Mavic 2 Pro Color Questions (DLOG, Normal)

[Dakrisht]

Hi All,

New to the forums, lots of amazing discussions here.

Waiting for my Mavic Pro 2 to be delivered but had some general color questions. I’ve read an onslaught of posts, reviews, comparisons and highly detailed write-ups on the various color modes available but curious to hear your thoughts on some color best practices.

Plenty of YouTubers and more professional and technical reviewers comment on D-LOG M being the best color mode as it shoots 10-bit and allows for more latitude in post during color grading. However, the same group demonstrates that Normal mode compared to D-Log M after grading is very close if not at times better - without the extra steps and time and equipment needed to properly color grade footage.

D-Log M also seems to suffer from lens distortion and the H.265 codec is relatively unusable unless you have a monster Mac or PC to handle the complex algorithm. Also worth mentioning is D-Log used a 4:2:0 color space.

The general consensus seems to be that Normal is the preferred mode for almost-ready-to-go footage out of the box. It’s just that good.

Sure, if you have the time, equipment and knowledge to properly color grade, you might get marginally better results.

The question is: for those shooting in Normal, are you using any particular LUTs or simply editing color channels, saturation, sharpness, etc. in your editor?

Curious to hear what you guys are doing both color mode-wise, settings-wise, LUT-wise, etc. to get the best possible results with your footage.

 

[Corthan]

Hi,
I'm not sure/aware of LUTs for Normal shooting mode as after doing some tests I felt that D-Log was better for most of my shooting. For background, I also shoot with a GH5 and GH5S and need to achieve some sort of continuity of look between the cameras. While I've edited with FCPX (available for Mac only), Premier ( used both Mac and Windows versions), Davinci Resolve (used Windows only) I do most if my editing with Magix Vegas 16 on Windows. I'm mostly working on a somewhat dated but still above average computer with an over-clocked i7 - 8700K and Nvidia 1080 ti. D-Log is a bit of work, which I'll describe below. With D-Log, I can get close enough to the Panasonic footage that it fools anyone that I'm working for/with. I can't get that with Normal mode in most situations.

So, for D-Log, I've used both the Leeming Lut (surprisingly cheap and awesome support and free updates) as well as the free DJI LUT. Both are good in my experience but have, generally speaking, particular and differing strengths. The Leeming LUT works better in well lit scenes in my experience. The DJI LUT works a little better in darker scenes in my experience. However, tonight I was editing some footage I took recently in really low light at dusk (probably pushing the limits of legality here in Canada [no night flying] but was shooting at an altitude of 15 metres (and it was still just light enough to see the drone without it's lights) in a high contrast scene along the shore of the Pacific with the setting sun obscured by clouds. The water is relatively bright but the shore and trees were very dark, and I found in this instance that the Leeming LUT was better at getting the look I wanted. I was able to raise the shadow areas way further than I could in Normal mode and keep detail in the highlights as well. I got some really great footage in pretty difficult light, and know from previous tests, that using Normal mode, they would have been throw-away shots, at least for me. I guess that the point of all of that is that there is no magic bullet.

Using D-Log is a bit of work. I've found that overall, I have faster turnaround if I transcode first if I've got a lot of footage, despite the time that takes. I've recently been using the Magic YUV codec, transcoding through Vegas. I've also used a Vegas Intermediate, Cineform and Prores (yes, it can be used on Windows despite the common perception that it can't). I still use the automatic proxy workflow within Vegas, so I do all my rough cutting/placing of clips with proxies and any color correction and sharpening/clean-up just using whatever frame I choose in the highest resolution mode possible while paused, not watching moving images. This could be a bias that works for me coming from a professional still photography background. YMMV, as they say.

However... If the light is good, and I'm just shooting for fun or to put something together for my friends amusement, and there's enough light, then Normal is pretty amazing. Going back to LUTs for Normal mode, basically, they're nothing you can't make a preset for in whatever NLE that you use. I hope that helps on the D-Log Side. I'm afraid that I can't really help any more on the Normal workflow side of things.

Cheers

 

[Dakrisht]

Corthan - thanks for a solid reply.

