2020-11-17

Owned by Michael Dolan
Feb 23, 2021
6 min read

November 17, 2020

Host: Michael Dolan

Attendees:

  • [X] Mark Boorer (TSC) - Industrial Light & Magic

  • [X] Michael Dolan (TSC Chair) - Epic Games

  • [X] Carol Payne (TSC) - Netflix

  • [X] Doug Walker (TSC Chief Architect) - Autodesk

  • [X] Matthias Scharfenberg - Industrial Light & Magic

  • [X] Dennis Adams - Sony

  • [X] Thomas Mansencal - Weta Digital

  • [X] Christophe Brejon

  • [X] Deke Kincaid - Digital Domain

  • [X] Allie Moon - Industrial Light & Magic

  • [X] Kevin Wheatley (TSC) - Framestore

  • [X] Zach Lewis - Method

  • [X] Alex Forsythe - A.M.P.A.S.

  • [X] J Schulte - Industrial Light & Magic

  • [X] Matthias Scharfenberg - Industrial Light & Magic

Apologies: *

OCIO Configs Working Group Meeting Notes

  • OCIO output transform implementation:

    • Doug: Working on PR to do something similar to ACES color space transforms. Add builtin transforms to facilitate making ACES config, etc. Involves mapping ACES output transform structure to OCIO structure.

      • See slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1sLyY8Q4JVkM6TqDHbqq9OWAW0zNcwvJQnh_jCtM4JHU/edit?usp=sharing

      • Plan is to map ACES 1.0 and 1.1 output transforms into OCIO v2 structure. Reduces code and makes it clear how the ACES transforms are defined. Moving linearCV to outputCV section of CTL into its own transform. Transforms which have similar calculations would share components in OCIO.

      • Naming can be discussed. Table is just straw-man for group discussion.

    • Alex: So primaries don't come into play until clamping happens?

    • Doug: Yes. Last slide has summary of all view transforms and display color spaces. display color spaces are very simple - basically matrix and gamma, or matrix and EOTF. Working on PR for this, but wanted to share high level thought process.

    • Mark: What is the PR for?

    • Doug: To add builtin transforms outlined in the slides. Each view transform would become a builtin transform. PR only on the OCIO repo (not configs repo).

    • Mark: Does this mean we have multiple display referred spaces, and some outputs attached to each one? Or are they associated with specific displays?

    • Doug: In display/view section of config. For example, "Rec. 709" display/view with "ACES 1.0 SDR-video" view transform, and "Rec. 709" display color space. Each would have name, view transform, and display color space. Down in 'view_transform' section of config would have the view transforms with a transform referencing builtin transform (see slides).

    • Mark: Shame that so many view transforms are required, due to gamut limiting and simming. Not a nice common space for them all to go through, like OCES for example. Can limits not be done on display end after transform?

    • Doug: Could be done that way. Depends what we think of as a display color space. Would take things from view transforms and move to display color spaces (limits, etc.). Did it the current way because it's nicer to keep display color spaces as simple matrix/gamma transform. The limiting and white poiont simulating parts are more of the view rather than part of Rec. 709/Rec. 2020, etc. Display color spaces kept as simple pure display specs.

    • Mark: Under assumption that with separate view transforms, the graph would be simpler. But with the complexity, why even need the view transform? Rather than going direct from scene to display?

    • Doug: This is more flexible. Allows adding other combinations not in aces-dev repo. Right now aces-dev doesn't have D60 sim on Rec. 2020 monitor. If someone needs that there's no way to do it. With this, that could be done easily.

    • Mark: That would need to be explicitly added to the config right?

    • Doug: Need to decide what we need to do with ACES config. Could be faithful mapping of things just in aces-dev repo. And a studio config with the other parts in the current ACES configs. Would be a choice for config author to make. The building blocks are there.

    • J: Know trying to map CTL to OCIO. There are lot of color spaces that use limited output, but we would never use the limited output. Adds a lot of extra outputs.

    • Doug: These are convenance things for people that want to work that way. Common request that people don't want to put colors out that they can't preview on their device. Goes against original ACES design intent, which was to preserve all of the colors. In practice post production doesn't want to take risk on out of gamut colors and clamp.

