Understanding Histograms: Part V

Excerpt from the Canon Boot Camp Manual

Stopping Down the Exposure

The shot below shows what happens if we “stop down” the iris. All the values have moved to the left. We still can’t tell if the whites are blowing out because they are “squashed up” against the right side.

Putting the skin tones in the middle.

The shot below shows the exposure most Hollywood DPs would like.

The WHITES are well away from the right, GREYS (skin tones) are in the middle, and the BLACKS are squashed up against the left side. We’re probably losing information in the blacks but judging from the blacks in the picture, that’s okay. Setting the correct exposure requires judgment. Sometimes you want to “keep” the blacks (move the blacks away from the “wall”. Sometimes you want to “blow out” the whites. Sometimes you want to “keep” the whites. Below are some more examples of situations where you might want to keep the blacks or blow out the whites.

REVIEW

Below is the complete nun photo. The “histogram” we inserted is the type used in Photoshop.

We can see the well-exposed picture has retained detail in the WHITES (the whites are not squashed up against the right.

The SKIN TONES are mostly in the middle.

The BLACKS are squashed but she’s in a black habit in a black room, so that’s just what we want.

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Gloria Baker's Experience at the Canon Boot Camp

Gloria Baker is a New York based photographer with considerable experience. Her 20 year career includes a client list spanning AIG, American Express, BlackRock, CR Bard, Fortune Brands, General Reinsurance, KPGM, Louis Dreyfus Group, New York Life, PwC and Pfizer. Gloria attended the Palms Springs Photo Festival and included the Canon Boot Camp in her agenda. In one weekend she updated her digital filmmaker skills and brought them to the next level. Her review of the Canon Boot Camp follows:

It exceeded my expectations and I thought the people were very professional. I was stunned by the amount of technology and equipment that we had at our disposal. Because, I've been at seminars before where I felt like the money was not well spent. I did not at all feel that way in this workshop; I felt like it was worth every penny. I was very happy that I did it. I feel much more comfortable working on a video project at this point than I did before I took the class.

Your class approaches different levels, and I think even if somebody is even relatively experienced, which we had some people in the class who were very experienced with video, and they still contributed a lot and learned a lot. You made a lot of different kinds of people with different backgrounds and different experience levels feel like they were contributing. And I think you really were good about that. And I think that's a special aspect.

Gloria Baker
Still Photographer, NY
 

Clean your Clapperboard

After all these years we’ve got a clean slate.

In video production and filmmaking they usually hold a slate (clapboard) up in front of the camera to identify the scene. They “clap” the board of the clapboard after identifying the scene and the director shouts, “ACTION”.  Word has it that Clint Eastwood doesn’t yell action but says, “Whenever you’re ready.”

Anyway, for years we had dirty slates.  They never seemed to clean off the last scene’s information.

The slates are made of acrylic. So, last week, to celebrate Oktoberfest, we bought a new one.  We picked up the dry erase marker we’ve been using for years on the slates and when we went to wipe it off, we saw the same after image.  We couldn’t get it out with window cleaner, soap, green cleaner etc. etc.

Then we noticed that on the dry erase marker we’d used for years there was some fine print – “Indelible if used on clothing and porous materials.”  

Aha! So we’d been using the wrong Dry Erase marker all these years.  Other dry erase markers, made by the same company with the exact same brand name had no such warning.

So, how do we salvage our brand new clapboard?  It turns out that “Goof Off” took the after image away completely.

HOWEVER, it will also dissolve the paint filling the etched words on the slate – “Director”, “PROD.” etc.  So be careful.  You may get a slate that’s cleaner than you wanted….which would be a refreshing change for Hollywood.

(We did contact Sanford, the maker of EXPO markers, to see if they still make the indelible on porous materials dry erase marker.  We’ll report back what they said.  Stay Tuned.)

Understanding Histograms: Part IV

Excerpt from the Canon Boot Camp Manual

Blown out whites Whites and Grey Whites

We’ve zoomed into the nun’s cowl by her temple. (see below)

Some pixels are reporting grey/white dots and some darker shades of grey, but none are completely blown out (“whiter than white”) and none are black-black. This is a sign of good exposure, i.e. no blown out whites. There is some black in the picture.

Draw the histogram for the picture above:

Print off the picture below, and try your hand at drawing in the histogram for the picture above.

Blown out whites go off the histogram.

Below is an example of the nun’s picture overexposed, i.e. blown out whites. This is how the histogram looks on the 5D (and 7D). There are six faint white lines running vertically across the histogram.

WHITES – The far right line (white arrow) is the edge of the histogram display. If values go past this point they disappear off the graph. They are “clipping”, which means there is no information…. just whiter than white. All detail is lost past that point.

The histogram squashes blown out whites up against the right side of the graph. (see white arrow). You can’t actually tell how much data you’ve lost. It just disappears off the graph and shows you a very thin spike along the edge.

GREYS – The greys of the nun’s skin tones are indicated by the yellow arrow. They are much too far to the right (over-exposed). Skin tones should be closer to the center of the histogram.

BLACKS – Also, see how the blacks (see black arrow) have moved away from the left edge of the histogram. In this case.the blacks won’t appear black but are “milky black”. The nun’s black robes won’t be black but dark, milky grey. Milky blacks are not good.

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Understanding Histograms: Part III

Excerpt from the Canon Boot Camp Manual

What each pixel “sees” and reports.

Now we’re going to zoom into the picture below with our 15 pixel camera. We’re going to see what light value each pixel “sees” on a tiny bit of the picture. This is the value the pixel reports. These reports are grouped and built into a histogram.

