T2i T2i Blown Out Highlights Vs Camcorders!

S

skital

Well-known member
Ok, I've been seeing some videos of the T2i vs Canon HV30 and now the Panasonic HPX300. I have noticed that while the T2i seems to nice colors and great low light the highlights are way more blown out. Is this just how the T2i always is or are the shooters simply using too high of an F stop or not using an ND filter like they should?

I'm curious, because I've been considering the T2i and was believing I'd have superior dynamic range/latitude compared to my HV20 in cinemode.

Here's the video link:

http://www.vimeo.com/10446308
 
Shoot a stop or a stop+1/3rd down, then grade to compensate for the underexposure.

As you say, the latitude is very good in the shadows, but not so good in the highlights. An ND filter should be used if you're wanting to keep a shallow DOF.
 
Well the HPX footage on that clip was way more underexposed than the 550 footage, so of course the highlights weren't as blown out.
 
There’s no zebra function or “live” histogram to help folks judge exposure…so that’s why you see a lot of folks blow it out often. What there is on the camera is a meter that shows how much light is hitting the sensor. The trick is to do what Calomile suggests: “Shoot a stop or a stop+1/3rd down, then grade to compensate for the underexposure.” This helps me outdoors bigtime. Indoors I just keep it to the right (or centered).
 
i dont think this is a fair example. the t2i shots are properly exposed for the subjects indoors. only blown highlights i see is the windows and door which is to be expected if you are exposed for inside. What you need to do is drop some ND on those windows or expose for the windows and pump up the lights for the indoor scene to be properly balanced. Sometimes people need to stop putting the blame on cameras and control light better. Thats a general statement and not meant for the OP. But i'm seeing alot of commments about people expecting unrealistic results from cameras when they need to learn to control light better.
 
The following is an excerpt from http://poetzerofilm.com/2010/03/the-great-zacuto-shootout-latitude/ in regards to the recent Zacuto shootout using the DSLRs vs film:

The final test is a black and white, 13-stop latitude chart, with each camera rated accordingly (Kodak/Fuji/D3s at 200, Canons at 160 ISO, and GH1 at 320 ISO). The Kodak and Fuji, as expected, display all the steps clearly. The 5d shows 10.5, while the 7d and 1d have about 11 stops. The Nikon also shows 11 stops, but is visibly more compressed. The GH1 performs the worst, at about 9 stops and even more noticeable compression.

The T2i didn’t make it to this part of the test and since I don’t have one I can’t speak for it. But since latitude depends on dynamic range this should give you sort of an idea about how well or bad these cameras can handle latitude in a controlled environment. I understand there could be some folks who don’t want to agree with the results but from watching the demonstration of the girl, light bulb and man in foreground the 7D’s flare/glare from the light bulb looked the best (outside of film of course).
 
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Ian-T said:
The following is an excerpt from http://poetzerofilm.com/2010/03/the-great-zacuto-shootout-latitude/ in regards to the recent Zacuto shootout using the DSLRs vs film:

The final test is a black and white, 13-stop latitude chart, with each camera rated accordingly (Kodak/Fuji/D3s at 200, Canons at 160 ISO, and GH1 at 320 ISO). The Kodak and Fuji, as expected, display all the steps clearly. The 5d shows 10.5, while the 7d and 1d have about 11 stops. The Nikon also shows 11 stops, but is visibly more compressed. The GH1 performs the worst, at about 9 stops and even more noticeable compression.

The T2i didn’t make it to this part of the test and since I don’t have one I can’t speak for it. But since latitude depends on dynamic range this should give you sort of an idea about how well or bad these cameras can handle latitude in a controlled environment. I understand there could be some folks who don’t want to agree with the results but from watching the demonstration of the girl, light bulb and man in foreground the 7D’s flare/glare from the light bulb looked the best (outside of film of course).
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Yes, but they also said that you can compensate the HDSLR with proper lighting. So where film looks better, you can achieve great results with an hdslr by lighting the area that looses detail.
 
A CMOS camera be it DSLR or camcorder will handle highlights worse than a 3 chip CCD camera as a gross generalization.

All the advise seems to be to underexpose by 1/3 stop to prevent clipping.
 
I have noticed that when you do get some blown out highlights on a DSLR, in most cases it still looks better than the blown out highlights from a normal video camera. It still has a more filmic blown out look than a video-ish one.
 
It would be great to exactly test the dynamic range of the T2i/550D compared to the 7D, with professional charts, maybe someone can do this.
 
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T2i Vs HV30

T2i Vs HV30

Ok, in the video I posted the HPX300 is pretty underexposed, but have a look at these two videos with the T2i vs HV30. Yes, the T2i has some advantages, but in the first video with low light towards the end the blacks are crushed into oblivion on the T2i whereas the HV30 retains a lot of dark detail.

On the second video with the little boy the HV30 is not massively blowing out the windows. It maybe just slightly under exposed, but not as much as the HPX300 in the other video. The window on the HV30 look pretty good, but on the T2i it's just a big white blob. The colors and everything look great and all, but dang. Even if the HV30 is just a little underexposed I think raising it to proper exposure would not result in windows that look like that.

http://www.vimeo.com/11286727

http://www.vimeo.com/11315305

Notice also how in the flashlight only scene that the T2i is not only crushing the blacks, but also blowing out the highlight on the stapler, whereas the HV30 is doing neither. The T2i is retaining good color on the stapler though; That is one advantage. Look at 1:28 and then 1:43.
 
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skital said:
Ok, in the video I posted the HPX300 is pretty underexposed, but have a look at these two videos with the T2i vs HV30. Yes, the T2i has some advantages, but in the first video with low light towards the end the blacks are crushed into oblivion on the T2i whereas the HV30 retains a lot of dark detail.

On the second video with the little boy the HV30 is not massively blowing out the windows. It maybe just slightly under exposed, but not as much as the HPX300 in the other video. The window on the HV30 look pretty good, but on the T2i it's just a big white blob. The colors and everything look great and all, but dang. Even if the HV30 is just a little underexposed I think raising it to proper exposure would not result in windows that look like that.

http://www.vimeo.com/11286727

http://www.vimeo.com/11315305

Notice also how in the flashlight only scene that the T2i is not only crushing the blacks, but also blowing out the highlight on the stapler, whereas the HV30 is doing neither. The T2i is retaining good color on the stapler though; That is one advantage. Look at 1:28 and then 1:43.
Click to expand...

You people are over analyzing things, lol........ These are all great cameras , instead of just being "test" film/video makers go out there and shoot some "real" footage
:thumbsup:
 
Have been using the GH1 and found the live histogram quite useful for judging exposure. Just had the 550D for a week and found my first footage, which was exposed according to how it looked on the LCD, appeared too light when the footage was later viewed on a TV. The brightness of the LCD can be changed: it defaults on a neutral setting of 4, so I deliberately set it to be brighter at 6 or 7 (the brightest). Now when I set exposure to look normal according to the LCD, it will be darker (ie. looks better) when later viewed on a TV.
 
Just to update this thread. I no longer think this was a fair comparison test now having owned both the Canon T2i and the Canon HV20 for awhile now I can say the T2i appears to clearly have superior dynamic range than the HV20 even with the HV20 using Cinemode. I use a custom picture style curve I call "Film Look" with my T2i. The dynamic range is vastly superior to Standard or any other mode prior to adjustment and is still very visibly better even after Adjusting Standard or Neutral modes to the best they can do. I'm going to post some results soon.
 
BEfore testing people should get poper quicktime cause many versions have bad gamma settings which are crushing blacks and blowout whites,then turn that contrast in camera down.
 
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