Anyone got any tips (apart from the obvious "upgrade")?  My 5K Retina iMac (2017) displays my HLG video faded/washed out in Quicktime Player and with highlights badly blown when I import it into FCP, iMovie or Da Vinci Resolve. And yet it displays in all its glory in VLC - from where it can't be exported. I can fiddle with the colourspace settings in Resolve to produce an acceptable approximation on screen and when exported, but FCP and iMovie won't play ball at all. I tried using Quicktime Player to make a screen recording of the VLC playback window but this too was washed out when I opened it in QT Player or any other Mac video software (Compressor refuses to open any of my HLG videos). My screen supports the full colour gamut but the contemporary Apple software can't handle it. I can't upgrade so I'm hoping there's a workaround.

I can only give you advice with DaVinci Resolve, I assume it will be the same as the Windows version.

From my point of view it is easiest to use in DaVinci Resolve their "new" YRGB Color Managed way for color grading. Not CST or LUTs.
A very nice video on how to 'automatically convert' videos from 'washed look' is here for example, this way allows you to combine multiple video sources easily:

Unfortunately, I can't help with playback on iOS platform ..

Run it through handbrake to save it.

DAFlys Posted at 12-14 02:14
Run it through handbrake to save it.

Run my original drone footage through Handbrake? And save it as what?

trainee Posted at 12-14 02:38
Run my original drone footage through Handbrake? And save it as what?

It will let you save it has h264 mp4 and then you'll be able to edit it.    You'll loose some data in the process but it will be better than nothing.     Ive had the same issues with my Macbook Pro with touchbar,  usually the files will just crash FCPX and compressor but handbrake seems to be able to get me a file I can edit,  handbrake is also free.

Jan Spacil Posted at 12-14 01:14
I can only give you advice with DaVinci Resolve, I assume it will be the same as the Windows version.

From my point of view it is easiest to use in DaVinci Resolve their "new" YRGB Color Managed way for color grading. Not CST or LUTs.

Thanks - that's a great video (although Rec 709 would downgrade HLG Rec 2020 footage if I want to preserve HLG for Youtube etc). I guess the key question is what the correct Input Colour Space for M4P HLG video is? I assume that the offered DJI D-Gamut is for D-Log footage only?

DAFlys Posted at 12-14 02:41
It will let you save it has h264 mp4 and then you'll be able to edit it.    You'll loose some data in the process but it will be better than nothing.     Ive had the same issues with my Macbook Pro with touchbar,  usually the files will just crash FCPX and compressor but handbrake seems to be able to get me a file I can edit,  handbrake is also free.

Thanks. I use Handbrake a lot but I don't think it will preserve the full HLG colour space so would defeat the point of filming in HLG. I'll play around and see.

I usually edit HLG clips in FCPX and DaVinci Resolve, delivering HLG HDR videos. All the editing tasks must be performed setting the right color management options, in order to avoid unwanted impacts. On FCPX, a HDR library must be created for editing HLG files. Then you need to specify the color space of the project (HLG, Rec.709, PQ, ...). If the final output is SDR (Rec.709) , a color space conversion must be performed, using one of the effects available in the HDR Tools. If you want to preserve the HLG color space you just need to define a HLG project and to export the final video as HLG.
In DaVinci Resolve it is more complicated, but the concepts are the same: you should define the input color space, the timeline color space and the output color space depending on the result you want to achieve and eventually you have to put the right color space transformation nodes if you want to deliver a Rec.709 output starting from HLG clips.

DAFlys Posted at 12-14 02:41
It will let you save it has h264 mp4 and then you'll be able to edit it.    You'll loose some data in the process but it will be better than nothing.     Ive had the same issues with my Macbook Pro with touchbar,  usually the files will just crash FCPX and compressor but handbrake seems to be able to get me a file I can edit,  handbrake is also free.

My initial tests with Handbrake haven't helped much. I asked Handbrake to retain the H265 10-bit data  and the transcode took forever. The resulting video was only partially editable in Quicktime Player ("Cannot Decode - The media data could not be decoded. It may be damaged.") and still displayed flat/washed out (although still played fine in VLC). The difference between the VLC and Quicktime screen grabs is obvious (see below).

I will try bog standard H264/8bit but that rather defeats the point of filming in HLG.

I think I'm just feeling disgruntled that Apple sold me an iMac with an integral wide gamut P3 display with support for one billion colours but without the native software to process it.

trainee Posted at 12-14 09:00
My initial tests with Handbrake haven't helped much. I asked Handbrake to retain the H265 10-bit data  and the transcode took forever. The resulting video was only partially editable in Quicktime Player ("Cannot Decode - The media data could not be decoded. It may be damaged.") and still displayed flat/washed out (although still played fine in VLC). The difference between the VLC and Quicktime screen grabs is obvious (see below).

I will try bog standard H264/8bit but that rather defeats the point of filming in HLG.

When transcoding a video there are many options that can impact on the final results. If you want to retain HLG  HDR features, you should transcode the video using H.265 codec, a 10 bits Main profile and setting  the color space to Rec2020 with gamma curve Rec2100 HLG. If only one of those parameters is wrong,  you can get a wrong result. A good (and free) video editing software that supports HLG processing is DaVinci Resolve. Another free video editing software with HLG capabilities is CapCut.   There are also Apple software available, but they’re not for free: Final Cut Pro and Compressor.

