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Legal Levels with a Scope and FSI
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oh and I should mention I made it sound like your FSI can only monitor 422 footage or something – you can monitor RGB 444 Full range over 3G SDI quite easily.
Robbie Carman
—————-
Colorist and Author
Check out my new Books:
Video Made on a Mac
Apple Pro Training Series DVDSP
From Still To Motion
An Editors Guide To Adobe Premiere Pro -
Thank you for this reply Robbie. (and everyone else, much appreciated)
The warning I was told was Yellow. I monitored as you described, and output at Normally scaled legal video. I can’t say for sure how they imported into FCP. I understand the need to put it through a legalizer. I think there are offshoots, as you described. Alot of the footage is bright and contrasty. Because I can’t put this through a legalizer, should I go with the option of putting a soft clip LUT on the output?
PS It’s my understanding that there are always going to be little bits of data that are offshoots from doing color if the picture is bright and contrasty, is this true?
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yeah for sure – unless your a robot or a very conservative grader it can be hard or impossible to catch those 2 pixels 🙂 However some additional things to keep in mind.
1. I wouldn’t trust the Luma warning in FCP at all. Just saying. Dedicated scopes in the SDI path really only way to tell for sure. And you also need to know your specs! DCI, GEO, SCRIPTS, PBS etc all have their own standards many will allow some over/undershoots for a specified period of time to a certain level. 102% for 2or3ms for example. RGB vs LUMA gamut also sometimes different. Really need to master those.
2. You don’t need a LUT and with absence of accurate scopes its going to be darn near impossible to tell whats going on with your transform.
3. You might try the old nest with a broadcast safe filter on the nest set to extremely conservative in FCP or use the excellent Eye Height software legalizer for FCP
Keep in mind Stig and Sasha are right on with RGB full scale workflows I was just trying to give you some perspective on a prores broadcast with FCP workflow. Your milage may vary! 🙂
Robbie Carman
—————-
Colorist and Author
Check out my new Books:
Video Made on a Mac
Apple Pro Training Series DVDSP
From Still To Motion
An Editors Guide To Adobe Premiere Pro -
“by William Edwards: Thanks for clearing this up with Avid. I never saw this kind of import option for Final Cut; is there one?”
William, I dont know about FCP but I will be surprised if you dont have the possibility to remap from full range to normal range on import, the same way in FCP as well.
The workflow Robbie is describing also works with Avid, but I recommend render full range and remap to 709 on import in any NLE.
The reason is that you can use the same full range file simultaneously in softwares as After Effects, Flame, Smoke etc as well.
If you render normal range from Davinci you limit yourself to only work with this file in a software that expects normal range.But yes, if your only and final destination is FCP then render normal range.
Stig
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Yes, thank you. In the end, there is no easy answer; or maybe it is just that easy!
Not sure what I should do now in my particular situation, but I’ll figure it out.
That harris machine, you just ‘feed’ the video through it?
Thanks again all for your time. I may have more questions tomorrow, but this is enough to go on right now.
Except Stig said there was a way to import footage into NLE as RGB, but can you do that in Final Cut?
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To clarify, I said that Avid will remap a full range file to video levels by checking RGB when importing.
Im not sure if this works in FCP, but it will surprise me its not possible.Those times Avid is the final destination and there is no need for going to another softwares for finishing, I do exact the same as Robbie is describing, except that I render MXF instead of Prores (because its Avid and not FCP).
So, if FCP is the only and last destination – do what Robbie says and you will be fine.
Stig
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Thank you Stig.
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[William Edwards] “That harris machine, you just ‘feed’ the video through it?”
Yes – its SD/HD SDI in out – actually you can have 3 outputs for feeding multiple places. Harris along with EyeHeight probably the most used legalizers in the world. Basically you set legalization parameters to meet your specs the box does its magic.
The thing though since its a baseband video device it works great in a tape based solution (which we often are) but can work in a tapeless solution as well. We simply route Resolve/FCP thru the legalizer (sometimes also thru a standards converter) to a hard disc recorder like the hyper deck. That way we can record truly legal prores, dnxhd or uncompressed in real time with out having to render usually highly inaccurate broadcast safe filters.
Robbie Carman
—————-
Colorist and Author
Check out my new Books:
Video Made on a Mac
Apple Pro Training Series DVDSP
From Still To Motion
An Editors Guide To Adobe Premiere Pro -
Hi Robbie
Can’t find any pricing info on eyeheight. Any idea how much their hd fcp plugin is or their hd desktop model is?http://www.4Kfinish.com | owner-colorist | Hollywood, CA
http://www.facebook.com/4kFinish -
Paul –
The Hardware Legalizers are priced depending on options similar to the Harris DL 860 so 5-7k. I think the software plugin is like $399 but not sure exactly. It works well in FCP but it takes a LOOOOOONG time to render.
Robbie Carman
—————-
Colorist and Author
Check out my new Books:
Video Made on a Mac
Apple Pro Training Series DVDSP
From Still To Motion
An Editors Guide To Adobe Premiere Pro
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