Tips for exposing and grading “flat” profiles

[FHDcrew]

I’ve been using NLOG consistently on my Nikon Z6. Paired with Resolve’s brilliant color space transform and the great grading tools, it’s been easy to get the hang of working with it. But I don’t always like external recorders and want to be compact. The Z6 doesn’t do 10 bit log internally, only 8 bit. But it does have the Nikon Flat picture profile, which I’ve heard good things about. I never liked it, but a lot of it is that I never really spent time with it, getting to know its strengths and weaknesses, and how to grade it. Any tips on how to maximize the results, from exposure techniques to grading processes, for getting the best results with Nikon flat?  How can I within its limitations, mimic the look one gets from a good log profile?

[webrunner5]

I have never used it, but I can tell you when using 8bit stuff the trick is to get it as perfect in camera and it is pretty damn easy to grade. You can't edit crap footage when using 8bit. It is unforgiving. You might not even need log if you get good at it. You really need a light meter to be good at it, and a good ND and a Polarizer.

[FHDcrew]

Good points!  I suppose with practice I’ll get good results. Gotta be much more careful in camera lol!

[webrunner5]

Cameras in this day and age have pretty darn good metering in them. So, on Auto you can trust them. The problem is when you go manual. If you have Zebras in your camera and set them right, you should be pretty safe. On my GH5 you have the waveform display, that is a crazy good way to judge stuff. False Color is good I find for static scenes but moving around it makes me well dizzy following it. 😬

If you are doing it for fun I would not get too excited about being perfect. Plus, if you have a camera with not a lot of DR it is pretty hard to get a killer look. The trouble in this era is we tend to change cameras a lot or even have several of them and we don't get used to how they react to different scenes. Practice makes perfect as they say.

[MrSMW]

I only work with the Flat profile for all my work, but Panasonic Flat profile.

Previously, I was a ‘Natural’ guy but I tried Flat earlier this year and immediately noticed I liked it more.

I shoot S35 crop mode across all 4 bodies and with the S5 and S1H, 4k 50p and with my pair of S1R’s 5k 25p.

If anything, I prefer the 5k footage. I guess it’s the different sensor it has, but IMO there’s some magic about the supposedly least video-centric of the S cameras. I just wish it would do 50p in this 10 bit 5k mode…

The footage I like the least is that from the S1H shock horror. I think it’s due to the anti-aliasing filter and so I have the sharpening set higher in this unit and use my 2 sharpest lenses.

And before anyone says you don’t want sharp output blah blah blah, actually I do because I can always reduce it in post whereas if it’s captured as mush…

And by ‘sharp’ I don’t mean over-sharpened, but just something to my eye that does not look soft.

Anyway, grading it…

Simple and doesn’t need much.

I use Première and simply adjust the highs, lows and sometimes mids.

Then I might boost sat to 120% in landscape footage.

Twiddle the colour balance if needed but skin tones tend to be pretty decent.

As always, getting it as right in camera as possible is our friend, so WB along with exposure.

Then a single layer Film Convert Nitrate film stock customised to my tastes plus a second single layer of secret sauce that just adds the final ingredient to my ‘look’ et voila, done.

But SOOC, Flat is my standard and I like it 👍

[kye]

2 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

Cameras in this day and age have pretty darn good metering in them. So, on Auto you can trust them.

In a sense, yes, but the devil is in the details.

One example is with the GH5, if you turn on AF then it enables face-detect and the auto-exposure automatically exposes the skintones in the face correctly, but if you turn off AF (or have a manual lens) then it disables face-detect and will only expose the frame as if it's a landscape, letting the face / skin-tones (which are clearly visible) fall where they may as if they don't matter in the slightest.

So the automatic metering is fine, but it's about as reliable as AF - meaning that it can do it but reserves the right to screw up for random reasons and at random times.

[MrSMW]

I agree with Kye. You can and I mostly do, use 'auto lot's of stuff' (mainly WB) but whether you can trust it is up for debate.

Define 'trust'...

100% bullet proof?

Good enough most of the time, for most uses?

