Stephen Hullfish

• Editing and producing since 1984.

• Editing on Avid since 1992.
• 10 years at The Oprah Winfrey Show and
Bill Kurtis Productions. National Emmy.
• Founding class of Avid Master Editors 1996
• Symphony beta team in 1997. First saw
color correction tools.
• Trained by a Da Vinci colorist on Avid
 My background
• Worked 10 years for Oprah.
• Worked for VeggieTales for two years as a
producer and editor.
• Started my own company. Mostly Christian
clients. Train NBC Sports, Turner, MLS.
Consult for Tektronix, Fujifilm, Avid and
Adobe. I have color corrected several
documentaries.
• Co-edited “Courageous” and Kendricks’
next movie “War Room.”
 Why is color grading
important?
• Color correction is one of the best ways to
contribute to a project that clients and
viewers will NOTICE.
• I am a good editor, but rarely did clients see
something I did that made them feel that
my skill was special or unique.
• When I color corrected, though, clients
noticed the contribution and many times
were amazed with the results.
What are the goals of
color correction?
• Proper tonal range or “contrast.”
• Proper “color balance”
• Match shots so edit appears seamless
• Provide emotional context like music
• Help tell the story (Kodak Barn example)
• Direct viewer’s eye
• Make it look cool, unique, hold attention
Basic Principles of CC
• To best GRADE an image, you need to be
able to ANALYZE the image.
• There are many tools to help you analyze
the image and you should always be
checking them against each other.
• Ways to analyze: Using your eyes looking
at a reference monitor, a waveform
monitor, an RGB color picker, a histogram.
 Analyzing
• Using your eyes, they are inexperienced
and can be fooled and can be tired or
“drift.” (Give the early CC room example)
• You need something to act as a firm mark
for what is the correct brightness or
blackness or color. Sunlight, 6000Kelvin light
patch, white or black border.
• Imagine trying to adjust audio to match
over the course of an hour-long show
without a VU meter.
 Analyzing
• Looking at a grading monitor, which can be
mis-calibrated or inadequate.
• The surround environment matters. The
colors around the monitor will affect how
you see the colors inside the monitor.
• The lighting in the room of course affects
the way the colors are seen as well. The
monitor is 6000 or 6500 Kelvin. The room
lighting should match.
Analyzing
 Analyzing
• You do this with scopes which are “the
bible” and confirm any of the above
conditions.
• External scopes are best. The most useful
scope is an RGB Parade Waveform monitor
but also vectorscope and gamut scopes
• RGB selection (eyedropper)
• Histograms
How we will learn and
what we will learn
• We will learn the tools and methods to
analyze the image first.You must
understand what is wrong, to fix it.
• We will learn the tools and methods to
change the image. We will look at many
tools in many pieces of software and see
how the tools in one software are similar
to the tools in other software.
How we will learn and
what we will learn
• We will learn how to decide which method
for analyzing the image works best for you
and which methods work best for a
particular shot.
• We will learn how to decide which tools
work best for you and which work best for
a particular shot or image problem.
How we will learn and
what we will learn
• Hapkido example.
• We will learn how to combine multiple
tools and techniques to create complex
looks and solve difficult image problems.
• How to budget your time to get all your
work done.
The first thing is Tonal
Range or “Contrast”
• With some exceptions, the goal is to
maximize the tonal range with blacks at
their lowest legal limit and whites at their
highest legal limit.
• Most CC calculations are based on the
tonal range so this is the first place you
should start. Especially establishing blacks.
(also called setup, pedestal or shadows)
Play through your clip

• We’re dealing with moving images.

Highlights and shadows can change
throughout a clip. Be careful of specular
highlights.
Highlights and shadows

• Highlights are sometimes referred to as

Gain or Whites.
• Shadows are sometimes referred to as
Pedestal, Set-up, or Blacks.
 Gamma
• Gamma has a few different meanings that
are all related. The basic meaning of the
word is “curve.” Gamma is also commonly
used to describe a midtone. This is related
because if you change the midtone, you are
adjusting the curve of the line from white
to black. Gamma can be used to set a look.
How rich or bright the image is is largely
based on the gamma.
 Gamma anatomy
• The toe is the bottom part of the gamma
curve. It helps control detail in the
shadows.
• The knee is at the top of the gamma curve
and helps control gamma. The knee “point”
is the point where the curve starts and the
knee “slope” is the angle of the curve after
that point.
 Gamma trick
• The “S” curve gamma is one of the great,
quick tricks in color correction.
• Place a point about 25% to 33% of the way
from the bottom of the Luma curve and
pull down just a bit. Then place a point
about 25% to 33% of the way from the TOP
of the Luma curve and pull UP just a bit.
• This is the classic “film” gamma curve. Save
this. Drop it on a LOT. Show this later.
 Tonal Range Tools
• Brightness is bad. It raises the black level as
much as the highlights.
• Contrast is bad. It spreads the contrast
equally from a center point so you may get
to the right black level before you get to
the right highlight level
• Best tools are master gain, master gamma
and master lift. (white, black and gray
points)
 Tonal Range Tools
• Curves - RGB and Y Curves.
• Difference between Avid/Adobe curves and
Resolve curves
• Ability to fine-tune tonal ranges
• Ability to soft clip
• Ability to create film-like gamma curves
Practical work on Tonal
Ranges.
• Using a chip chart to get some theoretical
understanding of the goals, let’s see what it
really means to adjust the tonal range of
your images.
• We’ll also work on some real-world images.
• There’s lots more to do, but all we want to
do at first is get the shadows, gammas and
highlights right for now.
Waveform explanation

• A waveform is a pretty complex technical

tool to analyze the video signal. We don’t
have to care about most of these technical
aspects.
• For us, a waveform is simply a graph from
dark to light and left to right.
 Luma Waveform
• Start by understanding where objects in the
image (reference monitor) are on the
waveform monitor.
• Let’s look at a chip chart (camera chart)
and some real world examples and
understand what we’re looking at and how
to identify specific parts of the image on
the scope.
 Luma Waveform
• On the chip chart we need to find each
chip on the waveform monitor. Where is
the grey background on the waveform
monitor?
• On regular footage, where is each element?
Why is this important? Let’s study some
examples.
 Setting Chip Chart
Tonal Ranges
• Where should black be? Black in HD is set
at 0 on a digital waveform monitor. White is
set at 100 (or 700 millivolts).
• Gray, midtones or gamma is really a matter
of taste.
Setting the tonal ranges
with different tools
• Levels (sliders) are a main way. In different
software, these are in different places.
Because they are so important, they are
usually in several places.
• Curves.
Setting tonal ranges on
real footage
• Let’s look at a number of shots and just set
the correct shadow, highlight and mid-tone
ranges.
• We won’t balance the colors or fix anything
else, just set the tonal ranges.
 FOCUS TIP
• This tip applies through ALL of the rest of
the color correction tools work!!!
• For each grade, take the effect TOO FAR.
• Then bring it back TOO FAR IN THE
OTHER DIRECTION.
• Rack the correction back and forth like
focusing a camera, settling on the best look.
• This is also helpful for the client to see.
 Waveform in real life
• Clipping (highlights too bright) and crushing
(shadows too dark) are indicated on the
waveform monitor by thin, flat, tight lines at
the bottom (crushing) and top (clipping) of
the image.
• Clipping and crushing on the histogram is
indicated by a “cliff” or sharp “spike” at the
far left or far right of the histogram.
 Waveform in real life
• One of the ways you know you are taking a
color correction too far is when the top or
bottom of the waveform starts to deform
or change shape.
• The green squiggles on the waveform
monitor are called “the trace.” When the
trace squishes at the top or bottom, you
are losing detail.You may WANT to do that,
but the trace shows you when you start
losing detail.
 Gamma in real life
• With the highlights and shadows set,
gamma or midtones are the next concern
• To me, this is where the real “feel” of the
image is set.
• Rubber band analogy of stretching tonal
ranges between shadows and highlights
using gamma placement.
 Seeing contrast in
curves and scopes
• On a scope, the LESS difference between
the top and the bottom of the trace, the
LESS the contrast. The greater to difference,
the greater the contrast.
• On a Curve, the flatter the curve, the less
the contrast and the steeper the curve, the
greater the contrast.
 Balancing the image
• Balance means that the strengths of the
individual color channels are balanced and
even. White is the perfect balance (equal
amounts) of red, green and blue. Black is
the perfect balance of RGB. Neutral gray is
the perfect balance of RGB.
• Vectorscope. Perfect balance in center.
White, black and gray are all in the middle.
 Vectorscope in 3D
• It may be hard to understand why white,
gray and black are all in the same place.
• Imagine a child’s top. Pointy at both ends,
round in the middle. Saturation (color) is
around the middle. At the top point is
white. At the bottom point is black.
• A vectorscope is looking down on those
cones of color from the top.
RGB Parade waveform
• RGB Parade waveform. Perfect balance
vertically in each tonal range.
• White will be equally high in each color
channel. Gray will be in the middle at the
same height in each color channel. Black
will be at the bottom at the same level in
each color channel.
• Things that are colorful shouldn’t be
balanced.
 Balancing the image

