Comments on: Shooting a Feature Film on the Canon 5D

By: McCarthyTech

McCarthyTech — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 19:07:43 +0000

Adobe’s H264 importer in CS5 was custom designed for Canon DSLR files, and is the only application I am aware of that properly decodes the files from Canon’s non-standard colorspace. (Full Range with a 601 color matrix) So as far as I am aware CS5 is the best solution that money can buy, for decoding DSLR files, at least for right now.

By: Frank Arch

Frank Arch — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 03:14:24 +0000

Thank’s for your help, Mike. And I did put the native file on that DPX test run. I’ll be looking at it with the colourist friday. But I’m curious… Am I limited by my tools?… So Mike, If you were me, and if you could go in any direction and had the money for whatever route… would that still be the best way to optimize those H264 file? Or is there a better recipe available?…

Francois.

By: McCarthyTech

McCarthyTech — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 21:08:29 +0000

Import the native source H264 MOVs into Premiere CS5 on your Mac, and export your series of clips directly to a DPX sequence. This will give you the maximum possible quality. The color will be different than the Cineform conversions, because that process uses Quicktime, but the colorspace directly from CS5 is “correct” and will be higher overall quality. That should also stretch the 0-255 values of the camera into the 10bit space of the DPX without squeezing them into 16-235 (8bit video space) at any point. You could render into Cineform instead of DPX and the result would be the same. The important step is to have CS5 decoding the source H264 MOV.

By: Frank Arch

Frank Arch — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 17:47:04 +0000

Mike,
HELP!
I’m still trying to put together the best possible recipe for my 5Dmk2 stock shot to bring them up to their highest possible quality for a feature film project. And even if I’m not using either Avid or PC (Mac and PPro CS5…sorry…), I’d love to hear your suggestions… In this quest to find the best transcode software and the best “post” recipe, here’s what I’m testing tomorrow on the Speedgrade DI at the Technicolor lab we have here in town:

-I took my native CF card stock shots and dumped it on an ext drive.
-I renamed and categorized it all.
-I used Cineform NeoHD, NeoScene and 5DtoRGB softwares to transcode the H264 files into higher res files (CF422 filmScan1, switching ON the deinterlace and Limit the YUV, 5DtoRGB PR4444, PRHQ etc…)
-I simply layed all the files down on a timeline on Premier Pro CS5, and then exported the sequence in DPX files.
-I will then go see the colorist with my hard drive and look at it on the SpeedGrade DI, hoping he’ll be clear on what transcodes he prefers…

Now, I’m trying to find the best way to optimise those files for a 35mm blowup… Can anything be done to bring those h264 files “cheated” up to higher quality files? Is there another transcode sofware you would recommend? Am I doing anything wrong here?

Thank’s for your help, Mike.

Francois.

By: bcj.

bcj. — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:18:39 +0000

Got it, thanks for the info!

bcj.

By: McCarthyTech

McCarthyTech — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 23:02:12 +0000

Depends on the project, DNxHD36 for the last two big ones, Cineform, ProRes, or Matrox for previous ones. The color shift is irrelevent because it’s an offline. We relink to the source footage for the online. With the online we usually see a gamma shift, but account for it in color correction.

By: bcj.

bcj. — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 22:50:38 +0000

Thanks for taking the time to share your experience with the 5DmkII. Regarding “converting the video files into a different, and ideally more edit friendly, compression format,” would you be able to share what format you chose to convert to? Do you experience any color shift as a result of the transcode? If so, is it significant enough to address, or do you just live with it?

Thanks for your time,

bcj.

By: McCarthyTech

McCarthyTech — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 18:57:25 +0000

Good article on ReelSEO. The project I am working on won’t be released until Fall 2010 at the earliest. More details to follow in future posts.

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 16:56:45 +0000

Hi,

Interesting post; good insights.

After an extensive period of researching cameras (I was considering an EX-3 with a Letus 35mm adapter), I decided to go DSLR all-the-way. I now own both a 5D-ii and a 7D, with proper 35mm glass and stabilisation gear from Zacuto. I’m in love with the shallow DOF and the versatility of the camera (timelapses).

I too wrote a piece on working with HD video on ReelSEO: http://www.reelseo.com/hd-video-dslr-camera/

Look forward to seeing the final result of your movie. Where/when is it going to be released?

Richard