User preference color bit depth overridden by prores HQ?

Hi there, any help much appreciated...
If you have your user preference color bit depth set to 8-bit, but render out to ProRes 422 (HQ) - does the codec's bit depth override that setting? Is the footage automatically rendered to at the codec's bit-depth?
And what bit depths does that codec support? There's no dialog drop-downs on the render codec settings to select a particular bit-depth... Which would suggest that this option is set in that user preference panel. However in my user preference panel, only 8bit and Floating are available as selectable options - 10, 12 and 16 are grayed out.
The reason I ask is this - I had the user preference bit depth set to 8 when I rendered out all my footage... Whereas I had I checked this option I would have preferred a higher setting. I'm on a deadline and don't have time to re-render everything... The film is heavily desaturated, so I'm not too concerned about banding - If I'm not mistaken, 8-bit color depth should be sufficient to prevent this in mostly gray images?

Wesley Ball wrote:
If you have your user preference color bit depth set to 8-bit, but render out to ProRes 422 (HQ) - does the codec's bit depth override that setting? Is the footage automatically rendered to at the codec's bit-depth?
There are two settings that are mutually exclusive: Output codec & Render Bit Depth.
Color will render at whatever bit depth you select. Your available bit depths for rendering is determined by your graphics card.
The export codec bit depth is how the resultant image gets written out to disk. If you pick Uncomressed 8bit, then that float image will get rounded down to 8bit.
ProRes is interesting. From some previous testing I've done this is what I've found (and if I'm wrong, please speak up): If you select ProResHQ (and I don't see any reason to ever pick ProResSQ) if Color is rendering at 10bit or better, ProRes will write out a 10bit file (which can be confirmed in FCP by viewing the footage properties - Command+9). If you have Color set to process at 8bit, then ProRes will write out an 8bit file.
Wesley Ball wrote:
The reason I ask is this - I had the user preference bit depth set to 8 when I rendered out all my footage... Whereas I had I checked this option I would have preferred a higher setting. I'm on a deadline and don't have time to re-render everything... The film is heavily desaturated, so I'm not too concerned about banding - If I'm not mistaken, 8-bit color depth should be sufficient to prevent this in mostly gray images?
More bits = more subtle gradiations without banding. Saturated or not. Remember, the difference between 8bit and 10bit is 256 shades of gray compared to 1024 shades of gray.
My general preference, render in float & write out at 10bit.
- pi

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To answer your specific question did you see the tooltip?
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Insanity is hereditary, you get it from your children
If this post or another user's post resolves the original issue, please mark the posts as correct and/or helpful accordingly. This helps other users with similar trouble get answers to their questions quicker. Thanks.

Maximum bit depth-maximum render quality when dynamic linking

Hi
A bit confused by the use of Maximum bit depth and Maximum render quality as used both in Sequence Settings and also as options when rendering in AME.
1 Do you need to explicitly enable these switches in the sequence for best quality or, do you simply need to switch them on in AME when you render in Media Encoder?
2 When dynamic linking to After Effects, when should you use an 8 bit vs 16 or 32 bit working space, and, how does this bit depth interact with the maximum bit depth, maximum render quality in PPro?

Hi jbach2,
I understand your confusion. I'm like that most of the time I'm working. *chuckle* The two settings you mentioned are two completely different parameters affecting (or is it effecting) your video. You do not need to enable them within the sequence itself unless you want to preview video on you program monitor at the highest quality. I personally don't recommend it, as it's a tremendous resource hog, (the program even warns you when you try to click them) and unessecary for improving final output. Again, do not enable these options in your sequence settings if you are only wanting a high quality export. Doing so will greatly reduce your editing performance unless you have a high-end system. ...and even then I don't think its worth it unless you're editing on a huge screen with a Director who wants to see everything at a maximum quality during the edit process.
Keeping it simple...
Resizing your final output video? Use Maximum bit depth.
Starting or working with high bitdepth sources? Use Max Bit Depth.
When/where do I enable these? In the AME only. ^_^
Why?:
Enabling the Max bit and Max render only needs to be done when you are exporting. They both serve different functions.
Max Render aids in the scaling/conversion process only. My understanding is that you never need to enable the Max Render Quality (MRQ) unless you are exporting in a format/pixel ratio different from your original video. For example, when rendering a 1080p timeline out to a 480p file format, you'll want to use MRQ to ensure the best scaling with the least amount of artifacts and aliasing. If you're exporting at the same size you're working with, DON'T enable MRQ. It will just cost you time and CPU. Its only function is to do a high quality resizing of your work.
Maximum bit depth increases the color depth that your video is working with and rendering to. If you're working with video that has low color depth, then I don't believe it will matter. However, if you're working with 32 bit color on your timeline in PPro and/or After Effects, using lots of graphics, high contrast values, or color gradients, you may want to enable this option. It ultimately depends on the color depth of your source material.
The same applies to After Effects.
Create something in AE like a nice color gradient. Now switch the same project between 8,16,32 bit depth, and you will see a noticable difference in how the bit depth effects your colors and the smoothness of the gradient.
Bit depth effects how different plugins/effects change your overall image. Higher depth means more colors to work with (and incidentally, more cpu you need)
Just remember that "DEPTH" determines how many colors you can "fill your bucket with" and "QUALITY" is just that, the quality of your "resize".
http://blogs.adobe.com/VideoRoad/2010/06/understanding_color_processing.html
Check out this adobe blog for more info on color depth ^_^ Hope that helps!
----a lil excerpt from the blog i linked to above---
Now, 8-bit, 10-bit, and 12-bit color are the industry standards for recording color in a device. The vast majority of cameras use 8-bits for color. If your camera doesn’t mention the color bit depth, it’s using 8-bits per channel. Higher-end cameras use 10-bit, and they make a big deal about using “10-bit precision” in their literature. Only a select few cameras use 12-bits, like the digital cinema camera, the RED ONE.
Software like After Effects and Premiere Pro processes color images using color precision of 8-bits, 16-bits, and a special color bit depth called 32-bit floating point. You’ve probably seen these color modes in After Effects, and you’ve seen the new “32″ icons on some of the effects in Premiere Pro CS5.
jbach2 wrote:
Hi
A bit confused by the use of Maximum bit depth and Maximum render quality as used both in Sequence Settings and also as options when rendering in AME.
1 Do you need to explicitly enable these switches in the sequence for best quality or, do you simply need to switch them on in AME when you render in Media Encoder?
2 When dynamic linking to After Effects, when should you use an 8 bit vs 16 or 32 bit working space, and, how does this bit depth interact with the maximum bit depth, maximum render quality in PPro?
Message was edited by: SnJK

