Welcome Matrice Pilots!
Join our free DJI Matrice community today!
Sign up

How to get exposure correct in EI Mode?

Joined
Jul 6, 2014
Messages
314
Reaction score
147
I am shocked at how little information is provided by DJI on EI Mode.

If you are using EI Mode, how do you get the proper exposure? Do you disable EI, calculate the exposure with the histogram and waveform, lock it, then enable EI mode? Or do you enable EI mode, and calculate the exposure from the flat image?

This video has a download link for the original EI mode file:


I downloaded it and opened it in Premiere Pro CC. The image is flat as expected, and the waveform tool shows that the darkest parts are at 30%, and the brightest parts are at 80%. The resulting graded image looks perfect.

So should I calculate the exposure so that the highlights max out at 80%, according to the live waveform?

Thanks.
 
I have stumbled my way into an answer.

The solution is on the camera settings page. The other camera settings page; not the one where you set aperture, shutter speed, ISO, etc. The one where you select EI Mode, ProRes, raw, etc.

There is an option on the right called SD/Liveview Looks. Set it to Rec.709, and the Go app will display a corrected image, with a correspondingly corrected histogram and waveform. This image and these exposure aids can be used to attain proper exposure. The ProRes or RAW footage recorded to the SSD will not have this look; it will continue to have the flat/desatured image expected in EI Mode.

I verified this with the TV production company I am currently flying for. I set my exposure based on the Rec.709 waveform, recorded a short clip, and sent it to them for review. They confirmed that the EI/D-Log footage was properly exposed.

My challenge to all: please show me where this setting is documented by DJI.

Thanks.
 
Thanks InterMurph. This makes sense as it's how many many pro digital cinema cameras work - with a Monitor LUT allowing you to correctly expose RAW footage. Surprising there isn't more detail from DJI about this though.
 

Members online

No members online now.

Forum statistics

Threads
2,726
Messages
25,386
Members
5,599
Latest member
ctfulgham