Color Correcting the Dragon Box - 3 Part Spectacular

[Lorium_O]

The rocks here for example are too red, all the colors are really far from how they should look, is a disaster


Here your white balance is absolutely terrible


My corrections are far from being perfect of course, but I think that you have really no idea how to do a good color correction.
How can you criticize someone else's work when you are that bad? It's so funny

My guy I made a nice and friendly critique trying to help you understand your mistakes. I'm happy you recognized them, but you were a bit rude to me .


I'd like to talk about something though...

The 2nd pic you posted was from somebody else, you mistook him for me.
I even tried explaining it in a reply.

My previous color corrections didn't have me using the same tools I have access to now, and the first pic you posted was a quick cc I made using a laptop.

Again, this cc right here IS NOT MINE:


You mistook it for mine, but someone else posted that.


Also:

"but i think you have no idea how to do a color correction"

-Trachta 2022

Aren't you the same guy who said the cel colors are the intended look? Using DBsuper as proof?

Whatever.


Thing is, I DID improve on color correction, and I believe it shows with my most recent one:

R2J DBOX:
https://i.imgur.com/acEsll0.png

CC:
https://i.imgur.com/7bRipBw.png

The increase in the gamma is needed if you want to fix the colors, in the source some colors are too much darker than it should be

You are absolutely right, but your increase in gamma is just way too high, it causes artifacts and washed out colors. Just try to tone down a little.

How can you criticize someone's work when you are that bad?

It's the same way non-animators critique animations. If they know how animation works and how it should be made, critiquing someone's skill shouldn't have anything to do with THEIR skill. Knowledge is what makes a critique, not being more skillful.

[Tamagon]

I'm not much of an anime expert, but reading the last few pages of this thread kinda reminds me of those arguments people have over retro video games and if they need to be on a CRT TV (or post-processing to make it look like a CRT) to look good. Like so: https://twitter.com/CRTpixels/status/14 ... 3214616587.

There's always gonna be subjectivity when trying to convert something made for analog to digital. I can understand why some people would wanna only look at cels for color correction since its straight from the artists, even if they knew that the colors would be warped in the final broadcast. It's something objective you can point at, and there's some precedent for it in the industry (Cardcaptor Sakura does it for its BD release, and Mazinger Z does it too).

That all being said, vanner64's color corrections look very nice. Definitely better than everyone having the skin of lobsters

[vanner64]

I'm not much of an anime expert, but reading the last few pages of this thread kinda reminds me of those arguments people have over retro video games and if they need to be on a CRT TV (or post-processing to make it look like a CRT) to look good. Like so: https://twitter.com/CRTpixels/status/14 ... 3214616587.

There's always gonna be subjectivity when trying to convert something made for analog to digital. I can understand why some people would wanna only look at cels for color correction since its straight from the artists, even if they knew that the colors would be warped in the final broadcast. It's something objective you can point at, and there's some precedent for it in the industry (Cardcaptor Sakura does it for its BD release, and Mazinger Z does it too).

That all being said, vanner64's color corrections look very nice. Definitely better than everyone having the skin of lobsters

Well said, and thanks for using an actual example anyone can check.

Enjoy some examples from the first episode:

Goku Before

Spoiler:

Goku After

Spoiler:

Goku and Bulma Before

Spoiler:

Goku and Bulma After

Spoiler:

I was a tad lazy and didn't grab the exact same frames, but it shows how bad and green the older DB episodes look and how much they can be improved upon.

[Pride9000!!!]

vanner64 I definitely agree with the methods you guys use to CC, as it gives good results and it's very simple and effective. People often over complicate things and do unnecessary things to achieve good colours.

Here's some of my CC

https://imgsli.com/MTExNjA4

https://imgsli.com/MTExNjEw

https://imgsli.com/MTExNjA5

I know no one asked but why not explain. I do my cc in Premiere Pro

How do I do my CC well I first correct the contrast (whites, blacks, midtones) (most people don't do this) sometimes the footage is too dark so I have to brighten up a bit. And sometimes the blacks are very grayish so I darken it a little. I use the waveform monitor as my guide and just color picker (the last number out of the three the luminance).