On the surface and without getting too technical, it seems that DLOG simply gives you more latitude when it comes to color correcting video that is shot in non-optimal lighting conditions (shadows, details, highlights, etc.) and I believe this is simply because DLOG is being saved as raw sensor data without applying any on-drone color processing (hence why you get a flat image recorded to the SD card).

So if one is shooting in twilight, dusk, dawn, perhaps even night shooting, you have more room to adjust and play with color and shadows, highlights, etc. given the raw video.

I definitely plan on shooting a ton of DLOG and Normal to get a feel for what works / looks best. I’m confident in DJI’s expression of the Normal color mode, after all, tons of r&d has gone into making a great looking out of the box experience with minimal tuning.

You mention you’re transcoding using the Magic YUV codec. I assume you’re doing this to get out of the H.265 codec due to various reasons?

Another issue is that Davinci (non Studio) doesn’t support H.265. I have to check if FCX supports this codec (container).

What I need to figure out next is a good and efficient workflow.

1. Shoot in DLOG H.265 >
2. Import into my NLE >
3. Apply the LUT / fine-tune color >
4. Transcode back into ???

It’s probably quickest / easiest to transcode after color correcting into something and then do the final editing. Question is what to transcode into?

You mention Magic YUV. Looking into this codec, it seems solid and loseless but as with any codec, there will always be some compression.

 

[Corthan]

Hi Dakrisht,

If you're on a Mac system, (guessing since you mention checking out Final Cut) then ProRes is probably the way to go. Yes, there is always compression but H265 really is efficient at reducing file size, more than anything else I've ever come across. That means that the computer needs to do so much work to uncompress it. ProRes, Magic YUV and Cineform are less efficient compressors, and since the computer has to do less decompression, more processor freindly. Your intermediates will also be way larger with any high quality codec. However, even with transcoded files, my computer stutters some with these files but doesn't with most of my GH5 files at real-time best playback mode. But at least the transcoded Mavic files don't cause Vegas to crash on me. So, it's a bit of a pain but it works for me. As an aside, you may notice that many media players will smoothly play back the footage while it hangs up the NLE software you use. My understanding is that the media players interpret a lot of pixels whereas the editing suite has to decode every pixel of every frame. There's a lot more computational work in the latter.

{"So if one is shooting in twilight, dusk, dawn, perhaps even night shooting, you have more room to adjust and play with color and shadows, highlights, etc. given the raw video. "
It's not RAW like a still image but it does act more like it when editing. You can pull more out of the shadows.}

You also have more to work with in the shadows in bright light as well with D-Log. However, if shooting at a fair distance, then shadow detail maybe isn't important to some shots. Your proposed workflow makes sense unless you think you might want to use a clip for different purposes and want different colour grading down the road. As an example, I'm working on a passion project that's a nature documentary. I thought that some of my Mavic footage might be usable for a client on something else. I also put together short clips of the footage for friends and family and the one or two that sometimes help me with the doc project. For the documentary, I want a realistic look that matches footage from my GH5/S. For the client, I really pumped up the warm colours of the late day light to make the image beautiful, albeit a bit unrealistic, but matching the rest of the project. For the Friends and Family cut I'm not concerned about matching footage even with adjacent clips, I just try to make each clip as pretty as possible so they'll say "Ooh, Aaah". So, if I apply the LUT and do colour correction before transcoding, then I have fewer options down the road unless I transcode the original again. With that in mind, I usually will only add the LUT before transcoding which gives me downstream flexibility. Then I can add whatever colouring and other effects in a way that is appropriate for the project. If I think that I might really want to experiment with colouring a particular clip, I don't add the LUT before transcoding. That gives the best possible freedom but means a little more work later.

Finally, if I think that I want to keep the original footage, but am done using it on any projects in the foreseeable future, I'll delete the transcode and just keep the original because it takes up so much less space. Yea, H265!

To be clear, I'm not a leading expert, or even a fake expert, so please take this advice as something that works for me and hopefully helps you out. I'm still refining my workflow with the Mavic as I've only had it for about 2 months. Hopefully others will chime in with their thoughts.

