Personal View site logo
ColorGHear [PART 2]
  • 568 Replies sorted by
  • @MikhailK I always ignore that warning. What they're talking about is: if you bounce between 8, 16, and 32 you'll see the image change if you are using those filters. SO what happens is you can't work in 8bit to save resources and then switch to 32bit and not have the image change drastically. That's what the warning is telling you.

    I use this anomaly as an advantage in CGT. You can do things in 32bit that you can't in 8 or 16.

  • @shian Thanks. Will check CG site for info on upgrade from CGT to Pro.

  • For those who asked - yes I do have some free tutorials. I've added a couple more.

    http://www.colorghear.com/free-tutorials

  • @SuperSet - regarding the bluish cast and plasticine skin on the GH3: there's not much you can do, except shoot in a hazed room to soften the skin tones (which only helps ever so slightly they still suck) and use Resolve to selectively suck out the blue on like hair highlights, etc. It's a giant pain in the ass cuz the blue cast isn't like the green cast in the GH2 where it is relatively even and can be compensated by applying the GK gear to the whole image, the blue cast shows up in some places but not in others, so you have to use a secondary and hunt down the problem and neutralize it.

    In Resolve with CG Pro you can use the secondary correction and a couple of minus blue LUTs to knock it out, and then save it as a LUT or a Powergrade and apply it to everything, and see if that helps.

    But the extra steps really make working with the footage a hassle. Which is why I've written the camera off.

  • @shian

    Can you develop some scientific measurement and show color difference for different cameras?

    I do not mean GH3 only here, we can start with any two different cameras.

  • I'd have to get them all together, but yes - I can do that...

    but it's gonna be awhile, I have a ton of CG Pro tutorials to get recorded and online, I'm way behind on this. CG Pro users deserve the same amount of training and grading insight as the CGT peeps got, and I've been negligent in that regard.

  • Had I a GH2 or other 'preferred' camera to compare with, I'd likely agree with Shian ... being enough a color-picky person as I am. However, I've not 'caught' the blue problems (that I've noticed) with my GH3, and the skin looks very skin-nish to our eyes. Shooting either "natural" or Standard with most everything dialed back and the grading in post handles all we need, though we're not shooting our Major Motion Picture Event yet. :)

    I've just had to move a 36" Hitachi CRT tele from my movie-room (rented that part of the house out) and am frustrated ... it's "standard" 720p HD if using the component-video inputs is a GORGEOUS 28" or so diagonal, lush and clean color after calibrating with color bars. I've no place to use it. Hoped I could find some way to hook it up for a b-cast monitor ... but alas, trying to go from a modern digital environ to an ancient (yet venerable) analog one is dicey to the point of stoopid. Sigh.

    We all have our little foibles. On this monitor, though calibrated quite well for "stills", well ... I'd rather have a decent b-cast setup to check on. Then I might well notice the color problems inherent in my GH3 that perhaps I can't see now.

    Neil

  • @shian

    Yea, wouldn't mind if you got more of the CG Pro tutorials up ... I'm still trying to figure out how to get the LUT's showing up in the dialog box of all the pre-loaded LUT's. Tried filling in the 'address' in the Preferences dialog for additional LUT locations ... they still don't populate the pop-up box of LUT options.

    I can hunt 'em down one by one, but ... I still think I should be able to get them to appear in the LUT dialog-box ...

    And mixing and matching just takes time to learn ...

    Neil

  • I've read that some folks have got the Apple ProRes codecs into Windows by downloading the trial version of FCP ... and as they're installed for that, were then able to use them in After Effects on Windows.

    Curious ... when the trial period ends, does Apple's knuckleheads have the codecs set up to cease and desist also?

  • the codecs are independent from FCP - if you can get them installed, they stay installed.

  • Cool .. I'll give it a shot ...

  • See if they can be somehow expanded out of the download ... hmmm ... wish Apple wasn't so touchy. :)

  • Used ColorGHear in FCP with moon 7 in the entire thing.. I have Da Vinci but I cannot use it on my Mac Laptop because the graphic card screws up my render...

  • Using a GH3, yea there's that bit of 'plasticene' skin at times, and a hint of blue in some highlights, ESPECIALLY skin (how'd they manage that?) and I'm working at mitigating the issue. In stills, a bit of Lightroom's grain pretty much kills the noticeability of both problems.

    But ... video. I think a titch of minus-blue in the highlights is good, doesn't seem to 'hurt' the rest of the image. But ... I think a bit of grain added in as I do in Lr would be needed to kill the plasticene look. The 'local' footage on this computer doesn't have close-in faces so I'll need to shoot some.

    Any suggestions as to which grain (CG or "native" AE) to use, amounts et al that anyone else may use?

