Here's How to Color Match Canon C70 and C300 Mark III Footage

I rented the C70 for several shoots. I was excited to use one of the latest Canon cinema cameras, because I’m seriously considering purchasing it along with a Ronin RS 2 to be my B-cam/gimbal cam alongside the Canon C300 MK III.

When it comes to the C70, I loved operating it on the gimbal, especially with the Canon EF-EOS R 0.71x adapter to give it that wide, full-frame feel.  However, when I used the camera on a two-cam shoot in a studio, I felt like the two cameras weren’t matching as well as I expected. I wanted to see if what my eyes were telling me was correct, so I did a series of tests in my studio. 

My friend Caleb Wojcik loaned me two of his Canon C70s, one with the standard EF to RF adapter and one with the 0.71x adapter, so I could also see if the 0.71x adapter was affecting the image at all since it adds another piece of glass into the mix.

Check out the results.

The Test

In my first round of tests, I put Canon EF 50mm F1.4 lenses on both cameras, placed them side by side, and shot the same scene on every setting I could think of, but as you see in the video, the images did not look the same.

The mistake I made was not using the same lens on both cameras. Even if the lens is the same make and model, image characteristics can vary from lens to lens. I fixed my error and filmed three separate rounds of testing using the same lens to ensure that the results were accurate and consistent.

The results surprised me, but since I was able to pinpoint what the cameras were doing via the RGB waveform and vectorscope, I’m confident that I now know what I need to do to each camera to get them to match.

I hope you find this video helpful, and if you have any questions, make sure to leave them in the comments!

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