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  thanks!

Followup question... when planning the shot (before hitting record) I like all the widgets on the screen like zebras, meters, etc. but when I magnify-zoom in it's b&w with a horrible lag, and then the zoom out button doesn't work so I need to hit play in order to get back out, and then it refreshes the screen for a few seconds (not terrible, but kinda annoying)

Is there a way to tell it to use the native camera mode when zooming in (5x or 10x), then ML with all the global draw stuff when at normal?

Two questions here...

1) If I haven't upgraded in several months, but last time I shot it was great- should I wipe it clean and re-install before my shoot tomorrow, or just use the older version since it worked fine?

2) if I don't touch any fps override, then it's 23.976 fps right (assuming 24fps is selected in canon menu)? Should I rather use fps override and set it to 24?

Thanks! Yeah, she does

As promised, here is the video master. It looks much better than the internet compressed version, especially when viewed on a large high resolution screen.

Right click and save as: http://goo.gl/hT2ucY (5GB)

You will need Quicktime to view, and possibly also to install the free Avid DNxHD codec. Mac and Windows downloads available @ http://avid.force.com/pkb/articles/en_US/download/en423319

Gorgeous grade. Would love some tips about your thought process while grading in general here

This is the workflow I used for the film @ http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=12720.0

Resolve (offline edit) -> FCP XML & Then -> After Effects (color grade w/ Film Convert) -> PSD Sequences -> Premiere (online "edit", not really much- just fade ins/outs) -> DNxHD -> Adobe Media Encoder (H264).

Why use Resolve for an offline editor and then after effects for color grade?! And if I'm already doing that, why not just do the online edit in Resolve as well?? Glad you asked

1) Resolve as an offline editor.

The real question is why *not* just use premiere. The answer is that Premiere sucks at playing DNG natively. By using Resolve as the offline editor, I could bring in the DNGs and edit natively with perfect playback, and even play with rough sample grades, without affecting the original DNGs or creating any intermediates.

2) FCP XML
I tried exporting to regular EDL and others and it was hard to read. FCP XML is easy to read and I can reference the clips by their actual file number. I.e. the <in><out> tags. That way in After Effects, I can match those numbers and export exactly what I need for online edit only

3) After effects as coloring

MLV did not look nice in Resolve natively using BMD Film settings. I know I could bump up the exposure in raw interpretation, but that just feels wrong, and didn't quite look as good as ACR

Furthermore, in after effects I use ACR/Bridge just to get white balance and exposure (so no flicker)- as well as denoise and sharpen. Since this is all happening on the native DNG, I can undestructively go back and tweak, using the benefits of ACR and raw

On top of this, there is then the entire arsenal of after effects to tweak the look/color. I used FilmConvert and Color Finesse.

I'm also very used to / fond of Color Finesse. I tend to get better results more easily with that than any other tool, especially when the intended look is natural (can then use other effects in after effects to get unnatural looks anyway... such as magic bullet or whatever)

4) PSD Sequences

I've just had battle scars from doing anything else in the past. I know that when I export a PSD, it is what it is, and don't need to worry about if any program is going to chop the bit depth or shift the gamma or whatever. PSD sequences work perfectly in Adobe products...

5) Premiere

As I said, PSD work perfectly in *Adobe* products

6) DNxHD

This is the one part I'm not happy about. Adobe won't export a DNxHD 444 at 48/64 bit depth without it getting all messed up. Google the problem, and you'll see the consensus is that DNxHD ignores this setting and simply uses it's own determination to do 10 bit instead of AME's settings. I've tried it, and indeed bringing the exported DNxHD back into After Effects for comparing shows it as "Trillions of Colors" and no visible difference really. So, reluctantly I'm trusting this and anyway it looks fantastic

7) Premiere crashed when exporting from timeline, so I brought the DNxHD into AME. No big deal. Rendered at High Profile 5.1 maximum quality and depth

[EDIT]

Youtube version:

Vimeo version:

Uploading DNxHD master now... will update and share here as long as y'all promise not to kill my bandwidth charges If the upload doesn't time out, should be ready in a day or so.

Okay, so what's the story with the "Weird Workflow"... well.. it went:

[ EDIT, moved to Workflow forum @ http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=12723 ]

Nice marekk, cool (pun intended) way to draw attention to the blue theme throughout a city. I'm sortof more in the headspace right now of less heavy saturation (not that it's a bad thing in general at all- just where my personal taste is right now), but here it really worked well to make usual city shots stand out and say something interesting and different. Nicely done!

