Highlight Compression/Aliasing - DVX100

[Kin869]

Hello, been a long time lurker, but I finally got over my stage fright, hehe j/k.

Well I was wondering if you original DVX100 users (not A or B) have a solution to the highlight blowout and aliasing issue. I know the DVX100 does not compress its highlights in the Cine-like gamma setting, but according to Adam Wilt's DVX article, there's something you can do to correct these nasty patches of white in post.

"To fully exploit Cine-like gamma requires you to handle these highlights yourself in post production; you can't just leave them in, uncorrected, and let the flattened knee of the curve smooth the transition between a normal tonal scale and overexposure, because Cine-like gamma has no such knee." -http://www.adamwilt.com/24p/

I use Adobe Premiere and there's a filter called the "Video Limiter" that can compress my highlights for me, but it only applies to the chroma. When I use the filter, I can see that it's smoothing out some of the colors that are about to be blown out, which is a good sign, but I have yet to find a proper way to handle the highlights. Any suggestions?

Here's two screen shots comparing the effects of the "Video Limiter" filter:

Another problem I'm having is that whenever there's a big difference in contrast on edges in the shot (especially black against white), aliasing (jaggies) occur. Currently I'm using AviSynth to smooth out the aliasing, but I was wondering if you guys have an alternate solution.

Here's a before and after comparison enlarged by 200%:

Your inputs will be appreciated!

-KiN

 

[Pukki]

Your "jaggie removal" seems to affect contrast too. bad.

I have a problem with chroma in premiere pro 2. I see on the waveform that color is going over 100% but if I change the saturation setting, the whole image gets affected too much. Anyone have advice on this?

 

[PaPa]

that may or may not be a good example of what the camera is capable of doing in standard def at 4:1:1: color sampling?

Shooting in controlled lighting situations will make the camera shine, but stay within its limits me thinks, otherwise your screwad.

could be wrong tho.

 

[Kin869]

Your "jaggie removal" seems to affect contrast too. bad.

Really? I never noticed that before. I just put the images into Photoshop and their histograms are almost identical. Could you elaborate on what you are seeing?

[To Papa] Yea, I definitely think that shooting in controlled situation would sure make the camera shine, heck, every camera would. But isn't there a "plan-B" for things that go wrong like this? I'm talking about the lack of highlight compression. I realize the shot is overexposed, but is there a way to "smooth" the transition from good exposure to overexposure?

Thanks for your replies!

-KiN

 

[PaPa]

yeah there is, and its pretty much as you said, play with the levels a bit in the highs to compress them i guess. but just careful not to distort the rest of your image too much.