Cheers

 

[Dakrisht]

Thanks Corthan - a good dialogue here.

Here’s an interesting thread / post on the whole H.264 vs. H.265 transcoding dilemma:

H.265 Playback on iMac 5k 2017

Depends on the bit deph and bitrate... e.g. I presume it can perfectly play 8 Bit, 35 bps, 30fps H.265 videos. But 10Bit, 100bps, 30fps is a different story. And this story gets worse when you look into the encoding side. I have an overclocked high end 6-core i7 and if I create a 10Bit HDR H.265...

mavicpilots.com

While some users report experiencing jitter and unresponsive timelines in their NLEs with newer, high-end machines due to H.265 others do not. Perhaps it’s Quicktime not playing these files properly. VLC seems to play H.265 just fine.

It seems the suggested workflow is:

1) Shoot in D-Log M 10-bit H.265 and then
2) Import into NLE and color grade
3) Transcode into ProRes 422.
4) Edit
5) Export into your deliverable (whether H.264 or H.265 or ProRes - it’s your choice).

Stupid question but I assume we color grade before transcoding into ProRes in order to keep all of the data from the original capture codec (?)

Do you know if when exporting to ProRes, the video keeps the 100mbps video bitrate?

As discussed, YouTube, smartphones and most consumer devices do not have the ability to display 10-bit color or advanced codecs, so it all depends on where this video ends up.

What I’m trying to wrap my head around is how to shoot in the best format (D-Log M H.265), color correct and edit but also export in the best format as well.

 

[Corthan]

Quote: Stupid question but I assume we color grade before transcoding into ProRes in order to keep all of the data from the original capture codec (?)

As I said above, I'll often do the colour grading in the final edit because I might use the clip in more than one project. If you grade and transcode, and then want another grade, you're grading on top of another grade. It can be hard to get the look you want grading over a baked-in grade. For example, lets say you want the over-used but still popular Orange and Teal look, so you grade accordingly and transcode. You then drag that clip into your project and carry on. However, in your final edit, you find you don't really wan't Teal and Orange. Now you have some more involved, maybe even difficult grading trying to get rid of the Teal and Orange and then get the look you do want on top of that. My recommendation for max versatility is just transcode and add the LUT and grade after. If you have a machine that is a bit on the slow side, adding the LUT before transcoding could speed things up in editing and final render.

Quote: Do you know if when exporting to ProRes, the video keeps the 100mbps video bitrate?

No, It will vary depending on the codec but it will likely be much more. For example, H265 at 100mbps is roughly equivalent to 200mbps with the H64 codec. They can have the same amount of information but the compression of H265 is better, getting the same amount of information in a smaller package. If you use ProRes, it has less compression so will be a much bigger file. I just checked a few of my files and as one example, a 41 second clip straight from the Mavic 2 Pro is 499MB. After transcoding the file to Magic YUV, it is still 41 seconds but is now 509 GB. So it's roughly the same number of units but up an oder of magnitude from MB to GB. So your mpbs will increase accordingly. That increase in file size is why, when I think I'm done with a file for a while, I get rid of the transcoded file and just keep the original.

Quote: As discussed, YouTube, smartphones and most consumer devices do not have the ability to display 10-bit color or advanced codecs, so it all depends on where this video ends up.

True, most people will watch on their phones or something else that's only 8 bit. D-Log still holds more info so you can do more with it in post like reducing shadows or pushing the grade, and that will still show up when you do your final render into Rec709 8 bit colour space that can be watched on any device.

Quote: What I’m trying to wrap my head around is how to shoot in the best format (D-Log M H.265), color correct and edit but also export in the best format as well.

My procedure when shooting in D-Log:
1) Shoot in D-Log M 10-bit H.265 and then
2) Import into NLE and trim the clip to remove any footage you're not likely to use to reduce file size.
3) Transcode into ProRes 422.
4) Edit and add LUT/Grade. That way you have more flexibility to match the project from a colour perspective.
5) Export into your deliverable (whether H.264 or H.265 or ProRes - it’s your choice). Or an internet friendly MP4 format.

