This is a fantastic video! I’ve been overexposing Nikon sensors since the Z9, which goes against their own recommendations of exposing for 36% middle grey, as their official LUTs (including the RED ones) will clip your ETTR footage if you don’t adjust the exposure in the node before. However, people who always complain about how noisy their Nikon footage is, are always surprised by my footage.
Finally - someone who understands that there's absolutely nothing special about high iso for saving highlights trick - you just need a camera that has no analog gain, and ISO setting is just meta data in the recorded file. And if you don't have a camera like that - then this trick just doesn't work - because there is no trick at all - just exposing to the left to protect the highlights - so what photographers have been doing for the last 100 years.
Fantastic video! I've got some signal processing knowledge, at a pretty basic level, but using it ive been overexposing my BRAW and Prores RAW footage on my S5iix and bringing it down in post. Its incredible how clean the inages are. More work in post but generally its still pretty easy to match.
Good video, but I dont get it. If the camera pushes the ISO digitally by 3EV then you manually underexpose by -3EV then how are you not where you started
The 3EV digital push puts you back where you started at the midtones since both Rec.709 and log curves intersect at around the same level at 18% scene light. But for scene light above 18% the Rec.709 encoding curve remains steep, providing only 2 1/2 stops of highlights above 18% before it reaches an encoded output value of 100%, whereas log curves above 18% become much more shallow, providing 3EV more room (~6EV total) for encoding highlights before reaching an encoded output value near 100%. I originally planned to demonstrate this but wanted to keep the video length to 20 minutes and decided it wasn't critical to the exposure explanation. I might do a separate deep-dive video into just the curves if there is enough interest.
Not always true for every camera. For example RED only records at 1 iso/voltage then is manipulated in post. Other cameras apply a higher or lower voltage to adjust ISO. ISO is essentially meaningless.
Very informative video, but I have some quibbles. You're dead right, ISO is not a measure if 'sensor amplification'. All ISO does is map exposure to lightness. Lightness is importantly different from 'brightness', because it is a perceptual scale running from 'black' to 'white', usually on a scale 0-100, whilst 'brightness', although not formally defined, usually signifies an amount of light energy, so has no absolute scale. I think this basic idea is getting a bit confused, using the word 'exposure' in a rather loose way, and saying things like 'return to original brightness' or 'see them as they are'. There is no 'original' lightness, because lightness is a product of processing, and you can process how you like (within limits). By definition of ISO, there is no 'sensor ISO", though there is a lower limit to the ISO setting that a sensor can handle, but that's not usually the 'native ISO' that manufacturers impose. Words like 'boost' also give the wrong impression. Nothing is being 'boosted', just different translation rules being applied. That's the whole problem with the 'gain' narrative, which is mostly based on a less than solid understanding of electronics. In a sense most of your video is about countering the common misconceptions around ISO, and it's unfortunate that it actually promulgates some of those. I suppose that the alternative is to demand that people unlearn a lot of it, which they are often unwilling to do. Just one pet-peeve. If you look at the ISOsit you'll find the 'ISO' is a name, not an initialism, therefore is 'Eye-soh', not 'Eye-ess-oh'. Not important, though the former is not only correct but a syllable shorter :-).
Thanks Bob, it's always great to hear from you. That might be the best report card I've received from you yet :) As with my other videos, I always carefully balance the goals of making the material relatable and understandable vs trying to correct the common vernacular and bring it closer to the objective terms used in the specifications. 'Lightness' was considered but I thought it was a bridge too far when coupled with the heavy technical load I'm asking the viewer to bear. 'Original brightness' used in the video is relative to what the user is subjectively accustomed to seeing relative to an underexposed equivalent. I consider 'boosting' a fair term for explaining the increase in lightness - it imparts more information than saying 'translating' and doesn't contradict the underlying mechanism. I've pronounced 'ISO' as a single syllable before but found it doesn't provide sufficient tonal separation from other words when used inside a spoken sentence.
@@testcams Hi Adam. I think you usually do a pretty good job, and you have here. I appreciate the problem you're facing. It's not one I've fully worked out how to solve. The issue is that over the last fifteen to twenty years photographers have been fed a narrative of how photography works that is just plain wrong and falls apart when you try to explain anything in detail - which is why you get some contradictions in your explanation. The heart of the problem is not understanding what is the type of information that goes into and comes out of the photographic process. The narrative tends to support a 'light in - light out' idea, and that's how most photographers seem to conceptualise it. In the days when the output was on a piece of paper it was easier to explain that the output did not consist of an amount of light, but whether the viewer should be seeing something as dark or light, whatever the mechanism used to support it. The problem with this ends up that when people use the word 'exposure' to mean simultaneously how much light is going in, and how light or dark the image looks, it's actually impossible to construct a rational narrative of what's happening. The same goes for the word 'brightness'. Using the same word for input and output causes the same equivocation issues, though I suppose if careful one can use 'is brighter' for the input and 'looks brighter' for the output. It all comes down to photographers not having a sensible word in their vocabulary for how light or dark the image looks. 'Lightness' is an established word for that, but does seem alien to many. In video, it does look at first sight as though the output is an amount of light, but of course it isn't. Anyhow, more power to your elbow. It was a valiant effort. As for 'ISO', it's a pet peeve as I said. It's an error which isn't of any importance, in that it doesn't harm comprehension.
