Would love it if the UI colors could be more customizable

Grading HDR is a challenge at times. I find the Pr scopes not particularly helpful and have been pushing for some changes to them.

And as Baffy19 has posted over and over, it would be helpful if we had a fourth color wheel and more control over the ranges each tool affects.

Neil

It sounds like you're referring to ASBL more than ABL, although yes, both can be particular issues in different situations. I am using a LG C2, and I have ASBL turned off through the service menu, a process that Vincent Teoh demonstrates on his channel sometimes, so it doesn't dim in static or dark scenes. ABL however can not be turned off. That will kick in if the APL is particularly bright, and is per refresh, not a gradual dimming. Thankfully, it tends to be fairly uncommon to have bright highlights covering so much of the screen at once for ABL to be a major concern for grading. Despite the higher peaks, the APL in HDR content tends to be even darker in many cases than SDR, particularly because of HDR's ability to handle shadows so well like you said.

Of course, there's also the issue of the C2 only having so much dynamic range. Unfortunately, I don't have anywhere near the kind of money you'd need to have substantially brighter highlights while also maintaining deep dark and accurate shadows. Have to work with what I can afford. I can still push highlights above my monitor's capabilities, by focusing primarily on the way shadows and midtones look first and foremost, and bringing the highlights to a level that feels naturally bright from within the limits of the display despite clipping, and then temporarily bringing the exposure down to get a better idea of how those brighter highlights look relative to the darker elements, and making adjustments from there. It's not perfect, but switching back and forth can give you a decent idea of the relative dynamic range, and allows you to keep an eye on the overall look of the highlights, despite the lower exposure. 

The vast majority of the highlight detail will fit within my display's dynamic range without needing to compress it unnaturally, so that final step is really just for fine tuning anyway. 

Interesting suggestions. Personally, I always vote for giving users more choices.

Quick question ... what are you grading on? I ask because for that precise level of work, any regular computer monitor or TV is going to be a problem. Because ... ABL.

One of the wondrous things my many colorist buds have found is how rich the shadows can be in HDR. And that it is often more 'delicious' to set up awesome shadows then BRIGHT colors. But there are limits, right?

Vincent Teogh set up a good test situation for the very dark House of Dragons ep a couple months back. An LG TV (as I recall) with the ABL turned off as much as possible,  side by side with a Sony BVM reference monitor, with a high-end Klein spectro and also outboard scopes on the signal.

Even though one scene was giving a top signal for "graphics white" below 20 nits, with speculars topping out at 25 or so, the scene was pretty 'static' for brightness. It stayed relatively the same for like 10 minutes.

On the LG, after around 30 seconds the ABL was clearly kicking in, and the screen darkened considerably. And after a couple minutes it darkened to the point where the brightest pixels were around 12 nits, most of the 'general' content around 6 nits or lower.

On the Sony BVM HDR reference monitor, that of course wasn't an issue. The scene was dark but you could actually see what was going on. IF you were in a black room, of course.

As he commented, given the clear limitations of the hardware many consumers would be using, the "artistic intentions" of the creators were irrelevant. Because as demonstrated, the typical hardware used by the consumser viewing the show interfered with that "intent".

I've seen experienced colorists note that, to get around ABL, they routinely and intentionally mix brightnesses of their Dolbyvision grades at least a moderate amount, every so often. What a total ... pain.

Neil