Sharpness and resolution

[Anton Meleshkevich]

Sometimes I can get those big hollywood movies sharpness, sometimes I can't, while camera is still the same.
How do you get this professional looking soft sharpness? I don't know how to describe it. Just look at any still from Company3 colorists' instagrams.

And what about resolution? You get 6k footage and xml from editor. If you create 2k (or HD) project, you acually work with downscaleed footage. Which is ok for color (2.7k*0.7=1080p of real colored pixels and so on), but is it ok for sharpness? Or you create 6k project and after all the grading and sharpness you render it. And THAN you downscale it to destination resolution?

And one question about music videos. Clients for some reason always want me to render final master in 4k for youtube. But 99.9% music videos on youtube still in HD. I mean most expensive music videos are still in HD? Is it because youtube downscales video from 4k (UHD) to HD not so accurate as, for example, davinci resolve?

Edited April 22, 2018 by Anton Meleshkevich

[Abby Bader]

The secret sauce is all about contrast management. You need to perfect the tonal curve, and also; most colorist favor heavier contrast in the mid tones than in the shadows as we're used to see in film.

Edited April 22, 2018 by Abby Bader

[Anton Meleshkevich]

Thank you, Abby!
I'm not a native english speaker, so could you please explain a bit more?
Heavier contrast in the mid tones - is what I should to get? Or I should to avoid it?
I'm a little confused.

Sometimes I desaturate timeline node at first. And then I adjust exposure and contrast of all the clips. Is it a good idea or it can force me to make more contrasty images than I need?



P.S.
"THEN" of course.

4 hours ago, Anton Meleshkevich said:

Or you create 6k project and after all the grading and sharpness you render it. And THAN you downscale it to destination resolution?

 

Edited April 22, 2018 by Anton Meleshkevich

[Abby Bader]

Study film images and you will see that the boldest contrast is in the mid tones, and to replicate that you need to learn a thing or two about contrast management.

No, it will not give you a better contrast to desat the image, adjust contrast and bring color back. Play with the curves in conjunction with the primary controls. And make sure to read Trish Cahill's Hobbit article where she explains how to work the contrast. 

Edited April 22, 2018 by Abby Bader

[Nicolas Hanson]

I agree with Abby that the contrast can really define how we perceive the sharpness of an image.

[Nicolas Hanson]

5 hours ago, Anton Meleshkevich said:

And one question about music videos. Clients for some reason always want me to render final master in 4k for youtube. But 99.9% music videos on youtube still in HD. I mean most expensive music videos are still in HD? Is it because youtube downscales video from 4k (UHD) to HD not so accurate as, for example, davinci resolve?

I don't think Youtube downscale 4K to HD, they simply compress the image and reduce the bitrate. It's common practice to work in UHD and deliver HD. That's good enough as the bitrate and some other factors defines quality, not so much the amount of pixels.

[Cary Knoop]

11 hours ago, Anton Meleshkevich said:

And one question about music videos. Clients for some reason always want me to render final master in 4k for youtube. But 99.9% music videos on youtube still in HD. I mean most expensive music videos are still in HD? Is it because youtube downscales video from 4k (UHD) to HD not so accurate as, for example, davinci resolve?

Beats me.  

Uploading a 4K source is much better than uploading a downsampled HD version.