C300: Lets see if I can explain

New_Zealand

New_Zealand

Veteran
This is for the C300 MkI I read or saw somewhere last year that you should keep the cap on the camera (before you put the lens on) and do some sort a refresh start which takes about a minute. SORRY my brain is just not grabbing it. I have been trying to find that info. I'm sure I have explain it pretty bad.
 
Are you refering to black balanceing - a thing that happens on many cameras.. you should only need to do it once in a while say when you are operating at a new ambient temperature.
 
Arri doesn't need or have black balance. Score another for Arri. :)

Red takes like minutes to black balance, at least the Red Scarlet I black balanced awhile ago.

I used to black balance my C300s more often, but I've been getting lazier lately. Probably should black balance them all.
 
Of course ARRIs have black balancing, but it's an automated process in their cameras.

And RED has two types of black balancing; one that may take minutes, and one that may take up to an hour calibrating for various settings/temperatures.
 
I find it critical to black balance Canon cameras. In particular when they are coming from a rental house and when I'm shooting multi-cam.
That's just been my experience. Thankfully it's a quick and painless process.
 
I do it every shoot as a matter of prep. It's a no brainer and I never have to worry about if I black balanced and now the color looks wonky, I must have forgotten to.
 
Has anyone ever done any tests to look at the difference between black balancing and not black balancing? I wonder how significant it actually affects the image. As far as I understand, it's a gradual thing, the longer it's been without a black balance, the more off-kilter it could become. Black balancing with every ISO change is unreasonable for any non-controlled shoot. At the end of the day, the images still look good without black balancing. It's just a question of how much quality loss happens by neglecting it, either a negligible amount or a noticeable amount.
 
It's ran to clean up noise and any artifacts (FPN, HPN, dead pixels, chroma issues, maybe other things).

You won't notice a before and after difference in most cases because cameras usually don't need it until they need it.

Some practice it "just in case" as there usually isn't time to inspect every pixel before you start the day, so most run the process in the morning (or whenever) just to be safe.

It's also recommended to do it in when changing drastic temperatures like filming in the freezing cold and then immediately in a cabin with a roaring fireplace.
 
I admit that I don't do it very often with my 300 or F55, because it's not as quick or easy as with an ENG camera that has a dedicated, physical switch and the camera automatically closes down the iris(ENG lenses fully close). I'm ashamed to say it's probably been months since I've BB'd my C300. My F55 will actually ask you for it every few days when you turn it on, if it hasn't been done and it will automatically close down the 17-120(which can fully close like a B4 ENG lens), so it's a little easier. With my ENG cameras, I BB at the start of every shoot day. It's habit and what we were all taught. And it's easy. No menu dive. No capping the lens. Flip the switch up and the camera takes care of the rest. As far as time it takes, the C300 moves at a glacial pace. My 55 isn't bad, but my 300 takes well over a minute. There have been times that I thought something was wrong and I was going to have to shut the camera down, because it was taking so long.

And remember to always black balance BEFORE you white balance(if you're WB'ing and not shooting preset). If you BB after you WB, go back and re-WB, otherwise it can throw your colors off, especially if it's had to make big adjustments.
 
When I had a Mk1, I rarely black balanced the camera. I found that it made no detectable difference to me. I did have to clean up a lit pixel at some point and BB did just that. I do BB more with my Mk 2, but its still not what I would call a practice. Mostly I do BB going from 1080 to 4K and the reverse. It doesn’t take that long, but its not as as quick as an ENG camera as Run N gun pointed out.
 
morgan_moore said:
.. you should only need to do it once in a while say when you are operating at a new ambient temperature.
Click to expand...

And when you lift gain or ISO as the sensors run hotter at higher ISOs because their amp circuits are peddling harder. The ISO temp changes can upset the black levels as the RGB values don't increase in a linear fashion to one another. Although modern cameras don't suffer uneven RGB Black levels on gain up anywhere as badly as the cameras of ten years ago.

Chris Young
 
One other piece of information about BBing cameras for anyone's consideration:

RED notes in their camera manuals that putting the lens cap on the lens and closing the iris is NOT enough for a black balance to work properly (maybe with their cameras). They recommend taking the lens off, putting the body cap on, and placing the camera in a dark room or covering it with an opaque material for true black balancing.

Now this would be excessive for some - especially if you do not really care about BBing your camera or it's been fine the way you've done it for 15-20 years of working in the industry (why fix it when it ain't broken?) - but just saying.
 
NorBro said:
One other piece of information about BBing cameras for anyone's consideration:

RED notes in their camera manuals that putting the lens cap on the lens and closing the iris is NOT enough for a black balance to work properly (maybe with their cameras). They recommend taking the lens off, putting the body cap on, and placing the camera in a dark room or covering it with an opaque material for true black balancing.

Now this would be excessive for some - especially if you do not really care about BBing your camera or it's been fine the way you've done it for 15-20 years of working in the industry (why fix it when it ain't broken?) - but just saying.
Click to expand...

This was one of the biggest factors that made me really dislike shooting with RED cameras last year. I had an Epic with the Dragon 6k imager, used it on a few of our shoots for our documentary and on one web video for an NPR station. If you plan on shooting at different raster sizes and frame rates, they recommended that you do the full black shading, which took over an hour. In 2019, these kinds of arcane requirements are a no go for me. My C200 takes less than a minute to black and white balance. This black shading thing was just one of the "quirks" that you deal with when shooting with RED. That's why I wrote in my review that REDs truly are best for crew served shoots where you have ACs and prep days to deal with all of this BS. Not a good camera for documentary, run & gun shooting. It can be done but it's not the best tool.
 
Pure, you have a bit of a negative bias towards them (which is 100% understandable and respected with your experience), but sometimes I feel like you're stretching too much to complain about them.

You don't have to black shade them for an hour every time. It's just a recommendation (like the one I mentioned above). I rarely black balanced/shaded the Raven and it was fine. Went from 24p 3:1 to 120p 18:1. Different ISOs, different WBs, different shutters.

And again, you can have a lightweight set up and do all of the running-and-gunning in the world with them.

They are not as archaic and inconvenient as sometimes made out to be.
 
I saw the sticky on REDUser several months ago on "Black Shading" and read it and what RED calls "black shading" really seems like a misnomer.
 
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