• Histograms can show these same

relationships, but they don’t show
differences in color balance in each tonal
range, like the RGB Waveform can.
• A Histogram only shows a graph of ALL of
the pixels at a certain brightness level.
 RGB Parade
Chip Chart
• A chip chart from left to right has dark
bars, light bars, a series of light to dark
chips, a series of dark to light chips. A super
dark center chip (sometimes) all on a gray
field.
• Why is this important? Because a balanced
image is one where each color channel is
equal in each tonal range. Black, gray and
white all need to be equal vertically.
RGB Parade in real life
• Rarely does anyone shoot a chip chart. But
most real world images have the basic “sign
posts” of a chip chart.You can almost
always find pure white and pure black.
• Be careful of “white” and “black” that could
have a real color cast that is “needed”
• The example would be of a very dark blue
coat that you think is black.
• Be careful of “speculars and of clipped
whites and crushed blacks.
RGB Parade Skin Tones
• Not everything should be balanced. If you
have grass, the green and channel SHOULD
be higher.
• For skin tones, you want to have a nice
straight, slight angle with red highest, green
second and blue lowest. This is because of
reddish skin tones and yellow (red+green)
tones.
 Curves
• Curves are the easiest way to directly
manipulate an RGB Parade image. Each
curve relates exactly to one of the “cells.”
• Other CC tools have sliders for each color
channel tonal range. Avid does not, so we
use Curves.
• Let’s balance the “neutral” chip chart.
 Curves
Protection Points

• Place points on the curve that are NOT

moved to protect the area above or below
the “protection point” from the move of
another point.
 Test your Curve
knowledge

• You can use the eyedroppers to see where

a certain color sits on the Curves. Guess
where the points will land before you click.
 Dangerous Curves

• Points should not be placed too close

together and moves between those points
can’t be moved too much without breaking
down the image.
 Analysis of RGB
• Use the eyedropper to sample
• Compare RGB values similarly to RGB
waveform, but with numeric values instead
of a “graph.”
• Practice with this game
• http://www.rgbchallenge.com
 Matching chips to do
balancing analysis
• In Avid the matching color chips can be
used for analysis, seeing the amount of each
color channel in a black, white or neutral
gray pixel.
• Color chips can be saved in bins and used
for later matches
Analysis by RGB picker
• Clipping and crushing are indicated by
“scrubbing” in an area that you suspect has
no detail due to clipping or crushing and
noticing if the RGB values don’t move
much. If all of the pixels are 100% white or
100% black then the individual RGB values
will all be identical. If they move a bit, that
means there is detail in that area.
 Vectorscope
explanation
• Black,
White and
neutral
gray all
belong in
center.
• Skin Tones
all belong
on the -I
line.
 Vectorscope
explanation

• Vectorscope explains color theory of RGB

primaries and CMY secondary colors and
their relations to each other and as
complementary colors.
 SKIN TONES

• One of the most critical of all colors is the

color of skin.
• There are two easy and important things to
understand about skin. One is done with a
vectorscope.
 Why are skin tones
there?
• Remember RGB values.
• Skin is mostly pinkish and slightly yellowish
• Pink is basically pale red.
• Yellow is the combination of red and green
• So skin should land between red and green,
but closer to red.
 Skin on an RGB
Waveform monitor
• As we showed, skin is mostly red because it
is a combination of red AND yellow which
is made of red and green.
• The color that is NOT in skin is blue, which
is the opposite of yellow.
• But remember R,G and B make up white
which adds to the luminance of the skin.
• So on an RGB Parade it’s a shallow or flat
angle from red to green to blue.
 Hue Offsets or
Color Wheels
• Most common for “real” colorists because
of the speed of use from the control panel.
• If you have panels to be able to move
multiple tonal ranges at the same time, you
save time by moving two controls in
opposite directions, like bringing shadows
down at the same time you bring highlights
up. Or push warmth into the midtones at
the same time you cool down the highlights
 Hue Offsets or
Color Wheels
• When using a vectorscope, the easiest tool
to use for color correction is the Hue
Offset wheels or “color wheels” as some
applications call them.
• WHY? Because the vectorscope is round
and the wheel is round. And a
corresponding move on the wheel
translates exactly to the same movement
on the vectorscope.
 Balancing with
Color Wheels
• It’s necessary to look at the specific
balances of each tonal range, not just the
overall balance.
• Each tonal range should be balanced
separately, sometimes in opposite
directions or in different amounts.
• RGB Parade is easiest place to see, but
Tektronix also has Luma Qualified Vectors.
 Balancing with
Color Wheels
• Move the color wheel the opposite
direction of the perceived color shift or
color cast. If it’s blue, go yellow. If it’s red, go
cyan.
• While moving the cast in a direction be “on
guard” for the color cast too far in that
direction, so while balancing out blue in the
highlights, look at the highlights only and be
careful they don’t go yellow.
 Histograms
• I’m not big on these, but they can be useful.
• There’s no perfect histogram. But a shallow
bell curve would be close.
• Can see misbalances in tonal ranges
• “cliffs” at either end indicate clipping.
• Make sure full Histogram range is full,
extending from one end to the other.
 First Do No Harm
• Like the Hippocratic Oath, don’t hurt the
patient. But sometimes you have to make
an incision (an injury) to fix something else.
• Some color corrections will make it SEEM
worse, but you have to have a plan that
you’re going to go back and fix that
problem with another correction later.
• Always check a “finished” correction
against the original look of the raw source.
 Tektronix Tips
• Presets. Why? Which ones? Create? Recall?
Name? What settings? Import?
• Why they’re better than internal
• Capture. Match. Cursor. Zoom. Reposition
• Gamut displays: Diamond/Spear/Lightning
• Custom Luma Qualified Vector Display
Tabs work in order in
Avid, but also in
Premiere and Resolve
• The processing of the colors works in
sequence from one tab to the next.
• Tabs can be bypassed and reset individually
• In Lumetri panel in Premiere, the flow of
color correction goes from the top “tabs”
to the bottom tabs, ending with vignette.
 Avid Tools
• Media Composer and Symphony differ a bit.
There are more tabs in Symphony, but the
tabs that are in both operate exactly the
same.
 Avid Tools
• In Symphony only, the first tab is SRC
SEGMENT. This allows you to apply color
corrections to a single segment in the
timeline and have them apply to every
other related segment.
• The relationships are Src Segment (the
default), Src Tape, Source Clip Name,
Master Clip and Subclip.
• Also, Program Track and Program Segment
and CC Effect.
 Segment Corrections
in Avid
• These are slightly dangerous.You need to
flatten later corrections so that changes
you make don’t get applied backwards.
• These corrections can be “flattened” so
that they don’t stay linked to previous clips.
• These corrections can also be passed from
one version of an edit to another, so if
there are revisions to the edit, the segment
corrections will apply.
 Avid Tools

• HSL tab in Symphony has three sub-tabs:

• Controls (sliders), Hue Offsets (color
wheels), and Luma Ranges.
• In MC, there is no Luma Range option and
the Controls tab only has a Master Range,
not individual tonal range tabs.
 Avid Tools
• Controls Tab: Hue, Saturation, Brightness,
Contrast, Gain, Gamma, Setup, Clip High>
Clip Low
• You can also invert Luma, Invert Chroma.
• Color matching boxes.
• Match color choices
• Color Buckets
• Auto correction tools
 Avid Tools
• Hue Offsets Tab (Color Wheels): Four
color wheels. One for each tonal range,
plus an overall (Master).
• Each has eyedroppers and numerical value
options and a reset button.
• Also the same tools to the right that were
in the Controls tab, but work a little
differently.
 Avid Tools

• Luma Ranges provides the opportunity in

Symphony to re-define the defauly tonal
range definitions.
• Three Tone option allows you to see the
definitions as shades of black (shadows),
gray (midtones) and white (highlights.
 Luma Ranges
in Avid Symphony
• Luma Ranges “describes” what each tonal
range means. Generally leave these at the
default.
• Can be customized for specific shots.
• Look at black/gray/white image
• Be careful not to have sharp curves
 Avid Tools
• Channels are complex.
• They allow you to define the mixture or
blend of color channels and to replace
certain color channels with other channels
including Luma, Cr, Cb and Offset.
• Usefully, the red, green and blue output
radio buttons allow you to see the solo
output of individual color channels to look
for problems.
 Channels
in Avid Symphony
• Only for severe corrections, personally
• Good for analyzing, just look at output of a
single channel.You can see noise. Usually in
the blue channel.You can see clipping in
individual channels.
• You can fix missing or clipped channels by
blending other channels in, then fixing the
result.
 Avid Tools
• Levels tab is good for people who like
histograms.
• This essentially allows you to manipulate
histograms using sliders or curves.
• You can switch between various color
channels, Composite and Master and Luma
• There is an INPUT side and an OUTPUT
side. These control how they are mapped
to each other.
 Avid Tools
• Curves. There are Curves for each color
channel and for the Master
• Each color channel shows the color and
the complimentary or opposite color.
• Points can be added anywhere. They can be
adjusted numerically
• Also Master Saturation, Master Gain,
Gamma and Setup controls.
 Avid Tools
• Secondaries Tab in Symphony only.
• Left side makes SELECTIONS of colors.
• Right side makes ADJUSTMENT of colors.
 Avid Settings
• 3x3 Averaging
• Eyedropper naming and info
• Safe color indications
• CC Effect default behavior
• Possibly set CC keystrokes - save
correction, CC mode, color buckets, dual
split mode, remove effect
 Avid Safe color
indicator
• Sometimes it’s off because of a slight black
edge around the picture.
• Indicators are yellow for Composite (luma
plus chroma together), white for luma and
RG and B for the RGB gamuts.
• Need indicators in the middle or
completely gone.
 Color Correction UI
• Some additional items about the Avid
Color Correction UI:
• Three monitor Composer view: Previous,
Current and Next. Can be changed to
include Scope, reference and entire
sequence.
• Split view for comparisons.
• Remove effect.
• Jump to prev/next corrected or
uncorrected shot.
 Saving Corrections
in Avid
• Saving corrections to a bin.
• Saving corrections using the buckets.
• Create a bin that you can share between
projects or even editors where you save
looks that can be re-used by simply
dragging and dropping them.
Autocorrections in Avid