Below is what our 15 pixel sensor sees of the picture above.

There are pixels that are mostly black and some “black/grey” to “dark grey” and one pixel that is closer to white but not white white….not 255 on the histogram.

DRAW what value each pixels on the sensor ”sees”. In other words, count the nearly black pixels and draw a column representing them. Count the “darker blacks” and draw a column of those. Count the pixels reporting “white” values and draw a column of those. Count the grey values into groups and draw a columns of those groups, i.e. milky black, black grey, dark grey, Or name your own groups and total the number of pixels in each group.

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We’ve been Maderized! Maderization is going to be the next big thing in Hollywood. What exactly is Maderization? It’s hard to describe, yet so simple. In one word, Maderization is magic. Magic is intangible, and so is the essence of Maderization. You can’t point at it and say: “there it is” because it isn’t one thing. Allow me to rewind and explain how I first encountered Maderization and The Maderizer himself, Mr. Ken Mader (an award-winning Director, Editor and Cinematographer).

I was editing one of our Canon Boot Camp shorts, The Sonnet, and had grown tired of sifting through hours upon hours of footage. Everything was pieced together on the timeline according to the storyboard but I was left uninspired. I just knew something was missing that could propel this piece to what it should and could be. The story we were aiming to tell is beautiful, so I wanted to do it justice. However, the clips that were layed on my timeline were just that, clips, not a story. Something about it almost seemed lifeless. My work with the piece was done, and I didn't know what else to do with it, so I sent it to Ken to finesse (at that point, I had not yet created the term "Maderize"). I was definitely worried that what we had on paper was not going to be reflected on screen, but all I could do was give it to Ken and wish him luck. 

A few days later, I went to Ken's edit bay to see what he had done. The opening credits scrolled past, and I thought it looked good. The next thing I knew, I was entranced in the very story I helped to develop, not sure what was coming next, as if I was watching it for the first time. The same clips I had layed on the timeline were still there, but they seemed new and alive. It was the strangest thing to see something I had stared at for weeks seem new and different, and of course better. The very first words that came out of my mouth were "Thank you Ken! You saved it!!". To this day, I still don't know what he did to Maderize it. He turned the short from "blah" to gold. I don't know what it is, but I won't lose sleep over figuring it out because I know that when I'm stuck, I'm sending my video to The Maderizer for an intense Maderizing session. 

Here is the final Maderized product, The Sonnet: 

Now you see why the term "Maderize" had to be invented. There isn't a word in the dictionary (yet) that describes what Ken can do, which is to bring a project to its best and set a higher standard of production.

Sometimes (or always), you just need a true professional storyteller who will guide you out of the apocalyptic production jungle. Luckily, The Maderizer is training me to be his first Maderite and someday this HDSLR Ninja will become a Maderization Ninja, aka a magician. 

Here is another video Maderized for The Association:

Get Maderized! Contact The Maderizer to increase your production value and check out his work at kennethmader.com and nightfall-studios.com. I've been Maderized!

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Dominic Gill’s experience at the Canon Boot Camp

Dominic Gil is definitely an adventurer. Already very experienced with the Canon DSLR 5D before he came, there were some knowledge gaps and questions to resolve. Here’s what he had to say about his training experience:

 I took the Canon Boot Camp because i don’t know everything about the 5D Mark II. Or, I didn’t! Well, having used the 5D quite a lot, I had a few queries, and they were answered pretty successfully, and I certainly felt like I’m walking away with a better feel for the menu system in the camera.

I think one of the nicest things about it is it’s very relaxed, not intimidating at all. Kind of like learning [the]  “good old fashioned home style cooking” way, you know, it’s very informative but never intimidating – always a helpful hand when you need it. If you’re interested in this camera, it’s a really quick, easy digestible way to get very comfortable with it.

Dominic Gil
Adventure Filmmaker

Understanding Histograms: Part II

Excerpt from the Canon Boot Camp Manual

A CAMERA’S HISTOGRAM

Histograms in cameras total how many sensors are reporting a certain value of light and then build a graph to visualize that.

The picture below is of a grey scale. It shows values of light from black to white. The values of light go from 0 (black) to 255 (white). The line along the bottom is marked by the values of 0 (darkest) on the left and 255 (brightest) on the right. 18% grey is right in the middle.

0%                                             177                                                 255                                                                            18% Gray

The spikes show the amount of pixels reporting that tonal value. In the above picture, the sensors are picking up nearly identical quantities in a range of tones from black to white. The grey scale isn’t perfect. You can notice the left edge of each column of grey is slightly lighter that the other edge. This is why some of the spikes are slightly taller than others.

You can see there are stacks for each of the shades of grey until it reaches complete white. The white spike (and the black spike are hard to see because they are up against the sides of the histogram.

Draw a histogram of what tone the pixels are sensing.

Let’s say you have a camera with only 15 pixels on the sensor. Below each circle represents a pixel on your camera’s sensor. Pixels measure light. The histogram uses these “reports” from each pixel to build the columns of the histogram.

DRAW : The column the histogram would build if all 15 sensors were reporting absolute white.

Practice your understanding of histograms by printing off the picture below and drawing in the column.

Pixels “seeing” different values of light.

Now here’s the same sensor but it is “seeing” different values or tones of black, grey and white.

Draw in the number of pixels reporting each of the tones. Assume the greys are exactly the value in the middle of the histogram, i.e. 18% grey.

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