The next step is the white balance. it can be done two ways one is to do it manually by adjusting the manually the temperature and the tint and using the RGB parade as a reference point and just color picker (the middle number the saturation). The second method is to do it pretty much automatically by clicking the drop tool on a white area and it will automatically do it for you, the second method is far faster and more accurate but if you have no white colour in the image the first method is the way to go.

Third step is to fix the hues, saturation and a bit of the luminance of the individual colours, I fix the overall image as much as I can if I want to go really specific I'll mask it out and then fix it. And that's pretty much it.

It's not complicated it's not hard it just takes time, and a bit of practise.

in my opinion when anyone has to do a CC they have to use at least some references: Cels, promotional material, broadcast, a home release with good colours...

I think this is pretty close to cel like, what are you guys think?

D-Box https://i.imgur.com/10QKQAo.png

Cel https://i.imgur.com/3Ekn0Ln.jpg

CC https://i.imgur.com/7vJpquY.png

[vanner64]

How do I do my CC well I first correct the contrast (whites, blacks, midtones) (most people don't do this) sometimes the footage is too dark so I have to brighten up a bit...

The next step is the white balance...

Third step is to fix the hues...

in my opinion when anyone has to do a CC they have to use at least some references: Cels, promotional material, broadcast, a home release with good colours...

Yeah you pretty much nailed how we've been doing it. When people miss the white balance and contrast, that's how you end up with color corrections that give characters weird green eyes. And yes, a mix of references is absolutely the way to go.

Regarding contrast, one of the biggest challenges we're facing now is touching up "bleached" episodes of Dragon Ball. "Bleached" refers to that overly bright, high contrast image. Dragon Ball episodes 109 and 110 are examples of this. While we do have a "first draft" color correction of the entire series, we're taking some time to fix these particular issues. I believe your third CC example may be from one of these episodes, or at least shows the problem with the source I am talking about.

[jjgp1112]

How do I do my CC well I first correct the contrast (whites, blacks, midtones) (most people don't do this) sometimes the footage is too dark so I have to brighten up a bit...

The next step is the white balance...

Third step is to fix the hues...

in my opinion when anyone has to do a CC they have to use at least some references: Cels, promotional material, broadcast, a home release with good colours...

Yeah you pretty much nailed how we've been doing it. When people miss the white balance and contrast, that's how you end up with color corrections that give characters weird green eyes. And yes, a mix of references is absolutely the way to go.

Regarding contrast, one of the biggest challenges we're facing now is touching up "bleached" episodes of Dragon Ball. "Bleached" refers to that overly bright, high contrast image. Dragon Ball episodes 109 and 110 are examples of this. While we do have a "first draft" color correction of the entire series, we're taking some time to fix these particular issues. I believe your third CC example may be from one of these episodes, or at least shows the problem with the source I am talking about.

Yeah, you can see it in Goku's eyes in that third cap - when the whites are that blown out, you have to do the white balance with extra care or else it'll look distorted. He took the best solution and even still it ends up looking noticeably weird; just really hard to get around.

[Pride9000!!!]

For anyone interested here's how the individual images look when they're done, https://slow.pics/c/KO6oifDQ

From what I have observed, early parts of OG DB are really grayish and very low brightness the waveform is very much compressed, but in king piccolo saga for some reason the image is way too bright it it's almost crushed whites. https://i.imgur.com/qU0owyD.png

it's very hard to fix it properly. I mean you can make it better but not ideal https://imgsli.com/MTExNjU4

[roseofpain]

Is there any way to get the images from the first post reuploaded again?

[nward50987]

New CC's I did! Let me know what you guys think!
https://imgsli.com/MTExODc4

https://imgsli.com/MTExODc2

https://imgsli.com/MTExODc5

[Pride9000!!!]

New CC's I did! Let me know what you guys think!
https://imgsli.com/MTExODc4

https://imgsli.com/MTExODc2

https://imgsli.com/MTExODc5

Those are pretty good attempts. The white balance is fixed and the hues are pretty good. But I do have to say that the luminance (the brightness) is way too high on the first and third cc. Oh and kid Goku's gi it's supposed to be red not orange.

