Mark Romero 2

What I "need" for both RAW stills and video is good low light ability, great dynamic range,  great UI, awesome colors, weight low enough to use on a smaller sized gimbal.

The UI of my a6500 is killing me. It just frustrates the heck out of me.

The X-T3 looks tempting despite lack of IBIS. Not a FF but it might be a great hybrid solution (my main concern with some of the Fuji cameras I have seen in the past is that the auto ISO function looks "stepped" with noticeable changes in ISO).

The new Panasonic L cameras look interesting too. As does the Z6. 

However, with the X-T3 and the Panasonic L cameras doing 4K 60p, probably next year we will all be saying "4K 30p is so 2018."

7 hours ago, jonpais said:

Sure. Here are the settings I use. 

Thanks!

21 hours ago, AaronChicago said:

Why not expose accurately? Use a LUT, waveform, and/or light meter.

Well... that brings up the point of "what is accurate?" And how much does it differ from us using prosumer cameras (either 8 or 10 bit) and those who might be using higher model cameras.

On 9/24/2018 at 8:20 PM, jonpais said:

With S-Log2, I just meter for brightest important highlight detail - whether it’s a shirt or the face - and the skin tone line on the vectorscope is usually spot-on. 

Hi @jonpais

Can you elaborate a bit on HOW you meter for the highlight? Are you using the zebras? If so, what have you got the zebras set to when shooting SLOG 2?

Thanks in advance.

Q: "What is the medium format look?"

A: an empty wallet...

45 minutes ago, jonpais said:

@Mark Romero 2 Re: The help guide, there's also this:

When using S-Log2 gamma, the noise becomes more noticeable compared to when using other gammas. If the noise still is significant even after processing pictures, it may be improved by shooting with a brighter setting. However, the dynamic range becomes narrower accordingly when you shoot with a brighter setting. We recommend checking the picture in advance by test shooting when using S-log2.

There are no such instructions in the a7 III help guide.

Shooting S-Log2 at whatever ISO, 800 and above, custom white balance seems just fine, and exposure is pretty straightforward just using zebras set at 100+. 

I don't use view assist or waveform monitors when shooting S-Log2 and I haven't been applying any special LUTs to the footage (except for the Leeming LUT Quickies in the screen grabs I shared to add a bit of drama).  

I'm really liking the highlight roll-off when compared to the Cine2 profile I had been using, and skin tones look okay to my old eyes.

In sum, I kind of enjoy shooting S-Log2 and will probably stick with it for the time being.

Thanks for sharing your experience!!!

25 minutes ago, jonpais said:

Switch out of S-Log while doing white balance? LMAO

Well... according to the sony help guide scroll to the bottom of here: http://helpguide.sony.net/ilc/1420/v1/en/contents/TP0000435736.html ), that seems to be what they are saying:

"Setting [ITU709(800%)] or [S-Log2] may cause an error in the white balance custom setup. In that case, set the exposure bright first and then perform custom setup."

Although it is hard for me to interpret that...

2 minutes ago, seanzzxx said:

The reason I stopped shooting Slog was the fact that by overexposing by two stops the skin tones get really pasty and thin most of the times. I much rather have good skintones than some extra dynamic range, however I agree with you on the fact that the Cine curves have terrible highlight roll off.

Thank you for the input. Have you had a chance to try the HLG profiles?

Beautiful work!

One more question for everyone: How does the HLG profiles of the 3rd Gen Sony mirrorless cameras (a7 III, a7R III) fit in to all this? I understand that 1) It isn't really supposed to be for grading, and that it is is supposed to be for "out of camera" footage that will be shown on HD TVs, but is there a benefit when shooting for (eventual) Rec.709 distribution like youtube?

For example: If shooting HLG and then editing on a Rec. 709 timeline, can I at least get the same 12 stops of DR that Cine4 at 0EV or SLOG2 at +2 provide without having the nasty Cine4 rolloff and without having to deal with the SLOG2 workflow?

I really have only seen the videos comparing SLOG2 with HLG by the one guy Scott Jeschke and they don't seem really conclusive to me (maybe I missed it).

HLG 3 seems a lot nicer than the STANDARD / oicture profiles off:

But not really sure about head-to-head with SLOG2

2 hours ago, Deadcode said:

With +2 stop overexposure, you still have around 12 EV dynamic range, and each stop represented about the same amount of luminance levels.

If you are shooting regular gamma, not each stop has the same amount of luma data which can cause limitation in colorgraing.

I tested extensively Cine4 (0EV) against SLOG2 +2EV which represents the same amount of dynamic range, but the low end of the Cine4 is heavily compressed compared to SLOG2. If you lift your shadows Cine4 falls in to pieces. Of course with regular grading both looks good and very close to each other.

