Before reading the 3D-specific Workflow Tutorial for First Light, please review the non-3D First Light Tutorial here: http://techblog.cineform.com/?p=1325

First Light 3D Workflow Overview

All image adjustments made in the Active panel in First Light are applied to both Left and Right eyes in a CineForm stereo file.

All image adjustments made in the 3D panel in First Light are applied to either one eye (color adjustments) or as adjustments between eyes (convergence).

Step 1: In the 3D panel, create your CineForm stereo files, and if necessary make temporal adjustments between clips (slide one clip relative to another) before muxing into a stereo file (discussed below).

Step 2: In the 3D panel, adjust color parameters on the Right eye so that it matches color on the Left eye.

Step 3: In the 3D panel, adjust convergence (horizontal, vertical, or rotation) to match project needs.

First Light is designed to be used alongside your editorial application like Final Cut Pro.  As you adjust image development parameters in First Light, those changes are immediately visible in Final Cut Pro when you scrub or play your CineForm media.  Because you are adjusting Active Metadata, and not flattening the adjustments into your media, you can adjust parameters at any time during your project workflow.

The 3D tab shown below is only visible if you installed Neo3D.

Convergence Controls (3D Panel): Upper-right controls are used to adjust convergence on CineForm stereo files.  Controls include horizontal and vertical shift as well as rotation (sometimes known as skew).

Image Development Controls (3D Panel): In the 3D panel, in assist adjusting for image differences between cameras, any adjustments made are only to the Right eye .  The Right eye is adjusted such that both eyes have the same visual look.  Once both eyes match, then subsequent adjustments should occur in the Active panel which affect both eyes together.

Image Flip: used to correct the orientation of the right-eye image to account for the mirror when using a 3D rig with beam splitter.

Stereo-Specific Adjustments: Temporally Aligning Left/Right Eyes

Since this is one clip of a stereo pair, we need to select it and mark which eye it belongs to.  This defines for First Light whether the clip is defined as Left or Right eye.  Select the clip and choose “Mark Right” from the edit menu as shown below.

All selected clips are marked as right eye clips.

Import the left eye and mark it as left.

Now that we have a stereo pair, we need to merge them into a single stereo clip.  Select the pair of clips.

When a stereo pair is selected, the clip movement controls such as the next and previous buttons – as well as the right and left arrows – move both clips together.

You will use these controls to find a point in a clip where a discrete event occurs, such as the clapboard.  (Clapboards are very helpful in stereo files because they clearly identify sync points between eyes.  In the absence of a clapboard you must find other sync point between the clips.  Once this spot is identified in one clip, the temporal adjustments can be made on the other clip (if necessary) to ensure the clips are aligned.  These adjustments are found in the edit menu, and have key equivalents.  (In practice the key adjustments will become second nature in adjusting temporal alignment between clips).

To switch from viewing one eye to viewing the other, use the up or down arrows.  To move just the clip you are viewing (not both clips simultaneously) use a shift-right arrow to move it to the next frame, and shift-left arrow to move to the previous frame.  You have now move the visible clip one frame relative to the non-visible clip.

In this example, the left eye has:

when the right has

Notice that the time codes for the frames are also different.  By using the shift-right arrow key to move only the left clip, we advance to the following frame:

The timecodes now align as well.

When adjusting clips for temporal alignment, the timecode may help.  Sometimes the timecodes will be off by a frame or two, sometimes off by hours.  Synchronized cameras will not always start or stop in the same frame, so this adjustment is necessary.

(Multiplexing) Muxing into a CineForm Stereo Stream

Once both clips are aligned temporally in First Light it is now time to create a single CineForm stereo file from the individual eyes.  showing the same instant in time, choose “Export” from the file menu.

A file save dialog will be displayed, and the default file name is the source file name.

Note the ability to choose the timecode to be placed in the destination file.  The timecode on the left is from the left clip, the one on the right is from the right clip.  Select “Save” and the file will be merged at disk speeds (no recompression is performed).  As the merge is proceeding, a progress bar will be displayed below the movie window.