Here's how I would do those 3 images, (sorry for the tournament one not being the same frame)

https://imgsli.com/MTEyODUy

https://imgsli.com/MTEyODUx

https://imgsli.com/MTEyODUz

[nward50987]

New CC's I did! Let me know what you guys think!
https://imgsli.com/MTExODc4

https://imgsli.com/MTExODc2

https://imgsli.com/MTExODc5

Those are pretty good attempts. The white balance is fixed and the hues are pretty good. But I do have to say that the luminance (the brightness) is way too high on the first and third cc. Oh and kid Goku's gi it's supposed to be red not orange.

Here's how I would do those 3 images, (sorry for the tournament one not being the same frame)

https://imgsli.com/MTEyODUy

https://imgsli.com/MTEyODUx

https://imgsli.com/MTEyODUz

(The tournament frame is great! It was a better shot than mines.) Thank you for telling me about the brightness! I'm still working on that! Also, I didn't know kid Goku's gi was red and not orange. I thought it was orange because Funi's releases and few other medias have Goku's gi as orange. I'll make sure to keep note of that! Again, thanks for telling me about the brightness and especially kid Goku's gi.

[supersaiyamangod]

(The tournament frame is great! It was a better shot than mines.) Thank you for telling me about the brightness! I'm still working on that! Also, I didn't know kid Goku's gi was red and not orange. I thought it was orange because Funi's releases and few other medias have Goku's gi as orange. I'll make sure to keep note of that! Again, thanks for telling me about the brightness and especially kid Goku's gi.


Technically the orange is the correct color toriyama wanted it to be orange from the start of the first tournament in dragon ball toei screwed up technically.

[roseofpain]

Has anyone been able to fix some other things besides color correcting?

Like dot crawl, edge enhancement, chroma correcting, etc.?

[jaisonas]

Has anyone been able to fix some other things besides color correcting?

Like dot crawl, edge enhancement, chroma correcting, etc.?

I think the most qualified here is Ikaos and his team. Most of that stuff is done with avisynth

[ikaos]

Has anyone been able to fix some other things besides color correcting?

Like dot crawl, edge enhancement, chroma correcting, etc.?

I think the most qualified here is Ikaos and his team. Most of that stuff is done with avisynth

Short answer is yes, although I can't really get into specifics on this forum for obvious reasons.

[VegettoEX]

Not quite sure I understand your response. There's nothing wrong with sharing, for example, specific tricks you use, things to look out for that someone fresh to the trade might not know to look for, and/or even specific strings within your AVIsynth scripting.

[vanner64]

Has anyone been able to fix some other things besides color correcting?

Like dot crawl, edge enhancement, chroma correcting, etc.?

I think the most qualified here is Ikaos and his team. Most of that stuff is done with avisynth

Sure, check out the images here https://slow.pics/c/tosudz4Q R2J is Japanese DVDs, SoM Merge is the improved version.

I'll highlight a specific area. Notice the chromatic aberration in her hair and eyes:

Spoiler:

Now improved:

Spoiler:

[ikaos]

Not quite sure I understand your response. There's nothing wrong with sharing, for example, specific tricks you use, things to look out for that someone fresh to the trade might not know to look for, and/or even specific strings within your AVIsynth scripting.

I didn't do the work myself, someone else in my group did, but yeah avisynth was used. I can share some of the screenshots of the work that we did. I know that it involved lots of code and filtering since the Dragon Boxes have quite a lot of authoring and encoding issues. They actually ended up combining both Dragon Box sources (R1 and R2J) to get the most out of the masters.

https://slow.pics/c/D8CrfuXV

*EDIT Vanner also went into it a bit above me.

[FPSSJ4_Goku]

snip

I...don't see a difference at all

[ikaos]

snip

I...don't see a difference at all

Look at the green tint around the lines of her hair and eyes, also her skin is generally kind of blotchy with green spots in the raw DBOX, all of which are a product of chromatic abberation, which is removed in our version.