Cheers

 

[Ollie-Aus]

I just checked a few of my files and as one example, a 41 second clip straight from the Mavic 2 Pro is 499MB. After transcoding the file to Magic YUV, it is still 41 seconds but is now 509 GB. So it's roughly the same number of units but up an oder of magnitude from MB to GB.

That seems like something bizarre is happening because even a full bluray movie is only usually about 50GB

 

[charlas]

I too tend to use DLOG, mainly so I can match to other footage better.

Tend to also use proxies for editing (Windows Premiere), all footage on SSD, I do have an i9 with 1080ti though, I always get annoyed that Premiere doesn't make more use of the GForce to be honest.

Colour grading is done not using the proxies (obv) and also remember to do the lens correction in post at the same time (DJI have a guide in latest manual for most software on the site).

LOG (all forms) gives you a much better chance in high dynamic scenes recordings (fly over lots of trees with a bright sky or example, using normal mode you will either loose all the details in the shadows under the trees, or blow out your sky).

My latest VLOG has a side by side in it ungraded/graded on the same shot (however still awaiting my ND Filters, so had to shoot at F9!)

But, if what you getting in x264 out of the drone works for you, then use that, don't make life more difficult for yourself if you dont have too. Better off just getting the right ND filter on it, and stopping the shutter down to 180deg with lowish F-Stop than worrying about most other stuff.

 

[Bemx2k]

Hi

This is my first post then please be forgiving for my mistakes.
My question is when I am recording video in Dlog-m mode my video footage is washed out what is the easiest way to saturate colors ?

 

[paulatkin73]

Google it here how to apply lut profile in davinci resolve. It is sort of time consuming, but needs to be done.

 

[Corthan]

That seems like something bizarre is happening because even a full bluray movie is only usually about 50GB

Nothing Bizarre happening. Blueray uses a fairly low bit rate. At 50 GB, the bit rate is only 80ish Mb/s, which probably doesn't have enough info to do any serious grading with. The codec I transcode to has relatively very little compression , so it's essentially decompressed H265 at 100Mb/s. I'm no expert but due to it's efficiency, that's roughly equivalent to H264 at 200 Mb/s which would be a much larger file and is still highly compressed. It's a lot of data when decompressed and takes up a lot of space. The lack of compression means that my NLE doesn't have to work hard decoding the codec and it therefore runs smoothly in playback/scrubbing, etc. As mentioned above, when I've finished the project, I delete the transcodes and keep the small, nicely compressed H265 originals, freeing a ton of drive space. I hope that clears things up a bit. Cheers.

 

[Corthan]

My question is when I am recording video in Dlog-m mode my video footage is washed out what is the easiest way to saturate colors ?

Applying a LUT is the quickest way. The free DJI LUT is actually pretty good and holds up well to subsequent grading if you need it. Another good one is the Leeming LUT which is about $15 dollars and the maker will help if you have any issues. I find the Leeming LUT better for brighter or perfectly exposed scenes and the DJI better for darker or underexposed scenes. For most uses, that's all you really need to do other than to adjust exposure if you want to keep it simple. It takes about 6 -15 seconds in most NLEs. You can do it either at the event level or the track level. Translation: You can apply the LUT to individual clips one at a time or to all the clips on a track just once. Either is easy to do with most editing software. Cheers.

 

[charlas]

Hi

This is my first post then please be forgiving for my mistakes.
My question is when I am recording video in Dlog-m mode my video footage is washed out what is the easiest way to saturate colors ?

D-Log is a Log mode (hence it's name) and therefore shoots in a Logarithmic way. It basically tries to keep all the colours in the center of the range, so you don't crush the tops or bottoms of the range. This gives it a very washed out look as you say, however all the colour and detail information is in there, you usually just have to massage it back into view.

- Take that shot for example, that's Log format, and you can see it's pretty flat, but notice in the whites of the rooflines, you can still see the shapes and things on them, even though they are bright white, on a sunny day (32ND used)

- and you can see the scope has a fair bit of wriggle room top and bottom

Then if we just add a standard S curve and a bit of contrast and the likes in the 'simple' menu


and a Standard S Curve and a bit of colour wheel balancing


Gives you a more vivid image (It's a 5 minute demo edit of stuff here, don't judge me )

You could use the DJI/A.N.Other Lut to get some/most/all of the way there, so use them if they help.

