cinematography Question about shooting flat.

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harmonica44

They say to shoot flat with DLSRs, cause that gives you more options in post, and cuts down on noise and what not. So their is saturation, contrast, sharpnes, and color tone. However I don't know how I am suppose to shoot flat with color tone.

Cause if you turn the color tone all the way down, the picture is more red. If you turn it all the way up, it's more green. So how is red, flat exactly?
 
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Sometimes I do white balance. It depends on the light. For example, I've tried white balancing during dusk, but when I do, the color is all green. So I figure maybe dusk is best left at a daylight balance maybe, unless I am doing it wrong.

And there are a couple of scenes I have in mind I want to do for a short, where I want more than one color of light hitting the actor's faces. So I can only white balance one of the lights, but then the other might not be as color correctable, depending on the light color temperatures. And at night, I don't white balance under orange sodium lights, cause faces look too desaturated and I can't bring the skin tones back well enough. So I just set those lights to around a tungsten white balance.

So I white balance if it will work the particular light of the particular scene. What's that go to do with contrast or color tone?

That's a good video. It's interesting how he talks about how adding a green tint is good for lips. I've had a problem with lips being too pink if I add saturation in post, and I don't even add much, just a little, but the lips go super pink. If that's what he's talking about.
 
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Oh ya. So what's the difference between neutral, faithful and all these other picture styles. I read before that some prefer faithful to neutral cause it has more dynamic range. I did a test on some footage I shot flat here, then graded. I shot on both neutral and faithful. The skin tones look slightly more pink on neutral, but not sure if you can tell on youtube as oppose to my monitor, if it's correct:

http://youtu.be/5c4doLZ9pFc
 
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harmonica44 said:
Oh ya. So what's the difference between neutral, faithful and all these other picture styles. I read before that some prefer faithful to neutral cause it has more dynamic range. I did a test on some footage I shot flat here, then graded. I shot on both neutral and faithful. The skin tones look slightly more pink on neutral, but not sure if you can tell on youtube as oppose to my monitor, if it's correct:
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To check your footage per picture style properly you need a good monitor, and one that is calibrated. How else will you know that your colors are true, the contrast correct etc?

If your monitor is not high end or calibrated then the best you can do is get an 'approximate'.

harmonica44 said:
Oh ya. So what's the difference between neutral, faithful and all these other picture styles.
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Search on youtube for:

canon picture styles
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... you'll get lots of hits showing the difference

I shoot flat as per the set-up used by Philip Bloom - I supplied the link earlier. He's been using Canon DSLR's since they first came out and is a very very experienced DSLR movie maker. So I don't use any of the standard Canon picture styles. This works for me. You may have a different preference - your call.
 
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As far as picture style goes it depends on the lighting per scene it seems but will do more tests. I could go for neutral if that's what I am suppose to do.

When I google properly calibrated monitor for movie making all sorts of things come up, and their doesn't seem to be an official method. How do I know if my monitor is? Thanks.
 
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harmonica44 said:
When I google properly calibrated monitor for movie making all sorts of things come up, and their doesn't seem to be an official method. How do I know if my monitor is? Thanks.
Click to expand...

There are guides on youtube as to how to do it manually.

I bought a piece of software/hardware that automates the task for me and gets more accurate results.

It's probably not worth the $$$ unless you have a monitor that is $500+ and up:

X-Rite ColorMunki Display
http://www.amazon.com/X-Rite-CMUNDI...1377556711&sr=8-1&keywords=ColorMunki+Display
 
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Yep I am getting my computer monitor calibrated right now. I don't own a field monitor cause a lot of camera operators already have one, and I figured I would just spend the money paying for them, rather than shoot as well as direct myself.

I've done tests but it seems that if you shoot flat, then add saturation and contrast later, their is more noise in post, compared to adding saturation and contrast in the camera originally. So why do they say to shoot flat, if you just get more noise in post later by grading, compared to doing it in camera? Not a lot more noise, but a noticeable amount.
 
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