Deartifacting B&W Footage

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PhilMNoir

Member
I'm involved in a short b&w horror film being filmed this summer. We're shooting on my dvx100b and using Adobe Premiere and After Effects CS4 to edit, color correct, etc. I've heard it said that one should always deartifact digital footage when planning to go b&w in post, but i'm not sure if it truly makes that much of a difference. Can anyone personally attest to this? If it truly does increase the quality to as large of a degree as i've been told, is there any specific plug-in i should use over another that might work better with Adobe?

Thanks!
 
Cleaning up images that have aliased or jaggy edges; removing blockiness that might leak through when converting to B&W.

I don't own said plugin filters, but am willing to make the purchase if, indeed, they are necessary. I've only heard rumors that the dvx is known for blockier images when converting to b&w because of the way it handles reds. Anyone have experience with converting to b&w that might be able to confirm or deny this statement?
 
I don't think it's that much of an issue; getting good black and white is more about how you light and what kind of contrast you use. But you can certainly try a chroma blur on the red channels.
 
I once heard that if you want contrast in B&W you can attach an orange filter on the lens and shoot.
and if you want even more contranst, then put on a red filter.
I think it's for film so I guess you can just do it in post if you're shooting with the dvx.
never really shot B&W so I'm not too sure...good luck tho
 
Deartifacting generally is reducing the color artifacts associated with miniDV's 4:1:1 color space (typically of ALL miniDV, not just the DVX). Usually it's a chroma blur, but sometimes it's an intelligent reconstruction.

Is this important when converting to B&W? Absolutely. I can personally attest to this. You will get cleaner, more well defined B&W images by deartifacting the color footage prior to converting to B&W.

If I get some time I'll post some stills with and without deartifacting.
 
Thanks for the responses all. And i'd be very happy to see those stills whenever you get a chance, Josh. What plugin do you recommend? I'll be shooting 24pA and doing everything post in Premiere CS4 and After Effects. Thanks!
 
Thanks for the tip...just ordered it :P If, by chance, you've picked up any other helpful b&w tips, i'd really appreciate all the help i can get. Found one of your other posts on the same subject, and it was all very informative and made sense to boot. Thanks again for the help.

-PhilM Noir
 
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