I am quite lost concerning what most people say is a very important pair of settings in Filmic. Even the tutorials I see or read just flip out something like, “Adjust the black and white levels”, even though most other settings are then explained in detail. I guess I am just too late to the party, while most others have had the process drilled in years ago.
My problem (beyond not understanding what I am doing with these controls) is that whenever I make changes to them, I usually prefer the way things were to start with. So, I tend to not use them.
My histograms usually extend beyond the left, so I think that maybe I should adjust black until everything is within bounds. But, with some images, everything never comes within bounds.
And, on the white side, the histogram is often far to the left of the upper bound, so I try to adjust it until it barely reaches the rightmost bound.
Are these attempts anything approaching what I should be doing, or am I just completely confused? Thanks for your advice and insights.
I only used dt’s filmic when it was in its early dev stage. I believe the controls you are asking about control the dynamic range setting of the module, which changes the response of the filmic curve. In other words, you can’t treat them as black and white levels. In your case, it may be simpler to rely on the presets instead.
I tend to only use these controls when I am trying to bring the highlights back under control.
Generally I push exposure to where I want and then filmic (for me anyway) tends to push the highlights out of gamut as shown by the clipping indicator. I use the white relative exposure to bring these back.
I very rarely have to touch the black relative exposure.
Based on the above, it sounds to me like your actual problem might be underexposing in camera. Have you tried getting the histogram more or less in range with exposure before playing with filmic?
The most important control in filmic-rgb … is not in filmic-rgb!
Before anything else make absolutely sure that your exposure is correct.
At that point try the auto-tune-levels in filmic-rgb … it does not always work but in 90% of the cases it will set your highlights ONLY. If you now turn on the clipping-indicators you will see that the shadows needs adjustment. At this point move the black-relative-exposure slider as needed and you will find that the white portion of the curve will be adjusted accordingly.
It is in fact blindingly simple IF THE EXPOSURE IS CORRECT …
Of course there are all sorts of other adjustments contrast/saturation and more but get this first step right and then work on other aspects later.
If, despite the black point adjustment in filmic, you are left with heavy black clipping, you can use the black point adjustment in exposure the lift deep shadows a bit. That is, instead of going to e.g. -15 EV in filmic (which often corrupts the curve), set your blacks back to where they were (somewhere around -7 EV), and adjust blacks in exposure (make sure to make small adjustments, or you’ll get a washed-out image). I think Aurélien used this with the ‘old’ filmic (can’t find the reference, maybe in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP5m1YmSRw8 ?), but I find it works just as well in filmic RGB.
You can actually set the grey point from within filmic, which has the same effect (as far as filmic is concerned) as changing the exposure. By default, the control is turned off (as it’s still recommended to get exposure right from the beginning), but you can enable it on filmic’s ‘options’ tab (‘use custom mid-grey values’):
Again: the key to using filmic is getting the exposure correct to star with. This is my procedure as illustrated by the clip below:
What you see above is a ‘preset’ that is used for ALL of my images. On my (Fuji) camera there is a mismatch between the JPG exposure and the RAW, so I bake in that 1.43 EV difference. Further I use the camera compensation, as needed, to avoid highlight clipping or for shadow enhancement.
With this as a preset my RAW data will present a baseline 18% starting point for filmic and thus (except for rare occasions) I will not need to muck about with that value in filmic. As I said before it is blindingly easy!
filmic does provide problems with snow-scenes, high/low key and a few other oddities where the camera will simply not believe what I am trying to capture … but that is another story.
Several weeks ago, I was studying the thread concerning ETTR. I was fired up about it, and I took my little camera out to work on it. I was blindsided by several circumstances. My Nikon D3300 is not quite up to the task, as I cannot make heads or tails about its histogram facility. Also, my eyesight is problematic, and I have to take my glasses on and off during the process of trying to set up an image and shoot it. The viewfinder is tiny. I think a better camera would help, but when I zero in on what I want, it quickly goes over $2000 for a body. Maybe my son will let me use his D750 sometime, but I’m not holding my breath.
I know that equipment does not make a good photographer, but I feel hogtied by my camera.
Yes, there is a reason why that control was hidden. Also, it isn’t just people being inexperienced. People were misusing it and then complaining that filmic didn’t work properly.
That is the way to go. dt attempts to direct the user toward good processing habits. It is generally advisable to do more of the necessary actions earlier in the pipeline because those modules are typically vetted to be safer than later ones. E.g. filmic changes the linearity.
Have you tried adjusting the diopter of the viewfinder or using the live preview?
Usually, the histogram has some sort of headroom to prevent people from clipping their highlights. Take several shots of an unfocused uniform reasonably illuminated area at various exposures and then inspect the raw files to see what this headroom is. It may change depending on your ISO and other camera settings. E.g. if the headroom is +1EV, then you know that you can expose to the clipping warning and boost your exposure +1EV beyond that limit. Always check your work though to see if you did it right.
Yes, it’s a bit of a PITA. I had the best success with my D7000 doing spot metering on the brightest part of the scene with a +.7 to +1.0 EV. After all, the priority should be given to not blowing highlights, even if they’re not right up against the wall…
The confusing thing about filmic is that it looks like a tone curve and users get the idea that by pushing a couple of sliders filmic can be correctly set. The reality is that this module is driven by complex algorithms that do not necessarily respond in a directly obvious manner for the user.
However, I now find that with a couple of presets and using filmic not only is my processing time down but more importantly I am achieving improved highlights and far far better shadow detail.
Duh! Thanks, I need to check on that. I have done it with binoculars, and I think I have done it in the past with some cameras, but I haven’t even thought about it for a long time.
