Color Picker Improvements

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polymetric

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Color Picker Improvements

PostThu Jan 23, 2020 9:32 pm

Currently, the color picker simply shows the RGB values of the pixel your cursor is hovering over. It appears to average a small area, but the size of this area is unknown and is not adjustable.

What I'm proposing is fairly simple, and would be an incredibly useful feature, most notably when working with color charts and cards.

1. Adjustable value range. The default range of 0-255 is simply not precise enough for some applications. Ideally, it should be able to reflect the actual 32-bit float values inside of Resolve's engine, instead of rounded sRGB values. Fusion Studio already has an option similar to this in its Preferences. I think I'd prefer this to be in the right click menu, though.

2. Adjustable sample area. Fusion Studio already has an option hidden in preferences. Again, this seems like something that you might need to change frequently, and should be more easily accessible if it's implemented in Resolve.

3. Set it and forget it. Nuke has a feature where you can essentially make a rectangular selection, similar to how one might in Photoshop. The program automatically averages the red, green and blue values of this area and displays the result. Most importantly, you don't have to hold your mouse cursor over the viewport. You make the selection, and it displays the RGB values, and they stay on the screen until you make another selection or disable the tool. Furthermore, when the timeline is playing, the displayed values should update accordingly. Fusion Studio does not have this feature.

All of these should be very easy to implement.

I've mentioned Fusion Studio a few times. This proposal is mainly for Resolve, but I wouldn't mind seeing #3 in Fusion Studio.

I'll make another proposal for this, but I'd like to briefly mention it. I just got Fusion Studio and I'm surprised that it doesn't have a lot of features that Resolve does, and vice versa. For example, OFX plugins, like Color Space Transform. The OCIO transform in Fusion Studio doesn't have all the gamma curves that Resolve does.
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Jim Simon

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostThu Jan 23, 2020 9:55 pm

polymetric wrote:It appears to average a small area


How do you reach that conclusion? Seems to me for such to work properly, it would have to operate on a single pixel. I assumed it did.
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Jim Simon

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostThu Jan 23, 2020 9:56 pm

polymetric wrote:The default range of 0-255 is simply not precise enough


You can change that to 10 bit values.
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polymetric

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostThu Jan 23, 2020 10:16 pm

Jim Simon wrote:
polymetric wrote:It appears to average a small area


How do you reach that conclusion? Seems to me for such to work properly, it would have to operate on a single pixel. I assumed it did.


It looked like it did to me, but I have no idea. I can't tell because I can't figure out how to disable pixel smoothing. The point is, whatever it does now, it should be adjustable.
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Jim Simon

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostFri Jan 24, 2020 6:54 pm

polymetric wrote:whatever it does now, it should be adjustable.


I guess to my thinking, it can't be adjustable. To operate properly, it needs to see but a single pixel.
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Hendrik Proosa

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostFri Jan 24, 2020 7:39 pm

Jim Simon wrote:
polymetric wrote:whatever it does now, it should be adjustable.


I guess to my thinking, it can't be adjustable. To operate properly, it needs to see but a single pixel.

Why? It works properly in both cases, unless user is incapable of making the distinction and informed decision between sampling a single location or averaged area. Which is a problem of user, not method. It works in Nuke, can't see why Resolve would be unable.
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polymetric

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostMon Jan 27, 2020 5:29 pm

Hendrik Proosa wrote:
Jim Simon wrote:
polymetric wrote:whatever it does now, it should be adjustable.


I guess to my thinking, it can't be adjustable. To operate properly, it needs to see but a single pixel.

Why? It works properly in both cases, unless user is incapable of making the distinction and informed decision between sampling a single location or averaged area. Which is a problem of user, not method. It works in Nuke, can't see why Resolve would be unable.

Exactly. The biggest problem with seeing only one pixel is that it does not account for noise. Picking a single pixel is not very accurate because the next pixel over could have drastically different values, even in an image without a massive amount of noise.
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lal0cura

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Re: Color Picker Improvements

PostMon Apr 10, 2023 6:34 am

Hi, you can increase the color picker size from 1x1 to anything you want in the Preferences for the View window.

Go to File, preferences, Check View down the list and you can set it up for each viewer independently.

For example you can leave the right viewer at 1x1 and left viewer at 15x15 or whatever you need to get the average color.

I hope this is what you are looking for.

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