Manual camera settings w/ filter shots look muted. Pro Tips appreciated!

Joined
Oct 3, 2016
Messages
7
Reaction score
1
Age
40
I purchased the 6-pack of Polar Pro Filters. I've taken my phantom 4 out a few times and played with ND8, ND16, and ND32 filters. The first time I kept my base shutter at 1/50 (doh!). I can't say that all of my first shots were bad, but they definitely much darker in the shadows than I expected. So of course, I figured out the calculated shutter speed should be at 1/50 and I took the drone out again. This time, I turned D-LOG on with the intention on bringing the colors up in post.

I feel like the colors are very muted, and when bringing the colors up in post it just doesn't look as rich to me as the shots I took when in auto.

I've been reading up on best photo practices, and I understand that D-LOG does mute the video but it just looks a little washed out overall. I just don't think I can make my photos look any better in post.

Can anyone give me suggestions on what I should try next?

I appreciate your time and suggestions.
phantom.jpg
auto-beach.jpg
jeep-custom.jpg
jeep-post.jpg
beach2-custom.jpg
beach2-post.jpg
 
What are you seeing in your scopes? It looks like you are a couple of stops underexposed. That would explain your issues in the dark areas.
 
What are you seeing in your scopes? It looks like you are a couple of stops underexposed. That would explain your issues in the dark areas.
It looks similar to the muted versions, but of course in the sun it can be very difficult to see anything when it appears that dark. Should I bring the exposure up by changing the shutter speed before increasing the iso?
 
It looks similar to the muted versions, but of course in the sun it can be very difficult to see anything when it appears that dark. Should I bring the exposure up by changing the shutter speed before increasing the iso?
I would say yes mosdefcon. Are you talking mainly stills or video? I would not go over 2-400 ISO on sitlls. So yes from there I would adjust shutter speed. It's unreal how slow you can run your shutter with these gimbles. But you want to keep your shutter as close as you can to double your frame rate for the silky smooth cinematic look if that's what your looking for.
 
It looks similar to the muted versions, but of course in the sun it can be very difficult to see anything when it appears that dark. Should I bring the exposure up by changing the shutter speed before increasing the iso?
Run with your histogram active and expose to the right. The zebra overexposure clipping indication is handy also. When I look at the scopes in post my best grading results are always with footage where the white point is close to the top of the scale.

It is preferable to reduce your exposure in preference to increasing ISO.
 
Thanks for the feedback @KevMo Photog , and I've been trying to do video for the past month. It's actually coming along a lot better, considering I spent the first 3 weeks just flying the dang thing.

@With The Birds : I do run with my histrogram active, I will work on exposing to the right. I had my zebras on but I lost in on the last DJI Go update. I'll need to put those back on.

Thanks for the tips, guys!
 
  • Like
Reactions: KevMo Photog

Members online

Forum statistics

Threads
143,066
Messages
1,467,358
Members
104,935
Latest member
Pauos31