Camera matching

[Irri]

I am trying to match the appearance of 2 different cameras. We shot colour charts on both and matched the colours and shades by hand, but I was wondering if there is a program that would do this automatically and generate a sort of LUT.

[Blaire Johnson]

If the cameras start out differently, a single LUT won't help. Matching 2 cameras is something you'll have to do by creating a separate base look for both cameras that match them, then you can create your "look" from there. That is why it is important that your 1st AC's make sure they have the same aperture.

This is a manual process that requires a high level of skill and knowledge, which is why Colorists get paid upwards of $500/hr.

[Dan Hudgins]

Using different optics, lenses, filters, etc. on two cameras from one shot to another should require some manual tuch up.

Another issue is mixed K value light, if you shoot two camera one camera will see a face with high K and the other with low K, so you would want to balance the shots by eye rather from some automatic thing, since other parts of the frame would go off balance if you match the flesh tones.

Some IR filters are uneven as to how much IR they block with angle of view, so if you have a 50mm on one camera and a 25mm on the other, the color will not match in the center and corrner of the frame for both cameras unless you do a mask that matches the falloff of the filter by angle of view.

How much off are your two cameras? Can you shoot the same gray card, and make a split sample image?