SOLVED: DPX-Export looks ugly

Hi there!

I am just creating a video for our music project and have a strange issue:
I wanted to get sequences over to Fuse and tried DPX as I read that this should be the best option for getting things over without losses.

BUT Rendering to DPX sequences looks frightening ugly compared to TIFF or DNxHD.
Please see the example screenshots.

This is the way it's meant to be.

Inside Resolve.PNG (340.5 KiB) Viewed 5609 times

This is the DPX from Resolve 12.0.1

Exported-DPX.PNG (352.91 KiB) Viewed 5609 times

DPX looks very dark and destructed. Don't know what is wrong because other formats look the way they are supposed.

Thank you!

You seem to be working in Rec709 colorspace in Resolve with the result, that you export dpx in Rec709 as well.

Traditionally you would expect dpx sequences to contain image data which is encoded with a cineon log curve, which is exactly what your player does and results in a rather dark image with high contrast. To fix this, you can change the input color profile of dpx files to none in the preferences of djv. Most software packages which import dpx files will allow you to do so.

ps: Grüße nach Hamburg

You seem to be working in Rec709 colorspace in Resolve with the result, that you export dpx in Rec709 as well.

Traditionally you would expect dpx sequences to contain image data which is encoded with a cineon log curve, which is exactly what your player does and results in a rather dark image with high contrast. To fix this, you can change the input color profile of dpx files to none in the preferences of djv. Most software packages which import dpx files will allow you to do so.

ps: Grüße nach Hamburg

Hey Til!

Thanks for your help.
So the export will always look like this and i have to convert the color from Rec709 to Cineon Log e.g. in Fusion?

Grüße aus Hamburg,
Thomas

What I wrote was a bit unclear in this regard. Actually, Cineon Log is completely irrelevant to you, as to most other people nowadays. I was just pointing out that djv (and other applications as well) thinks that your dpx files are Cineon Log by default which is rather a relict from the past – and will therefore show you wrong results.

The whole point is that the image data itself is not enough information for the viewer to show you the right results as it also needs to know its colorspace (which in our context is only the gamma curve) and as long as this isn't stored in the files metadata, the application has to go with its best guess.

What you have to do depends on what you are trying to achieve. If you plan to do VFX work you would want to convert the data to linear light because that's the way color interacts in the real world. Depending on your application this is done internally without you knowing but either way, the important aspect is setting the input colorspace correct, which will take care of the conversions needed.

I don't work with Fusion but from what I heard and also a few short tests it is rather counter intuitive when it comes to colorspace handling, at least for Nuke users like me.

You seem to be working in Rec709 colorspace in Resolve with the result, that you export dpx in Rec709 as well.

Traditionally you would expect dpx sequences to contain image data which is encoded with a cineon log curve, which is exactly what your player does and results in a rather dark image with high contrast. To fix this, you can change the input color profile of dpx files to none in the preferences of djv. Most software packages which import dpx files will allow you to do so.

ps: Grüße nach Hamburg

Hmm, not always. DPX can store data which can be in many 'forms'. Asuming that it's always log is very lazy.
DPX heder should say if image is log, Rec709, sRGB etc. In this case either Resolve doesn't write proper headers or djv doesn't read them. It's common problem that's why most software let you interpret footage manually. Check in djv if you can tell it what your sequence really is.
Other than this you can use free Scratch Play which is very fast and reliable DPX player.

Hmm, not always. DPX can store data which can be in many 'forms'. Asuming that it's always log is very lazy.
DPX heder should say if image is log, Rec709, sRGB etc. In this case either Resolve doesn't write proper headers or djv doesn't read them. It's common problem that's why most software let you interpret footage manually. Check in djv if you can tell it what your sequence really is.
Other than this you can use free Scratch Play which is very fast and reliable DPX player.

To add the missing information:
No, Resolve doesn't write the transfer information in the dpx header.
Yes, djv reads this information correctly if it exists.
Yes, you can override its default, what I also mentioned in my first post.

And assuming that it is Cineon isn't lazy, you just have to choose a default value if you have no better information. Which is Cineon for log files in most applications I work with, but regardless what your default is, it will always be wrong on some occasions.

Long live Resolve with missing DPX header info

In case of missing header info something has to be assumed, so I agree- log is as good as Rec.709.

Thank you for your help!
In Fusion I set the Log type in the DPX settings of the loader's format tab to Bypass and it looked back good again