daniel@toodee.de – Brylka – TooDee

project: December 2020

The last project of the year. The tasks for this job included set supervision, team lead and nuke comp and flame online. Other recent work can be found here.

When I think back what sites I visited the most in 2020 (related to nerdy stuff), where I spent the most of my “free” time reading, learning and participating, I came up with this small list of links:

ACES
https://community.acescentral.com
Learning about Color
https://www.filmlight.ltd.uk/store/watch/colour-online/
https://hg2dc.com – Troy Sobotka
https://www.rockflowers.net – Cédric Lejeune
Learning Blender
https://www.blenderguru.com – Andrew Price
https://www.udemy.com
Learning about HDR
http://www.lelabodejay.com – Jean Antoine Lacolle

Thanks to all for sharing so much knowledge. I am looking forward for a new, exiting and healthy year 2021.

A first iPhone 12 HDR clip

I got my hands on an iPhone 12 (non Pro) and had to try immediately the new HDR mode in 4K@30fps. On my iPhone 11 ProMax the result looks quite good, on an 2020 iMac27 the quality of the video looks not that great.

Click on the Vimeo link and compare the image brightness of the photo vs. the video (works from iPhone X upwards on Safari).

This photo was taken with the iPhone 11 ProMax at the same moment as the video was shot.

This short clip was taken with an iPhone 12.

projects: November 2020

Here are two projects I worked on in the last weeks. The tasks included team lead and nuke comp. Other recent work can be found here.

Resolve Studio HDR tests

Why can’t I see a proper HDR preview on an iMac2020/MBP2018 UI screen? In FCPX this is possible.

For some time now I am testing with HDR content in FCPX and Resolve Studio. FCPX works best for me with Alexa LogC material in HDR/WideGamut projects. In Resolve I set the project to ACES 1.1 and use the ST-2084 (1.000Nits P3D65limited) ODT for the tests.

Seeing HDR content in FCPX and review the exported ProRes444 files works the same convenient as with SDR footage. What you see inside FCPX is the same as in the Quicktime player.

In Resolve Studio (both V16&V17beta) this is a different story. I can also get a HDR preview in the Resolve UI, but it is vastly to bright. I can’ judge anything here. The exported result as a ProRes 444 however looks very similar to the FCPX output. I am aware that I am comparing two different color management systems and different HDR tone mapping curves.

The following screenshots don’t help much, as they can’t show the HDR values, but the most noticeable difference can be spotted on the grey background of the CG car render, and the overall overblown car paint appearance.

SDR screenshots of HDR UI screens. Not that helpful.

FCPX HDR/WideGamut project: A Rec.2020 working colorspace and a Dolby PQ view transform with a HDR tone mapping to 1.000 nits maximum.

Resolve Studio ACES 1.1 project: A ACEScct working colorspace and a ST-2084 (1.000 Nits P3D65limited) ODT.

I posted in the Blackmagicdesign forum with no success. I am not sure if this is a bug or I am just missing a button somewhere. I would expect the HDR preview to work very similar in FCPX & Resolve.

Blender Sky Texture ACES test

Quick test of the new Blender 2.9 sky-shader “Nishita” in ACES on the updated the page Blender & ACES Limitations.

(1.) Blender FILMIC / (2.) Blender standard over ACES / (3.) Blender OCIO/ACES1.2

And a quick FCPX HDR render of the 10 seconds clip that I rendered.

H(DR)ello

Here are some Quicklinks to the articles that are most important to me at the moment. Everything else you can find here by scrolling down or checking the menu up right: Panicpost – commercial break

HDR.toodee.de – a little subdomain which features only HDR content – updated in January 2021
SDR next to HDR – my latest article related to HDR, where I try to explain the advantages of HDR content from a perspective of media professionals who did not see their content in HDR (yet), but might like it. – from January 2021

HDR (If it is presented visibly a lot brighter on your smartphone display.)

The “lazy” compositor

Use the “winner” HDRI from the previous article and render a car with “no” compositing effort.

The previous article was already a bit long, so I split it up into two parts. Here it now the second part. I go over the preparation of the footage, render a car model and place it in the plate.

Blender Cycles rendering and more or less a simple A over B in Nuke.

Resolve HDR trim pass of the same image. Really shows the “ping” in the specular highlights.

HDR content disclaimer

Please continue with 2.4.4. Refine and Render.

Theta Z1 vs. Canon 7D

A direct comparison, shooting brackets back to back on a parking lot.

It’s been a while that I wrote the last article in the color chart series. Actually it was January this year, but like it feels like years ago. This time I stick to my “best” workflow using CaptureOne for the RAW to TIFF conversion and PTGui for the stitching of the HDRI, but I had the chance to do a shoot-out between the Ricoh Theta-Z1 vs. my Canon 7D setup on a quiet sunny morning. This article will be followed by a comparison of some Blender&ACES rendering results with the different HDRIs (coming soon).

Please follow the line to the full article “2.4.3. Eliminate Variables“.

I am still playing around with HDR content on this site. That’s why I rendered more content in HDR for further tests. This clip was rendered with Resolve Studio as a ProRes4444 and uploaded directly to Vimeo and YouTube. Somehow they look already different…

Note: I am only able to watch the HDR content when I view this page in Safari on an iPhoneX upwards or from inside the Vimeo App directly. This works then also on an iPadPro.