Color Shift During Playback with ProRes

Well, if you are viewing this only on the computer monitors, that is how FCP works. It lowers the resolution to give you real time playback. This typically is an indication of a slow hard drives, but also is just how FCP gets more real time. If the quality dipped when viewing on an external monitor...properly monitoring the footage, then there might be an issue. But computer monitor quality...never base any judgement calls on that. And know that this is normal.

If you had faster drives, this behavior will go away.

Shane

It all boils down to DATA RATE. H.264 is highly compressed, has a low data rate. ProRes has a mugh higher data rate than that. And yes, a gamma shift will equate a dip in resolution...it is lowering the data rate of the footage by dropping out some information, such as color.

Not sure what is up with your very oddly sized movies. I just know that with higher data rates, if your system can't handle the data rate, then resolution drops.

Shane

Sorry to open a dead thread, but I'd like to add some more information about this issue because I don't think it's a data rate issue. I just had a similar problem. I've been working on an animation project in AE at 1920x1080 23.98 and I thought I might save some time by rendering half-resolution clips to work with in FCP, knowing I'd probably be re-rendering a few times while I edited. So I output a 960x540 ProRes HQ clip, which did take very little time to render. I then created a 960x540 ProRes HQ FCP timeline to edit in. I immediately saw the gamma shift that sgmitch described. I'd never seen anything like it before, and I've done 1080p ProRes HQ editing on this system with no trouble in the past. So I did a little Googling and came across this thread.

I thought I'd test out the disk speed question by rendering a bit of the same sequence at 1920x1080. The data rate on that clip is 19.2 MB/s and the data rate on the half-resolution 960x540 clip is 8.6 MB/s. The full-res clip plays with no gamma shift in a 1920x1080 ProRes HQ timeline. But it turns out the half-res clip also plays with no gamma shift in that same 1920x1080 timeline, with or without rendering. When it's not rendered in that full-res timeline, it has an orange bar over it, but plays back fine. The half-res clip also has the gamma shift when playing in the Viewer, but not in QT Player. The 1920x1080 clip displays the gamma shift when placed into the 960x540 timeline and rendered. It will not play without rendering. 960x540 clips rendered using the Animation codec (33.3 MB/s) don't have a gamma shift in the Viewer or when played in a 960x540 Animation timeline.

There are no RT options in the drop-down menu for 960x540 timelines in any codec I've tried. I suspect the problem is caused by using non-standard resolutions with ProRes HQ, and it might also have something to do with the way AE saves gamma information in ProRes files. I know that came up when Frank Capria did that test last year comparing DNxHD and ProRes.

The obvious solution is to edit with standard frame sizes when using ProRes HQ. I know that's what I'll be doing.

I would like to add that I'm having a similar thing with a timeline that is non standard...

Mine is 3840 x 720 (dont' ask, it's a head ache) and when I hit play it looks a bit light and when I park it it's a bit dark... out in QT its pretty good...

another reason why FCP needs a ground up re-haul...

I am afraid all of these answers are incorrect, and even more afraid I don't have an answer. I have been working on a many projects in 1920x1080, and have not had this problem until it randomly popped up tonight. My hard Drive speed, computer, etc... all are sufficient, now and in the past to handle my footage. I am not in the office so I can not tell if this will happen on an external broadcast monitor, but do know I am about tired of all the Gamma shifts in Final Cut, I do know that this roughly began an hour or so after I auto ducked a sequence out of FCP to AE and brought that back in. With ultimate horrible color shifting no matter if you chose match legacy or matching profiles or use colorista. This is an awful bug in FCP one I know that doesn't happen when roundtripping from Premiere. Overall advice who sold the world on the idea FCP is better than some of the more less consider equivalent programs especially when FCP is engineered by the designers of one of the supposed less desirable programs. Sorry I am no help, if any has a working solution would love to hear it,

I'm having the same problem. In FCP, PRORES or PRORES HQ clips change gamma: paused = dark, playing = light. In Quicktime Player, paused or playing, they are just light -- unless I check "Enable Final Cut Studio color compatibility" in QT player's general preferences (but this doesn't change FCP's response... and I have no idea how people will have their QT Player's prefs. set on the receiving end.)

Uncompressed / Animation: Best QTs play in FCP or QT Player without shifting gamma.

Thoughts? Links?

I found the solution for me. Hopefully for you as well. I went back and noticed that I had a duplicate sequence that was fine, yet the other one kept shifting colors. So I went and checked the differences. I accidently had switched the compressor to HDV 1080 50 instead of the XDCAM 1080 50 setting which is the footage type I was working with. Using compressor settings in your sequence that match your footage made the difference for me. I hope it works for you. Good Luck Dion Hawley

That is a solution. But I think it means that you are using one of many HDV or XDCAM codecs instead of ProRes in your sequence. I am rendering ProRes QTs from AE, and assumed that if I dragged a ProRes QT into a fresh sequence, and accepted FCP's invitation to change my sequence settings to match that of the clip, that it would be all good. But it's not.

Though, when I put ProRes footage in a DV/NTSC-sequence, the ProRes footage doesn't shift, but is it playing back as ProRes or being converted on the fly? And when I render, it's back to the gamma shift problem.

Thanks,

B

First please excuse the non-pro software question - I am working up to FCP, I swear!

I am editing an iMovie of images from a book I illustrated. I am using the dreaded Ken Burns effect, as it makes pan and zoom relatively easy for still images. There are some problems with jumps/lags in the render, but an even more noticeable problem is the brightness change at the beginning and end of the effect. This happens on every clip/image it is applied to.

Most unfortunately, it renders it into the actual movie - not just an artifact of seeing it on the Mac - and this is destined to be shown HUGE on a plantetarium projection, so it's a big problem -literally!

Is there a control for 'gamma' or luminescence I don't know about in iMovie? Thanks for the help.

I have similar problems with footage in ProRes, sent to After Effects and rendered into ProRes there. It appears that After Effects isn't performing a check to see what Gamma to use with Pro Res. I've been compensating by either adding the gamma back in FCP (a pain) or using lossless out of After Effects (a pain). Has anyone here found a better workflow or command line trick to fix this?

You should give feedback to Apple, but it sounds like it's in AE's court to me though for a real fix.

You could render to another codec in AE as a "work around" ?

You're not comparing this to YUV rendered material side by side, right?

The FCP sequence settings are the stock ProRes or ProRes HQ? this happens in all frame rates and sizes of HD or SD?

I'd at least report this to Apple in the feedback for FCP. They read all of them I'm quite certain.

Jerry

I'm on the QT seeding program. I'll report it there as well. Thanks Jerry.