Avoiding HDR Calamities: What are the Sneaky Pitfalls I'm Missing?

Hey everyone,

I'm an aerial cinematographer, usually flying an ALEXA Mini with Canon cine primes, and I'm pushing more into HDR delivery on some commercial projects. We're talking big brand clients, so the stakes are high. While I feel good about capturing and exposing for HDR on set, often using a SmallHD Cine 7 in HDR mode, I'm finding the post-production workflow can be a minefield of potential issues.

I'm increasingly worried about critical pitfalls I might be overlooking. Things like treating HDR as 'brighter SDR' in the grade, or making the mistake of grading SDR-first and then trying to push it into an HDR space. I'm also concerned about on-set monitoring, are there common ways people are accidentally feeding Rec.709 LUTs into HDR monitors, and what does that actually look like to avoid?

What are the most critical mistakes you've seen or made when working with HDR, especially coming from an SDR-centric background?