    • Kevin: Artistic intent to clamp in range sometimes, in DI.

    • J: Yes, we master to an explicit target with no room for misinterpretation.

    • Michael: The idea too is that the config generator would be configurable. Definitely the studio config, but we could also make the reference config configurable to include/exclude certain transforms, like limited outputs.

    • Doug: Could also make them inactive, and just turn them on, wouldn't need to re-generate. Either way fine though.

    • Carol: Get the reasoning for adding ACES version to the naming, but also don't know how much that's going to be relevant to people. For change control mechanism?

    • Kevin: Runs risk of comparing versions and saying one is better than other.

    • Mark: Need it to support revisions. Very internal pieces.

    • Carol: Would version config with transforms usually.

    • Doug: Name of builtin transform definitely have version in it, but only seen by config author. Good point that for user facing parts, do we need the version in there?

    • Matthias: If the SDR transform hasn't changed and we're on new version, means that the SDR transform is still same for new version. Consistent version number that matches latest version of ACES release. If all taken from same ACES version, use current name, instead of old name.

    • Mark: Can alias them between versions and have same math if that helps people. Gives flexibility for building version specific configs.

    • Kevin: Version number change makes sense when look changes.

    • Mark: Would be nice if you could make a config based on specific ACES version, aliasing versions to keep them up to date.

    • Doug: One concern on ACES side about the transform ID. Thomas pulls name from the ID, which has persistent name for things like ACES metadata file. Wouldn't want to bump the ID version unless the code changed, but not a user facing name. For ID strings, shouldn't bump version, but for user facing things we need to figure out something thats not confusing.

    • Mark: Config authors are also users. Currently no mapping from ID strings to builtin transforms.

    • Doug: Correct, no direct mapping. Tried to demonstrate that in slides. Thomas is filtering some of the names. Kept it simpler for presentation, but agree that builtin transform code should have full transform id string.

    • Mark: If someone really has to understand history - the way ACES config code was structured at time. We have generator that sees both worlds. If you remove half from users, will have no idea.

    • Doug: That's behind string proposals in slides. But need to decide as group.

    • Michael: Could we store that in format metadata? accessible from API?

    • Doug: Yes, could create description tags in format metadata. More human readable name and include data from CTL which has a lot of great information.

    • Thomas: Being put in description right now.

    • J: A UI bomb for tools that use it.

    • Michael: Will it be 1:1 transform -> CTL?

    • Mark: Hard to keep that link because of the view/display split. Breaks that relationship. Free then to put whatever comment you like.

    • Doug: For input and color space conversion side, more 1:1. For output transform would need table.

  • ACES transform spreadsheet:

    • Another item we previously discussed was creating a spreadsheet with all ACES transforms, where we could discuss what should be included in the reference config.

    • Mark: Can take names from Doug's slides as well?

    • Kevin: For lib itself, would these transforms introduce new ops? Or black boxes?

    • Mark: Black boxes, implemented however we like. Either existing ops or on the fly 1D or 3D LUT.

    • Doug: No 3D LUTs in builtin transforms. Goal is to move beyond 3D LUT limitations. Big limitation in current config. Have ops now (fixed function, etc.) added for this purpose, which is faithful to CTL itself.

    • Kevin: Tradeoff between the black box and being able to understand that it is doing what the CTL is doing.

    • Doug: Will be very clear, mapping from ops to the CTL. That will be in the PR, and I can show corresponding YAML to help. Should show this comparison in meeting at some point.

    • Mark: Already quite a few implemented in OCIO source, under builtin transform folder.

    • Kevin: It's a bit opaque.

    • Mark: Its a black box by design, not having to think about how to add all the pieces to get an ACES config. Opting to have the pre-made collection of transforms.

    • Doug: convenience for config authors. If someone looks at the internals, could manually put all the pieces in the config yourself to be more transparent. Could have a builtin transform and more exposed version which lists individual ops. Would be long and verbose, but clearer for those who want to understand each step.

    • For next week let's get a spreadsheet populated so we can discuss config contents.

    • Mark: Can we link empty sapreadsheet in notes?

    • Spreadsheet for next discussion: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1SXPt-USy3HlV2G2qAvh9zit6ZCINDOlfKT07yXJdWLg/edit?usp=sharing