But like most things, shooting in the 'PRO' modes, means having to edit in the Pro modes. I think for a lot of my 'just droney' Vlog style footage I may just plonk it into H264 auto mode for the most part, and use DLog when I need it, as even on my 3 machines I use to edit (all fairly beefy to say the least, HP Z840 Dual CPU Xeon, HP ZBook i9 and HP Omen i9) the x265 codec in Premiere (PLEASE Adobe, start to use the GPU more!) can cause skipping of frames and the likes when using any sort of effects over them.

But hey, like everything, find what you like, and go with that

 

[gnirtS]

Plenty of YouTubers and more professional and technical reviewers comment on D-LOG M being the best color mode as it shoots 10-bit and allows for more latitude in post during color grading. However, the same group demonstrates that Normal mode compared to D-Log M after grading is very close if not at times better - without the extra steps and time and equipment needed to properly color grade footage.

All log footage has to be edited. If you dont have the time or will to do so then normal is the only option.
Also, if your footage does not contain a large dynamic range then normal is going to produce results that are indistinguishable from DLOG most of the time. The extra data comes in handy when trying to really push editing and/or have a large dynamic range.

D-Log M also seems to suffer from lens distortion and the H.265 codec is relatively unusable unless you have a monster Mac or PC to handle the complex algorithm. Also worth mentioning is D-Log used a 4:2:0 color space.

Dlog is by nature unprocessed. Thats the whole point of it. The normal profile is corrected on the drone. The Dlog needs a 2 second lens distortion fix in your editor which is literally a one click fix and adds no extra time what-so-ever to rendering. Its not an issue as all DLOG by definition has to be edited anyway.

You don't need a monster PC either - any 8th or above generation CPU will support HEVC in hardware.

The general consensus seems to be that Normal is the preferred mode for almost-ready-to-go footage out of the box. It’s just that good.

Its fine within limits. If the scene is benign, has no huge dynamic range then yes. And if you dont want to edit then its the only solution.

The question is: for those shooting in Normal, are you using any particular LUTs or simply editing color channels, saturation, sharpness, etc. in your editor?

Im using a LUT as a starting point. The default DJI one massively oversaturates and boosts contrast so needs to be toned down. Others are better but all LUTs are merely a starting point.

 

[charlas]

All log footage has to be edited. If you dont have the time or will to do so then normal is the only option.
Also, if your footage does not contain a large dynamic range then normal is going to produce results that are indistinguishable from DLOG most of the time. The extra data comes in handy when trying to really push editing and/or have a large dynamic range.



Dlog is by nature unprocessed. Thats the whole point of it. The normal profile is corrected on the drone. The Dlog needs a 2 second lens distortion fix in your editor which is literally a one click fix and adds no extra time what-so-ever to rendering. Its not an issue as all DLOG by definition has to be edited anyway.

You don't need a monster PC either - any 8th or above generation CPU will support HEVC in hardware.



Its fine within limits. If the scene is benign, has no huge dynamic range then yes. And if you dont want to edit then its the only solution.



Im using a LUT as a starting point. The default DJI one massively oversaturates and boosts contrast so needs to be toned down. Others are better but all LUTs are merely a starting point.

Agreed It's all down to what you want to use it for etc, after all they say "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" so, go with what works for you. If you enjoy the technical task of editing then go for it, if not, make your life simpler and just use the out of box settings. Flexibility is the name of the game.

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Hi all, I have two specific areas I would like to get straight, if you don't mind helping (and would benefit future readers).

Note: I'm on a i7 8th gen, plenty of RAM, Pascal NVIDIA GPU, and use Resolve Studio for production. I have been recording DLog h.265 on the M2P.

1. Transcoding: I love the idea of working with uncompressed images and don't mind creating intermediate files that would be deleted after production (keeping the source). I see mention of the MagicYUV codec above, but am unsure how to use that with Resolve. Or would I use a separate application to transcode files that I would then use in Resolve? Any tips are appreciated.
   
