Please upload a short original camera clip to Drive or Dropbox. That way I can determine if there is something that resembles banding in your 10 bit clip.

I've never seen a LUT reduce native bitdepth or add banding.

@mark-y With a 32bit project try a 10bit video that has a area that will clip easily, take note of histogram etc, blow out the highlights, export the grade as a LUT, reset grade, load lut that was just created and attempt to restore image and CG graphs back to original.

@Mindmatter Another possibility for your lut not working correctly, if the lut is meant for rec709 make sure you've done the color space transform before your creative lut

@Mindmatter How did you do the log to Rec709 conversion? I'd suggest either a LUT at the media level or ACES and set the appropriate color space. After that add the look stylistic LUT.

Thanks all so far for your help.

@UltraVista nodes? are you sure you're not talking about Resolve?

@RogerS and @UltraVista, the LUT from @mark-y in question is a 709 conversion LUT, not a stylistic LUT. It's meant for Slog3 conversion.

Please upload a short original camera clip to Drive or Dropbox. That way I can determine if there is something that resembles banding in your 10 bit clip.

 

I've never seen a LUT reduce native bitdepth or add banding.

 

@mark-y I was not meaning to imply that your LUT is at fault here. I'm justtrying to find the root of the issue. I'll upload a clip asap.

.

Than you for clarifying. Did you compare it to the built-in conversion LUT in the color grading panel? Also when you go to render in 32-bit full mode make sure the view transform is set to off in project settings or it will be double corrected.

I would add a conversion LUT at the media level so it comes before any other corrections (and you may want to edit the events individually if the lighting changed over the course of the shoot).

In general I'd do correction first (start with the conversion then further tweak exposure, contract, color) and finally add a look if you want via LUT or manually.

 

In general I'd do correction first (start with the conversion then further tweak exposure, contract, color) and finally add a look if you want via LUT or manually.

The thing with this particular LUT is that it strongly reacts to luma values, as it colors the shadows towards teal /blue. If I applyexposure corrections it strongly changes the look, the darker, the bluer, which is why I need to apply corrections pre LUT in this case.

Thanks for the idea, I'll do some testing and comparing the banding with the internal 709 conversion LUTs.

In that case it sounds too inflexible and reduces the benefit of shooing log so I wouldn't use this LUT and would use a separate teal/blue finishing LUT once the image contrast and exposure are set using tools like the 3 way color corrector.

Personally for such footage I use the Leeming LUT https://www.leeminglutpro.com/ as it gives me a better correction starting point with less work than the VEGAS conversion LUT or ACES. If you don't mind doing more work in the color grading panel the ACES transforms can get the job done as well and are more flexible.

Sony also has various LUTs here, including made by their ambassadors, if you are looking for more looks: https://pro.sony/en_TN/technology/professional-video-lut-look-up-table#TEME170404ThirdPartyLutsFromCreators-professional-video-lut-look-up-table

Have you tried the official Sony conversion LUT, from slog3 to rec709? Would do that first.

And if you intend to use the conversion LUT for all events - maybe it would be a nice idea to apply the LUT on the track level with the LUT plugin (not the CGP).

But what is less clear to me, is how professional the overall conversion anyway. In Resolve, you would make the conversion to a wide gamut anyway first. And then apply a LUT. But in Vegas in rec709 project settings you work immediately in the small gamut of rec709 with a LUT I think - what could cause banding maybe. From this perspective, the ACES transformation should be superior in Vegas - since default ACES uses a significant wider gamut. Would test that too.

@Mindmatter I meant to say in the position of node 10 meaning the last plugin of the chain as Vegas has the same left to right priority , and unless there's a reason not to, put the artistic lut after strong grading

@mark-y I was not meaning to imply that your LUT is at fault here. I'm justtrying to find the root of the issue. I'll upload a clip asap.

@Mindmatter That response was made for the benefit of a previous responder, who talked about "degradation" from using LUTS, those results being not visibly different than using ACES, but have nonetheless been a recurrent talking point here. I was just pointing out that LUTS do not cause banding by themselves, not even mine.

I have never produced an sLOG3 LUT; instead I have relied on the two official Canon versions included in my free package. I am almost certain you are thinking of my HDR10->REC709 offering I illustrated in another post.

I will remind myself to tag third party responders going forward, so as to minimize the confusion that typically results from them choosing to do so.

Top of the Holidays to you!

@mark-y When I do that LUT experiment I describe above my histogram has banding through it which I assume is lost color information leading to poor color rendition, but you're right in my example no banding in image.

This could be result also from 8bit decoding only.

I wait for an upload of the footage in question by @Mindmatter. And the exact name of the LUT used by him. To see, if it can be reproduced.

My own experience with 10bit 422 All-I footage from my FS7 - well, have not seen banding in Vegas here with the published original Sony LUT (slog3 to. Rec709) up to now. So keen to see how that looks like.

