GH6 Video Exif Value: Dynamic Range Boost on or off

Started by nogohome, October 10, 2022, 11:38:36 AM

Previous topic - Next topic
Print
Go Down Pages1
User actions

nogohome

October 10, 2022, 11:38:36 AM
Panasonic Lumix GH6:
I have been looking for the info if a video has been shot in "Dynamic Range Boost" Mode or not and I think I found it now.
There is a field "Contrast Mode" The value seems to be

"Unknown (0x56)" when "DR Boost" is turned on, and
"Unknown (0x41)" when "DR Boost" is turned off.

I checked with several files of which I knew which setting was active, but it is still just an observation and possibly wrong.

Cheers,
Niklas



Phil Harvey

#1
October 10, 2022, 09:37:55 PM
Hi Niklas,

There is much more work to do with the GH6 to decode the meanings of this tag.  When Dynamic Range Boost is off, what is the contrast mode set to?  0x41 doesn't seem like a normal mode.  Plus, there are a number of modes for which the value isn't known for the GH6:

Code Select
'Old Days',
'Toy Pop',
'Bleach Bypass',
'Fantasy',
'Star Filter',
'One Point Color',
'Sunshine',
However, "Dynamic Range Boost" isn't on this list, so presumably it is set via a different menu in the camera?

Any more testing you can do with this would be appreciated.

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).

nogohome

#2
October 11, 2022, 07:16:50 AM
Hi Phil,

thanks for your quick reply!

DR Boost is a global setting which can be only manually set "on" or "off" in "Creative Video Mode".
It is it's own menu item in the "video/Image Quality 1" menu section.
It combines the two gain circuits of the camera to achieve a higher dynamic range, and raises the minimum ISO from 250 to 2000 in V-log and from 100 to 800 in all  other color profiles.
In stills mode DR Boost is automatically applied to all photos taken from 800 ISO upwards.

The filters you mention are a separate menu item that can be set both for stills and video. It is independant from the DR Boost setting, but sets the color profile to "standard", regardless of what it was set before.

The code values "Unknown (0x56)" and "Unknown (0x41)" in "Contrast Mode" were the only thing I could correlate to the DR Boost on or off setting, but it doesn`t match the menu item name.

If I can help by cycling through a few options and taking short clips and generating the text files, I can do that, or is there something else I could do?


Kind regards,
Niklas

Phil Harvey

#3
October 11, 2022, 07:50:48 AM
Hi Niklas,

It would be useful if you could check to see if changing the contrast mode menu setting affects the value of the ContrastMode tag, and if so, what are the values of the unknown settings I listed (presumably with the DR boost off).  And how does the ContrastMode value change for different contrast mode menu settings when DR boost is on?

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).

nogohome

#4
October 11, 2022, 11:49:08 AM
Hi Phil,

the thing ist, there is no menu item called "Contrast Mode".
The filters (Old Days, Bleach Bypass etc.) are found in the menu item "Filter Settings" in the "Image Quality 2" section. In the generated EXIF text file they are found under "Filter Effect".
The filters in the GH6 differ in parts from your list, they are:

Expressive
Retro
Old Days
High key
Low Key
Sepia
Cross Process
Bleach bypass

The first one strangely shows up as "Unknown (01)" in the text file, the others appear correctly under "Filter settings". Even when the in "Filter Settings" Filters are set to off, the last selected filter appears in the text file under "Filter Settings"

I think these filters are a rather rarely used function of the camera,
because it is aimed more at peolpe who try to capture as much color Info as possible in the videos, and apply looks etc. in Post, e.g. using the V-Log profile (these profiles are called "photo Style" in the menu).
For a more baked in look, there are several other "Photo Styles" available, which are being used, such as "Cinelike D2", "Like709" or  "Natural" for example.

The "Contrast Mode" field in the text file always has the value "High" when a filter is used (which sets the Photo Sytle" automatically to "Standard".)

I tested 4 Other Photo Styles (Filters off, wouldn't work otherwise), these change the Value at "Contrast Mode":
Natural: Unknown (0x3)
Cinelike D2: Unknown (0x46)
Like709: Unknown (0x2d)

The currently used Photo Style also shows up under "CaptureGamma"

I'll attach a zip of the Text files generated in case it might help.

Thanks again,
Niklas

Phil Harvey

#5
October 11, 2022, 02:24:41 PM
The output you posted is only useful if I know what settings you used for each picture. :(

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).

nogohome

#6
October 12, 2022, 10:26:55 AM
Hi Phil,

I attached a zip with text files:
Every Exif data text file has a corresponding text file with the relevant settings info for the video file:

-Video format
-Photo Style
-DR Boost On/Off
-Filter Setting

They are grouped in Subfolders:
-DR_Boost_off
-DR_Boost_on

And these each contain the folders:
-Filters_on
-Photo_Styles

Maybe this is more useful.

