Oh yeah, I know what you mean...
The XLH1 can look
fantastic, but the factory defaults are nothing short of terrible... very flat and boring.
I'd say just hook the camera up to a good monitor shooting a well-lit colorful scene, and dig into the menu and start tweaking. There are (if memory serves) 23 different parameters that you can adjust. You will probably especially want to adjust gamma, knee, black stretch/press, pedestal, setup, and color gain.
We've made a bunch of presets which emulate my favorite filmstocks. Unfortunately, they wouldn't be of much use to you as they were not made for use with the stock lens (the cine lenses I use look very different than the stock... greatly different contrast and color), and since I don't use it much I have not gotten around to making any presets for the stock lens yet.
It's not hard though... and don't be daunted by the zillions of choices. Just start at the top of the list and make small adjustments, using the old eye doctor's "Better like this?... or better like this?" system... and work your way down.
T2
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Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