For me, that's when WB is because in the heat of my fast-paced work, it's one less thing to not have to think about and the way I work, it would be an utter PITA to do so because I use 3 principal memory settings when flipping between stills and video and I'd need to reset and lock in the WB in the memory settings for each camera every time. Err, no, too prone to error.

Reality shooting 100's of clips. Not an issue.

Ditto auto-ISO for stills. I always use auto-ISO unless it's after dark and I'm doing a slow shutter speed landscape or something when I maybe want a long exposure and low ISO. Fireworks or the Milky Way is another example. But every day work stuff. Auto-ISO. Unless using flash in which case I just pick something like 800 and go with that.

If I didn't shoot hybrid on the same bodies, I'd take a bit more control, but as with all forms of juggling, there are human limitations.

[FHDcrew]

7 hours ago, MrSMW said:

I only work with the Flat profile for all my work, but Panasonic Flat profile.

Previously, I was a ‘Natural’ guy but I tried Flat earlier this year and immediately noticed I liked it more.

I shoot S35 crop mode across all 4 bodies and with the S5 and S1H, 4k 50p and with my pair of S1R’s 5k 25p.

If anything, I prefer the 5k footage. I guess it’s the different sensor it has, but IMO there’s some magic about the supposedly least video-centric of the S cameras. I just wish it would do 50p in this 10 bit 5k mode…

The footage I like the least is that from the S1H shock horror. I think it’s due to the anti-aliasing filter and so I have the sharpening set higher in this unit and use my 2 sharpest lenses.

And before anyone says you don’t want sharp output blah blah blah, actually I do because I can always reduce it in post whereas if it’s captured as mush…

And by ‘sharp’ I don’t mean over-sharpened, but just something to my eye that does not look soft.

Anyway, grading it…

Simple and doesn’t need much.

I use Première and simply adjust the highs, lows and sometimes mids.

Then I might boost sat to 120% in landscape footage.

Twiddle the colour balance if needed but skin tones tend to be pretty decent.

As always, getting it as right in camera as possible is our friend, so WB along with exposure.

Then a single layer Film Convert Nitrate film stock customised to my tastes plus a second single layer of secret sauce that just adds the final ingredient to my ‘look’ et voila, done.

But SOOC, Flat is my standard and I like it 👍

I’d love to see an example of one of the weddings you shot with this beastly combo. Particularly interested in the results you got with the flat profile. Is it manageable even in harsh sunlight?

 

One thing I did notice is saturation increase behaves differently. With NLOG I can boost saturation and things look good across the board. With flat, to get background saturation at a similar level to NLOG when boosted, skin tones go a bit wild with over saturation. A simple layer node and skin qualification fix this, allowing me to adjust saturation of skin and everything else independently. I can then match the look of NLOG more closely. Another thing that is helping is using the “high soft” slider in resolve to add a bit of a highlight rolloff in post to the flat profile. Helps, because you notice a smooth highlight rolloff even when no highlights are clipped. 

[MrSMW]

6 hours ago, FHDcrew said:

I’d love to see an example of one of the weddings you shot with this beastly combo. Particularly interested in the results you got with the flat profile. Is it manageable even in harsh sunlight?

Sure: https://firehorsephotographyfrance.com/2022-weddings/the-two-sams-wedding

90% handheld with a pair of S1R’s, Sigma 35mm f2 and 65mm f2, 5k 30p plus church (dim) and barn speeches (dark, lit with single LED panel), S1H and S5 in 4k 60p.

There’s shade, bright sunlight, backlighting, golden hour…the lot.

There’s even some AF tracking! 😬

And a bit of lighting flicker/banding so gone back to shooting 25p and 50p as a result!

Flat profile, light grade as previously described. I’m not a grading expert so it’s more a ‘good enough for the purpose’ grade.

Pity the 5k is not available in 50/60p, but then there’s a 15 minute record limit for 5k on the S1R so not good for ceremonies or speeches.

So for now, I use the 4/5k mix and look forward to seeing what Panny do next with the S line.

[kye]

11 hours ago, FHDcrew said:

I’d love to see an example of one of the weddings you shot with this beastly combo. Particularly interested in the results you got with the flat profile. Is it manageable even in harsh sunlight?

