16 Bit Float Imports and Workflow, Does It Really Exist or Just Pretend?

[ryan]

I've never seen an Autodesk tutorial on working with half-float elements and anytime I try to import them, they come in with some god awful LUT that crushes everything down.  Before I give up and considering it's standard practice in VFX to work with 32-bit float CG renders in comps, I'm inqiuring here to see if there really is a practical workflow to comp in Smoke at at least half this bit depth; as seems to be advertised.

[ArtifactDesign]

I primarily comp in Smoke, and render out of maya linear srgb.  Works fine.  When I'm in connect fx i use the read node rather than using built in file managament/media hub.  it automatically comes in with gamma correction, so they look normal srgb, but if you want to work linear, you can either use the built in lut on the read node (which is sometimes slow), or use the lut node.  So you can either use the built in gamma controls to degamma them back to linear, or use the color transforms.  Then set your viewer window to linear.  

Chris

[ryan]

Hi Chris:

I'm already working linear in 16b FP, no no need to convert to linear.  I checked out all the LUTs, absolutely none of them match up with the correct look.

[ArtifactDesign]

Hey Ryan,

See attached.  This is how I do it.  Hope this works for you.

Image 1.  This is what I see in Maya.  It renders out as linear sRGB, but when I bring them into Smoke, they default to 2.2 gamma even though I can open them in photoshop, and they read as 1.0.  No biggie, all the info is there.

Image 2.  I apply a Lut Editor node.  And in the gamma field I plug in .4545, which inverts the 2.2 gamma curve and brings the colors back to linear.  Then I change the viewer to "linear (sRGB)".  You won't see this without first enabling in the preferences in the LUT tab.  As you can see, it's identical to the the 2.2 gamma screencap, so you know it's correct.

Maybe I misinterpreted your question?  Hope this is what you're looking for.

Chris