How to stylize a video like HDR style?

[Maxim Chernousov]

Hi Community

I would like to stylize my video to look like HDR.

For photos, creating an HDR image requires taking several shots at different exposures and merging them using special software.

Is there a simple way to achieve this with video? Does it require shooting multiple versions of the video at different exposures? This isn't always feasible, as scene content may change, and not all cameras allow manual exposure adjustments.

I've seen samples of HDR video on YouTube that were likely shot from a single source rather than merged from several. Are there some software to stylize any video as HDR, or is it necessary to use specialized cameras?

[R Neil Haugen]

No. Period. No.

Now that we have that out of the way, please understand when you transition from stills to video, you must leave most of your expectations and assmptions for how things work behind.

I've had a long pro portrait studio/environmental career behind me, over 40 years. I was technically one of the more knowledgeable portrait photogs around the profession. We had over 20 years of running a full wet lab to do our own color and black and white printing in-house, and did competition prints for many pro photographers getting things ready for PPA competitions.

Note, we were expensive for that service ... you came to us because you wanted to win ... and were willin' to pay.

Our first Photoshop was Cs4.5, used with a flatbed scanner, for copy & restoration work, mid--90s. We were also one of the first professional studios on the west coast to go into full digital production, around 2002, at least a year before we should have done so. Oh ... well ... we got very good at fixing in Photoshop fast. Started with Lightroom's public beta 0.8. Yea, been there.

I started into video and video post a bit over a decade back, thinking it would be very similar. Just ... no. Not even close.

In stills you can create wide dynamic range tonally via stacked exposures. As you note. But that is not possible in video production!

In video, you need to both shoot in an HDR format, and then have the proper gear and knowledge to work in HDR ... which at this time, is still the total Wild Wild West.

I work for/with/teach pro colorists, including the team that Dolby hired to do the inhouse training video program for using DolbyVision HDR in Resolve for broadcast and streaming deliveries. I'm a contributing author on MixingLight, a pro colorist's subscription teaching website and group. I'm around the practical discussions of HDR on a daily basis.

Most colorists still have not delivered a single paid gig in an HDR format. And realisticallyt, most screens that say they do HDR video, only do one or two of the several competing formats. And probably do not do the formats they do handle as you would expect they would. So a lot of professionally produced media is still total Rec.709.

That will change over the next couple years, I'd expected it to change faster. But producing video HDR, that displays as expected across devices, is still pretty hit & miss. Sadly.

[Maxim Chernousov]

Thank, Nail, for the answer. Your experience is impressive.

I’m realize that there are a lot of difficulties with HDR in video. But my ambitions are more modest. I just would like stylize video that it looks like HDR. I don’t want just modify color palette with LUT or curves because it makes picture too saturated and not realistic.

In Photoshop these are some plugins which let stylize picture like a HDR. Especially, I like a feature named “Dramatic Light” that lets to prove some hidden structures and details on picture like clouds, reflections and etc. (not just increase sharpness but rather increase some frequencies of details). Like on  the illustration in attach.

Few years ago, I’ve met an AfterEffect plugin (if I’m not mistaken the author was a Japanese). But this plugin works slowly and there were many bad artifacts on picture like white halo around dark objects and etc. This cannot be used even on miniDV resolution and quality was poor and as result I don’t want to use it.

I hope, since then some progress should be in this field and maybe some common solution already exists and can be recommended

[R Neil Haugen]

As noted, I work for/with/teach pro colorists. I'm involved in long discussions about HDR workflows and realistically, the many problems inherent in each at this time.

The short answer is ... there isn't anything in video like unto the stylized HDR 'look' in stills. As you note, at least, anything acceptable.

The display of video is the limiting factor here. Rec.709 is limited to sRGB color space and volume/gamut, and also 100 nits brightness when displayed on a high-end calibrated screen. You can't "push" more values into the file for display. That's it, period.

And  while many screens these days will actually splay it out there at 250 or even 300 nits, the tonal range is still the same, just parlayed over more screen values. So if anything, it will lessen the apparent contrast of the file.