• Autocorrections in each tab will result in a

different look. I personally like
autocorrections in the Curves tab the best
because of NaturalMatch.
• Can be a good way to start, but be
prepared to undo and do it from scratch.
 Matching in Avid
• Check Settings - choose 3x3 Averaging
• Click and drag the color chip to the color
pixel you want to sample or match
• Color Chips (samples) can be saved to bins
• The “match” color can be picked from
video or can be created from the color
picker
 Resets and tweaks
in Avid
• Option clicking on blue boxes resets tabs
and/or parameters.
• Each HSL or Curve can be eyedroppered.
• Hue Offset Wheels and Curves can be
adjusted numerically.
 DAY TWO
• Use the eyedropper to sample
• Compare RGB values similarly to RGB
waveform, but with numeric values instead
of a “graph.”
• Practice with this game
• http://www.rgbchallenge.com
 DAY TWO
• Since so many of you are on Premiere, I
want to re-try a few of the corrections we
did in Avid in CS6.
• Let’s try to match the two piano shots in
Premiere, by eye-matching the waveform
monitors and getting the height of each
color channel to match without looking at
the picture.
 DAY TWO
• New rules for the day!
• I am an Avid Master, but I am really just a
“jack of all trades and a master of none”
with most software.
• I have to remember the functionality of not
only dozens of pieces of software and
hardware, but the capabilities of several
versions - like CS6 instead of CS2015.
 DAY TWO
• I point this out because, while I am very
confident in my expertise at general ideas
and in the ways that it’s possible to do
many things in many pieces of software, I
can not know everything.
• I encourage you to raise your hand and
suggest better ways, if I say something and
you think there’s a better way. I will not be
offended at all and the class will be better.
 DAY TWO
• I have been using Premiere Pro since 2002,
but most of my real time editing has been
spent in Final Cut Pro and Avid.
• Most of my color correction time has been
spent in Avid and Apple Color and more
recently in Resolve.
• So please let’s have today be an interactive
day where it’s OK to question the teacher.
 DAY TWO
• Resources:
• If you can read and write English
moderately well, I encourage you to use a
few resources that you may not know exist.
• These are all American resources, but
people of many countries use them all the
time and not all of the English is perfect and
the people on these forums and list serves
are used to imperfect English.
 DAY TWO
• For Adobe Premiere, there is a Facebook
group called Moving to Adobe Premiere. Try
going on to your Facebook account and
signing up if that’s allowed on these
computers.
• There are also several Avid groups on
Facebook. I belong to the Avid Editors of
Facebook page and the Avid-L2.
• Avid-L2 is also a list serve.
 DAY TWO
• Has anyone ever heard of a list serve?
• What it does is it creates a central email
account. In the case of the avid-L2, that
account is Avid-L2@yahoogroups.com.
• You have to go to Yahoo groups to sign up.
• Then whenever you have a question, you
simply send it to that email.
• Then every person around the world who
has subscribed will receive it and can
answer.
 DAY TWO
• This is great free tech support. There are
thousands of people who are subscribed
and they live all over the entire world, so
there’s always somebody awake and off-
work and reading the list at any hour.
• If you know the answer to a question that
you read, you can simply reply. Everyone on
the list will get the reply. This creates a
conversation of people agreeing and
disagreeing and sharing best practices.
 DAY TWO
• There are many list serves for many
purposes. I suggest that you do internet
searches for your favorite software and
interests. They exist for more than just tech
purposes, so you can find them for
gardening and music and travel, etc.
• The list serves that I know about are for
After Effects, Final Cut X, Avid, telecine
(colorists, called TIG), cinematographers
(called CML) producers and others.
 DAY TWO
• The drawback is that it can create an
enormous amount of email, but most of it
you can simply delete or read based on the
subject.
• Also, to help manage this, I created rules in
my email program that automatically send
all of these list serve emails to a separate
folder, so I’m not distracted from important
work emails.
 DAY TWO
• In addition to Facebook and list serves,
there are professional groups on LinkedIn.
These include Avid editors, plain editors,
color correction, After Effects, Producing,
filmmaking, cinematography… check out
LinkedIn for more.
• There are also “user communities” on the
web, usually hosted by the software
companies. These are like the list serves,
but are browser-based. I know there are
communities for Adobe and Avid.
 DAY TWO
• Don’t be shy about using these.Your English
will be good enough, or try a web-based
translator and paste the results into the
forum or list serve. The people who read
them are used to it being a global
community of people whose main language
may not be English.
• The etiquette of these groups is to read
them (lurk) for a while before posting
anything so you get a sense for the
community and the way to respond.
 DAY TWO
• As I promised, today will be about
Premiere. We will start with CS6 controls
and then I want to show you CS2015.You’ll
be on it eventually, and it’s always nice to
see what’s coming next.
• We’ll deal a little bit with Speedgrade, but
at the CS6 level, I don’t like Speedgrade
much, and by CS2015, most of what you
want to do in Speedgrade has been
incorporated directly in Premiere.
 DAY TWO

• As we go through the color correction

tools in Premiere CS6, I want to take time
after each tool to have you play with that
tool with a few different shots and pay
close attention to the scopes while you’re
playing so that you see the effect on the
color channels as well as the effect on the
image.
CC in Premiere

• You can
apply color
corrections
from the
Effect pane.
 STAY in CC Mode
• To speed color correction, select multiple
(all) clips in the timeline and drag your
favorite color correction effects onto ALL
of the clips at the same time. Or double
click an effect with all clips selected.
• Go to Sequence>Selection>Follow
Playhead.
 Favorites Bin
• Create bins of favorite effects
• In the Effects panel, click the New Custom
Bin button , or choose New Custom Bin
from the Effects panel menu. A new
Custom bin appears in the Effects panel.
You can rename it.
• Drag effects to the Custom bin. A copy of
the effect is listed in the Custom bin.You
can create additional Custom bins, which
are numbered.
 Reusing CC effects
• If you have multiple instances of a shot in
your sequence - like an interview subject
that is covered with b-roll for most of the
interview but keeps appearing - after you
have an initial color correction created, you
can copy that effect and Paste Attributes on
subsequent appearances.
• It’s also possible to apply effects in the BIN
or the Source monitor so that all instances
of the clip are automatically effected.
 Reusing CC effects
• When you do this, you get a little red
underline to the FX icon in each affected
shot in the timeline.
• If you click on the effect in the timeline, you
won’t see the effect controls for the effect
you’ve applied.You need to switch to
Master Effect tab at the top of the Effects
Control Pane, or click on the Source
monitor or the Bin clip, but not the
timeline segment.
 Reusing CC effects

• On big complicated projects, you’ll need to

find the clip in the project or load it into
the source monitor to try this tip.
• To find it in the project, right-click on the
clip and Reveal in Project or press the F to
match frame the clip from the timeline into
the Source.
 Premiere Color
Correction Effects
• Brightness and contrast control is very
limited. Not enough control.
• Change Color is for Secondary color
correction.
• Change to Color is a kind of matching tool.
• 3 Way color corrector should be your main
tool.
 Premiere Color
Correction Effects
• Channel Mixer allows blending of color
channels. Powerful but difficult.
• Color Balance is similar to Resolve sliders
or like Curves turned in to sliders.
• Color Balance HLS is similar to an old TBC,
allowing changes to Hue, Luma and Sat.
• Equalize - a Photoshop thing. Have to look
this up.
 Premiere Color
Correction Effects
• Fast Color Corrector is like 3 way, but you
don’t get to balance individual tonal ranges
• Leave Color takes everything to
monochrome, leaving a color you choose
• Luma Corrector allows you to make
changes based on specific tonal ranges
 Premiere Color
Correction Effects
• Luma Curve allows you to set the curve of
Luma Only, like Avid or Resolve’s Master
• Lumetri Color is the SpeedGrade engine
• RGB Color Corrector is sliders for all
color channels and all tonal ranges
• RGB Curves is all four Curves, like Avid or
Resolve.
 Premiere Color
Correction Effects

• Three Way Color Corrector gives almost

all the tools you need - color wheels
• Tint adds a colored tint of your choice
• Video limiter is similar to Safe Color.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• In the Project Pane (Media Library) , select
the little “New Bin” button that looks like a
piece of paper with the corner folded
down (bottom right corner).
• In the resulting pulldown, choose Black
Video about halfway down.
• In the resulting dialog box, choose the
correct options for width, height, frame
rate, and pixel aspect.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• After clicking OK, a black frame will be
added to your media in the Media/Project
pane.
• Apply the black clip on the track above
your shot and trim it out as long as you
want it the vignette to last. It could be for
one shot or a series of shots or the entire
sequence.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Now in the Effect Pane, under Generate,
you’ll find Circle. Apply it to the Black layer
in the sequence.
• Then in the Effect Control Panel replace
the current color with black.
• Choose the Invert Circle option and
change the size to something pretty big,
depending on your frame size something in
the 700 to 900 range or 400 for SD video.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Still in the Effect Control Pane, spin down
the Feather option and increase it to your
taste. Try 180 to start with, but consider
going much higher.
• The goal with a vignette is to NOT call
attention to itself, but to be very subtle.
Vignettes add a great depth and since of
richness to the shot.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• I spoke to many professional colorists
when I wrote my book and some of them
mocked the overuse of the vignette, but
most said that it’s possible to see a vignette
on nearly every professional color grade,
especially in TV ads, which strive to focus a
viewer’s attention on a product.
• The vignette always turns the viewer’s eye
back to the center of the picture.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Vignettes can and should be shaped more
than just a circle… more oval. They can also
be rectangles with rounded corners or
hand drawn shapes.
• Vignettes in Resolve and other full featured
color correction software also are
sometimes used combining darkening of
the edges with blurring the footage in the
edges or even slightly coloring the edges.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Vignettes can and should be shaped more
than just a circle… more oval. They can also
be rectangles with rounded corners or
hand drawn shapes.
• Vignettes in Resolve and other full featured
color correction software also are
sometimes used combining darkening of
the edges with blurring the footage in the
edges or even slightly coloring the edges.
 Please bring footage
• I would like for us all to have the same
footage to work through, but if you have
specific footage from your own project that
you want to work on, you can.
• Can we all get the airport and celebrity
show footage on our computers?
• Tomorrow we work in Resolve. If you
KNOW you’ll never use Resolve, you can
work along with us in your favorite NLE.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Here’s another way to accomplish the same
thing.
• Go to the File Menu and pulldown to
New>Transparent Video. Set the correct
frame size for your video project and click
OK.
• This adds media to your projec that looks
like a black frame. Drag this onto the track
above your video. Trim it out.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• A variation on the above method is instead
of adding a circle effect to the black layer,
you create a New Solid and place it above
the video.
• Then in the Effects Pane, under Generate,
choose Ramp.
• In the Effect Controls, choose Radial,
reverse, move the start point towards the
center and the end to the outer edge.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• In the Effects Controls, spin down Opacity,
lower it a bit - start at 50% - and change
the Blend Mode to Multiply to start, but
you should experiment with different
modes.
• Adjust opacity to taste, and go back to your
Ramp effect and adjust those settings to
taste now that you can see what you’re
doing.
• https://helpx.adobe.com/premiere-pro/
using/blending-modes.html
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• In the Effects Pane search for Circle or go
to Generate>Circle. Apply it to the black
track.
• In the Effects Control Pane. Increase the
Radius size to mostly fill the height of the
screen.
• Spin down the Motion option and spin
down Scale Width and uncheck Uniform
Scale and increase the width to almost full
width of the screen.
Premiere CS6 Vignette

