Why doesn't Final Cut Pro X handle HDR video well by default?

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Level 1

7 points

Why doesn't Final Cut Pro X handle HDR video well by default?

If I shoot HDR video on my iPhone 14 Pro, and play it in Quicktime Player, it looks fine. But Final Cut Pro X shows it all washed out. In order to get it to look reasonable, I have to go to HDR tools, fiddle manually with some stuff, and hope I'm doing it right. I haven't found a way to apply the changes to all of the clips at once.

Hasn't Final Cut Pro X gotten the memo that iPhones are producing HDR video by default? Why doesn't it automatically detect that its HDR video and apply filters needed to make it look good by default; and then let pros do something fancy with it if they're purposely making an HDR video?

I had to turn HDR video off on my iPhone because it was such a pain to work with. This seems to be a case of the iPhone and FCPX sides of Apple not communicating.

iMac 27″, macOS 10.14

Posted on May 20, 2023 1:10 PM

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Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

Davis_

Level 2

219 points

May 23, 2023 10:04 AM in response to ranboii

FYI, it appears that the FCP 10.6.6 update does what you asked about...

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Answer 2

ranboii Author

Level 1

7 points

May 22, 2023 9:28 AM in response to terryb

Thanks. That was helpful to see how to deal with projects that are completely HDR.

But even in that video, it shows that if you want to do a mix of HDR and standard video, you have to use an HDR Tools filter, and then manually adjust exposure in the highlight and midtone range. Why doesn't FCPX do what iMove, Safari and Quicktime do, and filter HDR video automatically in an SD project so you don't blow out or have to manually edit it? I think the math is known for this already, so why make users edit it manually?

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Answer 3

Tom Wolsky

Level 10

151,995 points

May 22, 2023 10:16 AM in response to ranboii

QuickTime and Safari don't have projects. They only play a file in a single format. iMovie changes all HDR to SDR. FCP does not assume all users what to go to SDR. Projects can be either HDR or SDR and have a variety of color spaces. Why doesn't FCP fix it automatically? So the user has control over how they want to treat the media and how they want it to look.

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Answer 4

terryb

Level 4

2,620 points

May 20, 2023 4:04 PM in response to ranboii

FCP can work with iPhone HDR quite easily. Here are links to good instructions on how to work with HDR and SDR footage from Mark at Ripple Training.

https://youtu.be/rp3zXcyYyuo

https://youtu.be/H4RSS8g5HLU

Here are Apple's docs on how to use HDR: Use wide-gamut HDR color processing in Final Cut Pro - Apple Support

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Answer 5

ranboii Author

Level 1

7 points

Jan 11, 2024 9:48 AM in response to ranboii

The latest version of Final Cut Pro X (10.7.1) finally handles HDR video and regular video seamlessly. Apparently it just took them a year or two to catch up.

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Answer 6

ranboii Author

Level 1

7 points

May 23, 2023 10:25 AM in response to Davis_

Thanks! That's actually what I was hoping for. I guess they just hadn't gotten around to that yet in the version I was using.

I appreciate the other comments here, too, that helped me better understand how HDR video is intended to be used. But the latest update to FCP looks like it also treats HDR video intelligently when dropped into a SD project.

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Answer 7

Jan 11, 2024 11:07 AM in response to ranboii

ranboii wrote:

The latest version of Final Cut Pro X (10.7.1) finally handles HDR video and regular video seamlessly. Apparently it just took them a year or two to catch up.

It would be more accurate to specify iPhone video in the title and in this last post, as FCP has been handling HDR video very well since 2020 when I started using it. I'm talking ProRes and ProRes Raw video though, not iPhone.

For me, it was a matter of trial and error initially as there was very little HDR documentation apart from the FCP help. It has greatly improved in ease of use of HDR over time with gradual updates especially with the introduction of Color Conform in one of the more recent updates before 10.7. But even before that, it was pretty straigtforward. Make the library Wide Gamut, choose HDR PQ or HDR HLG and conform manually.

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Answer 8

Jun 17, 2024 1:39 PM in response to ranboii

"Hasn't Final Cut Pro X gotten the memo that iPhones are producing HDR video by default? Why doesn't it automatically detect that its HDR video and apply filters needed to make it look good by default."

Just to set the record straight, FCP has had this ability since version 10.6.6. It isn't just the latest version of FCP that can auto recognize HDR material. Of course you've been able to use the HDR Tools effect to properly balance HDR material in an SDR project since 2018 or 2019.

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