The only way to get video to "appear" as HDR, is to actually shoot and do righteous post work in an HDR environment, with fully HDR capable gear. I could spend an hour writing all the various pitfalls pro colorists have to deal with doing this. And yea, even "rank amateurs" can get out some things that on some screens look pretty freaking awesome.

But getting HDR out, so that it looks good across a lot of even the screens that can do several forms of HDR, is the trick ... still.

It can be done, yes ... but it takes some work on your part to get there.

[Maxim Chernousov]

all this sounds pessimistic 😞
My first attempts to make a HDR video was in 2008 years. And it is sadly to see that there is no progress since this time in this direction. 

[R Neil Haugen]

It's neither pessimistic nor optimistic. This is freakishly different tech, and it simply takes a while to sort out what works practically.

We've been through something like three completely different screen technologies as the manufacturers are trying to find something that is capable of both wide color volumes and gamuts, along with wider dynamic range. 

There have been two continually difficult issues ... solving uneven screen color/brightness in manufacturing processes, and inability to hold wide brightness/color ranges for any length of time without damage to or failure of the screen in use.

Quantam Dot tech seems to be the current answer, and is the form of Flander's new and incredible HDR Grade 1 Reference monitors ... and even more amazingly, is the incredibly low price ... like the Flanders XMP310, a 31" HDR mastering monitor, and is only $10,995. 

That is about the finest mastering monitor ... like it's larger siblings ... but at under $11G, it's less than half of what you needed to spend a year ago.

Unfortunately, all current TVs and computer monitors in the more "affordable" ranges have internal processing to 1) protect the screen from burn-in/over-heating and 2) "enhance the viewing experience!" ... both of which can not be completely turned off. Even with the "technician's remote". 

So the screen will shift overall and regional brightness and contrast, up and down, while playing. Especially as it has say a bright segment of the image, it will slowly dim that region down.

Think of that ... you're working on a clip, it's got some pretty bright stuff, and some other things that need color/tonal attention ... so you spend a couple minutes on it, and it looks good. 

Now you play it back without stopping, and ... it ain't the same! Yep. You didn't notice that it was dimming on you, so you kept brightening the bright thing. Which on general playback at full speed is now well over-bright from what you wanted.

That's one of the reasons it is so hard to do HDR video production without those spendy actual reference monitors. Which have been between $23,000 and $35,000 up until the new Flanders series was released last spring.

So when the screen you are relying on for grading your HDR is constantly, slowly shifting ... it's not a great tool. Yea, you can get by, and for "playing" with it, go for it! ... just understand the limitations of the tech available.

And that doesn't even talk about the general user screens out there ... which again, have been made by tons of different companies, have different specs, all have variances from "expected" as a normal part of manufacturing capabilities ... such as screen uniformity problems, color shift due to temperature changes locally across the screen, simply 'off' pixels, let alone hardware processor variances, OS variances, user settings screwups, all that sort of normal "out in the public use" stuff.

Now ... overlay that with several different forms of HDR ... DolbyVision (DV) as the high-end, down to HLG or HDR-10 on general computer/TV screen/device use ... but the color space/volumes are all over the place.

Let's se P3 as the "center", one of the wider currently possible color volumes. Much pro media is actually done as say "Rec.2084 limited to P3" or some variant of that ... well, X screen does "close to 100% P3" ... except that means it doesn't actually do the whole thing, and that "10%" you're missing won't be the same color segment ... hues ... as on another screen's 'missing' volume.

And most screens that claim P3 capabilities have the ability to use P3 data, but not really the full capability to reproduce the full range of P3 color. And again, every screen out there ... not just between different models, but within each screen model, will produce a slightly to notably different color display of the same image.

And again, that's of the screens claiming P3 compatibility! Most screens out there are simply incapable of reproducing a decently large portion of P3 accurately. And as it takes time to have older tech things go out of use, this will be an issue for some years yet.

Newer tech screens will be better at this, but it will be years to get them into wider use, and there will always be huge variants in the reality of the displayed image screen to screen. We simply cannot manufacture at a level to get past that ... it isn't phsyically possible.

All that said, every colorist I know wants to get into the Future and do mostly HDR as soon as possible.

