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Stevelong03
Participant
June 15, 2020
Question

Does Apple Pro Display XDR support Premiere Pro 2020?

  • June 15, 2020
  • 3 replies
  • 3057 views

Can I use the Reference Mode offerd by Apple Pro Display XDR for color grading in Premiere Pro? I have only one display connected Mac Pro 2019 via thunderbolt 3.

I mean both SDR & HDR color grading.

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3 replies

A
Andy 1968
Inspiring
February 18, 2021

If your final outout is to ATSC broadcast complaint hardware then the Apple XDR monitor is not your best bet. There is a difference between RGB and YUV. You would want a broadcast compliant monitor capable of playing interlaced video since most broadcast is done at 1080i. That is why people use the AJA and BMD poducts. If your final output is to Digital Cenima or Netflix then that is a different standard altogether. Apple should not have compared a computer montitor to highend video monitors designed for broadcast standards and digital cinema standards. That is not to say the XDR monitor is no good. The video below might be worth watching.



W
Wehrfalke
Participating Frequently
February 19, 2021

Hey Andy1968. 

 

No, the most work I do isn't for broadcast. But the most work I do is in the Rec. 709 Color space. So 1080i isn't luckily a problem for me. Thanks for your video; I will have a look at it. 

R Neil Haugen
R Neil Haugen
Legend
February 19, 2021

One of the most thorough, professionally done reviews of the XDR was very clear that it is NOT suited for grading HDR material at all, not even close to what is needed for pro b-cast HDR controls.

 

However ... he found that amazingly, the SDR/Rec.709 on the thing, when properly set, was vastly superior to any other Mac Retina monitor he'd tested. In fact, fairly close to qualifying for the official grade 1 broadcast monitor specs. Although you can get a full Flanders or Eizo grade 1 monitor for about the same cash. Which are both user-calibratable and at full b-cast grade 1 specs.

 

Neil

Everyone's mileage always varies ...
R Neil Haugen
R Neil Haugen
Legend
June 17, 2020

Chris,

 

As noted elseswhere, I "spend time" daily working with/communicating with colorists. In "pro" work, that is essentially broadcast/longform, it's still needing around/above a $30,000 monitor connected via external boxes for actually being acceptable for grading HDR work. (Never gonna be in my budget.)

 

The Apple XDR monitor is considered a joke as far as HDR grading is concerned, it has relatively few dimming zones and blooming is very, very notable on that monitor. You have much in the way of distributed speculars, your blacks jump up to shadowy mud in those areas. Not at all acceptable for grading any "pro" work for say Netflix.

 

However ... the Apple XDR monitor is their one and only monitor that handles Rec.709 very nicely, interesting that it is. A couple of the pro colorist's reviews have noted their surprise that it actually seemed to handle all the things that the Mac ColorSync utility combined with the Retina displays get wrong about actual real Rec.709.

 

Maybe that shouldn't be that big a surprise in some ways, as the price is about that of a typical Grade 1 Reference monitor for broadcast use. But the software/firmware handling Rec.709 so perfectly, that was unexpected.

 

Up until a few months back, the only way to get any full-screen out from Resolve was through BM gear, you couldn't get out for that through a GPU. For years, I'd been running three monitors including a transmit-out full screen in Premiere, but could only run two GUI screens in Resolve.

 

They all have their little "things". As they are clearly working on expanding their HDR work, especially with major changes rolled out in about three ways over the last what, 9 months or so ... I think it's pretty clear that getting more HDR capability out is a priority.

 

There are also half a billion other priorities also ... like the whole bug/stability/performance thing app-wide that Manalov was brought in to get after. And which they've been chasing hard. I'll give them another few months on HDR monitoring 'native' in the Program monitor.

 

Neil

Everyone's mileage always varies ...
    W
    Wehrfalke
    Participating Frequently
    February 18, 2021

    Hey Neil, 
     
    I'm going to have to take this up. I have an XDR display and am pretty happy with it (knowing its limitations). But I was so hoping to use it for some SDR work with Premiere CC. And unfortunately again, the same or at least similar problems as when working with the iMac Pro display and Premiere CC. Working in Premiere seems fine, but after rendering, the image is brighter, the colors are off, it seems to be a gamma shift issue.  How did your pro colorists come to the conclusion that working in SDR with the XDR display and Premiere CC works? Maybe I'm doing something wrong. Is there a hidden option that I need to enable?
    After applying the gamma correction effect to a layer above (15) the clip and rendering.... the result looks the same as in the Premiere preview, also with QuickTime Player and after uploading to Vimeo (Tested in Safari and Chrome) and on my OELD TV a more or less identical image. So what the heck is Premiere CC doing if not applying the layer with the correction effect? Maybe you or someone else can help?
    I was so hoping to finally get a working SDR workflow with the XDR display and Premiere. Here is some more information about my system:

     

    computer: Macbook Air M1
    monitor: Apple XDR Display
    OS: Big Sur 11.2
    Premiere CC 14.9 & Premiere Pro Beta

     

    cheers Falko

     

    R Neil Haugen
    R Neil Haugen
    Legend
    February 18, 2021

    The colorists noting that the Apple XDR display can actually be calibrated for decent SDR work ... were not comparing the image after export from Premiere by playing back within anything 'touched' by the Mac OS "ColorSync" color manglement utility. They were comparing it to the image played back through their BM/AJA kit to a proper grade-1 reference monitor. Outside of the Mac color controls.

     

    The images tracked pretty tightly.

     

    Now ... if playing on a Mac using most any player/browser, you will hit the problem that the Mac's color manglement app doesn't apply both the scene and display transforms as required for standards-compliant Rec.709. ColorSync does not apply the required display transform function to the image, for some reason only known within Apple and never publicly shared.

     

    Plus ColorSync will apply what Apple calls "sRGB gamma" ... but actually it's between 1.95 and 1.96 mostly sort of. The proper gamma for Rec.709 in 'semi-dark room' (required for pro broadcast work) is 2.4, and 2.2 is specified for "bright room working".

     

    Premiere Pro simply applies the full Rec.709 standards to the file on export ... the Mac mis-applies standards on playback ... so you can't see exactly what the b-cast standard image really is. Yea, that's a pain.

     

    Neil

    Everyone's mileage always varies ...
    chrisw44157881
    chrisw44157881
    Inspiring
    June 17, 2020

    Ya know, its funny to me. even after all the Extended Dynamic Range Monitoring for imac pro retina displays,  XDR monitor incompatibility and still needing an aja card, HLG timeline support, PQ export support, etc.

     

    You'd think adobe would actually make HDR a priority to actually view HDR...

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