550D Custom Picture Styles - Recommendations

[Trishutchinson]

Hey peeps.

Does anyone have any recommendations for custom picture styles for the movie mode?

I've no requirements, just interested in peoples ideas.

Thanks!
Tris.

[saint seiya]

flattening the look of what you record gives it more of a film look, heres a tutorial where you can download a picture style that you can upload to your camera through the eos utility prog that comes with the camera

http://eugenia.queru.com/2010/01/25/flatting-the-flat-look/

edit: the lady who owns that site sometimes posts in this forum too.

[rhervag]

you might want to step back from such advice and test your results against those trendy misconceptions gone viral.

and before following blindly eugenia's take on this , read that to put things in perspective...
http://hurlbutvisuals.com/blog/2010/03/30/color-correction-put-your-best-foot-forward/

many newcomers to the party keep on advocating those old profiles while many of their original creators have since a long time reverted to shooting neutral after facing disastrous results on skintones and mid hues when attempting to grade their footage as intended : horrid banding, midshadow noise, wax skintones, you name it....

it is now commonly admitted upon professionnals for quite a while that the best option for later color grading is to shoot a tamed neutral preset with dialed down sharpness, contrast and a bit less saturation. what really matters is correct exposure with perfect white balance to allow for maximum 8bit codec bandwidth.

those who promote other methods just do not give sound advice and shoot themselves in the foot compared to how the camera performs in wiser hands.
shooting low contrast to get a flat almost linear output is one thing to massage harsh light input right, but messing with color response in camera without knowing its inner guts is just settling for embarrassing results in post when it is time to consider a theatrical screening.

not trying to start a controversy here because it has been debated over and over again on the dslrs places long ago... and still to this day :
http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=204973

if you can't make it look good shooting flat neutral with a minimal grade, custom curves from the internet are not going to make the camera shine either...better hire a DP & colorist to get it right than ruin the shot

[Sagefox]

Rhervag is truly accurate.
White balance/exposure = critical to 8 bit quality.
Curves, which he wisely points out, also alter the color science in often messy ways.
But, it should be noted that curves, when not too strongly implemented, will get you what linear cannot. It has direct access to the raw data, and if stored like film, will behave like it - in ways you can't fake with color grading.
I have done a lot of work on this topic, and was considering posting on it here. Perhaps I will do a more advanced explanation with time. But for now, just know that curves, if used carefully and wisely, will do better both in color and luma structure. (one hint - they won't add dynamic range (!) - but another element will...)
http://i620.photobucket.com/albums/tt281/sagepictures/SNG.jpg

[rhervag]

thanks for shiming in sagefox (and yes please do elaborate !), that is exactly how i'd use them too when a custom look is agreed upon prior to shooting so to bake the most of light as possible towards the intended results.
i just wanted to point out the relevent debates have already happened elsewhere and respected experienced shooters seem to agree on applying a gentle hand in post production whatever picture style was used instead of overflattening the take to then push it over the top.
get the lighting to behave on set as the art direction calls for, nail the exposure & color accuracy to be able to record the maximum potential of the codec. once there, only mild adjustments should be needed to output a great picture...

[krewcial]

cosign, I've downloaded the Marvel's Cine style and the Ultra Flat, and with both of them I've seen an increase in noise. Same is true for the Highlight Priority option.

I'm now shooting everything with the Neutral setting and shaprness & contrast turned all the way down, and saturation 1 notch down. Same settings Philip Bloom uses.

This gives great results, which give me more than enough room for colour correction and other adjustments.

[Trishutchinson]

Guys,

Thanks so much for all your help and info. I think it is a balance between lighting and exposing well on set (my previous experience has shown me that) and maybe using a neutral PP with settings down a bit.

krewcial, you say you use Sharpness and Contrast all the way down, would this be to zero?
T

[krewcial]

krewcial, you say you use Sharpness and Contrast all the way down, would this be to zero?
T

Yes !

[The Crowing]

Really great info on this thread. Lots to learn. Thanks for the good reads guys!