Bob, I agree with all your points. The challenge I face is how to spend my attention capital wisely. Most of that budget goes toward the complex concepts covered, leaving little room to introduce corrective vernacular in the process. Sometimes the two goals align naturally, for example cleaning up the distinction between ISO vs exposure because doing so is necessary to convey how log ISO works. Other times the goals don't align, and I rely on using familiar but poorly defined terms as my crutch to provide a familiar foundation on which I can layer the explanation of the concepts, otherwise my explanations get unwieldy.
@@testcams I do fully understand the predicament. It's really hard for you, knowingly building on shaky foundations. Within that constraint you did a fantastic job. I've been pondering a 'basics of photography' series myself. The problem is that so much of it gets devoted to helping people unlearn stuff that you wonder how many would stay the course to the actual learning.
Nikon has given up on SLR players. Young people do not recognize the Nikon brand. No one is willing to learn NLOG. This is the reality. Nikon does not value players. Similarly, players can change brands.
Whaat a brain dead comment. "No one" - but people watch this vid and many people shoot Nikon. Log principles are common for many cameras. Nikon latest cameras are excellent, so "not value players" is a stupid statement. If by your comment you mean that Nikon does not promote yourself with brain rot skibbidy Ohio Riz memes for you and your friends - then go play.
Very welcome clear explanations of LOG. All to rare to have this level of explanation. Many thanks
This turned out fantastic! Happy to hear you‘re doing more of them! Keep em coming! Great work!
Thanks Eric, very kind of you to say.
@@testcams I can't find your email. Can you send me an email? I'd like to chat with you! :)
@@iamericlenz Sent an email to your YT-listed email address.
This is a fantastic video! I’ve been overexposing Nikon sensors since the Z9, which goes against their own recommendations of exposing for 36% middle grey, as their official LUTs (including the RED ones) will clip your ETTR footage if you don’t adjust the exposure in the node before. However, people who always complain about how noisy their Nikon footage is, are always surprised by my footage.
Amazing video. It truly makes one understand how log encoding actually works.
Thanks a lot for this fantastic video. By fat the most accurate and comprehensive explanation I've seen on the topic on RUclips.
I like when it is explained why one should do something instead of just instructing to do it. Thank you 😊
Haven’t seen this level of expertise regarding Nikon Nlog, I shoot primarily Nlog and Nraw, those are definitely great information.
Finally - someone who understands that there's absolutely nothing special about high iso for saving highlights trick - you just need a camera that has no analog gain, and ISO setting is just meta data in the recorded file. And if you don't have a camera like that - then this trick just doesn't work - because there is no trick at all - just exposing to the left to protect the highlights - so what photographers have been doing for the last 100 years.
Another great video, thanks for the effort put in making it
Thank you for the explanation! Really appreciate it.
Fantastic video! I've got some signal processing knowledge, at a pretty basic level, but using it ive been overexposing my BRAW and Prores RAW footage on my S5iix and bringing it down in post. Its incredible how clean the inages are. More work in post but generally its still pretty easy to match.
Awesome video, thank you!
Good video, but I dont get it. If the camera pushes the ISO digitally by 3EV then you manually underexpose by -3EV then how are you not where you started
The 3EV digital push puts you back where you started at the midtones since both Rec.709 and log curves intersect at around the same level at 18% scene light. But for scene light above 18% the Rec.709 encoding curve remains steep, providing only 2 1/2 stops of highlights above 18% before it reaches an encoded output value of 100%, whereas log curves above 18% become much more shallow, providing 3EV more room (~6EV total) for encoding highlights before reaching an encoded output value near 100%. I originally planned to demonstrate this but wanted to keep the video length to 20 minutes and decided it wasn't critical to the exposure explanation. I might do a separate deep-dive video into just the curves if there is enough interest.
Not always true for every camera. For example RED only records at 1 iso/voltage then is manipulated in post.
Other cameras apply a higher or lower voltage to adjust ISO.
ISO is essentially meaningless.
This is covered in the video.