It just isn't possible to do that easily, at moderate cost, at this time. But that is what they want to get to. Currently, there are quite a few colorists saying to their clients, "Ok, this is an SDR production; but how about I do the grade in Dolbyvision (DV) ... and a trim pass to SDR for your current release needs, meaning that this production has an archived DV form when you want to update?" ... as a way to encourage their clients to move forward.

The biggest problem is cost though. Even a 48" LG C3 screen, run from a Decklink card, and calibrated as best possible for DV work is gonna run over $4,000 after calibration costs. That's hiring the calibration service, not paying for $5G of calibration spectros. And it won't be a guaranteed setup for any broadcast work, though ... it might be possible to squeak by with it.

And that will be limited to 1,000 nits max, probably wiser to stick to 800 or under. But that is reality at this time.

I saw my stuff on a full-on HDR reference monitor for the first time at the 2019 NAB/Vegas show, where I presented on Premiere Pro's color management in the FlandersFSI/MixingLight booth. Between the DV guy from Dolby Labs and Alexis Van Hurkman's presentation on his new indie HDR film ... not that that was an intimidating slot to be in!

But just ... wow ... I knew the presentations were going to be on a large Flanders HDR reference monitor, a brand new model of the time ... so I'd set my brightest stuff up around 800 nights, and stepping out front to look at it was ... wow.

Visually ... just ... yea, I want that too! .... but ... five years later, and I still can't justify the cost within my business of a full-on HDR grading setup. THAT ... is frustrating. But I can't argue the bottom line stuff. It just is, hardcore data. Sigh.

[AlphaPlugins · Accepted solution]

Hi LesnLord

I think you are looking for something like AlphaPlugins HDR Enhanced plugin. This tool allows you to stylize SDR video as pseudo-HDR. I hope my answer will be useful to you

[R Neil Haugen]

Thanks for posting, that's an interesting plugin!

[Maxim Chernousov]

Mannyy thannksss @AEX&ProUser!

It is very close that I was finding in this forum. The AlphaPlugins HDR Enhanced is indeed a fascinating tool that leaves a positive impression, starting from its smart installer and extending to its balanced set of parameters.

I tested a demo version of HDR Enhanced on a video made with my iPhone and edited in Premiere Pro 2024.

First of all, the plugin works in real-time on my Mac. I can process even 4K video on the fly, which is a pleasure.

Secondly, HDR Enhanced allows to create the desired "Dramatic Light" effect with video, even though there isn't a parameter specifically named as such.

However, I should mention that the effect doesn’t significantly extend the color range of the video. While there are a few parameters for color saturation, it seems that this is not the main feature of the plugin. This may be due to limitations with video codecs that prevent extending the color range while still maintaining a realistic picture. Additionally, if you increase the details too much, some MPEG artifacts may become noticeable. However, in most cases, there is no need to move the details slider too far to the right; the middle position of the parameter range is usually sufficient to produce stunning effects.

In conclusion, I can say that the AlphaPlugins HDR Enhanced plugin is a helpful and useful tool. It’s clear that the plugin was created professionally, taking into account many nuances that may not be obvious at first glance but become essential during the workflow. I hope to use this in my work to enrich videos with HDR looks.

[R Neil Haugen]

Well, that's the problem, isn't it? There are several parts to video production and display, and you can't get around them as you can in stills. As you found, the color  space/volume in video formats isn't malleable, as it is in stills. The brightness range is also limited, as it is not in stills.

And the display of the image is also strictly controlled, which it is not in stills.

Changes to those three issues are all required to really re-create the HDR stills stylized look. But you can't do them in video.

I know all about 'HDR' stills. I've done them. It involves at it's most basic leaving behind the sRGB color space, for something larger, and more capable of color in bright areas. Such as ProPhoto, or even AdobeRGB.

And of course, 'stacking' exposures of differing brightness was done in the past, simply because the cameras could not record a wider dynamic ... brightness ... range. Many cameras can capture enough DR now that stacking isn't necessary for many stills workers. 

But whether you use stacked images or simply a wide DR camera, you have a lot of 'extra' values, a much wider range of brightnesses. At least to start. And perhaps, depending on your choices, you would go for a high-contrast look which actually compresses some of the DR, but still looks ... big.

And color is per-image in stills work, both working and displaying.

