Re: EX3 files not working in final cut

[Mike Neders] "I agree with the differences between monitors and how it looks but it seems so dramatic in the differences."

In my own experience, I found it far more dramatic on the EX than with any other camera I had used. Of course it depends where you're coming from but the demands for calibrated monitoring whether on camera or in the edit or magnitudes more important with the EX's sensor.
1/2" chips vs 1/3"
Radically improved low light performance
CMOS handling of the image vs CCD
XDCAM EX codec vs others
Radically high resolution of about 1000 lines resolved in some situations.
All this puts huge demands on calibrated monitoring. Noise not visible on the camera LCD would be plan as day on a calibrated monitor.

Once you used the camera in extreme circumstances and the LCD in default and then compare on a calibrated monitor, the differences can be radical. I discovered this first hand. I did test shoots with the camera and saw the differences. Once you know the differences you can compensate in your head but until then it's EASY to make MAJOR mistakes if you used the camera LCD without having first made a comparison.

Once I made that comparison I found there were times I could shoot at night or in dark locations at 0 or -3 gain depending on what I wanted. I knew that I might want to crush the blacks at times. I had basic picture profiles setup and would switch through them on location, knowing what might be good for in camera vs what might give me more flexibility in post.

Given the control it seems people who have shot with $30,000 and up cameras had the experience to anticipate what the EX camera could should like than those with other $5,000 cameras.

Assuming the lower end of the budget spectrum, one should calibrate a monitor with a Spyder Elite (which can be set to target REC 709) or the latest firmware of MXO2 out to an HDMI monitor. It won't rival a higher end calibrated monitor but that will get you close. You simply can not look at an uncalibrated computer monitor and know what you're looking at. You can't look at an uncalibrated LCD on an EX and think that's going to be close to what it looks like on a calibrated monitor. At the very least once you've seen the difference, you can compensate "in your head" on location or otherwise tweak the LCD to match a monitor by eye.

Personally my test shoots were also grainy at first because the LCD was not showing what I was seeing on a larger monitor.


[Mike Neders] "Her MAC has a great monitor"
It's not about "great" it's about calibration. If you've looked at a typical computer monitor at it's default vs a broadcast monitor they are worlds apart.

[Mike Neders] "Its like setting that iso way to high and then getting the noise all over the shot. "

Unfortunately, probably the camera LCD wasn't displaying the noise that was actually being shot. Alternately one has to check on a calibrated monitor to see if the computer monitors are not even close to true. There is no "setting" in Final Cut to fix that. The .mp4 is what's recorded. If the monitor is accurate and there is noise one has to consider how to grade the shots to lower the visible noise in the recording.

The .mp4 info only shows the file is recorded as it should. The settings, F-Stop, Gain, Picture Profile, can still do serious damage to the quality.