• Tobia Montanari – Memory Colors: an essential tool for Colorists

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    https://www.tobiamontanari.com/memory-colors-an-essential-tool-for-colorists/

     

    “Memory colors are colors that are universally associated with specific objects, elements or scenes in our environment. They are the colors that we expect to see in specific situations: these colors are based on our expectation of how certain objects should look based on our past experiences and memories.

     

    For instance, we associate specific hues, saturation and brightness values with human skintones and a slight variation can significantly affect the way we perceive a scene.

     

    Similarly, we expect blue skies to have a particular hue, green trees to be a specific shade and so on.

     

    Memory colors live inside of our brains and we often impose them onto what we see. By considering them during the grading process, the resulting image will be more visually appealing and won’t distract the viewer from the intended message of the story. Even a slight deviation from memory colors in a movie can create a sense of discordance, ultimately detracting from the viewer’s experience.”

  • sRGB vs REC709 – An introduction and FFmpeg implementations

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    1. Basic Comparison

    • What they are
      • sRGB: A standard “web”/computer-display RGB color space defined by IEC 61966-2-1. It’s used for most monitors, cameras, printers, and the vast majority of images on the Internet.
      • Rec. 709: An HD-video color space defined by ITU-R BT.709. It’s the go-to standard for HDTV broadcasts, Blu-ray discs, and professional video pipelines.
    • Why they exist
      • sRGB: Ensures consistent colors across different consumer devices (PCs, phones, webcams).
      • Rec. 709: Ensures consistent colors across video production and playback chains (cameras → editing → broadcast → TV).
    • What you’ll see
      • On your desktop or phone, images tagged sRGB will look “right” without extra tweaking.
      • On an HDTV or video-editing timeline, footage tagged Rec. 709 will display accurate contrast and hue on broadcast-grade monitors.

    2. Digging Deeper

    FeaturesRGBRec. 709
    White pointD65 (6504 K), same for bothD65 (6504 K)
    Primaries (x,y)R: (0.640, 0.330) G: (0.300, 0.600) B: (0.150, 0.060)R: (0.640, 0.330) G: (0.300, 0.600) B: (0.150, 0.060)
    Gamut sizeIdentical triangle on CIE 1931 chartIdentical to sRGB
    Gamma / transferPiecewise curve: approximate 2.2 with linear toePure power-law γ≈2.4 (often approximated as 2.2 in practice)
    Matrix coefficientsN/A (pure RGB usage)Y = 0.2126 R + 0.7152 G + 0.0722 B (Rec. 709 matrix)
    Typical bit-depth8-bit/channel (with 16-bit variants)8-bit/channel (10-bit for professional video)
    Usage metadataTagged as “sRGB” in image files (PNG, JPEG, etc.)Tagged as “bt709” in video containers (MP4, MOV)
    Color rangeFull-range RGB (0–255)Studio-range Y′CbCr (Y′ [16–235], Cb/Cr [16–240])


    Why the Small Differences Matter

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