Sun..burned

Hey everyone, I was hoping to get some advice on what I could to to possibly recover this (and some other shots). I recently shot a wedding and it was about 90+ degrees outside and the sun was as bright as can be.

I was shooting with my BMPCC6K at 100 iso and the color temp at 5600. I don't recall at this point what the iris was set to, but I was using a sigma 18-35.

Here's a screenshot from resolve and what I am trying to figure out. As you can see the people on the left are all blown out in their faces.



Am I doomed, or is there a way to make this look better?

A career change is the likely outcome.

A career change is the likely outcome.

Wow. Thanks Tom. I am going to continue to try my best.

You're screwed. Get the clipping point to the your peak levels and prepare an apology, and then buy some ND filters. As you have discovered, ISO 100 and stopping down will not defeat the summer sun.

A career change is the likely outcome.

Wow. Thanks Tom. I am going to continue to try my best.

LOL Can you punch in? Crop out the people on the left and then start with the exposure -1.5 or 2. The bride's face is all that matters here.

I would add a "Scotty-beam-me-up" halation effect to these illuminated people and let them shine like angels from another planet. And then tell the customer it wasn't an accident but it was intentional to add more drama. And then, as Ryan suggested, I would zoom in to the bride and crop those extraterrestrial guests.

In the future you’ll want to use NDs to get your exposure properly. In a pinch you can lower your shutter angle, and then emulate the motion-blur afterwards in davinci.

Did you happen to have any other angles you could cut to?

What kind of wedding film are you doing? Is it possible to pull audio from the ceremony and use BRoll instead?

Good luck Rob. Sorry for being a smart aleck.

Aside from the irony, there is technically no way to save these. Get creative, as already suggested.

It's irrecoverable but I personally don't think it looks that bad. Add a lot of halation, maybe some vignetting as well to distract your viewer from the error and convince them it's a stylistic choice

... can I have that clip. I would love to try things out on it for fun.

Just a long shot but have you tried using DaVinci Color Management? It looks like you are processing unmanaged from your raw settings. The odd thing to me looking at the Parade scope is the low level at which everything is blowing out even if you have Video Level Scopes turned on (given that your exposure level is 0). It might not be as overexposed as it looks or as bad as you think (then again it might be but anything is worth a try).

Perhaps try something like DaVinci Wide Gamut Intermediate for Processing Mode and a Rec709 output in Project Settings

I don't have a BMD camera but I have a VA 12G. I can get a very similar clipped effect using the same raw settings as your's with slightly overexposed BRAW. If I use color management I can get it looking usable.

I wish you luck but I would also add that, while learning by mistakes is arguably by far the best way to learn, it is not a good idea at all to apply that philosophy to professional wedding work.

under Color Tab, go to Camera raw, here you have a button save a braw frame, save it, post it.

how to .jpg (114.83 KiB) Viewed 3025 times

we can judge better from it, may be that we can help you but we need to have original frame to test it and judge correctly, like other tolds you color managment can save you from some extreme situation like your or help to do a bit better.

The correct settings have been applied in the RAW processing tab so it's clipped and it's not recoverable using alternative colour management settings

Ah, sorry Rob.

I know it's not very helpful to say, but at least this is a learning experience. Definitely worth investing in some ND filters for next time.

A career change is the likely outcome.

Wow. Thanks Tom. I am going to continue to try my best.

LOL Can you punch in? Crop out the people on the left and then start with the exposure -1.5 or 2. The bride's face is all that matters here.

If you have a 6K clip then delivering in 4K and a bit of a crop will clean up the overexposed areas as Ryan suggested.

Another though less helpful suggestion is to duplicate the clip lay it on top .... lower the exposure and
then use a gradient to feather the two .... matching the saturation and contrast will be a challenge.

I wonder if you have applied a LUT and whether it is contributing to the severe clipping ....

My only addition would be that with ND's you may want a large bounce reflector off to the right to balance the dynamic range of the scene.

... can I have that clip. I would love to try things out on it for fun.

I’d like to take a look as well.

Good Luck

Another though less helpful suggestion is to duplicate the clip lay it on top .... lower the exposure and
then use a gradient to feather the two

That method won't yield any more highlight detail. There is no additional highlight data there in the file. When all 3 channels are clipped, as is the case here, the only option is to make it appear to be intentional via covering it over with some form of blooming or other effect. There is no way to recover data that was never there.