Kind regards,
Niklas


Phil Harvey

#7
October 12, 2022, 04:28:49 PM Last Edit: October 13, 2022, 07:00:45 AM by Phil Harvey
Hi Niklas,

Great, thanks!

I've summarized your results in the table below (bold headings are your settings, and the other columns are tags currently extracted by ExifTool).

I'll run through the table and update ExifTool conversions when I get a chance, and I'll post back here if I have any questions.

- Phil

DR BoostFilter SettingPhoto StyleAdvanced Scene ModeAdvanced Scene TypeContrast ModeFilter EffectLight SourcePanasonic 0x00c6Panasonic 0x00cfPanasonic 0x00e8Panasonic 0x00eePhoto StyleShooting Mode
OffExpressiveStandardOff1High (0x2)Unknown (0 1)Unknown011000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffRetroStandardUnknown (0 2)2Unknown (0x3)RetroUnknown011000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffOld DaysStandardUnknown (0 3)3Unknown (0x3)Old DaysUnknown011000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffHigh KeyStandardUnknown (0 3)3Unknown (0x3)High KeyUnknown001000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffLow KeyStandardUnknown (0 9)9Low (0x1)Low KeyUnknown001000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffSepiaStandardUnknown (0 4)4Low (0x1)SepiaUnknown001000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffCross ProcessStandardUnknown (0 2)2Low (0x1)Cross ProcessUnknown001000Standard or CustomDigital Filter
OffBleach BypassStandardUnknown (0 5)5Low (0x1)Bleach BypassUnknown001000Standard or CustomCreative Control
OffOffNaturalUnknown (0 10)10Unknown (0x3)ExpressiveShade001000NaturalMovie Preview
OffOffCinelike D2Unknown (0 10)10Unknown (0x46)ExpressiveShade001000Unknown (18)Movie Preview
OffOffLike709Unknown (0 10)10Unknown (0x2d)ExpressiveShade001000Unknown (12)Movie Preview
OffOffV-LogUnknown (0 10)10Unknown (0x41)ExpressiveShade002500Unknown (17)Movie Preview
OnExpressiveStandardOff1High (0x2)Unknown (0 1)Unknown018001Standard or CustomCreative Control
OnOffV-LogUnknown (0 10)10Unknown (0x56)ExpressiveShade2020001Unknown (17)Movie Preview
OnBleach BypassStandardUnknown (0 5)5Low (0x1)Bleach BypassUnknown208001Standard or CustomCreative Control
OnOffNaturalUnknown (0 10)10Unknown (0x3)ExpressiveShade208001NaturalMovie Preview
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).

Phil Harvey

#8
October 13, 2022, 07:04:28 AM Last Edit: October 13, 2022, 07:23:27 AM by Phil Harvey
OK, here is what I will do:

  • Set name of Panasonic_0x00ee tag to "DynamicRangeBoost" with values 0=Off 1=On
  • Change FilterEffect "Expressive" (0 0) to "Off"
  • Set FilterEffect "Unknown (0 1)" to "Expressive"
  • Set PhotoStyle 12 to "Like709"
  • Set PhotoStyle 17 to "V-Log"
  • Set PhotoStyle 18 to "Cinelike D2"

The ContrastMode decoding changes with model, and the list of missing values I gave above was actually for the GF6 not the GH6.  I don't know what this tag means for the DC-GH6, so I think I'll just avoid converting the value altogether and just leave it as a number.

I haven't figured out what to do with the Composite AdvancedSceneMode tag.

Let me know if you understand what any of the other unknown tags mean (0x00c6, 0x00cf, 0x00e8).  Maybe 0x00e8 should be called MinimumISO?

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).

nogohome

#9
October 13, 2022, 03:34:04 PM
Hi Phil,

great findings!
Minimum ISO makes perfect sense.
I'll look into the mentioned values if I can see a connection.
I can give you the values of the other photo styles, too, there are some more,
I just didn't get to record+extract them all yet.

Thanks a lot!
Niklas

Phil Harvey

#10
October 13, 2022, 04:23:29 PM
Sure.  If you do the other photo styles it would be good.

BTW, I've released version 12.48 with the changes so far.

- Phil
...where DIR is the name of a directory/folder containing the images.  On Mac/Linux/PowerShell, use single quotes (') instead of double quotes (") around arguments containing a dollar sign ($).
Print
Go Up Pages1
User actions