm after all, the photos show how easy it is to set up with lights as compact and lightweight as the Nanlite Forzas. For counterweights, we just used a couple of Lacie Rugged RAIDs and two NPF batteries. hehe
Manual SDR Grade vs. Dolby Vision Derived SDR Version
Can industry professionals distinguish between the 'hand graded' SDR version of a Hollywood film and a Dolby Vision derived SDR version? That's the question Dolby Vision set about to answer when they went on a worldwide tour of nine cities to do an 'SDR Survey'. The cities they visited were Los Angeles, Tokyo, London, New... Continue Reading →
ProRes RAW HQ Grade Reveal
Lighting setup - window light, two reflectors https://youtu.be/sp_msCFEUmI
The GM Advantage
How well does the new Voigtlander Apo 35mm f/2 aspherical stack up to the Sony 35mm f/1.4 GM? In the most critical areas, like architectural and landscape photography, the two lenses might be difficult to tell apart (although we still think the Sony will prevail); however, with its fast f/1.4 aperture and the quickest, most... Continue Reading →
HDR Nirvana
ASC associate member and American Cinematographer contributing editor Jay Holben discusses HDR from the set to post with Polly Morgan, Markus Förderer, Marshall Adams, Erik Messerschmidt, Jay Holben and Dave Cole, followed by a question and answer session in a new series of in-depth interviews entitled Insights: an incredible wealth of knowledge spread across three absorbing hours. In... Continue Reading →
Criteria for Evaluating Online Instruction
As the number of online HDR tutorials grows, it becomes necessary to separate the wheat from the chaff. The best way to go about that is pretty straightforward - just have a look at the content creators' own footage: is it noisy? blurry? are highlights clipped? how about tonal gradations, or lack thereof? compression artifacts?... Continue Reading →
iOS Devices as Client Reference Monitors
Part I: The iPhone 12 Pro Max as a Consumer Reference Monitor Part II: iPhone 12 Pro as a Consumer Reference Display (cont’d) Part III: iOS Devices as Client Reference Monitors Part IV: Consumer Displays: When Your Client is David Fincher We've already talked about how important smartphones can be when evaluating content made for YouTube. Post-production houses... Continue Reading →
Fog Machine
Looking forward to sparking this puppy up once lockdown is lifted. 🙂
There’s No Shame in Shooting With a Non-Log Picture Profile
For our friends who are still shooting with the a7 III, here are some exposure tips. First, it is highly inadvisable to shoot either S-Log 2 or S-Log3, with the a7 III. It will result in ugly banding which cannot be removed in post. Those who think banding only occurs in skies are sorely mistaken -... Continue Reading →
Ashley III
Colors are more intense as well as more accurate on the iPhone 12 Pro Max than on the LG OLED 55CX and there's also greater separation between the model and background, possibly because the mobile device is tracking the PQ curve more precisely. If the nails look like they're ablaze on your mobile device, it's... Continue Reading →
Using a Fresnel for Soft Lighting
We got this arrangement from Bill Holshevnikoff, author of the Arri Lighting Handbook. Since we don't have Arri lights, we placed a Nanlite Forza 300 fitted with an FL-20G fresnel lens perpendicular to the camera and directed it toward a reflector, which then becomes our key light, creating a soft light with gentle wraparound and... Continue Reading →
HDR Quiz
1. On the HDR PQ curve, 100 nits is a. 10% of 10,000 nits peak level b. 25% of 10,000 nits peak level c. 50% of 10,000 nits peak level 2. The maximum pure blue in SDR is 10 nits. Maximum pure blue in HDR is a. 25 nits b. 50 nits c. 110 nits... Continue Reading →
LG G1 vs. Sony A90J: Which Is Best for Content Creators?
Vincent Theo of HDTVTest fame recently compared LG's G1 OLED to Sony's A90J, which in an earlier review he announced produced the most impactful HDR he'd ever seen from an OLED TV. Which is best for content creators who can't afford a USD $30,000 reference monitor? Sony's WRGB quad sub-pixel boosting A common complaint of... Continue Reading →
BRAW vs ProRes RAW
Sherif Mokbel compares Lumix S1H Blackmagic RAW to Apple’s ProRes RAW, with results that may surprise you! Incidentally, Atomos just released a firmware update for the Ninja V enabling white balance and ISO/exposure offset adjustments in Final Cut Pro for the a7s III. The Ninja V currently brings ProRes RAW to over thirty different cameras.... Continue Reading →
Ashley
In our long list of pet peeves related to HDR YouTube videos, obscenely bright specular highlights in the subject's teeth must rank among the most distracting. And as luck would have it, last night's shoot provides us with a perfect illustration. Peak highlights are brushing up against 400 nits, already several stops ETTR, but still... Continue Reading →
The Daejeon Chronicles 