Hi all !

I would like to try to use D-Log mode with my Phantom 4 Pro drone. I'm relatively new in the video-world (but experimented in photography-world).

I understand that if i record video in D-Log mode, the render will be "flat" and i need to use a LUT to add a first stage of color correction and after i can adjut my colorimetry / color grading.

- Firstly is there a LUT for the DJI Phantom 4 Pro available ? If yes, where i can find it :-)

- If i use D-Log mode, i see that the ISO is fixed to 500. Is the white balance setting impact the D-log mode ? I mean D-Log is like a RAW footage, so if i change the white balance to AWB or sunny, it is a modification on the footage ?

- How D-Log mode impact when i shoot photography in RAW ? Is there an impact of the picture or not ?

- I'm on Windows and i use Adobe Premiere CC to edit my video. If someone could explain me quickly the good workflow to use the D-Log mode (or have a a tutorial/video) it will be helpful.

Thank you in advance :-)

The best thing to do is search on Youtube. Hard to explain it in print. There are many good tutorials there. One thing I notice though is that in many videos the LUT is placed at the end of the workflow and adjustments are inserted between the LUT and the D-log footage. I believe the reason for this is that in D-Log format, you have access to the entire dynamic range for editing without causing blowouts in hilights or shadows prior to the LUT.

Hi, thanks for your answer. It make sense effectively. There are a plenty of info, but i'ts quite complex to find clear and good info.
Firstly i need to find a correct and good LUT xD

Go to youtube and search for color grading drone footage using Davinci Resolve.    All though Davinci has a steeeeeeeep learning curve that tutorials are comprehensive and the fundamentals  are transferable to other editors.

Here is one to get you started.

Hi, thank you for the input ! I will learn it :-)

Hello, one thing about d-log is that its not a RAW video, its a flat video so it allows you to be more flexible while editing. So once the WB is set, its done...
You're looking for Cinema DNG for this type of correction
And you don't need a LUT to work with D-log... you can color correct the file as is... Color Tables are just presets basically.

Hello,
Oh okay interesting ! I understand better ! So firstly i fix my WB to sunny/cloudy/manual value (Is it good to set a manuel value like 5500K as general setting for all flights and correct after ?!).

After i can either use a LUT to apply a color correspondence or grade like i whish.
Cinema DNG is equivalent of RAW in photography right ? I use a Phantom 4 Pro, by the way i cannot have Cinema DNG format.

Thank you for the helpful input :-)

There is no general setting in WB as its changes frequently You can set the WB before the flight but it needs to be adjusted to conditions.
Yes you can apply LUT and work with it afterwards or start grading yourself.

Okay perfect. I need to play with these parameters ! Thank you for the explanation :-)

No probs

samuraiz Posted at 2017-5-9 13:34
Go to youtube and search for color grading drone footage using Davinci Resolve.    All though Davinci has a steeeeeeeep learning curve that tutorials are comprehensive and the fundamentals  are transferable to other editors.

Here is one to get you started.

This is the program I use as well. I found DaVinci Resolve easy to use, very powerful and it's free for single user use. It also uses your GPU card for rendering.

Xavier1984 Posted at 2017-5-10 03:40
Hello,
Oh okay interesting ! I understand better ! So firstly i fix my WB to sunny/cloudy/manual value (Is it good to set a manuel value like 5500K as general setting for all flights and correct after ?!).

Definitely set the WB manually. It can change during video capture which cannot be edited easily. If it is fixed, you can always correct easily in post if you set incorrectly. In most cases, you'll do some WB corrections in post anyway.

Hi,
Thank you for your feedback. I will definitively set the WB to a fixed value i think around 5500K and adjust in post-prod for sure.
Concerning the workflow, i can grade with Premiere (Lumetri), use Resolve or i have seen than Adobe got SpeedGrade for color grading. I need to test and learn xD

LUTS can be useful but they are not a one size fits all solution every time.
If you are using Adobe Premiere it will be useful to you to learn how to colour correct and grade using Lumetri Scopes.
I recently started using Adobe Premiere and found Frederick Hagan over on YouTube a great resource.
https://www.youtube.com/user/fhagan02/videos

Thank you very much for the link ! I will study this.

Now i discovered that in D-Log the ISO is fixed to 500 and i don't understand why ?! Perhaps it is at this sensibility than the dynamic range is the best, but what about the noise in the image and by the way the image quality...

Firstly, you don't NEED a LUT, you can just do the color correction yourself but the LUT will help you from someone that is hopefully using almost the exact settings you has to get you as close to what REC 709 would look like. LUT is just a fancy way of saying "Preset".  A LUT is just a preset and they can be helpful but you don't "need" it if you know what you're doing in post. If you know how to WB, change the colors to warm it up, cool it down, saturate if, expose it, light it, etc. This is a great idea for a video. I will show the processs on how to make your own LUTS, be it a D-Log to Rec709 LUT or a fancy color correction heavy on style LUT so you can follow along and learn what is really happening.

Using a LUT is nothing more than a place to start your grade and is helpful but not NECESSARY.

Also very important that you understand you should first convert to something other than H.264 so you have more color space when dealing with D-Log or any DJI compressed footsge unless coming from an X5s as prores or uncompressed. Here is a video I made on that workflow some time ago but true today as it was then.

This video. Ask me any questions you like.

Hi,
Thank you for your great explanation. Ok, so i need firstly convert my H.264 footage to another profile with wider DR like the prores. I will study with your video and make some try. It's a lot of information to learn and to understand :-)

Hum, could you explain how it is possible to extend the color space (the gamut) by transcoding the H.264 to Prores ? If the footage in a smaller gamut transcoding to a wider gamut will just add color value not used. By the way it is not very useful no ?
It's like convert a photography from sRGB space to AdobeRGB or ProPhotoRGB, no information will be added to the image.

Xavier1984 Posted at 2017-5-10 12:10
Hum, could you explain how it is possible to extend the color space (the gamut) by transcoding the H.264 to Prores ? If the footage in a smaller gamut transcoding to a wider gamut will just add color value not used. By the way it is not very useful no ?
It's like convert a photography from sRGB space to AdobeRGB or ProPhotoRGB, no information will be added to the image.

transcoding from h.264 to ProRes is not adding dynamic range.  the reason for transcoding is because h.264 is meant to be a compressed, deliverable format.  ProRes is a working editing format.  This is why h.264 files are much smaller than ProRes files in the same clip.  It's like doing a bunch of editing to a JPEG photo and re-saving and re-saving over and over again.  Eventually, the Jpeg will start to loose quality.  h.264 is like the video equivalent of JPEG. By transcoding to ProRes, you are essentially placing the video you captured into a format that is not compressed when editing and coloring so that you retain all of the same image quality information you started with when you export back out to compressed format like h.264.

I like to think of it like this: Imagine you have a little Geo Metro car and you are taking it on a long journey over various terrain through the mountains.  If you make that long of a trek, your little Geo is going to take a beating and wont look quite the same as when you started.  Now imagine if you do that same trek, but you place your Geo inside of a tank before the trip.  Now when you come out on the other side and out of the tank, the Geo still looks as good as ever.

H.264 is the Geo and ProRes is the tank in that analogy.  The journey is the editing and coloring process.  hope that makes some sense.

Hi,
Thank you very much for the comparison and for the explanation. It make effectively sens and i understand better !

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Dont use d-log. At 500 iso there will be lot of noise. Use d-cinelike is better and perfect for color grading. There are some good luts out there. Check with polarpro, they have a really nice ones.

Hi, thanks for the input, i will check. It seems there exist a lot of possibilites and LUTs :-)