Newbie question: RED monitoring via HD-SDI

[Reinis Traidas]

Hi there, please bear with me in case my questions are a bit silly.

I'm about to shoot a short student film on the RED (Build 17). It will be my first time using the camera. I have played around with it for a couple of hours to get to know it, but could barely scratch the surface, obviously.

I plan to use a REC709 calibrated Grade 2 field monitor on the shoot to help me evaluate scenes for lighting, color and etc. It has HD-SDI inputs, obviously. My question is this:

What color & gamma space does RED output over it's HD-SDI by default? Is it already set to output REC709 or does it output RGB and I need to manually set it to REC709 through the video menu somehow?

The manual was contradictory on this subject. Thanks in advance.

[Stuart English]

Hi Reinis.

The camera outputs REC 709 as a default color setting.

The difference between the REC 709 and REDspace settings is gamma.

We recommend that you use the latter when shooting to help protect your highlights.

[Peter Hodgins]

From page 20 of the build 17 manual .....

When in playback, all cursors will be disabled, and the camera provides a clean feed of the recorded
video signal at 1280 x 720 resolution on the Preview HD-SDI and HDMI outputs.
Depending on the capture frame rate, pull down will be added to create a standard 1280 x 720
progressive scan 59.94Hz or 50.00 Hz high definition video signal. At this time there is no embedded
SMPTE timecode on either the Preview HD-SDI or HDMI outputs, however they both
include 4 independent channels of 24-bit 48KHz audio.
Note: If PLAYBACK MODE preference is set to 1080p, HD Preview HD-SDI and HDMI outputs
switch 1920 x 1080p progressive scan 10-bit 4:2:2 at 23.98, 24.00, 25.00 or 29.97 fps.
Note: If PLAYBACK LOOK preference is set to CLIP, the color adjust metadata will be read
fro the recorded clip. If set to CAMERA it will be taken from the current camera settings.

(.... my bold type .....)

also if I understand correctly ....

Note the RED-EVF and RED-LCD use factory preset values

[Reinis Traidas]

Thanks guys.


Note: If PLAYBACK LOOK preference is set to CLIP, the color adjust metadata will be read
fro the recorded clip. If set to CAMERA it will be taken from the current camera settings.

This is really good to know.