Info: THE ARRIVAL - Special Edition (seeking a team up) (lots of useful info) — Page 5

Yes, I know it has some problems, but this was only a fast test to compare color grading; hope to have few problems with the final version; hope it will be more like Halloween than The Matrix! (-^,)

50/50 seems the best way to go - "In media stat virtus!" - but I'd like to receive some feedback more...

Give me the frame number or time, and I'll do it now; also, would you like to see two clips, or one clip with half screen corrected BD and the other 50/50 mix?

Here you are:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/p2ay9p (119MB, 20mbps, no sound)I think that lowering a bit the saturation will lead to a better result, but I need your feedbacks anyway.

New clip:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/di20cy (60MB, 20mbps, no sound)

this time saturation is lowered; at first sight it seems more similar to the BD, but comparing it side by side reveals the differences - note the green of the forest, and the ancient palace color on the right side in one of the last shots.

I prefer this version; need further feedback.

EDIT: take a look at this comparison

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/64539

Can you see the pink halos in the sky on the BD?

It is a side effect of BD correction... I could always leave the BD "as is", even when using 50/50 mix; it will regain some details lost in the shadow, but the contrast will be overall not correct IMHO...

Here you are the difference:

http://screenshotcomparison.com/comparison/64629

in my calibrated TV, the increased contrast outweight the tiny shadow details lost; what do you think?

thegroovologist said:

I didn't like the version that much where you lowered the saturation. It's lowered too much in my opinion.

So, what do you suggest? Half way between first clip and desaturated one? More toward desaturated version? Let's say that first clip is 100 and desaturated one is 0, let's state what do you think could be the right one, and I'll encode it to watch it in motion.

Any feedbacks from other users?

Here you are a clip with a new saturation setting:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/8to3nq

let me know what do you think, and which darker shot I should use for the next clip.

Here you are: http://www.sendspace.com/file/mddzct

Yes. But this time I encoded the last two clips at 10mbps; hence, maybe you could note less grain, if this is the problem... i've done it to upload (and let you download) clip faster, as I think I reached a good result with grain, but still not sure which saturation setting I should use.

So, focus first on the saturation; then, if the last setting is good, I could make another test clip, this time using an high bitrate setting - 25/30mbps, that will be used for the final release.

OK; let's wait for TheGroovologist's opinion.

Last clip @25mbps: http://www.sendspace.com/file/hdf4cf

thegroovologist said:

So are you giving it the green light?

Not yet, sorry... I decided to use a completely different color matching method, to get rid of the artefacts DoomBot noted, present also in the snow shot; the new one is more conservative and less aggressive than the old one, but result seems more natural.

Here you are the split screen test clip (25mbps) - left BD, right setting 2:

http://www.sendspace.com/file/dceq61

as you can see, the new setting (called, guess what? setting 2 - what a fantasy, eh?) seems to avoid the "wrong" colors - e.g. in the bd the snow is pink first, then violet, then blue, while in setting 2 it remains more or less white.

With this, I don't want to say that the BD color grading is wrong or right, but only that I like most setting 2's grading.

Now I'm going to encode the previous test clips with this new setting; I'll post them ASAP; meanwhile, take a look at this last clip and let me know what do you think.