Sorry this happened to you Rob. Like everyone already said, buy a set of NDs.
Post a frame of that clip so others can try and experiment with ways to cover it up. You’ll have to accept the fact that the clipping is irrecoverable.

This is also why I don’t want to ever do anything with weddings and events.

Rob as you’ve now learned, clipping (where the flat lines are on the waveform) is unrecoverable over exposure.

You might want to try using the “zebra” function, and set it to 95%.

This will give you a visual indicator while you shoot of what’s close to clipping and unrecoverable.

Now it’s natural to have some speculate highlights clip or say the back edges of someone backlit but the sun.

Zebra will tell you what’s clipped or about to clip and you can then decide if it’s important to protect that information.

The red colour in false colour does the same thing but I find it much easier to leave the zebra on full time and continue framing and shooting.

JB

You might want to try using the “zebra” function, and set it to 95%.

This will give you a visual indicator while you shoot of what’s close to clipping and unrecoverable.

Now it’s natural to have some speculate highlights clip or say the back edges of someone backlit but the sun.

Zebra will tell you what’s clipped or about to clip and you can then decide if it’s important to protect that information.

The red colour in false colour does the same thing but I find it much easier to leave the zebra on full time and continue framing and shooting.
JB

Very good advice.

95% zebra will work assuming correct ISO, LUT, and monitoring functions. This footage is clipped at about 72%.

Good Luck

This footage is clipped at about 72%.

Yes that is strange as well as the fact that there is a lot of deep shadow on the waveform and parade scopes that is not showing on the shot. The shadows look washed out and the blue channel is clipped in the shadows whereas there is no sign of that in the clip. That made me think that it is rendering strangely on the computer screen - like a HDR video on an SDR monitor or similar and wonder if the clipping may not be as bad as it looks. But I'm new to video in comparison to most of you guys so absolute respect there and I'm not arguing. I'd still love to see a clip from the original raw file.

The low clipping is due the the data distribution of Braw at different ISOs. Shooting at 100 will have
far different consequences when shooting 709 rather than a wdr log format.

Good Luck

OK thanks for the explanation. I've not got a BMD camera. My only experience of BRAW is pretty recent with the VA12G and a Nikon Z6. I'm still experimenting ad trying to figure out optimum settings. I tend to expose with the built-in waveform or parade scopes so highlights are not clipping although it does seem like there is a bit of latiitude there with BRAW.

Anyway I should now take a seat in the back row and hope Rob returns . I learn a lot from this excellent and overall incredibly helpful forum.

He got this Ascend LUTs open -> https://colorgradingcentral.squarespace.com/ascend
that's a LUT package from 2015, so maybe it is really just a bad choice of workflow with LUTs?

He got this Ascend LUTs open -> https://colorgradingcentral.squarespace.com/ascend
that's a LUT package from 2015, so maybe it is really just a bad choice of workflow with LUTs?

Nice catch Robert.

Rob, Take the LUT off the node and everything else so we can see the scopes from the original clip. We can go from there.

Well, this is definitely a lesson I will never forget.

Here's a post of a shot from outside unedited. I only clicked recover highlights and use video black level. I didn't try to make it better by lowering the lift, etc.

Why don’t you share a frame of that clip with the community. Maybe you’ll get different folks to give it a shot and share the grade back with you.

It’s not a fix at all, but I think adding the resolve glow effect set to screen blending mode will help make it feel like a glowy style rather than feeling like digital clipping. Play with the spread and other settings to give you some nice halation. I don’t think you’ll ever recover the highlights so your best bet is trying to make it look as pretty as you can anyway!

For future reference, lowering the iso is just moving the mid point down, so you’re effectively getting more dynamic range in your shadows and less in your highlights. So the same shot would be no more over exposed if it was set to 800ISO, it would just be brighter overall but still the same amount of clipping. That’s why it’s so easy to clip highlights without them seeming like they were super bright. Easy mistake to make, and there’s no point stressing about it, just try and make the best you can of it in the grade

95% zebra will work assuming correct ISO, LUT, and monitoring functions. This footage is clipped at about 72%.

Good Luck

Zebra @95% shouldn’t be affected by viewing LUT or iso.

JB