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Shot using 5D3/ML Raw (except the slow motion parts).

Please watch, enjoy and also share if you like.

Further used software includes Neat Video for grain reduction, The Foundry Kronos for further time stretching the slow motion parts, AE for linear and FCPX for non-linear editing.

I have a really cool idea, but it doesn't work 

I'm making a film using ML/RAW. I want to process it using ACR in AE because it produces the most awesome image results I've seen so far.
I own a copy of Adobe CS5 and neither want to afford to buy an update nor pay their CC rental fees nor want to pirate a new copy.

So I'm looking for a workflow with my existing software that will let me use flicker-free ACR processing anyway.
After checking out the Flicker Free ETTR Time Lapse page (http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=5705) I thought that individual XMP files for each DNG (identical file base name with .xmp extension) with a constant exposure attribute could maybe trick ACR into keeping a constant exposure when making heavy use of the Shadow and Highlight Recovery features on images with changing exposure.

However, when I write files of following content for each DNG, importing the sequence into AE will result in ACR image manipulations being applied only to the very first image of the sequence. All subsequent images will remain in their unpolished raw appearance.
This makes me believe that I could have made mistakes in creating the XMP files or its syntax, and that the idea in general could still work.

I tried both following file contents. One is basically the file created by the ML Post-Deflicker routine. The second has been extracted from a ACR-manipulated file, stripped of all attributes except the crs:Exposure.

Does anyone spot a mistake or know which attributes need to stay in the XMP code?

First try:

Code Select Expand

<x:xmpmeta xmlns:x="adobe:ns:meta/" x:xmptk="Magic Lantern">
<rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#">
  <rdf:Description rdf:about=""
    xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
    xmlns:photoshop="http://ns.adobe.com/photoshop/1.0/"
    xmlns:crs="http://ns.adobe.com/camera-raw-settings/1.0/"
   photoshop:DateCreated="2050-01-01T00:00:00:00"
   photoshop:EmbeddedXMPDigest=""
   crs:ProcessVersion="6.7"
   crs:Exposure2012="0.00">
   <dc:subject>
    <rdf:Bag>
     <rdf:li>ML Post-Deflicker</rdf:li>
    </rdf:Bag>
   </dc:subject>
  </rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>
</x:xmpmeta>


Second try:

Code Select Expand

<x:xmpmeta xmlns:x="adobe:ns:meta/" x:xmptk="Adobe XMP Core 5.3-c007 1.136881, 2010/06/10-18:11:35        ">
<rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#">
  <rdf:Description rdf:about=""
    xmlns:xmp="http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/"
    xmlns:xmpMM="http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/mm/"
    xmlns:stEvt="http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/sType/ResourceEvent#"
    xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/"
    xmlns:crs="http://ns.adobe.com/camera-raw-settings/1.0/"
   xmp:CreatorTool="Rarevision RAWMagic 1.0"
   xmp:Rating="0"
   crs:Exposure="0.00"
  </rdf:Description>
</rdf:RDF>
</x:xmpmeta>

Hi there,

my idea might come a bit on short notice or be unrealistic, but please consider it:

In the week of August 26th–30th I'm shooting a dance film using ML RAW. That's a week from now.
I'm looking for the simplest possible way of reviewing the RAW footage on-location, most likely by people who are not DIP cracks.
Currently the easiest way is to use Ginger HDR with After Effects, and although this is already pretty straight forward, it can be simpler.

I'm chipping in $150 to the person who can make an otherwise freely available QuickLook plug in or standalone Mac RAW viewer app (with command line opening support and a separate window per file and full screen support) within a week from now, including automatic file spanning. I'm aware that the files probably won't play back in real time, but that's not necessary. The review is meant for checking overall image composition and sharpness.
$150 isn't really what the work is worth, but it's what I can offer. Furthermore I believe that much of the underlying work has already been done by the developers of GingerHDR and the RAW2DNG converters. It's possibly only a matter of getting to know the QuickLook plug in structure and delivering single images to the OS as required. Since OSX/QuickLook can already read DNG files, an on-the-fly conversion might not even be necessary.