• Spin down the Feather option and Invert

Circle and change the color to Black and
really increase the feather a lot.
• Possibly go back into the Radius and the
Horizontal scale parameters and adjust
them to taste.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• These are both fast ways to create a
vignette. However, vignettes in real color
correction tools don’t just add black to the
edges, they actually allow you to color
correct the video in the edges differently
from the center, so the more correct
approach to this effect would be to
duplicate the video from the bottom track
and place it on the top track.
• To do this hold down option (Mac) or alt
(PC) and drag the clip above itself.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Then use color correction tools to lower
the brightness of the top track.
• Then in the same effect control area that
you used to lower the brightness, select
one of the mask tools (circle, square, pen
icons). Circle is obvious, but try pen.
• Draw out the mask, invert it.
• In the Opacity effect, adjust the opacity
amount and the Blend mode. Probably use
Multiply, but you should experiment.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Another method involves the use of the
Lighting Effect. This can be found in the
Effects Pane under the Video Effects>
Adjust>Lighting Effects.
• Select the first light as the spot light
(usually set as default).
• Click on the effect name or the transform
icon to the left of it to see visual input in
viewer window.
Premiere CS6 Vignette
• Adjust the center point, and both radius
controls and the angle so that the center is
where you want to point viewer’s
attention.
• Alternatively tweak focus (feathering) and
intensity properties for additional effects.
• You can also tweak Ambient Light Intensity
and Exposure to adjust overall lightness or
darkness of the image.
Premiere Color Mode
• Now, similar to Avid, Premiere can get into
and STAY in color correction mode instead
of having to just drop color correction
effects on shots as effects.
• Go to the COLOR tab in the top center.
• Clicking on any clip in the timeline and
moving any slider in the Lumetri control
panel to the right will automatically add a
Lumetri effect.
Premiere Color Mode
• At the top of the Lumetri panel are two
instances of the clip you’re parked on. The
Master instance allows you to apply the
effect to the actual CLIP in the project,
thereby making ALL future uses of the clip
edited into the timeline have the same
color correction.
• The other instance is just for that one
section of the timeline you’re parked on.
 Premiere Color
• Use the Color Correction Workspace
• Gang the Reference monitor to the
Program Monitor by clicking small options
button in top right above the Reference
monitor and choose Gang Reference
Monitor to Program Monitor from the
pulldown.
 Luma Ranges in
Premiere
• With a 3 Way color correction effect
applied, in the Effects Pane there is an
Output pulldown menu. This is usually set
to Composite. But you can set it to Tonal
Range
• Spin down “Tonal Range Definition” and
you can adjust what is considered a
highlight or a shadow with squares in slider
and the fall off with the triangles
 Adjusting within that
range
• In the Tonal Range adjustment, the
pulldown is normally set to Master, but that
can be switched so that adjustments work
on just a single range instead of over the
entire image.
 CC in Premiere
• ~ will expand any pane to full screen
• Instead of working with CC inside the
Effects panel, go to Windows>Lumetri
Color. That brings up a new pane with the
options to revise in the pane.
• This also allows you to NOT have to add a
CC effect to the clip to work on it. Just
start grading a new clip and the effect will
be added automatically.
 CC in Premiere

• Also from Windows menu in Premiere, you

can call up new scopes: Lumetri scopes.
• In the Lumetri Scopes, at the bottom of the
pane is a wrench icon to change the scopes
and layout.
Secondary Corrections
• Despite NAB demos, Secondaries are most
often used for colors that our eyes know
“by heart:” Grass, Sky, Water, Skin.
• Standard Vectors and custom vectors.
• Custom vectors are sampled with the
syringe and are oval in shape. Standard are
pie shaped.
Secondary Corrections
in Avid
• Left side “vectorscope” is for the
qualification of the color and the right side
is to alter the color (hue, sat and lum) of
the qualified color.
• CAREFUL: “isolation” check mark - if left
on will RENDER with the isolation.
• Multiple custom vectors can be used in a
single correction.
 What is Secondary
Color Correction?
• Primary color correction is any OVERALL
look or correction or change that is done
to basically the entire picture, though it
definitely includes changes within the three
broad tonal ranges. (gain, gamma, shadow)
• Secondary color correction is a correction
applied to a specific portion of the image
either based on an HSL range or a
geographic portion of the image or a
combination.
 WHY do Secondary
Color Correction?

• Often times, you can get the entire image

into a good looking grade, but part of the
image still doesn’t look right. In those cases,
a secondary correction is necessary to also
correct that part of the image.
 Typical Secondary
Color Corrections
• Demos always show a car or piece of
clothing with a secondary applied to change
it to some completely different color,
however, the TYPICAL examples of
secondary color correction are for skin
tones, sky and grass. These are things we all
have a built in intuition of what color they
SHOULD be.
Process of Secondary
Color Correction
• First you determine what part of the
picture needs to be changed from the rest
of the image.
• Second you determine the easiest way to
separate that from the rest of the image
based on brightness, hue, saturation, or
physical position on the screen.
 Process of Secondary
Color Correction
• Third, you “qualify” the selection of the
section you want to change. This means you
select it, usually based on an eye-dropper
value.
• Fourth, you refine your “qualification” or
selection. Tweaking the parameters of the
hue, brightness, saturation, mask and
softness.
 Process of Secondary
Color Correction
• Fifth, you color grade the “qualified” or
selected area using the typical color grading
tools you used for the main image.
• “Qualifications” that are pixel-value-based
are the best because it doesn’t matter if
something passes in front of them in the
foreground. No matte or rotoscoping
needs to be done because it’s value-based.
 LUTS
• A LUT is an acronym (letters standing for)
Look up Table.
• LUTs are lists of numbers that transform a
given input to a chosen output.
• Instead of a complex formula for the
transformation, it’s simply a table created
with answers for every color.
 LUTs
• LUTs are used to transform the original
camera image which may not be the “look”
that the director actually wants. An
example of this would be that the camera
original is Log-C (or some other Log type)
that looks flat, low-contrast and low
saturation or the footage was shot for film
output and the editor will be viewing and
outputting in Rec 709 (video).
 LOG
• Log is short for “logarithmic.”
• Cameras turn light into electrical values.
Usually this is done in a “linear” fashion.
• An exact amount of light equals an exact
amount of voltage.
• By creating a CURVE instead of a straight
line, it is possible to increase the number of
possible tonal values between the minimum
value and the maximum value.
 LOG
• Everyone knows that the shortest path
between two points is a straight line, but
what if you wanted a LONGER line, you’d
make a curve. Now more points (values)
can fit on the line from point A to point B.
• Each camera manufacturer creates a
different “log” curve. This is their unique
signature.
LOG
 LOG
• The goal is to make the curve in such a way
that the points, or values on the LOG
curve are in the best location to provide
the most NOTICEABLE tonal range
improvement. Our eyes tend to discard
information in some places and desire it in
other places.
• Camera manufacturers are sensitive to
losing detail in the highlights.
 LOG
• The images that LOG footage creates are
designed to protect the highlights and
shadows from being over and
underexposed, and that saturation doesn’t
cause clipping or gamut errors.
• Because of this, LOG images are very flat
and under-saturated. They are boring.
LOG
 LOG
• The goal of LOG footage is to give the
colorist as much latitude to grade the
image as possible, with no clipping or
crushing.
• You can’t show most people LOG footage,
so you usually have to feed a LUT into a
monitor so that the “intended” image is
seen by the client instead of the recorded
image.
 LUTs
• There are a number of types of LUTs or
reasons LUTs are used:
• Calibration LUTs help “correct” a display
to allow it to properly display an image
• Technical or Dailies LUTs convert the
camera files to ProRes or MXF for Avid or
somehow alter an image from (usually)
RAW to something that can be edited.
• Creative LUTs for Looks LUTs: convert any
image to a different look like film emulation
 LUTs
• The order of LUTs and other color
correction is important.
• If you are trying to use a LUT to create a
specific look, you should do your
corrections BEFORE the LUT and the LUT
will RESTRICT your corrections.
• If you want to “violate” or alter the look of
the LUT more easily, then do your
corrections AFTER the LUT. In all CC
software, the order of tools is critical.
 LUTs in Avid
• LUTs inside Avid are applied by right-
clicking an image in the source monitor and
choosing Source Settings from the
contextual menu. Color Management
allows for importing and applying LUTs and
converting between color spaces.
• Multiple clips in the bin can be selected,
then go to the contextual menu in the bin
to get to Source Settings, add and apply the
LUT to all
 LUTs in Avid
• Avid can import LUTS that were created
or exported as .cube. There are
several .cube types: Adobe AE.cube, Davinci
Resolve.cube, Foundry Nuke.cube, and
Iridas.cube. LUTs that work in Avid are
usually .cube LUTs. If you are exporting a
LUT for use in Avid, try a Resolve.cube or
Adobe AE.cube LUT.
 LUTs in Avid

• Avid can import LUTS that were created

or exported as .cube. There are
several .cube types: Adobe AE.cube, Davinci
Resolve.cube, Foundry Nuke.cube, and
Iridas.cube.
 LUTs in Resolve

• Creating and Exporting LUTs in Resolve.