Once the merge has completed, First Light removes the right and left clips from the project and adds the new stereo clip to the project.

First Light Workflow Hints

It is important to remember that any adjustments made to the image made in FirstLight appear immediately in any other application that uses the clip.  This includes QuickTime, Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere and even iMovie.

The most efficient way to work is to have FirstLight open with the clips you need, and switch between FirstLight and your NLE program.

To make adjustments to a clip, select the clip in the bin.  It will be displayed in the main window.  Move the sliders to adjust image color, saturation and gamma.  Neo HD, 4K and 3D all ship with some sample look files.  You can select these from the “Look” menu and they will be applied to the clip.

3D-Specific Workflow Hint – Convergence (3D Panel)

If you have Neo3D, a menu appears on the right side of the menu bar which allows you to control the 3D display mode.  This is always accessible from any application, and allows switching the 3D mode while Final Cut is playing a clip, without stopping the playback.

If you are adjusting 3D material, make the adjustments to the primary (left) eye first.  Once these are set, switch to the 3D panel.

Hint for adjusting convergence: One of the more powerful adjustments is the convergence and alignment of the individual clips in a stereo stream.  To adjust convergence, select “Onion Skin” from the 3D mode menu.

This mode shows both eyes at the same time with a 50% blend

As you can see in our sample clip, the cameras have quite different views.

When adjusting 3D, anything in the image which aligns exactly between the images will be perceived in 3D mode as being located at the surface of the viewscreen.  Any element in the left clip which is located on the screen to the left of the corresponding element in the right clip, will appear to be beyond the surface of the screen.  Any element which is crossed, left to the right of the right element, will appear to be in front of the screen.

When you start experimenting with the 3D controls, you will quickly realize there is a limitation to what the brain can interpret in 3D images.  In our example, the cameras were too far apart for our screen, the distant objects appearing farther apart than our eyes.

Scroll the clip to a section that has a view of the distance.

Notice the double image of the truck.

Also notice the center line of the road in the foreground.

If we adjust the horizontal convergence to almost align the lines in the road

We will place the road slightly into the screen.  We then have the truck as

Which will seem “distant”.  Sometimes there is a slight vertical, or rotational mis-alignment of the cameras.  The image above seems to show a vertical problem, but if you adjust the horizontal to align the objects horizontally, the road also aligns vertically.

You can now switch to FCP, or any other program, and see these changes.  (Note that you will need to change out of Onion Skin mode prior to playing the images in FCP.  The mode you choose is the mode supported by your 3D display monitor.)

3D-Specific Workflow Hint – Adjusting Right-Eye Color (3D Panel)

Now that the convergence geometry is set, and you observed the “depth” by playing your stereo sequence in FCP, you can switch back to First Light to adjust right eye color.  To do this, place the 3D control into side by side mode.

Most 3D stereo streams will show a slight difference.  In this case the difference is caused by the mirror rig, and the right eye is slightly darker.

You can flip one eye or another to place an area of interest side by side.  For our example we flip the left eye to have the shadow area below the center line together.

You can clearly see that the right eye is both a little darker, and a slightly different color.  If we adjust the gain on the right eye

we can lighten the image overall, and add a little blue to it as well.

Now the two sides are well matched.

The color changes will show up at once in any application that is used to view the movie, there is no need to render the clip.

When you close the window, or quit First Light, it will ask you to save the project.

Choose a name from the “Save” dialog

And the project will be saved.

When you open a previously saved project, First Light will show the last clip, and all clips will remember the last location that you viewed.

Tags: active metadata, first light, mac, neo 3d, neo 4k, neo hd, workflow

This entry was posted on Friday, May 1st, 2009 at 8:32 pm and is filed under Tech Notes : Applications : First Light, Tech Notes : Applications : ReMaster, Tech Notes : Products : neo3d, Tech Notes : Products : neo4k, Tech Notes : Products : neohd, Tech Notes : Technology : 3D, Tech Notes: Product Related. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.