COLOR BANDING... how to avoid it?

From my other thread (and after a google search), I've learned the correct term for the distortion I was seeing on my walls after uploading to youtube, is called 'Color Banding' (I thought what I was seeing, was called 'light ripples' or 'wavvy lines').

I was looking up various bulbs, led, regular, natural plant light, etc... and understand they each have a different CRI rating, the higher CRI indicates the bulb will reveal more color the light reflects off of.

soo... I was wondering if a light bulb with a lower CRI lighting, might reduce Color Banding?

anyhoo... if you could post your light bulb knowledge, would be appreciated

Note: I did a test with vairous light settings on my original BMPCC such as 180, 216, 270 shutter with 400,800,1600 ISO but this Color Banding was still showing up on walls.

IN THE VIDEO BELOW I recently uploaded and you can see this COLOR BANDING on the walls pretty bad. FAST FORWARD TO THE 36 SECOND MARK, this Color Banding happens indoors only.
If I cant figure it out, Im going to have to buy the BMPCC 4K or 6K model.

I wonder how the sensor would react if the soft box light was aimed slightly in front of the camera lens?

Color banding has nothing to do with light. It is about reduced bit depth in your exported video with soft gradients, computer screens with less than 10bit and human vision limitations.

If you want to reduce banding you have to insert some artificial noise into your footage to make the steps in 8bit less visible.

Here is an example - source was RAW footage, with a post added vignette after final delivery to 8 bit codec which lead to extreme banding:

Abheben_8bit_03248-1920x1080.jpg (697.83 KiB) Viewed 9188 times

Same footage with a bit of added noise (aka dithering):

Abheben_8bit_03248_dithered-1920x1080.jpg (461.72 KiB) Viewed 9188 times

Hi Robert
Very good explanation and sample!

There were a time when 'gradations' between grayscale values and color values became available in 'any' software package
Even invoices got pastel gradations as backgrounds!

In Photoshop or any other software where it's easy to create a gradation between 0-100% gray or whatever color you choose, do instead a very small change, like 20-23% over a long distance, try also to shorten the distance
Then zoom in to that, or print it to a big size
You will see the stepping clearly!

If all is in 8 bit, of course you will get a stepped gradation!
It's just simple math/physics:
You asked for it, you get it!

Professional retouch artists know this by heart (clipping/burnt out highlights...) and as you wrote and show, the only solution (still at 8 bit) is to add noise so the banding is 'overwritten' and not 'seen' any longer

I like this forum, so high quality!
Björn

Color banding has nothing to do with light. It is about reduced bit depth in your exported video with soft gradients, computer screens with less than 10bit and human vision limitations.

If you want to reduce banding you have to insert some artificial noise into your footage to make the steps in 8bit less visible.

Here is an example - source was RAW footage, with a post added vignette after final delivery to 8 bit codec which lead to extreme banding:

Abheben_8bit_03248-1920x1080.jpg

Same footage with a bit of added noise (aka dithering):

Abheben_8bit_03248_dithered-1920x1080.jpg

My color Banding looks more like blocks than waves.
If I add Vignette, I get both blocks and waves.

Your example is from a still photo, does it look clear all through the video?

How do I add noise in resolve? (I see adding grain but cant find adding noise)

My example is from a short film we shot in 2008 on the RED ONE.
A bit of noise forces the encoder to add more bandwidth so you get less artifacts.

In Resolve to add noise use the Grain FX and set grain size, softness and texture to zero.

with original bmpcc:

1. use "Neat Video" for denoising
2. export from Davinci Resolve to DNxHR (HQX) 12 or 10-Bit in (upscaled) UHD/4K
3. convert export file to h.264/5 with HandBrake
4. upload the finished video to YouTube or Vimeo

The result is guaranteed to be much better.

with original bmpcc:

1. use "Neat Video" for denoising
2. export from Davinci Resolve to DNxHR (HQX) 12 or 10-Bit in (upscaled) UHD/4K
3. convert export file to h.264/5 with HandBrake
4. upload the finished video to YouTube or Vimeo

The result is guaranteed to be much better.

Will converting it to h.264 color band again?

I tried that with MXF DNXHR and it still looked horrible BUT when i uploaded directly to you tube from MXF file in my hard drive, it came out descent.

This kind of banding is usually the result of too small a tonal change stretched over too large an area in an 8 bit file. It has nothing to do with the camera or sensor. The blocky artifacts are often iffy encoding in combination with the banding.

The H264 encoding in Resolve is notoriously bad. Render to ProRes or DNxHR for upload if you have the bandwidth. If not, do your H264 encode in Media Encoder or HandBrake. Much better results.

The first step in avoiding any kind of banding like this is to make sure it's not on the source footage or the edit and for this you need to be using a 10bit monitor on a decklink or similar that can bypass the graphics card. Once you have eliminated the source then it's down to the codec used for the output and the compression used. Unfortunately for Youtube and Vimeo the compression they apply will also create these artefacts so you will have to adopt other strategies like avoiding the use of vignette filters, speeding up and fade in or outs to black and not lingering on smooth graduated surfaces. Next time you shoot you will be aware of avoiding smooth graduated backgrounds as well.

Seems like what you have is banding from compression / bit depth.

This has nothing to do with the CRI of the lighting you're using.

Using a lower CRI light source will only make colour correction and post harder.

You need to do a lot more research on post workflows and maintaining a high bit depth environment.

JB

This kind of banding is usually the result of too small a tonal change stretched over too large an area in an 8 bit file. It has nothing to do with the camera or sensor. The blocky artifacts are often iffy encoding in combination with the banding.

The H264 encoding in Resolve is notoriously bad. Render to ProRes or DNxHR for upload if you have the bandwidth. If not, do your H264 encode in Media Encoder or HandBrake. Much better results.

Adding into this post because I can second this – Resolve’s H264 export with Pocket 4K BRAW footage produces a barely usable delivery file because of significant colour banding.

Color banding has nothing to do with light. It is about reduced bit depth in your exported video with soft gradients, computer screens with less than 10bit and human vision limitations.

If you want to reduce banding you have to insert some artificial noise into your footage to make the steps in 8bit less visible.

Here is an example - source was RAW footage, with a post added vignette after final delivery to 8 bit codec which lead to extreme banding:

Abheben_8bit_03248-1920x1080.jpg

Same footage with a bit of added noise (aka dithering):

Abheben_8bit_03248_dithered-1920x1080.jpg

Thanks for this information, Robert – I was just reading up on how best to implement dithering. Was the delivery file H264 as well?

Thanks for this information, Robert – I was just reading up on how best to implement dithering. Was the delivery file H264 as well?

I exported to a Cineform master back then (that was in 2008) and from there to h.264
When using the x.264 encoder you can use the film grain tuning profile and it will keep most of the grain intact. Most encoders will see the slight grain as details and try to raise the bitrate accordingly so banding should not occur.