• Importing LUTs into Resolve.
• Organizing LUTs in Resolve.
 LUTs in Premiere
• In Premiere, you add LUTs using the
Lumetri effect, just like adding any other
effect.
• Lumetri will call up a dialog requesting that
you point it at a LUT that you want to
apply.
• These Lumetri looks are .look files which
are the file suffix created by Speedgrade.
 LUTs in Premiere
• The easiest and fastest method to add the
LUT is to be in the COLOR tab and at the
top of the Lumetri effect, the first choice is
LUT and it has a pulldown menu.
• The color correction flows THROUGH
Lumetri from top to bottom so the LUT is
the first thing applied and the vignette is
last.
 LUTs in Premiere
• There is an additional LUT you can add in
the Creative section. 2 LUTs per image.
• Why have two LUTs applied on one image?
One of them can be to bring the camera
from LOG to 709 and the other can be a
creative LUT, like something the DP
worked out on set or something from the
on-set colorist or dailies colorist.
• The Creative LUTs are more stylistic. The
LUT’s at the top are camera LUTs.
 LUTs in Premiere
• You can browse the look of the LUTs in
the Creative section with the <> arrows on
either side of the image thumbnail in the
Lumetri pane. Clicking on the thumbnail
when you have your preferred LUT chosen
applies it or makes it active.
• The slider below “Intensity” allows you to
mix the LUT with the original.
Lumetri effects controls
• Faded film just fades blacks and whites,
basically reducing dynamic range.
• Shadow Tint and Highlight tint allow adding
a tint in those tonal ranges. The tint balance
slider under it controls how much of the
image is defined as shadow and how much
is defined as highlight.
Lumetri effects controls
• Vibrance is SIMILAR to Saturation, but only
increases the saturation in the areas of the
image that are NOT very saturated yet.
• Hue Saturation Curve - while it looks like a
wheel - allows for control of saturation in
specific hues. Add points on the white circle
to control specific hue ranges. Pull them
more or less saturated. Colored dots
underneath are pre-set hue ranges with
points already marked.
 LUTs in Premiere
• Currently Premiere provides hundreds of
pre-made Lumetri looks which are available
in the Effects pane. There are different film
stocks and LUTs for different camera
manufacturers.You can buy them from
companies like Osiris.
• http://vision-color.com/osiris/
Lumetri Effects
Creating new Looks in
Speedgrade
• Instead of grading in Speedgrade, which has
to be done using either ProRes or DPX
files, which are big and time-consuming to
create and render, you can go to File Menu
and do a Direct Link to Adobe Speedgrade.
• This opens the sequence into Speedgrade,
where you can apply a LUT or create a
look.
Creating New Looks in
Speed Grade
• In Speed Grade, at the bottom left corner,
the + button allows you to add a custom
look layer. In the pulldown list, under Film is
a choice for LUTs. (images on next slide)
• This creates another pulldown in the
center of the screen to choose from a long
list of LUTs.
• Then, use the fourth button at the top left
(next to the back arrow icon), to go back
to Premiere. Save.
Creating New Looks in
Speed Grade
Creating New Looks in
Speed Grade
• Back in Premiere, if you select the effect
(either adjustment layer or select the clip
itself), you can see in the Effect Controls
pane that the Lumetri Effect is applied.
• Right click on the Lumetri effect in the
Effects Controls and choose Save Preset.
• This saves it in your Presets folder in your
Effects pane.
Creating New Looks in
Speedgrade
• Once the grade is saved as a .look file, it
can be accessed and applied in Premiere
without having to do a full roundtrip back
and forth between Premiere and
Speedgrade.
• Apply ANY Lumetri look and click on the
small folder icon in the Effects pane next to
the Lumetri look to call up a window
allowing you to point to a new look.
 Please bring footage
• I would like for us all to have the same
footage to work through, but if you have
specific footage from your own project that
you want to work on, you can.
• Can we all get the airport and celebrity
show footage on our computers?
• Tomorrow we work in Resolve. If you
KNOW you’ll never use Resolve, you can
work along with us in your favorite NLE.
 DAY THREE

• Resolve
 Important
Resolve concepts
• You need a mouse or control device that is
capable of doing right-click and center-click
in addition to the traditional left-click.
• Almost every pane and every item on the
screen allows access to a specific
contextual menu JUST for that item
through right and center clicks.
 Resolve
• The Resolve database is a container for
users.
• A Resolve User is a container for projects.
• A Resolve Project is a container for
timelines, grades, media and all other
project resources.
• Database is controlled from little “disk
platter” icon at the bottom right corner of
the user login page. Disk-based or SQL.
 Resolve Databases
• Disk-based databases have a folder
structure.You can see where they are by
following a folder path to the database.
• Post Gres SQL databases look like an IP
address (168.10.0.1 for example)
• The difference is the SQL is shareable on
the network and can be optimized if slow
• For disk-based databases, no hyphens or
spaces, only underscores and alphanumeric
 Resolve Databases
• With Database manager open click on the
+ button.
• In the next window, name the database (no
spaces or slashes…just underscores.
• Change the “driver” pulldown menu to
Disk from SQL.
• Point the Host to assign a directory within
your user. (to aid in automated backups)
 Resolve Databases
• Choose “Create New Database”
• Then make sure that new database is
SELECTED - turning it orange
• Click on the little three vertical dots icon
on right above the database list and choose
“Select” from the resulting pulldown menu
• From there, you can manage Users
• New databases could be for new clients, for
example. Many projects can go in a DB.
 Resolve Databases

• Upgrading SQL databases should only be

done between versions of Resolve. Once
upgraded, the database can’t be used in
previous versions, so BACK UP FIRST!
 Resolve Users
• Set Up account or select user.
• You can add passwords, but be careful
• You can add photo or icon
• Admin has some additional power - mostly
to change passwords.
• You can log off of a user from icon for
current user in the bottom left.
• Right-click on a user to delete it
 Resolve Projects
• Inside each user are projects.
• Add projects from + in bottom left
• Create folders to organize projects from
folder icon in bottom left
• Drag and drop projects into folders
• Sort and view from icons in top right
• Home button in top left gets out of folders
 Resolve Media Page
• Resolve has four main pages or tabs which
are accessed along the bottom: MEDIA,
EDIT, COLOR, DELIVER.
• Projects start in the MEDIA section.
• The library or browser provides access to
drives and other assets where media and
sequences are stored
• The Media pool is where you find and link
footage. Media has to be in Media pool.
 Resolve Media Page
• In the Preferences, you can set what drives
Resolve will look at for media. Not all
drives need to be seen by Resolve.
• In Preferences, the Media Storage tab
allows you to assign what drives Resolve
looks at to find media.
• Library is a browser. Pane to the right
shows lists or thumbnails of media or
folders.
 Resolve Media Page
• Double-click thumbnails or items in the list
to see them in the main viewer and in the
metadata in the bottom right pane.
• In the metadata section there is a pulldown
menu - maybe says “Clip Details” now -
that has a long pulldown list of different
metadata options. This metadata
information can only be edited if the clip is
in the Media Pool under the viewer.
 Resolve Media Page
• Once you start to place footage into the
Media Pool or bring it in from an imported
sequence, the preferences on the project
become locked in for critical things, like
frame rate and size. So it is smart to
examine footage in the library, especially
noting frame rate, frame size and bitrate, to
determine and SET the correct settings
PRIOR to placing that library media into
the Media Pool.
 Adding clips to the
Media Pool
• Drag and drop from the Library.
• Select, shift select clips, then right-click and
choose “Add to Media Pool.”
• Right click on entire folders and choose
“Add Folder to Media Pool.”
• Deleting things from the Media Pool does
NOT delete them from the hard drive.
 Working in the
Media Pool
• Use the + button under “Media
Pool” (bottom left pane) to add Bins to the
Master bin (folder). This is similar to Avid’s
bin structure. Organizing shots in bins.
• Drag clips from one bin (folder) to another.
• To add multiple folders in the Library into
the Media Pool select folder in Library,
right-click and choose “Add Folder and
Subfolders into Media Pool (create bins)”
to maintain the folder structure.
 Keyboard commands
• command-F makes viewer FULL. Opt-F
(Mac) Alt-f (PC) bigger viewer/no timeline.
shift-F gets to smaller viewer.
• shift-D = bypasses all grades
• option-command-G= Grab Still
• shift-home resets the selected node grade
• CMD-OPT-F (Mac) or CNTL-ALT-F (PC)
turns wipe on and off.
• shift-CMD-W (Mac) shift-Control-W for
scopes.
 Important
Resolve concepts
• There are TWO sets of Preferences or
Settings in Resolve.
• “Project” settings are accessed from the
small “gear” icon in the bottom left corner.
• The other is accessed from the Da Vinci
Resolve menu in the menu bar at the top
and pulling down to “Preferences.” These
are the OVERALL preferences for the
software itself or for the user.
 Important
Resolve concepts

