Cineon

[kippard]

Any opinions, explanations, suggestions, elucidations, edifications etc. of the Cineon converter in Premiere CS3?

[edDV]

Any opinions, explanations, suggestions, elucidations, edifications etc. of the Cineon converter in Premiere CS3?

Any context to this question?

Cineon was Kodak's film negative to 10 bit digital RGB format (base 10 log) intended for film to film color correction. Film dynamic range is huge and non-linear (unique gamma) so RGB component intensity needed to be expressed as a log function similar to decibels (dBm) in audio.

Most film makers used Kodak film so they had an advantage controlling the transfer tables used for negative to negative or negative to positive.

Similar to 10bit CCIR-601 (a linear video format), sub black and super whites were preserved. Cineon used level 95 for black and 685 for white on a 0-1023 10 bit scale. 10 bit parallel CCIR-601 (or serial SMPTE 259M) used for Digital Betacam uses 64 for black and 940 for white allowing a much reduced overshoot range more appropriate for video.

Film post production now uses 12-16 bit per component or more for serious work.

[kippard]

Thanks, edDV. I'm still trying to decide how/whether to stylize or attempt to film-look my 1080i 50i HDV and noticed the Cineon tool. Didn't know , if it was something I should learn more about and attempt to use. Lately, I've been thinking of leaving my footage as is and just having a sort of Spanish soap opera video look (it's a drama/comedy/romance feature).

[edDV]

There is no advantage for video source. Cineon is designed for film dynamic range and digitized film to film transfers. When film is transferred to video for post production and distribution, 8 bit 1440x1080i,144Mb/s HDCAM is usually used for the video distribution format. When HD video cameras are used for production instead of film but with film as the distribution target, the 10 bit, 440Mb/s HDCAM SR (RGB) format is used.

Cineon is mostly obsolete. Today serious film to film projects are transferred and edited at greater than 10bit digital intermediate.

[edDV]

Since your source is 8bit HDV format, not film, there is no advantage to using these wider dynamic range film digital intermediate formats. The audio analogy would be trying to bump a 16bit 48KHz mp3 up to 24bit/96KHz uncompressed. It won't improve the sound quality.

[kippard]

Cheers,

[SingSing]

edDV has a weak spot for red head.