Apple software has evolved during the last years and the capabilities for handling HDR videos has improved a lot. I think you cannot complain with Apple if you do not upgrade your OS version to the latest version supported for your device. I remember I was editing and displying HLG files on an iMac without any issues, until I sold it in 2021. I used to keep the OS up to date. I assume you cannot upgrade because of some incompatibilites with some applications you're using. In that case you can add a partition to your system (also on an external USB SSD drive) with a recent version of MacOS, just for processing your videos.

trainee Posted at 12-14 03:03
Thanks - that's a great video (although Rec 709 would downgrade HLG Rec 2020 footage if I want to preserve HLG for Youtube etc). I guess the key question is what the correct Input Colour Space for M4P HLG video is? I assume that the offered DJI D-Gamut is for D-Log footage only?

Hi, you are welcome!
And that's the beauty of Color Managed editing, your footage from M4P is 10bit BT.2020/HLG and if you import HLG clip into DVR and use in Project settings > Color Management option 'DV YRGB Color Managed', your clip will be recognized as Rec.2100/HLG automatically and the basic color grading will be adjusted immediately.

This is an automatic way to properly set the input color space (gamut). All additional adjustments (on timeline) will be running in a very wide gamut, so the information will not be clipped.
And you can set as output format in your project also HDR, if you like, there is no need to export everything in Rec.709/Gamma 2.4. I'm using SDR/Rec.709 for output, that's how I have my project set up. And you can also "manually" control it via CST node for example :]

It's a pity that DJI only allows either HLG+wide gamut or LOG+Rec.709 in M4P. So yes, you can shoot videos in LOG, but neither combination is quite perfect. If P3-D65 or the same gamut as HLG (Rec.2020/2100) were possible with DLog-M, for example, that would be ideal. But I understand that this is marketing strategy ;]

FabioV Posted at 12-14 23:16
Apple software has evolved during the last years and the capabilities for handling HDR videos has improved a lot. I think you cannot complain with Apple if you do not upgrade your OS version to the latest version supported for your device. I remember I was editing and displying HLG files on an iMac without any issues, until I sold it in 2021. I used to keep the OS up to date. I assume you cannot upgrade because of some incompatibilites with some applications you're using. In that case you can add a partition to your system (also on an external USB SSD drive) with a recent version of MacOS, just for processing your videos.

It seems I need new hardware as well as a later Os. Apple tell me that only iMacs from 2018 onwards (three years after HLG became a global standard) support HDR/HLG in native software - and that only the latest Macs support newer iterations of these colour spaces. None of which explains why VLC on my 2017 Mac does correctly display HDR/HLG video (but can't edit it of course).

trainee Posted at 12-14 03:10
Thanks. I use Handbrake a lot but I don't think it will preserve the full HLG colour space so would defeat the point of filming in HLG. I'll play around and see.

You have to strip all that for your Mac to be able to handle it,   You need an ultramodern CPU to deal with this format of video.

trainee Posted at 12-14 09:00
My initial tests with Handbrake haven't helped much. I asked Handbrake to retain the H265 10-bit data  and the transcode took forever. The resulting video was only partially editable in Quicktime Player ("Cannot Decode - The media data could not be decoded. It may be damaged.") and still displayed flat/washed out (although still played fine in VLC). The difference between the VLC and Quicktime screen grabs is obvious (see below).

I will try bog standard H264/8bit but that rather defeats the point of filming in HLG.

Unless you upgrade your computer theres no point filming in HLG,   more suggestion was to help you save what you have.    Your Mac is far too old to edit this type of video.

DAFlys Posted at 12-15 04:54
Unless you upgrade your computer theres no point filming in HLG,   more suggestion was to help you save what you have.    Your Mac is far too old to edit this type of video.

I can edit (and view) HLG video in Da Vinci Resolve. The real pain is not being able to view it conveniently in Quicktime Player.

trainee Posted at 12-15 02:25
It seems I need new hardware as well as a later Os. Apple tell me that only iMacs from 2018 onwards (three years after HLG became a global standard) support HDR/HLG in native software - and that only the latest Macs support newer iterations of these colour spaces. None of which explains why VLC on my 2017 Mac does correctly display HDR/HLG video (but can't edit it of course).

As I wrote, I don't know iOS, but it's possible that VLC can download and use not only the necessary codec but also some suitable LUT and use it for playback (I'm just guessing, it might not be true).

Jan Spacil Posted at 12-15 05:55
As I wrote, I don't know iOS, but it's possible that VLC can download and use not only the necessary codec but also some suitable LUT and use it for playback (I'm just guessing, it might not be true).

It is true. VLC is a life-saver on my old Mac - but only as a viewer/player. It can't do basic cuts/edits unfortunately.

trainee Posted at 12-15 05:12
I can edit (and view) HLG video in Da Vinci Resolve. The real pain is not being able to view it conveniently in Quicktime Player.

Your probably looking at proxy files and not the original footage.  

trainee Posted at 12-15 06:00
It is true. VLC is a life-saver on my old Mac - but only as a viewer/player. It can't do basic cuts/edits unfortunately.

Yep, VLC is "only" a player, not a video editor. For that is IMO the best way to use Davinci Resolve, it's free (or pay for Studio version, if you need to use some extra functions, like HDR scopes, etc.).