• Almost any number in the Resolve UI can

be hovered over and then the mouse can
adjust the number by sliding left or right.
• Or the number can be clicked on and use
the keyboard to type in numbers.
 Overall Resolve
System Preference
• System overview - which graphics and
video cards are installed
• Media Storage manages the drives used for
Media. Scratch Disk is used for Stills and
Cache files, and should be very fast.
• On a Mac there is a checkbox for letting
the Library access ALL mounted drives
instead of specific, named drives.
• Add specific drives using the + button.
 Overall Resolve
System Preference
• Video I/O Options: For capture and
playback to an external video monitor or
deck, what video card or video device is
attached.
• Resolve LIVE: beyond what I think you’ll use
and what I know how to teach.
• Check “Use GPU for RED debayering" if
you have are going to use RED footage.
 Overall Resolve
System Preference
• The “Use GPU for Compute” option is
good to check. Running the screen doesn’t
require a lot of GPU power, so you’re
allowing the GPU to be used by Resolve for
other processes.
• Use System Audio - if you don’t have an
audio card or device or a video card with
audio support, then use this to hear the
audio coming from Resolve.
• GPU Processing: leave on Auto
 Overall Resolve
System Preference
• Control Panels - this is for Resolve’s big
control panel or one of the third party
control panels from Tangent Devices, or
Avid or JL Cooper.
• These settings have to be saved and then
for most of them, a full restart of Resolve
will be necessary for them to be
implemented and work.
Resolve Project settings
or preferences
• Accessed from the small “gear icon” in the
bottom left corner.
• The list down the left side are the “tabs”
that give access to the specific settings:
Master Project settings, Image Scaling,
Editing, Color, Camera Raw, Lookup Tables,
Versions, Audio, General Options, Capture
and Playback, Control Panel, Auto Save,
Keyboard mapping, and Metadata.
 Project Settings
• Master Project Settings - start in Video
monitoring settings, because it will
automatically update settings that are above
it in the Timeline Settings area.
• Video monitoring depends on your video
card/device and your reference monitor.
You may need an engineer to help with
these initially, but I’ll give you some guesses
about the correct settings.
 Project Settings

• In Timeline settings, interlacing seriously

degrades performance. Only turn it on if
your video is interlaced not progressive (P)
• You CAN grade interlaced material without
this on and only turn it on during the
render.
 Project settings
• Audio tab is pretty simple. Turn on audio if
you have audio to monitor. Turn it off if you
don’t.
• dbFS is where “0” VU is digitally. Common
places to put this are -14 and -20. Has
nothing to do with the loudness. Just has to
do with where the audio monitoring levels
are seen on a “VU” meter.
 Project settings
• General Options: Change “Enable
Background Caching” to 3 seconds.
• UI settings: Turn on “Always highlight the
current clip in the Media Pool.” Turn off
“Wipe Wraps when referencing Stills”
• Auto Save: very important. How often will
Resolve automatically save your project?
Set for every 5 minutes or 10 minutes.
 Project Settings

• Auto Save: If you use the “Backup Project”

setting, Resolve creates an entire archived
backup of the whole project instead of just
saving the “delta” or things that have been
changed. This takes a LONG time with big
projects and takes up space.
 Project Settings
• Keyboard mapping: Personal preference.
• Some say to stick with the defaults as much
as possible.You can make the keyboard
work more like some other software you
like, like Avid or Premiere.
• This is a good tab to study to better learn
and memorize the keys. Using keyboard
commands makes you faster and more
intuitive and allows you more time to be
creative.
 Project Settings
• Improving playback performance:
• Master Project setting: video field
processing (interlacing) off
• Video bit depth can be changed to 8
• Hide UI overlays for optimized playback
• Image scaling: Optimize for playback
• Debayer quality: optimized for playback
 Project Settings
• Optimize for playback:
• General options: deselect “Always highlight
current clip in the media pool”
• Enable “Minimize interface updates during
playback” (This is a BIG one to help)
 Scene Detection
• Render out from NLE at highest possible
quality.
• Navigate to it in the MEDIA page. Don’t
add it to the Media Pool.
• Right-click on it and choose Scene Cut
Detection.
• Scene Cut pane opens. In Options, choose
Auto Cue (should be default)
• Click START button under pane to the left.
 Scene Detection
• This starts the analysis process. Green
spikes are considered edit points. Magenta
line is the threshold for edits. Position it
about halfway up.
• Jump to the top of the project. Use N and
P button to jump NEXT and PREVIOUS.
• Three-up display shows three consecutive
frames. Frame 1 should be different from
frame 2, but frame 3 should be the same
(kind of) as frame 2.
 Scene Detection
• Scene detection is based on luminance
changes, so often, fade ups and downs have
extra edit points added. Step through these
and use the - button under the scene
detection pane (spikes) to the left to
remove add mistaken edits.
• Play through entire sequence looking for
MISSED edits. Seeing if there’s a green spike
at every one of those points. Use the +
button to add any missed cuts. +/- buttons
are key shortcuts to add and subtract cuts.
 Scene Detection
• When you’re done go up to Options near
top right side and Save the Scene Cut.
Navigate to where you want to save it.
• That’s just so you can edit it later or
protect all of the work you just put in.
• In the bottom right corner, choose “Add
Cuts to Media Pool.” A dialog asks to match
frame rate of sequence, click “Change”
• Close the Scene Detection pane. The media
pool populates with individual clips.
 Scene Detection
• In Edit page, Create a new sequence and
deselect checkbox for Empty Timeline.
Name the sequence and save. This will add
all of the shots in the Media Pool in the
original sequence order.
• In the Edit page timeline command-B (Mac)
control-B (PC) to add an edit point. This is
for recreating dissolves and fades.
• Drop a transition on to those points.
Command-drag the length of transition.
 Resolve Color Page
• Top left is the Gallery with Stills and
Powergrades
• Top Center is the Viewer
• Top Right is the Node Tree window
• Horizontally through the center is the
timeline
• Bottom are the color tools
 Resolve Nodes
• Nodes are the fundamental building blocks
of color corrections in Resolve.
• The fundamental, most basic node for
building color corrections is the Serial
Node. Opt-S (Mac) or Alt-S (Windows)
adds a serial node. Or Add serial node
under Nodes in the top menu.
• You can tell a serial node because of the
two yellow input and output dots on either
side of a serial node.
 Resolve Nodes
• Nodes are numbered in the order they
were created. If nodes are deleted, the
numbering of subsequence nodes changes.
The numbers of the nodes don’t really
matter.
• Order of the nodes in series DOES matter.
You can delete the links between nodes by
selecting them and deleting them and then
dragging them on to the connecting line
between two other nodes and dropping it.
 Resolve color wheels
• Primaries and LOG mode. Select with
pulldown menu above the offset wheel.
• Options pulldown lets you reset all.
• reverse circular arrow icon above each
wheel lets you reset each wheel
individually.
• Sliders below each wheel and above
numeric values allow tonal range
corrections.
 Resolve color wheels
• Offset control is overall and lifts everything
equally - different from the individual tonal
range sliders.
• Offset can maintain relationships between
color channels and maintain the
“stretching” and “compressing” of those
channels, but move them up and down and
in relationship to each other.
 Resolve color wheels

• shift-click anywhere in the color wheel to

get someplace fast.
• click in the wheel then hold shift key allows
you to move around faster.
 Resolve sliders
• Gray bar is luma only
• Double click on the numeric entry below
the slider to reset it to default.
• For me to most easily use sliders to
balance an image, I have to turn Lum Mix to
0. Lum Mix at 100 is the default. This is part
of Da Vinci’s color science to keep the
luminance the same when making color
adjustments.
 Resolve
Contrast and Pivot
• So before I said, “Never use contrast
controls.” This is still basically true, but
Resolve makes them a little more useful
because it adds a PIVOT control which lets
you adjust the point around which the
contrast “pivots” giving much more control.
• Show this with a gray scale.
 Resolve RGB Mixer
• Similar to Channels control in Symphony.
This allows you to add or swap colors from
other channels to recreate the RGB
channels or to simply blend them.
• Note that in the Mixer, the RED output has
red at 1 and the other two color sliders
and 0. The GREEN output has green at 1
and the other two at 0 and so on.
• Generally a way to repair images and
making B/W looks, determining which
channel is most powerful in creating B/W.
 Resolve RGB Mixer
• To create a black and white look, choose
Options button and pull down to
Monochrome, then adjust the “power” of
each color channel.
• Try undoing “Preserve Luminance in that
same pulldown menu. Experiment with
adjustments.
 Curves
• Two types of Curves. Custom and
“versus” (also Soft Clip)
• Custom Curves first. Like Avid’s but you
can’t move the highlight point higher and
you can’t move the shadow point lower
than the default.
• Options in Curves allows reset and gang
and ungang. Gang is default. I prefer
Unganged.
• Intensity Sliders allow blending back effect.
 Curves