Very informative video, but I have some quibbles. You're dead right, ISO is not a measure if 'sensor amplification'. All ISO does is map exposure to lightness. Lightness is importantly different from 'brightness', because it is a perceptual scale running from 'black' to 'white', usually on a scale 0-100, whilst 'brightness', although not formally defined, usually signifies an amount of light energy, so has no absolute scale. I think this basic idea is getting a bit confused, using the word 'exposure' in a rather loose way, and saying things like 'return to original brightness' or 'see them as they are'. There is no 'original' lightness, because lightness is a product of processing, and you can process how you like (within limits). By definition of ISO, there is no 'sensor ISO", though there is a lower limit to the ISO setting that a sensor can handle, but that's not usually the 'native ISO' that manufacturers impose. Words like 'boost' also give the wrong impression. Nothing is being 'boosted', just different translation rules being applied. That's the whole problem with the 'gain' narrative, which is mostly based on a less than solid understanding of electronics. In a sense most of your video is about countering the common misconceptions around ISO, and it's unfortunate that it actually promulgates some of those. I suppose that the alternative is to demand that people unlearn a lot of it, which they are often unwilling to do. Just one pet-peeve. If you look at the ISOsit you'll find the 'ISO' is a name, not an initialism, therefore is 'Eye-soh', not 'Eye-ess-oh'. Not important, though the former is not only correct but a syllable shorter :-).
Thanks Bob, it's always great to hear from you. That might be the best report card I've received from you yet :) As with my other videos, I always carefully balance the goals of making the material relatable and understandable vs trying to correct the common vernacular and bring it closer to the objective terms used in the specifications. 'Lightness' was considered but I thought it was a bridge too far when coupled with the heavy technical load I'm asking the viewer to bear. 'Original brightness' used in the video is relative to what the user is subjectively accustomed to seeing relative to an underexposed equivalent. I consider 'boosting' a fair term for explaining the increase in lightness - it imparts more information than saying 'translating' and doesn't contradict the underlying mechanism. I've pronounced 'ISO' as a single syllable before but found it doesn't provide sufficient tonal separation from other words when used inside a spoken sentence.
@@testcams Hi Adam. I think you usually do a pretty good job, and you have here. I appreciate the problem you're facing. It's not one I've fully worked out how to solve. The issue is that over the last fifteen to twenty years photographers have been fed a narrative of how photography works that is just plain wrong and falls apart when you try to explain anything in detail - which is why you get some contradictions in your explanation. The heart of the problem is not understanding what is the type of information that goes into and comes out of the photographic process. The narrative tends to support a 'light in - light out' idea, and that's how most photographers seem to conceptualise it. In the days when the output was on a piece of paper it was easier to explain that the output did not consist of an amount of light, but whether the viewer should be seeing something as dark or light, whatever the mechanism used to support it. The problem with this ends up that when people use the word 'exposure' to mean simultaneously how much light is going in, and how light or dark the image looks, it's actually impossible to construct a rational narrative of what's happening. The same goes for the word 'brightness'. Using the same word for input and output causes the same equivocation issues, though I suppose if careful one can use 'is brighter' for the input and 'looks brighter' for the output. It all comes down to photographers not having a sensible word in their vocabulary for how light or dark the image looks. 'Lightness' is an established word for that, but does seem alien to many. In video, it does look at first sight as though the output is an amount of light, but of course it isn't. Anyhow, more power to your elbow. It was a valiant effort.
As for 'ISO', it's a pet peeve as I said. It's an error which isn't of any importance, in that it doesn't harm comprehension.
Bob, I agree with all your points. The challenge I face is how to spend my attention capital wisely. Most of that budget goes toward the complex concepts covered, leaving little room to introduce corrective vernacular in the process. Sometimes the two goals align naturally, for example cleaning up the distinction between ISO vs exposure because doing so is necessary to convey how log ISO works. Other times the goals don't align, and I rely on using familiar but poorly defined terms as my crutch to provide a familiar foundation on which I can layer the explanation of the concepts, otherwise my explanations get unwieldy.
@@testcams I do fully understand the predicament. It's really hard for you, knowingly building on shaky foundations. Within that constraint you did a fantastic job. I've been pondering a 'basics of photography' series myself. The problem is that so much of it gets devoted to helping people unlearn stuff that you wonder how many would stay the course to the actual learning.
Nikon has given up on SLR players. Young people do not recognize the Nikon brand. No one is willing to learn NLOG. This is the reality. Nikon does not value players. Similarly, players can change brands.
Whaat a brain dead comment. "No one" - but people watch this vid and many people shoot Nikon. Log principles are common for many cameras. Nikon latest cameras are excellent, so "not value players" is a stupid statement.
If by your comment you mean that Nikon does not promote yourself with brain rot skibbidy Ohio Riz memes for you and your friends - then go play.