In stills you are not limited in either really by anything. As both DR and color are per-image no matter the method of display.

In video, each format has very specific rules and limits in use. And very strict limits for display usage on all screens. 

In video, we have two main "formats" only ... SDR, meaning Rec.709, and HDR, done in different apps and screens in several non-conforming and different ways.

HDR can be produced among the several competing forms of HLG, PQ, HDR10/+, and DolbyVision ... DV.

But each has very specific display transforms and limitations.

Let's look at any attempt to do the stylized 'HDR Look' as has been done in stills, staying in SDR/Rec.709.

First, brightness range .... there's a strict limit on the brightness range according to the standard, which you cannot exceed and keep any data showing in the display. Past that, you get clipped whites or 'crushed' blacks, neither showing any detail. Just gone.

So yes, you can try to create some of the well, "packed" high-contrast look of stills HDR, but you still have a very finite range of screen values to work within.

Now let's take the color issue. In SDR/Rec.709 work, the brighter values simply cannot hold much saturation. Period. Color is only a 'strong' thing in the upper shadows through upper mids. It diminishes rapidly upper mids up, and lower mids to black.

Even in the most saturated mid-tones, you still do not have the color volume/gamut to amp up color that much. Because of the lmiitations of the sRGB color space/volume/gamut.

So you can push contrast and saturation, but only within rather limiting limits. As past those, all data is simply lost. Period. Crushed blacks, clipped whites, and harshly banded color.

So that's why the above plugins and practices can go so far but ... not really get where you want to go.

Working in full-on HDR formats in video production is the only way to actually do it, and well ... good luck!

I work for/with/teach pro colorists, including the team DolbyLabs hired to create Dolby's in-house DV training for colorists. I work with and around some of the more early adopters of HDR video professionally. They are total adherents of migrating to HDR for anything as soon as possible.

And they are all commenting about how it is still so frustratingly the Wild Wild West. Competing formats, very few screens do more than two of the four or so, and those that do too often don't do them all that well.

And still ... the majority of screens can't really do HDR at all.

So yea, it's coming ... but the present is very frustrating. Most professional colorists have yet to do a paid gig in full-on HDR. I do expect that to start changing finally, but that's reality now.

I first saw my video media on a really high-end HDR screen, while presenting a program at NAB 2019 ... and ... WOW!!!!!!!!

I assumed, as did we all, that soon, it would be everywhere.

Almost five and half years later, and finally, Flanders FSI has an actual, shipping full-on reference monitor under $10G, with everything else near $20G to $30G still.

And consumer screens are still ... well ... wildly variable is being polite. Yea, I'm frustrated.

[Maxim Chernousov]

I have the impression that we are talking about different effects.

R Nail talks about real HDR and some high range of color gamut, which is unachievable on video without special equipment.

My wishes were to simply emulate a pseudo HDR effect, which can look like HRD even on regular SDR monitors. And I think that the AlphaPlugins HDR Enhanced plugin copes with this task.

Of course, the result is not real HDR (and I agree with R Nail that this is currently impossible). But in general, the plugin's result can enrich the processed video by making it look unusual and saturated. I am not talking about color saturation (these functions are optional in the plugin), but about increasing the details and some structural elements of the picture, which are not very expressive in the original video, but are enhanced in the resulting one. And this is not just sharpness, but rather the detection of spatial 2D objects and their enhancement. That's how I see it.

[R Neil Haugen]

I quite understand what you want to do. I've had a career in pro stills for 30+ years before transitioning to pro video post a bit more than a decade ago. I watched the stills faux-HDR look from the beginnings, the first few images that popped into PPA competitions. We knew some of the photographers doing that then-pioneering work. Many years ago now.

So of course, we had to try that immediately. And as we knew the people doing it, we asked for information and went after doing some ourselves. Because we always pushed image capabilities. Back in the film days, we had our own wet lab with staff highly trained in what we'd been able to accomplish. We routinely produced production prints that the big pro portrait labs said couldn't be done in a custom process.

We were the first high-end studio in the northwest to go full digital, leaving out RB67 ProS gear with 220 roll film in the cases ... in 2002, about a year before we should have.

