Filming in Winter & Snow

Jim H wrote on 2/4/2013, 12:35 AM

I have this problem with video and still photography in the winter. Flat light and high contrast between snow and subject. I play with levels to pump up the shadows and pull down the highlights to get more detail but in the end the images lack the "pop" you get on a normal sunny day. I usually end up going with black and white because I feel the overall look is better. Are there any good in camera settings I should be using or are these things better dealt with in post like I'm trying to do? And what are the best ways to get more life in a lifeless image? Here's an example of what I'm talking about - this was filmed with my Sony NX5U in 720/60p mode and auto exposure/speed settings:

Comments

musicvid10 wrote on 2/4/2013, 12:43 AM

I started shooting stills in the mountains over forty years ago.

One thing is to set manual exposure or open up a stop.
Autoexposure is easily fooled by all the snow and underexposes.
Another thing is to let some bright whites go to bring up the subject a bit.
Bumping the gamma in post, say +.10 is another effective technique.

If you'll upload a camera clip somewhere, we'll give you more suggestions wrt exposure and post leveling.
Cute footage!

Jim H wrote on 2/4/2013, 12:45 AM

Here's another recent project where there was a bit of sunlight and the results are much better. But at around 8min I film inside a tent with bright tent walls behind the subjects. So I had a similar problem with wanting to bring up the dark shadows... as you can see I failed miserably be had a tight deadline and had to go with what I got and couldn't fall back on making into "art" by going with black and white and cranking on the levels mindlessly... lol. The joys of being an "amature" or volunteer means lower expectations... but I would like to improve my skills in this area.

Jim H wrote on 2/4/2013, 12:47 AM

musicvid, thanks for the suggestions. What do you mean by upload a camera clip? You mean an untouched bit of video? The beginning the the dog vid has some of the untouched color footage that I don't think I played with much. I know this is a dynamic range problem... I guess I was hoping for some sort of HDR-like trick for video?

musicvid10 wrote on 2/4/2013, 12:50 AM

Take a short piece of original camera footage and upload it to a file sharing place. Not Youtube. Post a link here so we can download the file and look at it.

Your second clip also, is suffering from autoexposure. Learn to expose for the subject, not the backlighting.

Jim H wrote on 2/4/2013, 1:10 AM

This is not the best clip but it's the only raw bit that was small enough to upload.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/80092785/00179.MTS

I notice that this new to me Sony seems to record very low contrasty images... maybe it's just the conditions because I only just got it this winter and everything I've shot so far has been outdoors in snow. This example doesn't show as much of the problem but it definitely doesn't pop.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/80092785/00179.MTS

and this one is from the second video where there's terrible back lighting.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/80092785/00070.MTS

farss wrote on 2/4/2013, 1:10 AM

"I know this is a dynamic range problem... "

Sure is. The contrast in front of the camera is huge,

"I guess I was hoping for some sort of HDR-like trick for video?"

Using Cinnegamma or S-Log in the camera is the trick.
The high contrast edges also show up defects in lenses.

If you want to shoot those scenes and have it look a million bucks, you've kind of got to spend that kind of money. I will say when it's done really well it does look simply stunning, some of the opening shots in The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo took my breath away.

As none of us are likely to have massive budgets my suggestions are a bit different to Musicvid's.

1) Protect the highlights, underexpose a bit so you don't clip.
2) Use a Colour Curve to pull up the lower midtones and roll off the highlights that are over 100% IRE in post.
3) Static camera. There's a lot of detail in these scenes that can cause losses during compression. Keeping the camera static could help.

Bob.

Jim H wrote on 2/4/2013, 1:17 AM

Bob, can you expand on the color curve suggestion? Which FX is best? If you're familiar with BCC is there one there that might work better? Perhaps there's a tutorial that explains it as I'm sure I've tinkered with all of the apps I have but I have no clue what I'm doing.

Also, this is the first camera I've had with built in density filters. The camera kept flashing for D3 (darkest) so that's what I used. Not sure if that flattens the DR or not or just allows for a better auto exposure.

farss wrote on 2/4/2013, 2:17 AM

"Bob, can you expand on the color curve suggestion? Which FX is best?"

The one that comes with Vegas, "Color Curves".
Best way to learn it is to put a gradient on the T/L from Gen Media, apply the FX and also open the Waveform Monitor. Try changing the end points, add nodes. move nodes, etc. It takes a while to get the feel of it.
Then, when you know how to drive it, try it on some real footage.

ND filters will not change dynamic range. Your new camera also has zebras I think. Learn what they're for and use them.

Bob.

Grazie wrote on 2/4/2013, 2:51 AM

ND filters will not change dynamic range.

Why?

Grazie

farss wrote on 2/4/2013, 5:02 AM

Dynamic range is the difference between clipping and the noise floor.
It's mostly a function of the sensor itself.
A ND is the same is an optical fixed attenuator, no different to the iris except it's fixed.
The reason for having both is to keep the iris opening at a sensible size.
There's the physical limit of the optics that determines how much light the lens can send to the sensor. The other limitation is ff the iris is closed too small then diffraction occurs and the image becomes soft.

On the cheaper cameras with no ND filters the exposure control of last resort is shutter speed.

Bob.

Jim H wrote on 2/4/2013, 4:44 PM

good answers. thanks.

musicvid10 wrote on 2/4/2013, 11:07 PM

At the risk of repeating myself, don't autoexpose in snow.
Your footage is badly underexposed. You've lost at least 25% of your native bit depth.
"Some" improvement can be made in post, but why not shoot correct levels?
If your camera does not have any manual adjust, it may be time to consider upgrading.

farss wrote on 2/5/2013, 12:37 AM

I just downloaded the footage.
I was completely wrong, the problem isn't too much contrast the problem is not enough. The cloudy sky and the big reflector on the ground is washing it out.
Whites are lucky to hit 65% and blacks are pushing it to get below 15%.
Applying a quite aggressive Color Curve and it looks much better but just how far you'd want to push it is a matter of taste.

Before:

After:

The NX5 is capable of full manual and has adjustable Zebras from 70% to 100% and 100+%, the latter would be good to start with because the aperature on all the others could be limited i.e. you might see no zebras and think you're ok when you're not.

Probably more by good luck than anything the Autoexposure isn't doing too bad a job, nothing is being clipped. No matter what the exposure it really can use some grading. If I was shooitng this in full manual I'd have probably set the exposure around there anyway. Because you're trying to following something moving fast there's a lot to do and a bit underexposed isn't doing much harm and gives you some headroom as you swing the camera and clouds move etc.

Of course if the sun came out then who knows. Learning all the features and how to use them on a camera like this is the only way to get a return on the investment.