Space Adventure and Super Hero LUT’s
Alister Chapman shoots short movie Orlaith with FX3 and FX6
Above is Orlaith with the Space Adventure LUT applied.
Recently I was commissioned by Sony to create two new LUTs and I took inspiration from recent hit blockbuster movies and streaming shows. The Space Adventure LUT pays homage to some of my own favourite films and provides a medium contrast look with deep blacks. The Super Hero LUT draws heavily from many of the comic book based super hero films released in the last 2 or 3 years. It’s quite different to Space Adventure having a warmer and more pastel colour palette.
To demonstrate these two new LUT’s I created a short film called Orlaith. Shot in a single evening over just four hours, it was shot using a Sony FX3 rigged to the car exterior. The FX3 was also used for all the handheld shots. An FX6 was used for the remainder of the shots. I used Sony 85mm, 50mm and 28mm E-Mount lenses.
Both cameras were set to S-Log3/S-Gamut3.Cine and both cameras were exposed without the addition of any exposure offsets or special techniques. The white balance of both cameras was set to 5600K and LED lights with a colour temperature of 5400K were used for the night scenes.
During the daylight part of the shoot the FX6 was set to 800 base ISO and 800 EI and the FX3 to 640 ISO. For the night scenes the FX6 was set to 12,800 base ISO and 12,800 EI and the FX3 to 12,800 ISO.
Light in darkness
For the scenes in the woods, where the search team come through the trees, a single Nanlite Forza 300 light on a 5m tall stand was used right of frame to add contrast by illuminating the tree trunks brightly compared to the otherwise dark background. The actors used high power LED torches (flashlights) that could be focussed to produce a narrow beam. The smoke and mist effects were created using white smoke grenades. The use of the light, torches and smoke creates a very dramatic effect without the need to do any extensive grading or image enhancement, the LUT was simply applied to the S-Log3 footage and this is the end result.
During the final scene a real oil lamp was used and the warmth of the light from the flame from this lamp helps give the female Orlaith character a warmer, gentler look compared to the harder look of the male actor lit by the LED light. I feel that where you can use actual light and colour contrast with the scene you are shooting the end result is more pleasing than trying to use secondary colour grades to produce a similar effect. Again, what you see in the video is simply the result of applying the new LUT’s directly to the S-Log3 material. The only place in the entire video where any additional significant grading or effects have been applied is where two shots have been blended together as Orlaith appears through the smoke.
Exposure and Post Production
I used Viewfinder Display Gamma Assist function on the FX3 and the default s709 LUT in the FX6 to assist with exposure assessment. It is not essential to load these LUT’s into the camera while shooting as the s709 exposure is matched with the brightness of these LUT’s. But the LUT’s provide are 33x LUT’s and full compatible with the FX6, FX9 and VENICE etc. In post production, the LUT’s were applied to the S-Log3/S-Gamut3.Cine footage to obtain the two very different looks you can see demonstrated in the video.
If you need to make any additional exposure adjustments or wish to tweak the contrast for yourself, I recommend that any such adjustments are made in a node or layer prior to the addition of the LUT in order to preserve the best possible dynamic range and image quality.
Download Free LUT’s
Here are two new LUT’s for use with Sony cameras that shoot with S-Log3 and S-Gamut3.Cine. These LUT’s were tailored for use with the FX3 and FX6 but there is no reason why they won’t also produce great results with Sony’s other Cinema Line cameras such as the FX9 and VENICE.
The Space Adventure LUT pays homage to some of my own favourite films and provides a medium contrast look with deep blacks. This gives a dramatic look especially when your scene contains a wide dynamic range or contains practical lights within the frame. It has elements of the classic blockbuster teal and orange look with an overall steel blue tint rather than a teal tint. To contrast this, skin tones have a very slight orange skin tint. The saturation of blue and red objects is maintained at a high level for a futuristic look, while greens are slightly subdued for a more film like look.
The Super Hero LUT is inspired by recent comic-book based films released and is quite different to Space Adventure having a warmer and more pastel colour palette. Blue objects in the scene will retain their saturation to provide colour contrast against the overall warm look. So, when choosing wardrobe, locations or sets this should be considered. Like Space Adventure it has a medium contrast level allowing you to further tweak the contrast during grading if you wish. Skin tones are not tinted as strongly as Space Adventure and remain fairly neutral to warm.
Above is Orlaith with the Super Hero LUT applied.