• As with Primary Sliders, I find it difficult to

work with the Curves when an adjustment
of one color channel is interactive with the
others, so to fix this, I turn Lum Mix to 0.
• Under the Curves is a upward arrow icon
that allows you to make the Curves BIG
for better control.
 Versus Curves
• The Hue vs. Sat curve allows you to set the
saturation of a specific hue.You can choose
the hue by placing your own points on the
curve, by using the eyedropper under the
source monitor or by using the colored
squares underneath. Pull up on a dot to add
saturation in that hue range. Pull down to
decrease satutation in that hue range.
 Versus Curves
• The Hue vs. Hue and Hue vs. Luma work
the same way, but change the HUE and the
LUMA in a selected HUE range.
• Also Luma vs. Sat and Sat vs. Sat work in
similar ways, but allow you to increase or
decrease Saturation in ranges of Luma or
Saturation.
 Versus Curves
• Soft Clip - unlike the other curves controls,
the shape or “curve” of the diagonal line is
neither a control point or an indication that
the soft clip has been applied.
• To set a soft clip usually gang the sliders,
then use the numeric controls under one
of the curves to move them all, or use the
little triangles on the left and right of a
curve to move the shadow clip or highlight
clip. Left triangle controls shadows, right
controls highlights.
 Resolve Nodes
• Nodes can be named (right click) and
Change Label. If you have time this is a
smart thing to do to make it easy to
deconstruct the node tree and understand
it.
• Nodes have little icons telling what tool is
applied to them.
• You can hover over a node to see what
tools are applied.
 Resolve Nodes
• You can bypass (or temporarily turn off)
the entire node tree with the small
electrical plug icon in to the bottom left of
the node tree.
• shift-D is the keyboard shortcut for
bypassing the node tree.
• You can also select a node (orange highlight
around it) and cmd-D (Mac) to bypass a
single node in the tree. Indicated RED dots.
• Option-D bypasses all individual nodes.
 Resolve Nodes
• Bypassed nodes are also indicated by the
electrical plug icon overlaid on the node.
• You can also bypass a node by clicking on
its number under the node.
• Key signals can be passed between nodes
by using the small triangles on either side of
the node instead of the dots.
• shift-home resets a selected node. Or
under the Color menu, reset selected
node.
 Resolve nodes
• Almost all of the work you do as a colorist
in Resolve will be done with serial nodes
only.
• Mostly this is a matter of time. Creating
and organizing and understanding how to
manipulate the other nodes - or even
needing their true power - is costly to your
time budget.
 Resolve Nodes
• Some node “macros” do stuff you could do
manually, but would take some time.
• From the Node menu: Splitter node
actually adds a splitter node, a series of
nodes from each channel, then a
recombiner node on the other side.
• No cc operations can be done on the
splitter or combiner nodes, just the nodes
in between. Sole purpose is split/combine.
 Resolve Nodes
• If you want to do an operation on a node
in a window or inside of a selection and
then do something different on the
OUTSIDE of that correction, you can add
an Outside Node from the Node menu and
it gets the same selection REVERSED, ready
to apply a different correction OUTSIDE of
the first nodes’ selection.
• The selection is always controlled by the
first node. There is no way to adjust the
window or selection in the outside node.
 Resolve
• Curves works different than most other
software because Resolve tries to preserve
the luma of the image, so when pushing
Green brighter, it pulls down red and blue
so that the overall brightness (actually
luma) is maintained.
• To stop that behavior, under the Offset
Slider to the left of the Curves is the Lum
Mix control. Set that to 0.
 Continuing with
Secondary Tools
• The next tool in line in the “secondaries”
area of Resolve is the Qualifier which is
indicated by the eyedropper icon.
• From the pulldown just above and to the
right under the icons is a place to choose
whether the qualifier is HSL, RGB and
luminance only.
 Qualifier
• Even though I prefer RGB CONTROLS to
HSL controls, I prefer the HSL qualifier.
• You can turn off the H, S or L qualifiers
with the little checkbox under each one.
• To start with a selection the eyedropper is
the most obvious way, but you can just
start using the controls under each bar.
Width on Hue and Low and High on the
other two bars are the main controls.
 Qualifier
• shift-H or click on the little highlight button
that looks like a little magic wand. This
shows you the matte that you’re pulling.
• No need to pull a perfect key. Just get close
and start color correcting. If the shot starts
to look bad, go back and revise the key
more.
• Blurring, denoise, black and white clips help
pull the key and clean it up.
 Qualifier
• There is a pulldown menu under View
and pulldown to Highlight menu and
choose BW or Highlight Difference to
change the look of the matte.
• Notice that there’s a keyboard shortcut
• This is a toggle, so you may have to try
clicking on it a few times.
• As in most apps, the white part is the
part that will be affected. Black will not.
 Qualifier
• Under Project preferences (gear icon lower
left) you can change the default highlight
mode to black and white under General
Options. Mattes display in HC BW.
• As you make a mask in Qualifier, your node
will show you the mask as well, so it’s easy
to see in the node tree what’s happening.
 Qualifier
• Using the eyedropper first is the most
obvious way to do qualifications… at least
to start.
• After a qualification is made in a node, all
other changes made using the other tools
happen only inside that qualification.
• The little circle icon next to the magic
wand icon and eyedropper is the INVERT
button.
 Power Windows

• If you don’t want to see the wireframe for

the window (that helps you see
adjustments) use the little Power Windows
icon under the main viewer to turn them
off. The icon changes between tools, so it’s
really just the leftmost tool under the main
viewer.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• Create a Power Window and then usually
INVERT it so that we’re working on
changing the OUTSIDE of the window.
• User shapes - instead of circles or squares -
are harder to spot than geometric windows
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• First window shape is Linear. Second is a
circle. Third is polygonal tool where you
can add control points and move them. But
this has no on-screen softness controls.You
have to use the softness controls to the left
of the window shape picker at the bottom.
Black and white highlight view (opt-shift-H)
will show the window you’re creating.
Inside and outside softness controls.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• Custom Curve shape.
• Command (minus sign) (Mac) or Control -
(PC) shrinks the viewer so you can click on
points outside the viewer.
• option-click and drag a point to turn it into
a bezier (alt on a PC)
• Also, when drawing the shape instead of
clicking if you click and drag you get bezier
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• Middle click (need a middle click mouse) on
a point deletes it.
• shift-z will resize the viewer after shrinking
it.
• Final shape is a gradient wipe. It helps to
either look at the mask or create a strong
effect to be able to see what the gradient is
doing while manipulating it.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• Next to all of the shapes are numeric
transforms for more precise control. All
numbers can be hovered over and used like
sliders with the mouse.
• All windows created can actually be saved
as preset windows using the + icon above
the numeric entry section. Name it. Then
the preset will appear in the Preset
pulldown just above the + icon.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• Above that pulldown is the little options
triple dot icon and you can reset any
window using a big bunch of options.
Including copy and pasting windows
• In the big space to the right of the shapes
and mask icons you can click and label each
window.
 Vignette Work
• Now that you know how to use the tools
and controls for vignette, we want to try
some examples.
• Let’s take shot 4 of the woman in the
control tower and add a vignette to it
focusing the attention on her.
• On shot 3 let’s add a gradient vignette to
turn the sky blue, but NOT the building or
the grass.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• You can track every window. Select the
window you want to track by clicking the
shape icon layer or the shape in the
window, then go to the next icon next to
the Power Window icon in the Secondary
Tools area. This is the tracker. It looks kind
of like a gunsight.
• Let’s go to shot 15 of yellow plane tractor
and create a window, invert and grade so
that rest of shot is dark.
 Tracking

• Now let’s track the shot and have it follow

the tractor.
• Go to next slide immediately for directions.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• In the UI below choose the directions to
track (pan, tilt, zoom, rotate) and use what
look like play controls to track forward or
back.
• If the window leaves or enters frame you
can track from the middle of the shot
forward and back. The track timeline shows
the part that has been analyzed as darker
green. Move playhead and track backwards.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes

• There are some advanced tools to revise

and fix the tracks, but we don’t have time
here to deal with them, but you can
explore if you have to. The tracker is so
good now that you shouldn’t need to
worry about it.
 Power Windows to
create vignettes
• If you want to subtract one shape from
another, for example protecting a face from
a giant gradient wipe, you can click on the
circle (or any other shape) and position it
to protect or subtract that area from the
other window and click the Mask button
which is next to the invert button next to
the shape itself.
 An example of this
• Find the shot of the luggage on the
conveyor belt. Probably shot 20.
• Add a gradient to make the shot very
yellow across the entire image.
• Now we want to protect the suitcase from
being the yellow color.
• Make a window and mask it, then track it.
 Power Windows
• Use them to limit the qualifications that
you’ve made with the Qualifier.
• Power Windows is the next icon next to
eyedropper qualifier icon.
• In the Power Window there are a bunch
of shape choices for making your
windows. At the bottom you can add
more instances of the shapes.You can
have multiple windows.
 An Example

• Using the same shot, let’s create an HSL

qualification of the suitcase and clean it up
as much as possible, but to limit the key to
just the suitcase, we’ll also add a window
and track the window limiting the color
change to just the hue of the suitcase and
just within the window.
 Now you do it

• Let’s get the Vietnam airplane landing

(probably shot 11) and turn it purple with a
hue qualifier, then protect and track the
HSL qualification with a window on the
plane and track it.
 Stabilize shots
• In the tracker, in the Window pulldown you
can swap the tracker into a stabilizer.
 Stabilize shots
• Use the pan, tilt, zoom and rotation to
decide what you want to stabilize.
• Use the “play controls” to analyze the shot
forward or backward. Nothing seems to
happen.
• Click Stabilize down at the bottom to
execute it.
• Option button allows you to clear points
 Stabilize shots
• You can stabilize by having it analyze the
entire image or you can lasso a portion of
the screen that doesn’t have a lot of
internal motion to it and use the Add
Points icon. To lasso you have to be in
Interactive Mode. Then you lasso and click
the little Add Points icon under Interactive
mode. Analyze forward and/or back and hit
Stabilize.
• Turn on Zoom to not see the movement in
the edges before you Stabilize (or do again)
 Blur and Sharpen
• Round icon next to Key icon in secondary
tools.
• Three sets of controls that can be applied
to individual color channels if you want.
• Blur, Sharpen and Mist controls.
• You can drag blurs ABOVE the top of the
sliders to get more blur.
 Blur and Sharpen

