HDR confusion

i have read alot about it. Websites are explaining that it has mostly to do with the difference between the darkest and brightest values. but no matter how much i read about it, i just dont get it. deciding the contrast is my job as a ''colorist'', right?(i'm not that much of a colorist) or something with color accuracy. Well my flanders does not have an hdr sticker but i assume it is color accurate. or the brightness the tv (nits) can display. i dont own an hdr tv at home, but i am pretty sure that it ''pops''. blacks are pretty black and whites are really bright. when i walk around in stores, i dont really see that much of a difference. or am i just blind? i assume the footage itself is the key to quality.

i have always seen hdr as a workflow to combine multiple exposures in post. does that have anything to do with hdr tv's? does it manipulate my graded image? what is the big deal?

https://www.cnet.com/news/dolby-vision- ... explained/ - reasonably concise description.

Doesn't mention 'SR Live for HDR' from Sony though - https://www.live-production.tv/sites/de ... or_hdr.pdf

High dynamic range as a term is a bit of a misnomer because "high" is a relative term. In simple heavy-handed explanation, anything brighter than white diffuse paper surface in full illumination is traditionally in the range of "high". In video aquisition, those values were usually clipped, everything was a white splotch. For better visual representation, intensity values above diffuse white can be compressed, mapped, with a soft rolloff to keep the traditional value range, but still produce the relative appearance of surfaces that are brighter than white. HDR displays take this concept further by increasing the maximum display luminance. This in turn allows display intensities higher than traditional rec709 displays and thus not so heavy-handed rolloff, which for observer means that while an image of white sheet of paper appears "white", the same display can at the same time display surfaces that are quite a lot brighter.

For better grasp of hdr and especially the allmighty "linear workflow" it is useful to get rid of the concept of "white" as a description of maximum possible brightness. White means neutral (in given gamut, there are actually many "whites"), not max brightness. Normalized value 1.0 has any meaning only when talking about either limited value range or brightness range of display or some other device. As a general brightness level, 1.0 has no specific meaning whatsoever, it is just as good as 0.2 or 3.91

Hendrik has summed it all very well.


To answer your first question "HDR" is also the vernacular name given to the photo technique combining multiple normal exposures to get a final one with a higher dynamic range (if done properly...), but it shouldn't be mixed up with what "HDR" usually mean.

Deciding on the final contrast is indeed your job, but what you can achieve depends on what you are given (inputs), what tools you have (your NLE and plugins) and how your result will be used afterhands (post processing such as VFX), stored (codecs), played (software and hardware players) and displayed (TV, Cinema projector, Laptop screen etc.)