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Premiere Pro & S-Log3
Hey everyone,
Calling any Premiere Pro & S-log3/S-Gamut3.Cine Experts.
I recently started shooting in LOG (I know I’m late to the party) and love the dynamic range, but I’m not sure what’s happening in my Premiere Pro.
What I am expecting: I have a conversion LUT that I want to apply to all my LOG footage as a base (this specific one brags about its ability to give the best skin tones to S-log footage). In my head, I have my greyish footage in the timeline and I throw on the LUT in the Lumetri Color panel and adjust any minor parameters to fine-tune the shots.
What is happening: Premiere is automatically converting to Rec.709 and giving me a fine looking shot. I go to apply my LUT to the shot and as you expect, I’m left with a super contrasty shot.
What I’ve tried: The new Premiere Pro (Version 24.0) must’ve moved some settings around that I haven’t touched in a while, but in the settings tab in Lumetri, there’s a Source Clip section that allows me to throw an input LUT (same outcome as before). Under that, I can tick Use Media Color Space or Override Media Color Space. Use Media Color Space is ticked and gives me the default conversion LUT. If I change that to Rec. 709, I get my log footage looking like log footage and the LUT works as expected. BUT… Playing with exposures and curves on two very similar shots side-by-side (because I can’t use the same source clip in the same project to compare), I noticed that it seems that I’m not getting the same behaviour in my Waveform when adjusting the exposure. This begs the question: Is this method going to somehow ruin my footage and give me less flexibility or more noise, banding, etc.? It could just be that the footage just looks different because the LUT is different to whatever Premiere is doing. I’d just hate to be working so hard to get the shots, only to be unknowingly shooting myself in the foot in post.
Sorry for the long story. I’m hoping my ignorance is the only problem here. Any help would be much appreciated.
Camera: Sony A7siii
Footage: XAVC S 4K 4:2:2 10bit
Computer: Macbook Pro 16″ 2021
Apple M1 Max
64GB RAM
MacOS: 13.5.2
Premiere Pro Version 24.0.0
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6 Replies
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Probably not what you want to hear … if you’re using a Sony A7 series (I’m using A7RV) I would highly recommend you go with DaVinci Resolve 18.x for S-Log3 and use the Sony LUT that’s included in DaVinci Resolve. I use BlackMagicDesign mini panels for color control and much more, it just works, no fuss. As you can see from the attached image, drop footage into the timeline, add 4 nodes (these are like Adobe layers only more flexible) White Balance, Saturation, Luminance, Last is the color space transform and select Color Space and Gamma for Sony.
For Adobe Pr, it’s a pain … you’ll need to download the LUT from Sony. Once done, put you footage in the timeline and add FX Lumetri Color in Pr and set the Input LUT to the downloaded Sony LUT files (.CUBE) … I think you want ToLC709.cube (you may have options here). Then use the Lumetri FX controls to adjust Light and Color … where it get VERY tedious in Adobe Pr is if you want to adjust specific areas (i.e. light up a shadows on subjects face because they’re wearing a hat) then you go the mask route and setup tracking etc. … in DaVinci Resolve this process is super easy and tracking just works and very easy to quickly adjust.
IMHO, if S-Log is your thing, don’t use Adobe as the workflow is horribly time consuming (when it works).
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Hey Rob,
That is definitely NOT the news I wanted haha
Been contemplating making the switch to DaVinci Resolve for a while, just don’t know that I’m willing to re-learn a completely new software & workflow at this point, especially because I’m aiming to eventually ease out of the nitty-gritty with editing and work more on growing the business.
Also, the worst part is, that even if I download the Sony LUT, my problem occurs when I try and input a LUT anyway. It’s like Premiere puts a LUT on for me and I can’t just edit the raw log footage. So frustrating! I definitely see the appeal in Resolve when it comes to weird issues like this.
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Completely understand Michael. The biggest adjustment for me when moving from Adobe Pr to Resolve/Fusion was node vs. layer. But like you, I just got fed up of getting bogged down in Adobe workflow details that I felt I shouldn’t need to know.
Sorry I can’t help with your issue, has been about a year since I touched Adobe Pr/Ae.
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Yeah, I can imagine the transition to node-based editing is a bit weird.
Thanks so much for taking the time to lend your help though, I appreciate it!
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Premiere automatically detects your slog footage now. When you add it, you are dobling, hence the crazy. Check your projects settings for color interpretation
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If Premiere is doubling your S-Log footage, check your project settings for color interpretation; it may be automatically detecting and applying a color profile, causing the issue. Adjust the settings accordingly to resolve the problem.
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