 

One thing I did notice is saturation increase behaves differently. With NLOG I can boost saturation and things look good across the board. With flat, to get background saturation at a similar level to NLOG when boosted, skin tones go a bit wild with over saturation. A simple layer node and skin qualification fix this, allowing me to adjust saturation of skin and everything else independently. I can then match the look of NLOG more closely. Another thing that is helping is using the “high soft” slider in resolve to add a bit of a highlight rolloff in post to the flat profile. Helps, because you notice a smooth highlight rolloff even when no highlights are clipped. 

Have you tried playing with Saturation vs Colour Boost?  Sat expands all saturation evenly, whereas CB only expands the low-sat stuff and doesn't increase the high-sat stuff, so using various combinations of them you might have a setting that doesn't need any masks.  Maybe a combo of Sat with negative CB to boost stronger colours and not over-do the skintones?

Any time you can apply an overall adjustment vs pulling a key is always safer.

You could also try the spider-web tool (Colour Warper) to boost sat for all hues except the skintones?

[FHDcrew]

I’ll play with color boost and the color warped. 
 

Now how should I go about artificially improving the highlight rolloff in post?  I want to make the footage look like it’s been shot in log even though it hasn’t.

Also, has anyone had experience with either EOSHD ZLOG or BeatLog II?  Two custom “log” picture profiles for the Z6. People say they improve stuff. But I tried making the BeatLog II profile and ended up with very yucky skin tones. Shadows improve but highlights are no better. Wondering if it’s the same story for ZLOG. Not trying to bash on Andrew Reid or anything, just want to know if his profile exhibits this issue. 

[kye]

5 minutes ago, FHDcrew said:

I’ll play with color boost and the color warped. 
 

Now how should I go about artificially improving the highlight rolloff in post?  I want to make the footage look like it’s been shot in log even though it hasn’t.

Also, has anyone had experience with either EOSHD ZLOG or BeatLog II?  Two custom “log” picture profiles for the Z6. People say they improve stuff. But I tried making the BeatLog II profile and ended up with very yucky skin tones. Shadows improve but highlights are no better. Wondering if it’s the same story for ZLOG. Not trying to bash on Andrew Reid or anything, just want to know if his profile exhibits this issue. 

My tips for highlight rolloff are to have a curve that makes the transition more gradual, so things have a really gradual transition into clipping.  That requires you to either add contrast, or to lower the white-point, so that's a creative choice and either can help if things are clipped.

It's also nice to desaturate the whites too, which hides it when the channels clip at different levels.

Ultimately, if you want to shoot and 'fake' log then the best way is to shoot subjects that are low-contrast to begin with, that way the files SOOC will be quite flat because the subject was flat.

[kye]

5 hours ago, MrSMW said:

Sure: https://firehorsephotographyfrance.com/2022-weddings/the-two-sams-wedding

90% handheld with a pair of S1R’s, Sigma 35mm f2 and 65mm f2, 5k 30p plus church (dim) and barn speeches (dark, lit with single LED panel), S1H and S5 in 4k 60p.

There’s shade, bright sunlight, backlighting, golden hour…the lot.

There’s even some AF tracking! 😬

And a bit of lighting flicker/banding so gone back to shooting 25p and 50p as a result!

Flat profile, light grade as previously described. I’m not a grading expert so it’s more a ‘good enough for the purpose’ grade.

Pity the 5k is not available in 50/60p, but then there’s a 15 minute record limit for 5k on the S1R so not good for ceremonies or speeches.

So for now, I use the 4/5k mix and look forward to seeing what Panny do next with the S line.

Thanks for sharing - always interesting to see people's work.  

I noticed that the stills are very different to the video (subject matter, composition, etc) - every other wedding shooter I've seen includes the same in both, so the wedding films tell the story with the getting ready / dress / rings / first-look / venue / guests / waiting / bride entrance / ceremony / kiss / rice confetti / reception venue / buffet / entrance / toasts / speeches / first dance / party mayhem....

Curious your thoughts on taking a different approach?

[webrunner5]

6 hours ago, MrSMW said:

Sure: https://firehorsephotographyfrance.com/2022-weddings/the-two-sams-wedding

 

Really top notch stuff Simon. You had to be one busy person doing what was involved in that wedding. Hats off to you.

