What is the best ACES workflow for VFX and more

Hello Emil,
welcome to ACEScentral. I have been myself wondering the same questions as you are. I work in a CG studio in paris and have been studying ACES for cg for over a year. Hopefully, some of my insight might help you.

  • For rendering, the best rendering space is ACEScg. Some tests have been done by Thomas Mansencal and Anders Langlands to compare renders in ACEScg, Rec.709 and Spectral. Result is : ACEScg is overall the best rendering space as it is closer to Spectral Rendering. Here are the links.
  • We use ACES2065-1 for delivery to DI. The exr coming from our render engine are in ACEScg but the exr coming from Nuke are in ACES2065-1 as it is the recommended format for exchange between facilities.
  • I would never render in ACES2065-1 since Steve Agland from Animal Logic did those tests showing it was not an appropriate colorspace for rendering.
  • To use properly ACES, you need a software that can read an OCIO configuration like Maya, Nuke, Guerilla Render… Unfortunately Photoshop does not accept OCIO configs and this is why we need to use ICC profiles. Does Unity accept OCIO config ? It seems like it is not the case. We have the same issue with Substance where we have to use an exr as a display LUT to simulate the ACES ODT look.
  • Have you read those threads on ACEScentral ? About Photoshop and Full CG ACES workflow.
  • Finally, I have tried Resolve recently and i was able to import some ACEScg footage in it without any issue. I can look back for the configuration if you want.
  • Do you know about this article ? it may be helpful.

Hope that helps and welcome to the ACES community,
Chris

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