AE vs Nuke (color grading any difference?)

[ph2007]

Okie hi folks,

as title do you notices there is a difference between these 2 programs when you grading your footage using cinestyle profile?

recently i got into shooting weddings video with my T2i, when i grade the footage inside AE there is color banding everywhere..... (am i doing it wrong?)
I scratch my head until this week i gave nuke a try.... and boom!
u can really push the 8bits footage to VERY far compared to AE. especially skies and skintone..... theres no banding showing up in nuke.
even if u push it to extreme it will shows some banding... its very impressive for me so far (guess thats why its so expensive......)

Here is the example:
Nuke graded-- looks clean

AE graded-- banding apear ;(

Nuke push to extreme

AE push to extreme


Original cinestyle image:

Whats your thought?

[ansius]

in what bit depth you use After Effects 8 / 16 / 32 ? there is a big difference!

[ph2007]

Ah your right, thanks for reminding me.
Nuke always in 32bit, guess ill do another 32bit test in AE using 32bit

[ansius]

You don't need always the 32 bit, it all depends how far you are pushing the footage, and remember not all AE effects there work well with 32 bit. Of course if you shoot RAW or do time lapses form RAW (CR2 or DNG) then 8 bit in AE is somewhat bad idea. It depends where you grade, if your images are graded in ACR so that they fit in histogram well, then you should not get any artifacts unless you do some drastic curves / luts or other extreame color grade.

Other big problem in Adobe world is exporting to a codec that supports more than 8 bit (because encoding in highly compressed final format trough AE is BAD idea - slow and unstable). I have tried many and have not yet found one that I would like, Avid DNxHD was a good candidate but adobe has problems phrasing more than 8 bit deep DNxHD tough can create one with no problem. Other I have found are either too CPU consuming or too big or unstable (I'm in PC, so no ProRes for me). therefor unless I must (client wants) I try to keep to 8 bit files. I have found MXF / XDCAM HD 50 being really good, fast, not that big, 422, there for still useable for some more editing, fx, grading. (by the way youtube seams to love it really fast processing). Stability is key for me, because many times I have really tight turnaround time for my edits, and I can't lose time on crushed renders (when each would they take 2-4 hours or more).

[PaulJBis]

anius: have you tried Cineform? It can go up to 10 bits, and from my experience it seems to be okay.

[ph2007]

Hi guys,

I just do a test using 16/32bit in AE results seems better.

and i just tried out Resolve, and its so awesome. Everything process just in realtime
I think ill stick with it haha