So I had some trouble in Resolve again... not due to Cinelog, just my own troubles getting it where I wanted, matching a reference I had previously. I'm sure I'll have more headache in AE, but going to start there and try again tomorrow.

Hehe... I've got to learn to let it go and move on to the next thing. I'm telling myself I'm not going to spend nearly as much time matching all the other clips as I did just to get this one the way I like.

But it's a good learning exercise anyway

Here's where I ended up, FYI (AE+ACR+FilmConvert... adjusted exposure in ACR and not much in FilmConvert.

EDIT: Hah, nevermind what was there before... had bad camera settings.... here's the latest:

LOL, well, nm... playing around in AE/FilmConvert didn't ultimately get me any better... seems the tools aren't the limitation

Now to reconstruct how in the hell I got to my most favorite setup in Resolve hehe.

Hope my notes help someone avoid making the same mistake I did... do not be fooled by the initial dark levels! As Andy said, there's more than enough there, and you gain nothing but heartache trying to go the AE route...

Nice seeing what can be done so quickly. I think these looks lend themselves much more to the sortof action/thriller sort of genre, not so much an old world naturalist vibe... but very good to know that there's a very quick route to that commercially-successful sortof look using your LUTs. Kinda makes me want to shoot something in this genre just to show how easy it is to blow someone's socks off

Understood that it's not limited to that at all either.

Thanks for confirming it's not a big deal to bump up the exposure too, no doubt others might have wondered the same.

For right now, this project, I'm going to try going the AE route and see how it goes. This is such a small piece, and I might give FilmConvert a whirl too.

Thank you for all your help- even if I don't use it for this project, I'm happy with my purchase and looking forward to using it (and Resolve) in the future where it's a better fit (esp. where there's lots of media, intermediaries, deadlines, etc.) Rare that you get such dedicated feedback from the actual developer (for my dayjob- I'm coding mobile apps and web services and things like that, I have a huge appreciation for the technical R&D process and how it can be to need to explain it over and over again)!

Can't wait till the next project and to see all the improvements that have happened in between

Later!

I guess what's really throwing me off is the BMD Film setting making the CDNG so dark... needing to +1 the exposure just feels like too drastic an adjustment. Am I crazy?

Would it be better to use ACR and the current version of Cinelog to render out stills (or DNxHD... though there's issues from AE with that...), bring that into Resolve and just grade that by hand?

Re: the differences between Resolve and PP, AE, FCp etc etc - it's a nightmare familiar to colorists everywhere. That's why it's best to stick with known (SMPTE) standards. We can work out the scaling differences and make something to bridge different apps to fix gamma mismatch etc. It's like the gamma shift you get with H.264 - it's different across several apps because developers don't always stick to standards or they interpret them differently.

You might have to output at Video levels from Resolve or set you workspace to linear gamma (i.e. in After Effects) but it's wholly dependent on the app you are going to work in and the source signal/gamma. Don't fret, there is a solution for everything

I think what might work really well is when you can get from ACR(DNG)->Resolve, and apply a LUT to see exactly what it looked like in ACR originally

The only piece that's missing for that is ACR->Cinelog-C right? Once you've got that, then it's in a standard that should look the same everywhere- and nothing really gets lost in the above workflow (assuming 10-bit intermediate)?

Cool, thanks for taking a look. Here's the file (maybe a frame or two off, but just about right):

http://we.tl/BLiNanPbhn

You are right, it was using the embedded profile... probably the technicolor one from when I was shooting h.264

For what it's worth, speedgrade 2014 rendered it almost totally black upon initial open, lol

So so far the only app that *really* gives me what I'd expect is After Effects, but then you can't grade the DNG directly (actually- what happens if you just adjust exposure and white balance in ACR that way, and then throw Synthetic Aperture/Color Finese on top... is that a high quality workflow, even if it means having to write down timecodes by hand to match an EDL? Last time I tried something like that was ages ago... and Color Finese didn't exactly reflect the ACR settings, had to toggle back and forth)

Gotta run, will be back later

Yeah, but it doesn't quite look as good when bumping the exposure...