The Missus is still working her portrait studio, that I started many years ago. And doing a lot of highly stylized workflows involving a lot of the 'crunchier' look similar to the faux-HDR look we've seen in all those PPA contests over the years. We're both PPA lifetimers, M. Photog., Craftsman, CPP for "status" or whatever. Been around that type of stills post processing, done it many times.

And as someone who ... now ... works for/with/teaches pro colorists, who are mainly based in Resolve, I work heavily on the color side of things. Especially, how to accomplish in Premiere what the colorists working in Resolve do, and often don't think can be done in Premiere.

So I push the color controls of both apps around daily, have done that for the last decade.

And working so closely, so long, with some of the top teaching colorists in the world has been a fascinating and deeply informative 'ride'. As they get way deep into the technical under-the-hood stuff as a normal part of explaining any color working.

And this of course heavily covers the limitations and capabilities of all media, spaces, tools, displays, everything. Including ... how to push the stylization of an image to any conceivable place. And quite bluntly, how to fake anything that you can't really do, so as to be no never-mind in the end.

I am used to demonstrating doing a series of things in Premiere, that mimics high-end work in Resolve enough, that you cannot tell the difference after H.264 compression. Showing stuff done in Premiere that stuns Resolve based colorists. And yes, that includes pushing saturation for both image basics, luminance and chrominance, to the max possible. Without breaking the image in clipped, crushed, or banded data.

(And you really need to understand how the image is two, separate, different parts, luminance and chrominance, to do advanced workflows. Just ... to make sure anyone reading this understands.)

The stuff I've done in stills in Photoshop, to make faux-HDR ... can be done, especially in a PQ working space. Which is now a standard thing in Premiere 2025, which will switch from public beta to the main "shipping" release version, first day of Adobe MAX, probably October 14. You can test the public beta now, alongside the current shipping release as always.

But that full look, the crunchy, spectacular thing ... isn't quite doable in SDR video due to primarily the saturation limits in the upper values. You can mostly mimic the crunchy contrasty stuff, and the mids/lower region color, but ... the upper color values are simply "pale" compared to what I can get in Photoshop with a stills image. But then, that's normally in ProPhoto RGB I think. 

I'm both a totally practical guy, and pretty darn picky for tonal/hue/color things of the image. I often see minor things that others don't. I'm used to that. And I know pretty much the technical limits of what is doable and tend to understand the underlying reasons for those limits better than most.

You might get a faux-HDR image you're quite pleased with, that I might see and think ... dang, still can't get that splashy feel to the colors of the near-white things ... so I'd be critical of the image, not because it's not a "good" image, but because ... I can see where it doesn't quite get all the way 'there'.

[Maxim Chernousov]

If true HDR is still not achievable for video, I am optimistic that AI will help solve this problem in the near future. I think it is already technically possible, it is just that no one has trained a network for this effect yet. If AI can smoothly increase the resolution of video and can colorize black and white videos, then I see no reason why AI cannot increase the color range of video.

But until no one has created this AI tool, the AlphaPlugins plugin is the only way to make fake HDR on video with acceptable quality.

[R Neil Haugen]

Apparently you mis-read, perhaps? As I've said, full HDR is quite possible, if somewhat still problematic.

It's just that the faux-HDR look in SDR video that is also difficult, compared to stills, because of the limitations inherent in the sRGB color space and dynamic range of SDR/Rec.709 specifications.

Full HDR in HLG and PQ are quite well included in Premiere, and will have even more 'native' settings in the 25.x series due out around the 14th, the first day of Adobe MAX.

[Maxim Chernousov]

Does this mean that a future PremierePro release will contain some kind of tool for creating HDR video and playing it on SDR screens? Even if the video is just a regular SDR shot from a regular EOS camera? Will the new PremierePro features only be about color range or will they also improve spatial detail?

[R Neil Haugen]

I think you are still trying to think as if this is stills ... which doesn't have set color spaces and transforms for all display uses.

A stills image in display on most any screen will work. And stills formats are more widely accepted on most devices.

Video has set display transforms for specific file types. If you don't have the required transform process available in a device, the device may or may not play the file back at all, and will not play it correctly.

That doesn't have squat to do with Premiere, it's all about the devices and what they can display correctly.