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Video lacks contrast — help
My editor e mailed me a clip. It look fine when played in the e mail, but when I save this attachment to desktop and then play it, it look flat and contrast is gone. what is this about, and what can we do? thanks.
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1 Reply
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The result is probably because of the difference in gamma between the expected output device (TV) and your computer monitor. As a result, never rely on the computer monitor for eyeballing color corrections. Page III-517 of the FCP 5 Help explains this.
If you’ve got a DV tape deck, drop the clip into a DV sequence in FCP, set the output to FireWire and have a TV set (at least, if not a TV reference monitor) plugged into the deck. Judge the clip on what is on the TV screen, not what is on the computer screen. This is useful for not just gamma issues, but interlace issues as well (although if you’ve been emailed the clip, it’s likely not an interlaced clip any more after compression to a smaller frame size). In this case you can add a gamma filter to a clip to bring it closer to that of what you would be seeing. If you’ve calibrated your monitor for a gamma of 1.8, then the filter correction should be 1.222.
There is a miniscule chance that you have been given a Cineon file, which has a non-linear gamma – but if that is the case, then your likely to have access to Shake to view and edit this material anyway.
See also https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/gamma_mac_pc.html for the inverse of the problem – delivering to PCs which have the same gamma (2.2) as television sets, instead of the gamma of 1.8 that Macs have.
Bill Lee
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