My conclusion after tons of testing: expose for the highlights in wide DR scene, using SLOG2 for best looking image, and always expose for the skintones when using Cine4, and let the highlights clip, if necessary to get out of camera nice results.

Thank you for the input.

I can understand your findings. I guess the sadness for me is that the highlight rolloff of Cine4 is... how should we say it... pretty bad... So having the hghlights clip is pretty upsetting to me.

Your testing seems to confirm my (rather haphazard) comparisons between Cine4 and Slog 2. There is not a whole lot more DR in a SLOG2 shot that has been overexposed by two stops. It seems that the main benefit in this case is that SLOG2 gives a less harsh rolloff though.

All other things being equal, in regards to skin tones, would you say that Cine4 at 0 EV gives better skin tones than SLOG2 at around +2 after grading? Or are they about equal? You said with regular grading they both look about equal, so i am assuming that also refers to skin tones being on par with each other when exposed optimally. (I haven't been able to test on skin tones really.)

3 hours ago, MattH said:

But if you're over exposing by two stops (definitely 3) you may as well just shoot in normal gamma because you are throwing away everything log gives you anyway.

Yes, that is definitely a concern. Cine4 is much easier to use in the field (on an a6500) but the rolloff is nasty. Even using in-camera LUT (I don't know what sony calls it exactly... gamma assist???) when shooting SLOG2 the issue is that they recommend switching OUT of SLOG when doing your white balance, which is really difficult on a gimbal with the tiny buttons on an a6500.

8 hours ago, kye said:

It depends on the camera.

High end cinematographers always test the optimal level of exposure when they are about to film with a new camera. The answer of where each camera looks nicest with skin tones and DR is always different from camera to camera. For some it is underexposing, and others it is overexposing.

However this is with cinema cameras and you are talking about prosumer mirrorless.

The real question is perhaps "How do I get good results on a budget 8-bit camera shooting log?" 

Thanks for your input.

I think the "real question" for me, though, is maybe more along the lines of, "is it worth it to step up from a budget 8-bit camera if I want to shoot log / get more dynamic range"?

Admittedly, I did only allude to prosumer cameras. Hopefully that won't dissuade people from sharing findings about some of the more affordable cine cameras though.

11 hours ago, Mako Sports said:

I believe so because with shooting log you are try to protect the shadows.

Exactly why log is almost never recommended for low light situations.

In regards to your a6500, shooting log is a LOT easier with an external monitor because you get access to a waveform monitor.

Yes, wave forms or false color would make it a lot easier, I believe, as would just having a larger, brighter, more detailed screen. (The screen on the a6500 is pretty useless).

Do other LOG profiles (aside from SLOG) benefit from significant overexposure (plus 2 stops), or is SLOG the only one that is really noisy if it isn't overexposed?

Curtis Judd suggested about one stop over for Panasonic V Log. Some people on other forums said that with the GH5 you don't really need to overexpose any more.

Anyone heard anything about N-Log yet regarding overexposure?

Do the actual Pro Log S profiles used in EOSHD Pro Log 3 and Pro Log 4 require 2 stops of overexposure? (sorry, Andrew, if I am dipping in to the secret sauce too deeply)

Shooting in SLOG is just such a frustrating experience on my Sony a6500.

5 hours ago, jase said:

@Mark Romero 2 thanks for your advice, however the Base ISO for SLOG is way too high for my taste.

Yes, it is.

Using ND filters is quite a pain. Although i am looking into possibly getting one of the polarpro combo ND / polarizer filters.

On 9/20/2018 at 11:52 PM, jase said:

exactly and this lens is just 120% pure joy in use!

Interestingly, I found out that a two pass encoding from FCPX to compressor yields better quality than rendering ProRes directly from FCPX. So in the end, the result is better than expected, yet shows that the A7ii is quite limited:

Thanks for posting your video. To me, the IQ looks something like that of an 80D. However, I can see why you love the voitlander 40mm lens now.

Do  you think you will keep your a7 II??? Or do you think you will sell it?

If you think you will keep it, may I make a suggestion? I would suggest trying out SLOG and seeing if you are ok with the workflow required for using SLOG. I say this because in the few shots in your video where it is bright and sunny, the highlight rolloff is pretty bad. Most sony picture profiles have nasty highlight rolloff (IMHO).

SLOG will give you a bit more dynamic range and the rolloff is less nasty than the other profiles. But the workflow is harder.

Of course, if you are going to sell this camera than that is irrelevant.

Anyway, please keep us updated on whatever you end up deciding to do.

On 9/19/2018 at 4:51 PM, plucas said:

Hi,

A few people have commented that Sony's codec makes 4k editing a bit tougher and longer than say Canon's on the M50.

