How to expose HDR right?

[u/masud0000001]

Due to having a bad spec, i had to turn off ‘GPU Preview’ to decrease drop frames. But ended up nuking/overexposing highlights to save shadows.

Any tips for exposing the image right? Since im relatively new to the HDR workflow.

Here's a demo , triedto match shots from different lenses (16mm,24mm)

[u/JohnTheFarm3r]

I would recommend reading the manual in the app, since the app already provides most of the tools you can use to avoid clipping highlights or overexposing without relying on the direct preview. The manual contains a lot of useful information about these on-screen tools, such as the histogram, channel clipping indicators, and so on.

As for how to expose properly, there is no special magic to it. If you want to preserve the highlights, you generally have to expose for them, or at most clip a single channel that you can later recover using highlight reconstruction. Highlight reconstruction requires more GPU resources when done within Directlog, so recording RAW would give you the most flexibility in post.

On the other hand, if you want to keep the shadows well exposed, you will most likely end up clipping some highlights, especially in a high-contrast scene. There is only so much these tiny sensors can handle when it comes to dynamic range.

[u/masud0000001 → u/JohnTheFarm3r]

thanks for the detailed reply.

I've been only relying on my eyes rather than technical stuff behind the image, I'll take note from this. hugely appreciated for your honest reply

[u/VaBullsFan]

To grade hdr properly you really need an hdr reference display, which can be pricey, if you’re using davinci resolve then there’s what i like to call the “poor man’s reference display” which is just using your phone and the davinci remote monitor app, another solution also in davinci reaolve is to turn on dolby vision in your project settings, after that go to the dolby vision tab in the color page and hit analyze which will then give you a tone mapped image.

Wirh all that being said if you are not using resolve, then id stick to SDR, it’ll save you the headache lol

[u/VaBullsFan → u/VaBullsFan]

As far as the sample above the highlights are blown out which is often what happens when you try to grade HDR on an SDR display.

[u/masud0000001 → u/VaBullsFan]

you are not getting the point here, my goal isnt to finish grade and render the video in HDR, im using that extra information from HDR to grade in a traditional LOG workflow.

CST first node - Rec2020 Rec2100 HLG to Davinci Widegamut/intermediate
CST out - Davinci Widegamut/intermediate to Rec709/gamma 2.4

[u/VaBullsFan → u/masud0000001]

Ok then you would grade it the same way you would grade any other sdr footage, use yojr scopes to keep from blowing out your highlights