Grey ball and X-rite colour checker passport

[DPS]

Excuse the dumbass question - but.... would this be the correct swatch for which to get my local hardware store to colour match me some paint?

[joconnell]

That'd do nicely alright. What you want from them is being colour neutral for starters, the second thing is being an appropriate level of grey so that you can see the difference between the light and dark side. If you're on a night set or something very darkly lit, you may find a medium grey ball is too dark to register much so you're better off having a white ball too.

Your chart is the only absolute, measured value that you're going to use - the ball is less precise so you're more trying to go for ratios of how bright the light is compared to the dark and also if the various shadow and highlight colours hitting the ball have any colour tint to them.

[DPS]

Thanks - I've since found this book to have answers:

High Dynamic Range Imaging: Acquisition, Display, and Image-Based Lighting

[joconnell]

Awesome - just ordered the HDRI handbook myself, your one is written by most of the kings of the subject, let me know how it goes!

[DPS]

Yep will do - and no doubt I'll be around here with a few questions as the information begins to sink in.

The HDR handbook is also very good.