Didn't use any profile or LUT in ACR

OK, I'm actually very confused... just to compare, I opened up one of my DNGs and it inherently looked much better than what I was getting for starters in resolve (both via Resolve's native CinemaDNG and using Cinelog)

Here is the ACR, set white balance to 6500 and tint = 0



Here is the Resolve, set white balance to 6500 and tint = 0 (and BMD Film 4K)
LUT #1 = [INPUT] BMD Film 4K -> Cinelog-C
LUT #2 = [MONITOR] Cinelog-C -> Rec 409



To my eye, it's not a matter of just bumping the exposure, when I do that the Resolve one doesn't look as good as the Adobe

So back at square 1, recut the film in Adobe? Aye... what's even the best process for that to utilize ACR, assuming disk space isn't an issue? Grade in After Effects with Synthetic Aperture?

EDIT: And just for fun, here's a DNG from around the same timestamp exported with same basic settings direct from Premiere... yet another difference!

Tim - See above: http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=10151.msg98416#msg98416

"The difference between Cinelog and Visionlog might not appear big at first glance but...."

We suggest the intermediate stage (raw to Cinelog-C DNxHD or ProRes 4:4:4 video) for those who want to free-up a lot of drive space because the log conversion can effectively be reversed to debayered linear raw RGB in .exr files (i.e. for VFX) using the Cinelog-C to Linear lut. This means you don't need to retain the original DNG images. Cinelog-C is useful for efficient archiving

Totally, for a larger project that's critical and also I think if one wants to use ACR (i.e. via After Effects)

Though, I must say, as much of an Adobe fanboy as I am, it is *really nice* to be able to do the whole thing without leaving Resolve. That software is growing on me and I can't reason to do a short form project any other way

Thanks for confirming the above is all sane When you author the guide, for other people like me- might be helpful to know a little bit more about what the different GAMUT Luts are for. I just sortof randomly played till it looked good

p.s. you can add some simple tags to keep images within the 900px width forum rule like this:

Code Select Expand

[url=http://i.cubeupload.com/6MlM7C.jpg][img width=900]http://i.cubeupload.com/6MlM7C.jpg[/img][/url]

Done, thanks for the tip

OK, here's what I ended up doing last night... didn't actually need to touch any color wheels at all! Now I can reserve that for just matching the different clips and maybe a tiny bit more tweaking on a clip-by-clip basis, though even that isn't really needed I think and even that could be done mostly in raw interpretation

Andy- can you confirm that this is a good, non-destructive approach? Seems so strange to barely touch anything yet get such a nice old school cinematic looking grade (to my eye at least). My biggest question is if it made sense to arrange the LUTs like this and especially LUT 2

Step 1 - Apply BMD Film 4K -> Cinelog-C across entire project:



Step 2 - For each clip:

A) make sure Color Space is BMD Film and Gamma is BMD Film 4K and Highlight Recovery is checked

B) Adjust tint, exposure, color boost to liking. Can come back to tweak these again later



Step 3 - Add Node, set LUT to [GAMUT] Cinelog-C to Photometric Rec 709 Primaries



Step 4 - Add Node, set LUT to [PE_A] Unversal HD



Step 5 - Go back to Step 2.B and tweak a bit to liking, paying attention to scopes etc.

Step 6 - Render out (I'm on windows, so that's DNxHD 10 bit at Data levels). Result:



Edit: In case it makes a difference, shot on 7D and converted to DNG with Raw2CDNG at default (CDNG 16 bit). Brought straight into Resolve 11 for all-in-one workflow, no roundtripping anywhere (not even back into resolve).

Wow, very helpful, thanks

To confirm- working space is BMD film and Gamma is BMD Film 4K (for 7D)

Thanks for answering all these questions... hopefully they'll be helpful for other newbies too

Ah... another question- to compensate for the darkness, what do you think of boosting the exposure in the camera raw decoding settings?

OK... thanks

What do the abbreviations for the film stocks mean? (A vs. D65)

Also- any way to avoid the film stocks from being so dark other than pushing it back up after? Does anything get lost in that darkness?

OK, will digest all this and play around...

For what it's worth, my workflow is a little bit different than what you described, using Resolve 11 and 7D.

I convert to DNG using raw2cdng

Then I am editing those natively in Resolve Small project on very fast drive (2xSSD in Raid 0) so space and drive speed are not a problem...

So I guess for this, I only need the input lut (BMD Film 4k -> Cinelog-C) and then I can pick a PFE for output/monitoring?

Also, there is only an option for BMD Film 4K in the Gamma settings for Raw settings, not Color Space (which only has regular BMD Film)

NM about it not looking flat- forgot I had a color correction node on that clip

But still, not quite sure about workflow... is input always meant to be BMD Film 4K -> Cinelog C, and then output is a film emulation? i.e. how would one get to Alexa-ish footage in the new LUTs?