AOV group 'Light mix node' compositing in AE

Tue Apr 04, 2023 5:53 pm

Hello its me again,

I am testing the 'Light Mix Node' AOV preset for a project.

When I composite all my Lights passes in After Effect I have a slight color difference compared to my beauty pass. It looks slightly darker.

I am using the ACES tone mapping option in the Imager as well as render my passes in EXR(Octane) 16 bits.
I tried Screen mode, Linear Dodge mode and almost every kind of project setting possible in After Effects, still can't get the exact same result as my beauty.
My beauty seems correct, same as the live viewer.
It seems that after compositing it loses the ACES response curve and end up a bit more burned out than my beauty.

You can see my setting on the attached screenshots.

What may I do wrong?

Tue Apr 04, 2023 7:05 pm

Hi J,

jeremyshin wrote: I am using the ACES tone mapping option in the Imager

There goes the source of the issue. TL;DR: EXR export = "sans camera imager" aka: nearly all of the options in it are being bypassed when exporting an EXR.

jeremyshin wrote: It seems that after compositing it loses the ACES response curve and end up a bit more burned out than my beauty.

It's not a response curve but that's a topic for an other day.

Bookmark this: Octane ACES & Octane Color Management. And for more content.

Tue Apr 04, 2023 7:38 pm

Thank you Elsksa!

See attachement picture, is it what you are talking about?

So, if I want to have my AOV passes correct, I need to go through the standard ACES workflow with the openio file, am I right?

Then this means the 'ACES Tone Mapping' in the imager is just a 'fake' ACES and should be used just for straight renders, no compositing? pretty confusing

Wed Apr 05, 2023 10:52 am

jeremyshin wrote: See attachement picture, is it what you are talking about?

Yep.

jeremyshin wrote: So, if I want to have my AOV passes correct, I need to go through the standard ACES workflow with the openio file, am I right?

TL;DR: EXR or AOVs implies that the camera-imager will be bypassed, thus leading to reproducing the "color-management" identically in post. The OCIO tools in-software (renderers/3D DCCs) is only present for
1. previewing purposes
2. exporting preview with "baked looks" aka baking the look of whatever "color encoding system" to a non-linear integer file format (e.g. web ready JPG).

jeremyshin wrote: Then this means the 'ACES Tone Mapping' in the imager is just a 'fake' ACES and should be used just for straight renders, no compositing? pretty confusing

Indeed. As mentioned on the page, it's a hard-coded native implementation of the ACES sRGB ODT (v1.2), therefore, not requiring OCIO (config-file) to be loaded.

I've updated the page to avoid ambiguity.