Matti Haapoja also commented that it made his post-production work a decent bit harder: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmL19fSQCMA

If I found editing the Canon M50's MP4 files not too bad (albeit a little tough) on a Microsoft Surface Book i7 (Intel[R] Core[TM] i7-8650U CPU @ 1.90GHz 2.11 Ghz with 8GB ram), how usable (or not) would the Sony A7iii's 4k codec be?

Will the Sony A7Siii likely have the same codec?

Kind regards,

Paul

The codec is supposed to be the same (XAVC-S) as on other 100mb cameras, like my Sony a6500 when shooting in 4K.

I find it pretty easy to edit 4K footage in resolve because of the automatic Cache feature (as @Inazuma alluded to) and the ability to create proxy files in 1080p if I need to.

i7-6700 @ 3.4GHZ, 24MB RAM, win 10 64-bit, 256GB SSD, GTX 960 2GB version

Well.... I have bought a few courses on the standalone version of fusion on udemy. We will see how it pans out.

I feel that the youtube videos on fusion have been pretty lacking when compared to the general youtube videos on resolve.

Maybe I just haven't found the right ones yet.

On 9/6/2018 at 4:35 PM, DaveAltizer said:

Some frames from a shoot I did this week. All shot on various Pro Color profiles (with some of my own tweaks here and there)

below are frames from two a7iii’s using a customized version of EOSHD ProColor V4 PP1. 

 

And below is a6300 on the tight shot and a7sii on the wide. Both using EOSHD ProColor 3.0

 

All of these frames were color corrected to match, and I was extremely pleased with how easy they were to match one another. The client was very happy with the results.  

Thanks for sharing your results and your feedback.

So many cameras to choose from...

The lack of IBIS is kind of a bummer for me. Wonder what the DR is going to be like.

4 hours ago, Jimmy said:

Top work, as always.... The lighting is stunning. I'd love to see you make a post with some behind the scenes chat about your lighting ideas and setup.

Yes!!! That would be great.

7 hours ago, Oliver Daniel said:

Hey Everyone, 

Here’s a bunch of stuff I’ve shot, graded and edited for music videos between 2012-2018. 

The shots in the reel not done by me are the drone shots. 

 

For you camera nerds, I used......

Sony FS700, FS5, FS7, F55, A7SII, A6500.

Panasonic GH3, GH5. 

DJI X3, X5R.

Brilliant work!!! It's a really captivating show reel.

1 hour ago, mkabi said:

Ditto!

Although, I suppose those 3 features will equal to a 4th feature i.e. internal over-heating.

It's not a bug... it's a high-tech hand warmer...

On 9/4/2018 at 8:39 PM, jonpais said:

You can’t judge skin tones in daylight. You’ve gotta shoot mixed lighting.

(Shoots mixed lighting).

You can’t judge Caucasian skin tones by those shots of Asians.

(Shoots Caucasians under mixed lighting).

You can’t judge skin tones with flat footage.

(Cranks up saturation).

Makeup?

?

Skin tones look fine to me.

Yeah, I find the skin tones in your recent vids with the a7 III to look really good. On the other hand, I am the type of person who finds canon skin tones to look way to red (and I often try to reduce the red that the EOSHD profile has on my a6500 as well). Personally I am probably a big fan of the Fuji Eterna skin tones and Nikon skin tones.

On 9/3/2018 at 11:48 AM, webrunner5 said:

My grade on it.

 

I like it, but agree with @mercer that a bit more contrast would make it even better.

4 hours ago, arant.joseph said:

Can I get people's take on this one?  It looks good abiet overexposed....

 

What are your thoughts on this one Andrew?

I really like most of the footage. There were some shots where her face was really, really green (assuming that was light reflected off the river / canal). But in many scenes her skin tones looked really nice.

On 8/31/2018 at 5:46 AM, Turboguard said:

New stuff I did for Olay;

 

NICE!!! Great work.

8 minutes ago, Django said:

Absolutely awesome to see confirmation the battery life way exceeds what was initially announced!

1000 shots / 2h10mn 4K ..with LCD on all the time! what was CIPA smoking when they rated it?!

That is much more of a surprise to me that it is that good. My a6500 regularly takes about 100 more stills on it's dinky battery than my D750 took with its beefier battery. Of course, I shoot 95% of my stills in LiveView, and the D750 was a battery hog for me when shooting in liveview.  I could get about 450 stills on a single battery on my D750 shooting in liveview, and about 550-ish with the a6500 using LCD screen. (Apparently, the EVF of the a6500 takes up more power than the back LCD screen does.) On the other hand, the LCD screen of the D750 is much, MUCH better than that of the a6500, so not a surprise to me that it soaks up so much juice.

Anyway, good on Nikon for having good battery life.