    Neil

  • So apparently now, according to one of my GhearHeads: with the aid of this $30 3rd Party LUT Utility, CG Pro users can now use ColorGHear inside of FCP X. I don't yet have any tutorials showing you how, but if you are using CG Pro in FCP 7, the workflow is almost identical.

    http://www.colorgradingcentral.com/lututility?awt_l=FTfu6&awt_m=3atPD8wmAzQFX_2

  • Shian ... with the released CC stuff today, working at learning the 'new' process/practices. Some odd changes here and there that will take some getting used to ... but the quickness and ease of going betwixt P-Pro, Speedgrade, and AE is ... slick. And the render times ... right out of P-Pro, even ... are so much faster that what would have taken say 1:45 (hours!) before is now like 10 minutes.

    Still ... Speedgrade has you enter the folders of additional LUT's you may have into the interface, right? Yet ... anytime you create a LUT layer, you have to navigate to the folder to get to say, the Ghears. After you choose one, it will put it on the big pop-up list ... until you close Speedgrade, when it forgets about it again. Bit of a pain ... but wow, going back and forth is slick.

    Neil

  • I've put a request over at Adobe for:

    1) actually utilizing that huge blank window that shows up when you add a LUT layer in a SpeedGrade session by listing the available LUT's all at once, rather than in a pop-up box you have to scroll INTERMINABLY.

    2) actually utilizing the linking to one's custom LUT's that one does in the Preferences panel to populate either that scroll-list or the big box of options requested in 1).

    And ... either way ... the ability to select the LUT's that are shown, as so many of the main Adobe-list are ones you will ONLY use if you have specific equipment. Even for most of the people that will utilize some of that list, you won't use the VAST majority of them.

    For those of us who love both Shian's Ghears, AND the custom LUT's we've made from them ... this would be a HUGE workflow upper. If you're running any Adobe stuff, please ... pop over to their request window and request away!

    https://www.adobe.com/cfusion/mmform/index.cfm?name=wishform

    Neil

  • So refer back to the Part II of the Zone System tutorials... and these photographs that reveal the 1960's, B&W Addams Family color palette will make perfect sense..... photographically speaking.

    http://www.fastcodesign.com/3021327/asides/the-addams-familys-living-room-was-pink

    [the pink is actually faded.. the wall would have been a bit darker in real life]

  • @shian, really like Colorghear LUTs and I've been incorporating them into my projects, and I'm getting some great results. One thing that would really help is to have more information on the LUTs and how to use them -- specifically, what order to use them in. Yes, much is necessarily trial and error, but some helpful specifics have been lacking, unless I've missed it somewhere. You don't necessarily have to make another video, what I'd like to see is just a written description of each as a reference. Or does that exist already? Thanks.

  • @Alienhead The very first video on the Pro Tutorial page walks you through all of the original GHears. (minus the newer ones in CGT 1.1 and the CG Pro film stocks.) If you are a PLUS user - all the theory is in the CGT tutorials 3-8 and 12 I haven't had time to rework all of them for the Pro platforms. I've got a long list of tutorials to record for the site. And hoping to get to them before the end of the year.

    I finally have a nice quiet studio to record tutorials in, unfortunately, I booked my first gig in in it sooner than I had expected - I'm producing and engineering an album right now, so I have to be hyper focused for 10 hours a day, and by the time we finish in the studio everyday I'm wiped out.

  • @shian ...

    I second Alienhead's comments, that a couple straight text-documents on use/suggestions of your Ghears & adjustments would be very useful. Less work (immediately) for you than doing a full-up "vidorial", and ... perhaps more useful than a video. We can print it out, have it sitting by our workstation, refer to it ... cool.

    That said, when you get past the current grind, any more tutorials will be appreciated. I've especially learned from your example-of-shooting stuff also.

    Neil

  • I'm happy to report that with the aid of this utility, - http://www.colorgradingcentral.com/lututility - CG Pro LUTs, and node based grading are now available inside FCP X. You'll lose the folder organization that you have in the other platforms, but you can layer and mix to your hearts content now in FCP X.

    For the next 32 hours or so, you can get it for around $18 by using this promo code - biggestsale2013

    I haven't done any tutorials on it yet, so you'll be flying blind except if you've used CG Pro anywhere else, it's basically the same concept as using in FCP 7, only easier. But I wanted to give you a chance to get the utility this cheap rather than the usual $30.

    Screen Shot 2013-12-02 at 1.01.22 PM.png
    1628 x 1432 - 1M
  • Just 2 weeks left to take advantage of the 30-35% off in the CG store. New contents coming as soon as I emerge from the studio - lots of CG pro tutorials coming for FCP X, Davinci, Film Looks --- and using AE as a LUT converter.

    Happy Holidays, everyone!

  • @shian Just a question: CGT could be used with other cameras besides the ones listed in the "About" section of the site? Namely, in the case, a Lumix GX7?

    I know that the concepts and the tools are useful for all types of footage, but just want to know if there are things that are optimized specifically to some cameras.

    Regards.

Start New Topic

Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!

Sign In with Google Sign In with OpenID

Sign In Register as New User

Tags in Topic

Top Posters