[FHDcrew]

1 hour ago, kye said:

[FHDcrew]

1 hour ago, kye said:

Ultimately, if you want to shoot and 'fake' log then the best way is to shoot subjects that are low-contrast to begin with, that way the files SOOC will be quite flat because the subject was flat.

Yes, that does make a big difference. One question I do have though, is how close could I get things if I have to shoot in harsh lighting?  On some events I have to shoot outside in the middle of the day without a cloud in the sky. Here, where I have no choice but to shoot where the subject is at, I find lot very much helps ease the harsh lighting. 

[kye]

1 hour ago, FHDcrew said:

Yes, that does make a big difference. One question I do have though, is how close could I get things if I have to shoot in harsh lighting?  On some events I have to shoot outside in the middle of the day without a cloud in the sky. Here, where I have no choice but to shoot where the subject is at, I find lot very much helps ease the harsh lighting. 

There's no substitute for dynamic range.  

Ultimately you can emulate the nice rolloff (highlights, shadows, or both) of high-DR cameras by using curves but that will increase the contrast of the image.  If there's already lots of contrast in the image then you can emulate the lower-contrast look by reducing contrast so the mid-tones are softer, but that will ruthlessly reveal your white and black clipping levels.

Another trick is to raise the levels of your image, which means you have some extra space to lower contrast or rolloff the highlights nicely, but that will raise your noise and black levels, so the trick is to apply noise to mask this.  The cost of this look is that you'll have elevated black levels and lots of noise in the image.  It's not really for modern work but it can work for vintage / film looks though.

High DR cameras are desirable because they give you the flexibility in post to choose whichever look you want, but lower-DR captures (like 709 profiles that don't include the full DR of the camera) simply can't do everything - you have to choose the trade-offs.

Higher DR cameras are also a challenge in post because you're trying to pack all the DR into the lower-DR 709 profile to publish them, so in a way your lower-DR capture is just doing in prod what you would have to do somehow in post anyway, except that you don't get to fine-tune or apply curves like you can in post.  I shoot higher DR shots with moderate DR cameras (GH5 HLG which is almost 11 stops and OG BMPCC and BMMCC which are 12.5 stops) and even these are difficult in the grade when you are capturing the full DR on these.

[kye]

1 hour ago, FHDcrew said:

Yes, that does make a big difference. One question I do have though, is how close could I get things if I have to shoot in harsh lighting?  On some events I have to shoot outside in the middle of the day without a cloud in the sky. Here, where I have no choice but to shoot where the subject is at, I find lot very much helps ease the harsh lighting. 

The ultimate statement about DR is perhaps that people shooting with an Alexa or RED which have the highest DR capturing around still light and control their contrast ratios.  Yes, they can push and pull the RAW / Prores files from those cameras in ways that we can only dream of, but they still take the time and effort to capture it right in-camera.

There's no substitute for making your scene look how you want it, even if you have 15+ stops of DR and have 14-bit RAW.

[MrSMW]

3 hours ago, kye said:

Curious your thoughts on taking a different approach?

I’m not really sure how to answer this…

For one thing, I rarely look at what anyone else is doing as it’s such a rabbit hole.

Otherwise, I have a plan of sorts in regard to what I shoot with both stills and video, and there is some crossover, but at the same time elements unique to each.

Ceremonies and speeches for instance I use 2 ‘extra’ static cameras which leaves me free to roam, mostly shooting stills.

Details that a lot of pure videographers shoot, I tend to ignore and leave purely to stills.

Candid people tends to be the biggest crossover area when I tend to capture the same scene in both formats ‘at the same time’, ie, seconds apart.

There is also quite a bit of focal length difference.

I dunno, it kind of just is what it is and kind of evolved by itself over the last 12 years I have been shooting hybrid… 🤷‍♂️

[FHDcrew]

Guess I’ve got to accept the facts. If I want the high DR look in even difficult evironments, I just have to shoot log. I’m actually considering selling my z6 and switching to a Fuji xt3, I think I could live without IBIS but having internal 10 bit log would be so nice for keeping things compact. I would use some of the fast sigma or viltrox 1.4 primes. How do you think the FLOG image would compare to my full frame NLOG image?