   
2. Proxies: I've seen this many times, but can't find a good "Proxies 101" page. Any pointers to materials on this would be appreciated much.

Chris

 

[charlas]

Hi all, I have two specific areas I would like to get straight, if you don't mind helping (and would benefit future readers).

Note: I'm on a i7 8th gen, plenty of RAM, Pascal NVIDIA GPU, and use Resolve Studio for production. I have been recording DLog h.265 on the M2P.

1. Transcoding: I love the idea of working with uncompressed images and don't mind creating intermediate files that would be deleted after production (keeping the source). I see mention of the MagicYUV codec above, but am unsure how to use that with Resolve. Or would I use a separate application to transcode files that I would then use in Resolve? Any tips are appreciated.
   
   
2. Proxies: I've seen this many times, but can't find a good "Proxies 101" page. Any pointers to materials on this would be appreciated much.

Chris

Quick one, like mentioned earlier, unless your using the pay for version of the software, there's very little use of the GPU, and rather uses the built in code s on the machine, so bare that in mind.

As for proxies, that's exactly what the intermediary is, it creates a lower resolution version of the video and you use that to edit, then the render uses the higher quality original to render out at the end. Proxies in premiere are simple, either set your injest settings to do it automatically or just right click a file/bin and click create proxies.

I'm less well versed in Resolve, and not used the free version in a long time (have paid for edition) and its very similar practice to create proxies on there, just bring up the properties, select the proxy option and it should create one, although they are called optimised media. So search for that, as proxies are the premiere term.

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

Quick one, like mentioned earlier, unless your using the pay for version of the software, there's very little use of the GPU, and rather uses the built in code s on the machine, so bare that in mind.

As for proxies, that's exactly what the intermediary is, it creates a lower resolution version of the video and you use that to edit, then the render uses the higher quality original to render out at the end. Proxies in premiere are simple, either set your injest settings to do it automatically or just right click a file/bin and click create proxies.

I'm less well versed in Resolve, and not used the free version in a long time (have paid for edition) and its very similar practice to create proxies on there, just bring up the properties, select the proxy option and it should create one, although they are called optimised media. So search for that, as proxies are the premiere term.

Thanks for that -- it's enough for me to go on to search for more on proxies.

Yes, as I said in my opening note, I am using Resolve Studio (the paid for version). I used the free version for several weeks, so I know what it's like to run on software emulation (not have that hardware support).

Thanks again!
Chris

 

[Corthan]

Transcoding: I love the idea of working with uncompressed images and don't mind creating intermediate files that would be deleted after production (keeping the source). I see mention of the MagicYUV codec above, but am unsure how to use that with Resolve. Or would I use a separate application to transcode files that I would then use in Resolve? Any tips are appreciated.

You could transcode with a free program like V6 from HD Cinematics (Free, it's easy and OK.) or something like Handbrake if you want to geek out, or you could just do it straight from Dacvinci. Just render it out as a different file type. You can get a decent workflow from:

How to Export Resolve file to ProRes, MP4, MOV, AVI?

There are obviously many tutorials elsewhere.

Cineform, H264, one of the MXF YUV options embedded in Resolve, even RroRes if you have the codec, all would likely work. You'll have to run a few experiments with your system to see what works best for your needs. Just pick a clip with a lot going on, render it out as something else, import into a new project and see how it plays back and grades. A 10 bit codec may give you more latitude in grading but sometimes it's not worth the trouble/time/file size and 8 bit may suit your needs best. A list of Resolve Codecs can be found at:

https://documents.blackmagicdesign.com/SupportNotes/DaVinci_Resolve_15_Supported_Codec_List.pdf

I hope that helps. Cheers.

 

[Not A Speck Of Cereal]

I hope that helps. Cheers.

It does much, thanks. I didn't think to just Save As from Resolve. I'll look at the others for command-line conversion for projects with lots of source files. And test all of this first -- great suggestion.

Thanks for the links!

Cheers, Chris