I have never produced an sLOG3 LUT; instead I have relied on the two official Canon versions included in my free package. I am almost certain you are thinking of my HDR10->REC709 offering I illustrated in another post.

Thanks for the clarification. I guess I must have mislabeled your LUT being an Slog3 LUT. I referred to the package inside your collection called "Sony LUTS and Collections" and automatically assumed it to be for Slog3..I'm using the "Blockbuster V2". So did I wrongly assume it is a Slog to 709 conversion LUT? If it wasn't, I doubt it would work so well and look so good.

Have you tried the official Sony conversion LUT, from slog3 to rec709? Would do that first.

And if you intend to use the conversion LUT for all events - maybe it would be a nice idea to apply the LUT on the track level with the LUT plugin (not the CGP).

But what is less clear to me, is how professional the overall conversion anyway. In Resolve, you would make the conversion to a wide gamut anyway first. And then apply a LUT. But in Vegas in rec709 project settings you work immediately in the small gamut of rec709 with a LUT I think - what could cause banding maybe. From this perspective, the ACES transformation should be superior in Vegas - since default ACES uses a significant wider gamut. Would test that too.

I must admit ACES is still above my paygrade and I have to dig into that whole concept and workflow. I haven't experimented with your idea of using conversion LUT first, right now I'm running into crashes and issues with some BCC and NB plugins. I'll do some experimenting today and report back.
I'll upload a scene to my wetransfer where the bandîng is most prominent, but it's a 10 min. ITV. I'll have to export it to 10 bit 422 MXF to do a 10 sec version, I reckon that's not going to downgrade anything.

@Mindmatter I meant to say in the position of node 10 meaning the last plugin of the chain as Vegas has the same left to right priority , and unless there's a reason not to, put the artistic lut after strong grading

Thanks. I was wondering about some of the processing hierarchy in vegas. I take it it's

media level --> track level --> event level --> adjustment track level --> video output bus level?
 

Thank you all .

I must admit ACES is still above my paygrade and I have to dig into that whole concept and workflow. 
 

It is quite simple, to apply ACES. For HDR, we had some questionmarks. But that is wirk in progress.

Thanks, I PMed you a clip.

We have explored that in some more detail. @Mindmatter was so kind to deliver me the original footage, and the LUT used by him.

Following test results:

- the LUT used by @Mindmatter results in banding really.

- the official Sony LUT to transform slog3 1_SGamut3CineSLog3_To_LC-709.cube does not show any bandings. Neither in 8bit or 32bit project settings (32bit without transformation if we apply the LUT)

- if we apply the ACES transformation (without any LUT) to rec709, no banding takes place with the original footage.

All tests were done in VP22 b194.

Conclusion: to use ACES or the official Sony LUTs seems to be the best solution here. I would prefer ACES.

Why we see banding with the LUT used by @Mindmatter stays unclear. Could be something in the design of this LUT, or could be that the transformation in standard rec709 project settings (with the small rec709 gamut) results in the banding observed.

Many thanks to you and the Vegas team for looking into this!
👍
The strange thing though was that in V21, the banding disappeared as soon as I switched to the 32bit mode, and that the LUT was a lot stronger in V21, resulting in deeper contrast and saturation.

While also the official LUTs from Sony show some (more or less minor) banding, I have not seen that with the ACES transformation to rec709 in VP22 b 194. I recommend that to use.

Settings for this type of footage:

I don't shoot with a Sony but I've never gotten banding with the official LUTs from Canon and Z-Cam which I do shoot. I always download the official OFX LUTs from the manufacturer and choose the high-quality 64- or 65-point variety. For maximum quality, I also choose Tetrahedral interpolation option instead of Linear. I also manually add them to the Vegas vp22 cgp folder so they show up in the dropdown:

C:\Program Files\VEGAS\VEGAS Pro 22.0\OFX Video Plug-Ins\Vfx1.ofx.bundle\Contents\Resources\AutoLooks

The 3D LUTs supplied by Vegas in that folder are all medium-quality 33-point, better suited for small in-camera lcd displays. The high-quality 3D LUTs from the manufacturers are better for video editing and more comparable to the SPI 65-point Aces LUTs used in Vegas. But I got a performance penalty when I tried Aces with Canon clog2 or clog3. But not when I use OFX LUTs. Z-Cam only supplies the Aces algorithmic format supported by Resolve so I couldn't try zlog2 with Aces in Vegas.

The Vegas Aces SPI-LUTs for vp22 are stored here:

C:\Program Files\VEGAS\VEGAS Pro 22.0\OpenColorIO\configs\aces_1.2\luts

Btw, all LUT files can be opened with Notepad if you want to look at them yourself. I should also mention that I don't shoot HDR, so Aces isn't really necessary for what I do.