[banicos]

this works with all Canon Video DSLR cameras?

Very helpful!!

Thanks!

[drapeama]

It could have been usefull to copy/paste the link from DVXuser to here.
Canon Picture Styles (http://www.canon.co.jp/imaging/picturestyle/file/index.html).

[Bif]

this works with all Canon Video DSLR cameras?


NEUTRAL with Sharpness, Contrast, and Saturation "dialed" down worked with all of the Canon DSLRs I've had. T1i, T2i, T3i, 7D, and 60D.

I was beginning to try it out with the T1i I had for a short period of time. When I got the 7D I shot the first project with that using the default STANDARD picture style. Didn't like the look of that, too vivid.

Now, with the 7D, 60D, and T3i I have, I use NEUTRAL with Sharpness all the way down, Contrast and Saturation down two "notches". This seems to be a good "match up" with HF100 footage shot in Cine mode with Custom settings "tweaked". I even use this for most stills.

Bruce Foremen

[drapeama]

Now, with the 7D, 60D, and T3i I have, I use NEUTRAL with Sharpness all the way down, Contrast and Saturation down two "notches". This seems to be a good "match up" with HF100 footage shot in Cine mode with Custom settings "tweaked". I even use this for most stills.

I should try to match both the HV and the T2i. Do you think the technicolor profile is too flat to match up the "tweaked" cinemode?

[Bif]

I don't know, Marc. I've not been tempted to try any of the "downloadable" picture style profiles. I'm not one of those who has to try to "tweak" everything I do. I don't mind doing a bit of density and color correcting if necessary but I don't want to be forced into a corner where I have to do it on most every scene because I used an overly "flat" setting.

Slight variables in white balance, color of light, color cast from reflections, and simply daylight variations have caused virtually uncorrectable color cast in skin tones for some due to "flat" picture styles someone came up with and made available for download.

Canon has given us a reasonable amount of change we can dial in on the supplied picture styles "out of the box", and that's been good enough for me so far. I had my old HV20 "dialed in" where I wanted it, my HF100s are set so I like what they give me, and so far on the DSLRs basing a "user defined" picture style on NEUTRAL with a few "tweaks" is giving me a fair "match".

Test your question out by setting up both cameras and shoot the same scene with your HV, then with the T2i using the Technicolor profile, then using NEUTRAL and follow that with NEUTRAL with Contrast and Saturation both down two "notches". See which looks to be the closest match to HV footage.

Bruce Foreman

[Janke]

I should try to match both the HV and the T2i. Do you think the technicolor profile is too flat to match up the "tweaked" cinemode?

Yes, too flat. Here's how I've matched the cameras (only for contrast & color, disregard shutter, no tripod use, i vs. p etc. - see the youtube page for details, click the "show more" arrow below the video):


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlPO958_hFc

[mkkid28]

You could try Technicolor's Cinestyle picture style which is kind of the official picture style.

[drapeama]

You could try Technicolor's Cinestyle picture style which is kind of the official picture style.
I'm using Technicolor's CineStyle on the T2i, but as Janke stated:

Yes, too flat.
I'll try it when I'll get enough time. If I get something decent and useable to match both, I'll post the exact settings.

[Janke]

Also, CineStyle gives me rather bad banding or posterizing, see the footage in the "Night intervalometer" thread...

[drapeama]

Also, CineStyle gives me rather bad banding or posterizing, see the footage in the "Night intervalometer" thread...
I've been able to "mask" it with a fine noise layer in After Effects (see this thread (http://www.hv20.com/showthread.php?44111-Technicolor-CineStyle-unnecessary&p=413743&viewfull=1#post413743)) but since I've tried Janke's S-Curve and Marvel CineStyle, I find Technicolr a bit too flat. Usable and useful in very low-light, but other than this, too flat. You were right mister! ;)

[Lawrence189]

This must not be overlooked, bumping this thread. http://vimeo.com/7256322

[Janke]

You know, I liked the original samples better than the color-corrected ones... even though they were a bit too flat...

[jet]

who would not the corrected ones were revolting.