“Blinded By The Light: A Case Study Of HDR Integration In Animation Production” by Caria, Macha, Northcott and Agland
Conference:
Type(s):
Title:
- Blinded By The Light: A Case Study Of HDR Integration In Animation Production
Session/Category Title:
- Enlightening and Moving Workflows
Presenter(s)/Author(s):
Moderator(s):
Abstract:
This talk explores the challenges faced by Netflix Animation Studios in implementing HDR (High Dynamic Range) technology in artist workflows, through an internal animated short film project Sole Mates serving as a case study. We discuss overcoming software and hard- ware integration constraints, specifically the lack of native HDR support in Linux-based DCC applications when not using dedicated video output, as well as the limited availability of suitable display hardware. Our approach involved developing technical solutions, namely SDR simulation for UI elements and tailored ACES display transforms. These efforts supported creative workflows, enabling artists to work interactively with HDR imagery.
References:
[1] Steve Agland, Jakub Jeziorski, Manuel Macha, Simon Bunker, Francesco Sansoni, and Eoin Murphy. 2020. Grip and Filament: A USD-Based Lighting Workflow. In ACM SIGGRAPH 2020 Talks (Virtual Event, USA) (SIGGRAPH ’20). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 33, 2 pages.
[2] Jon-Patrick Collins and Anno Schachner. 2024. Nucleus: A Design System for Animation and VFX Applications. In Proceedings of the 2024 Digital Production Symposium (Denver, CO, USA) (DigiPro ’24). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 4, 10 pages.
[3] Adam Jackson. 2020. Support HDR. Retrieved Feb 14, 2025 from https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/xorg/xserver/-/issues/1037#note_521100
[4] Tania Pouli and Joshua Pines. 2016. HDR content creation: creative and technical challenges. In ACM SIGGRAPH 2016 Courses (Anaheim, California) (SIGGRAPH ’16). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 14, 82 pages.