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I'm constantly confused about which color space and bit depth to choose for various things.
Examples:
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- Likewise for AdobeRGB - are the upper 8-bits empty if you use 16-bits?
- What is the relationship between Nikon AdobeWide RGB, and AdobeRGB? - if a software supports one, will it support the other?
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Do realitze hat the original image in 12 to 14 bits is in linear gamma as that is how the sensor reacts to light. However formats for display are always gamma corrected for efficiency, because the human eye reacts non-linearly to light and because typical displays have a gamma powerlaw response of brightness/darkness. Lightroom internally uses a 16-bit linear space. This is more bits than the 12 or 14 bits simply to avoid aliasing errors and other numeric errors. Similarly the working space is chosen larger than the gamut cameras can capture in order to have some overhead that allows for flexibility and avoids blowing out in intermediary stages of the processing pipeline. You have to choose something and so prophotoRGB, one of the widest RGB spaces out there is used. This is explained quite well here.
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- And standardize 16 bit formats on the widest gamut supported by whatever you're doing with it? - ProPhoto for editing, and maybe whatever gamut is recommended by other software or hardware vendors for special purposes...
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Flash only supports non-sRGB images if you have enabled it yourself. NONE of the included flash templates in Lightroom for example enable it.
that IE was the last browser to be upgraded for colorspace support (ie9)
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Not natively. Some plugin maybe?
În data de 15.05.2012 20:12, "B r e t t" <[email protected]> a scris:
Filter tiffs by bit depth, color space created by B r e t t<http://forums.adobe.com/people/Brett>in
Photoshop Lightroom - View the full discussion<http://forums.adobe.com/message/4409492#4409492

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Since the camera should be producing 12-bit depth it seems I am losing information in the conversion, and I don't want that.
I have installed the 7.1 DNG converter, and I suppose that is what is used when I download from camera memory card through Bridge 5.1 and click dng conversion.
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http://www.imaging-resource.com/PRODS/D90/D90A.HTM
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Archiving pictures in the .dng format seems to be a good idea -- but only if no information is lost in the conversion.
Thus, the "10-bit" info showing in Bridge worries me.
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Not exactly sure how Image Capture works on lion, but i belive i read that since os x 10.5 that it should scan in 16 bits/channel
Are you able to use the software that came with the scanner instead of Image Capture or maybe you need to update your scanner software or
possibly check the preference in the Image Capture scanner preferences to use Twain Software When Possible.
Or scanner software like VueScan which is much better than most software that ships with scanners.
http://www.hamrick.com/
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Photoshop seems to be converting pictures that I open to 8-bit from 24-bit: before the problem I think it was converting to 16-bit because Photoshop doesnt seem to support 24-bit but I cant remember.
I've been using Photoshop CS4 for about 4-5 weeks now without any problems and this just seems to have come out nowhere. The problem doesn't seem to be related to Camera Raw at all because I don't use it to import my pictures, so the "Workflow Options" don't seem to have any effect on the converting. I've also tried to delete the preferences file and that doesn't help either.
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Cacogen24 wrote:
Hey everyone, this is something i've just been wondering about. Correct me if i'm wrong but its my understanding that with 10-bit depth footage or higher After effects crunches it to 8-bit after the render/export.
You're only partly wrong. If you keep the project 8bit then you're right, but that's a terrible workflow. Where most folks foul up is in the rendering.
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Image
Format                                     : JPEG
Width                                        : 1 306 pixels
Height                                       : 979 pixels
Color space                             : YUV
Bit depth                                   : 8 bits
Compression mode                : Lossy
Stream size                              : 2.83 MiB (100%)

Hi Jeff, thanks!!
I guess one cannot import cannot import a CMYK image in Premiere at all.
When I inspected the image in Media Info it ID'd it as a YUV and so I assumed that the imagwe was converted for use in a video that they'd created sometime in the past.
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Anyway, Photoshop ID'd it as CMYK and when converted to RGB that did the trick!
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User preference color bit depth overridden by prores HQ?

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