32-bit and changing saturation

vitalforce wrote on 11/18/2007, 11:04 AM
Working on a long-form SDV project and am trying to render from the 32-bit setting (seems to give slightly better color), I notice that when certain plugins are in a chain, such as the Bump Map plugin, but whenever I add an FX to the chain and try to either increase or decrease color saturation (e.g. with CC or Sony HSL) the screen goes black. Anyone seeing similar behavior between 32-bit settings and color saturation changes?

Comments

GlennChan wrote on 11/18/2007, 1:07 PM
1- The reason you are seeing better colors is because you're seeing the levels being decoded to computer RGB instead of studio RGB. In 8-bit the Video Preview isn't accurate in that it didn't show you levels appropriate for display.

http://glennchan.info/articles/vegas/v8color/v8color.htm

2- Check that the alpha channel isn't getting knocked out. In the video preview window, there is a dropdown button that will let you see alpha as grayscale. (That would be a bug.)

I think one of the workarounds was to use a filter that would restore the alpha channel... I think the color corrector might do it??

vitalforce wrote on 11/18/2007, 10:15 PM
You're starting to look a little like a beneficent Wizard of Oz. Yes, when I set the preview window to show source alpha, there's the black screen. So Bump Map, which I assume works by masking at the alpha level to create higher spot luminance within a frame, does not play well with 32-bit in certain combinations with other V8 plugins.

I tried adding CC to the end of my plugins at the track level (the entire project is now a sequence of hundreds of events on a single track, a 92-minute timeline). Although trying to raise saturation before with CC or Sony HSL gave me a black screen for every event with the Bump Map plugin attached, this time, after I have added the Levels plugin at the track level, adding CC saturation works. It does not cause a black screen, and the source alpha on the preview window is grey, not black. The only change from before is that I added (also on your general advice to others) Levels at the track level (with the default channel as alpha) instead of using CC for RGB to Studio conversion.

Strangely, if I move the CC plugin to where it precedes Levels, there's the black screen again. If I keep CC subsequent to Levels, particularly at the very end of the plugin chain, alpha is restored and I can raise saturation.

Thanks once again for lending your experience to fellows like myself. This is a DV feature that is going to be walked around L.A. in January and I wanted it to be picture perfect, no pun intended.
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