Hello,
I'm a real newbie to making DCP's and have some settings questions. I shot a documentary on Panasonic GH2 1920 x 1080, edited on Final Cut 7 and just finished the color grading on Davinci Resolve. So I have 2 questions:
1. What's the best and simplest export setting to go out from Davinci and into DCP-o-Matic? I was thinking to just stay with Quicktime ProResHQ 422 1920x1080 with a conversion to 24 FPS and also include the 6 tracks of audio to convert to the 24FPS timespace. But maybe I should scale to 1980 Quicktime x 1080? or use TIFF's?
2. When I get into DCP-o-matic should I set the color conversion to Rec. 709 or sRGB or something else. I know that Panasonic is Rec 709 but since we are working in a Davinci Resolve studio with a calibrated screen I wasn't sure...
Thanks so much in advance for your help!
Best Davinci export and Color Conversion setting question
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cineasta
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Carsten
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Re: Best Davinci export and Color Conversion setting question
Export to Prores 1920/1080 24fps with rec.709 would be my suggestion. Use rec.709 conversion preset in DCP-o-matic.
You can do a 25/24 conversion in DCP-o-matic as well, if your source footage is 25fps. If this Resolve export is your only master file, stay within the original frame rate, and create 24fps only for the DCP. As a matter of fact, you could just as well create the DCP with 25fps. There are just a few servers out there without 25fps capability. Some folks I helped created both a 24 and 25 fps version, some did not care about the slowdown and created only the 24fps version.
When you pass your footage through FCP and Resolve, your capture colorspace is not necessarily your backend colorspace - on the way, it could have been shifted into other colorspaces. But in general, stay within your capture color space throughout the post process.
Scaling from 1920/1080 to 1998/1080 - that is up to you. In general, I try to avoid that type of scaling and try to remain within a 1:1 pixel relation. But it depends a bit on how you expect your work to be presented. Cinemas may deal with 1920/1080 DCPs in different ways, depends on their masking and projector settings. In our cinema, I can mask to a 1920/1080 frame, so that's what I prefer.
That said - if your footage is not extremely synthetic in nature, most people will probably not notice the 1920->1998 scaling.
Educate yourself - create a 24fps, 25fps, 1080p and 1998/1080 version - then QC at a cinema.
- Carsten
You can do a 25/24 conversion in DCP-o-matic as well, if your source footage is 25fps. If this Resolve export is your only master file, stay within the original frame rate, and create 24fps only for the DCP. As a matter of fact, you could just as well create the DCP with 25fps. There are just a few servers out there without 25fps capability. Some folks I helped created both a 24 and 25 fps version, some did not care about the slowdown and created only the 24fps version.
When you pass your footage through FCP and Resolve, your capture colorspace is not necessarily your backend colorspace - on the way, it could have been shifted into other colorspaces. But in general, stay within your capture color space throughout the post process.
Scaling from 1920/1080 to 1998/1080 - that is up to you. In general, I try to avoid that type of scaling and try to remain within a 1:1 pixel relation. But it depends a bit on how you expect your work to be presented. Cinemas may deal with 1920/1080 DCPs in different ways, depends on their masking and projector settings. In our cinema, I can mask to a 1920/1080 frame, so that's what I prefer.
That said - if your footage is not extremely synthetic in nature, most people will probably not notice the 1920->1998 scaling.
Educate yourself - create a 24fps, 25fps, 1080p and 1998/1080 version - then QC at a cinema.
- Carsten
Last edited by Carsten on Mon Mar 28, 2016 3:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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cineasta
- Posts: 2
- Joined: Wed Mar 16, 2016 4:23 pm
Re: Best Davinci export and Color Conversion setting question
Thanks Carsten!
Had my first successful DCP viewing yesterday on a Christie projector! Sound and image ran very well though to my eye it felt a little softer to me that I expected. I am thinking of doing a TIFF export out Davinci the next time around. Do you think I would notice a significant difference in image clarity?
My specs were:
Starting materia/timelinel: Quicktime Apple PRORES HQ 422 - 1920 x 1080 at 23.98 FPS
Exported via Davinci: Quicktime Apple ProRes 422HQ - 1998 x 1080 DCI Flat 1.85 at 24FPS
Was thinking maybe i'll get a bit more out of the images if I go out
TIFF - RGB 16 bits - 1998 x 1080 DCI Flat 1.85 at 24FPS
Anyone have advice if it's worth doing?
This is such a great board. Thanks to all!
Jeff
Had my first successful DCP viewing yesterday on a Christie projector! Sound and image ran very well though to my eye it felt a little softer to me that I expected. I am thinking of doing a TIFF export out Davinci the next time around. Do you think I would notice a significant difference in image clarity?
My specs were:
Starting materia/timelinel: Quicktime Apple PRORES HQ 422 - 1920 x 1080 at 23.98 FPS
Exported via Davinci: Quicktime Apple ProRes 422HQ - 1998 x 1080 DCI Flat 1.85 at 24FPS
Was thinking maybe i'll get a bit more out of the images if I go out
TIFF - RGB 16 bits - 1998 x 1080 DCI Flat 1.85 at 24FPS
Anyone have advice if it's worth doing?
This is such a great board. Thanks to all!
Jeff
-
Carsten
- Posts: 2804
- Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2014 9:11 pm
- Location: Germany
Re: Best Davinci export and Color Conversion setting question
With 'soft' you mean 'unsharp', or 'flat'? Keep in mind, you rarely see your GH2 source footage on a big screen, only on a smaller monitor with a very high contrast. While the GH2 had a rumour for being the sharpest 1080p camera once, it is not a pro cinema camera, so, I would consider it natural that it looks not that crispy on a big screen.
Going single-image series is not a guarantee to solve these issues. It may create more issues as well. Only deviate from standard procedures if you have enough testing time for your DCPs.
On a recent project I assisted, the guy exporting the image series screwed the image export two times, which resulted in doubled frames in different parts of the DCP. And they only noticed this at the cinema while watching it, so had to recreate the image series and DCP and ingest and QC three times altogether...
Stick to a clean workflow. Double check your folders and parameters.
DCP-o-matic allows you to create DCPs from small portions of the source footage for testing (use trim under the timing tab). Create a couple of test DCPs with different parameters (e.g. 1920*1080 no scale, and 1998*1080 scaled, and then compare at the cinema. Same for audio levels - create a short test DCP from the part of the movie with the highest audio levels, check in the cinema for listening level and possible clipping.
Creating these test DCPs will usually only take a couple of minutes compared to the full length movie. Name these DCPs so you can quickly identify the variations on the server so you can advise the projectionist which one to play.
- Carsten
Going single-image series is not a guarantee to solve these issues. It may create more issues as well. Only deviate from standard procedures if you have enough testing time for your DCPs.
On a recent project I assisted, the guy exporting the image series screwed the image export two times, which resulted in doubled frames in different parts of the DCP. And they only noticed this at the cinema while watching it, so had to recreate the image series and DCP and ingest and QC three times altogether...
Stick to a clean workflow. Double check your folders and parameters.
DCP-o-matic allows you to create DCPs from small portions of the source footage for testing (use trim under the timing tab). Create a couple of test DCPs with different parameters (e.g. 1920*1080 no scale, and 1998*1080 scaled, and then compare at the cinema. Same for audio levels - create a short test DCP from the part of the movie with the highest audio levels, check in the cinema for listening level and possible clipping.
Creating these test DCPs will usually only take a couple of minutes compared to the full length movie. Name these DCPs so you can quickly identify the variations on the server so you can advise the projectionist which one to play.
- Carsten