• Little yellow Link icon at top left of pane

allows you to unlink and link the color
channels.
• You can add blur in vignettes or Power
Windows.
 Resize Reframe
• The resize icon is the square with double
arrows on it.
• There are four types of resize: edit, input,
output and node. Edit is same in Edit menu
and resize in Clip inspector. Input sizing is
for a reframe during grading. Node sizing
lets each node have its own sizing. Output
sizing takes us to timeline to adjust whole
timeline. Using Blanking can add custom
crop of whole timeline (only in output).
Gallery/Stills/Memory
• Opt-1 (one) (Mac) or alt-1 (PC) saves the
selected thumbnail in the timeline to the
first memory position. 2-9 add to memory
A-H
• Or to save Stills which are similar, Go to
View> Stills>Grab Stills or opt-cmd-G
(Mac) or alt-control-G (PC).
• The difference is that memories are easier
to recall using the big $30K Da Vinci panel
Gallery/Stills/Memory
• Right-click in the Stills area for the
contextual menu.You can choose to only
have a still for the LATEST correction to
the shot “One Still Per Scene”
• Stills allows you to have multiple folders of
stills, clicking the little + icon in bottom left
of pane and renaming the folder.
• At end of job create “Finals” folder. Hover
over viewer, right-click and choose Grab All
Stills to grab a still for every shot in TL.
Gallery/Stills/Memory
• Use these stills to match shots. Park on a
shot in the timeline that you want to match
to a previously saved still. Double click on
the still. Now you have a wipe between
them. If the wipe doesn’t work, make sure
that Interactive mode in Tracking is turned
off.
• CMD-OPT-F (Mac) or CNTL-ALT-F (PC)
turns wipe on and off.
Gallery/Stills/Memory
• You can wipe directly to another shot in
the timeline by right-clicking it and choose
Wipe Timeline Clip from the contextual
pulldown menu.
• In Project preferences under General
Options you can choose “Disable wraps
when viewing refence stills.”
• With a still selected, right-click and choose
Display the Node Graph from pulldown.
Gallery/Stills/Memory
• With a shot selected in the timeline that
you want to apply a previous saved grade
(Still) for, middle-click on a grade in the
Stills area to apply that grade.
• With a clip selected in the timeline, it’s
possible to add just a single node from a
grade in the Stills area by Displaying the
Node Graph and dragging a node from the
graph to the Node Tree.
Gallery/Stills/Memory

• Right click on the viewer and pulldown to

Split Screen and choose an option of what
to see split. This creates side by side images
between Still and timeline selection. Or it
can create side by sides for base grade and
current grade or other options.
 Power Grades
• These are essentially looks. They are slightly
different from Stills, though they’re saved in
the same area. Power Grades transfer
inside of a database of users. Stills are only
PER PROJECT.
• Open the Gallery view with this icon at the
bottom of the Stills/Gallery pane.
 Power Grades
• Check out the Da Vinci Resolve Looks.
• There are a number of categories that ship
with Da Vinci Resolve.
• You can right-click on any Power Grade
and display the node graph to deconstruct
the look.
• To use them in your project, you need to
drag them from the top pane to the Project
Stills pane below.
 Power Grades
• Notice the folders in the bottom pane. If
you put them in the STILLS folder they can
only be used in this project. If you put them
in the Creative Looks folder, they’re
accessible to all projects and users in the
database.
• Right clicking on a look in Stills or Creative
Looks allows you to replace the whole
look or Append the look to what you
already have applied in the selected shot.
 Power Grades
• If you just want to replace the current
grade with a look or add a look to an
“empty” grade, you can just drag the
thumbnail from the Stills or Creative Looks
onto the Node Tree.
• If you want to apply a Power Grade (or a
fresh look you design) to the ENTIRE
timeline, at the top of the node tree is a
pulldown to switch between local and
timeline. In timeline mode the grade is
applied to all shots in the timeline.
 Grouped Grades
• Select the first clip that you want in your
group. Right-click and pull down to Create
New Group. Give the group a name. Green
Link icon above clip in timeline indicates
Grouping.
• Select or command/control select
additional shots, then right-click to get
pulldown menu and assign them to the
Group you just created or another one.
 Grouped Grades.
• You can choose timeline filtering (the
magnifying glass icon below the timeline to
the right) and select the specific Group you
want and you’ll only see that Group in the
timeline.
• To add a grade to all of the shots in a
group, you can go to the top right of the
Node tree and you’ll see options now for
not just Local and Timeline but Grouped
pre-clip and Grouped post-clip.
 Grouped Grades.
• Pre-clip adds the Group look starting at the
camera original THEN goes to the already
applied individual grades.
• Post-clip starts with whatever grade may be
applied individually and THEN adds the
Group Clip look.
• It then passes from these looks to the
Timeline look if there is one. In order of
processing.
 Deliver Page
• Basically for rendering
• Top Left is Render settings
• Top Center is Viewer
• Top right is the Job Queue
• Horizontally through the center and
bottom is the timeline
 Rendering
• You can render out individual shots in the
sequence. This is useful for roundtripping
between Premiere and Avid and Resolve
because it will send those color corrected
shots back to the NLE.
• You can also render out a self-contained
movie of the entire sequence.
 Rendering
• Go to top right corner pulldown to clear
out any previous renders.
• From the Presets pulldown to Video
Sharing Export.
 Rendering
• Go to top right corner pulldown to clear
out any previous renders.
• From the Presets pulldown to Video
Sharing Export.
• Go through the options including how to
render out and where to render.
• Add job to render Queue. Start Render.
 Rendering

• We’ll talk about rendering individual shots

to do roundtripping when we talk about
workflows on Friday.
 DAY 4
• Transitions with Scene detection
• Versions
• More on Resolve Nodes
• Matching
• Various Plug Ins that do color correction
• Red Giant Colorista and Looks which can
be used in Avid and Adobe products
 Scene Detection
• Scene Detection analysis can take a while
and we spend quite a bit of time
customizing and refining the edits so we
want to save all that work if we want to
come back to it.
• Go to the options button at the top right
and pulldown to Save the Scene Cuts.
 Scene Detection
• There is no way to rejoin clips that are
separated with Scene Detection. This
should be able to be fixed in future releases
of Resolve, but for now the only solution is
that you SAVED your Scene Detection
results and recall them, then go back and
find the mistaken split clip in the timeline
and hit - (minus), then re-export the entire
scene detection creating all new clips and
re-editing in to a new timeline. If you’d
already done CC on it, you'd need to
reapply the CC. Create new folder in Media
Pool.
 Scene Detection
• Cmd-b (Mac) Cntrl-b (PC) Adds an edit
point in the timeline in Edit Page.
• We need to add edits IN the fades,
otherwise our corrections will be added to
the fades and they won’t really fade out.
• Then drag on a dissolve from the bottom
left pane (Toolbox icon + Transitions tab)
or cmd/cnt-T to add dissolve with keys
• cmd-+ (Mac) cntrl-+ (PC): zoom timeline
 Key commands
• Split Clip is cmd-backslash (Mac) cntl-
backslash (PC)
• Razor is cmd-B/cntrl-B. Blade is B. Blade
just turns on the Blade tool THEN you have
to click to make the cut… cmd-b is faster.
• Join clips is Option-backslash (Mac) alt-
backslash (PC) (only works on split clips)
• Select an edit (transition) you don’t want
and hit delete. (only works on split clips)
• Add Transition is cmd-T (Mac) cntl-T (PC)
 Scene Detection
• At each edit, there are handles - in other
words, more footage on either side of the
cut, because these clips are actually just
pieces of the entire original video piece.
• With the video timeline zoomed way in,
scrub through looking for the first frame of
the dissolve before the edit.
• command-drag (Mac) cntrl-drag (PC) the
beginning of the dissolve icon to the first
frame of the fade to black.
 Scene Detection
• Then on the back end of the fade to black
cmd-drag (Mac) cntrl-drag (PC) the end of
the dissolve icon to match the last frame of
the fade to black.
• This is the same procedure for all of our
dissolves. Go to each dissolve and add an
edit in the middle of each and apply a Cross
Dissolve from the Transition Toolbox pane.
 Scene Detection

• A little tip: When doing scene cut detection,

once the analysis is done and you have all
of the right “spikes” in the analysis UI and
you have the individual edits loaded into
the Media Pool, when you got to make your
timeline, if you uncheck “Make Empty
Timeline” it will automatically string out all
your shots without needing to drag them
into the timeline.
 Scene Detection
• Another tip: In the Scene Detect Options,
you can choose AutoCue and it will
automatically advance the playhead to each
cut as it detects it allowing you to watch
the edit points WHILE it’s doing the
analysis.
• It’s important to set the frame rate and
even whether it’s drop or non-drop before
doing the analysis.
 Matching
• I’m going to do these in Resolve, but you
can find the same tools, or similar ones in
Avid and Adobe Premiere. Please use the
software you feel most comfortable in and
work along with me.
• With scene matching, the scopes are really
important, especially RGB Parade.
 Versions
• By right-clicking on a shot in the timeline
that has a grade applied, you can go to local
versions option in the pulldown and save
and load versions of the color correction.
• You can quickly step through these using
the keyboard command command N and B
(Mac) and control N and B (PC) to step
through the versions NEXT and BACK.
 Resolve Nodes
• Layer Node creates a serial node and a
mixer node after it.
• You really need to use windows on the
nodes or a qualification before the Layer
Node to see the effect.
• The lowest node (bottom dot) on the
Layer Mixer node is the top priority.You
can rearrange the priority by de-linking and
relinking in a new order.
 Resolve Nodes
• Parallel nodes let you do two corrections
at the same time. Sometimes this is
important that they’re at the same time so
one does not affect the other in serial.
• Layer node combines IMAGES not
corrections. It’s really a compositing tool.
• For example: desaturating an entire image,
while maintaining the color of the client’s
product. Desaturate. The create a layer
where the color is isolated. Then combine.
 Resolve Nodes
• Select the node. Choose to add a Layer
node. This makes a split and a return. On
the top node, kill saturation. On the
bottom node, do a secondary to select a
color and make a key from it. The easiest
way is in the secondary tools, select the
eyedropper and choose the color and
adjust the controls to perfect the key.
• Opt-shift H lets you see the key.
• You can color correct in the key if you
want. Or slightly alter the de-sat node.
 Resolve Node
• What if this was a Parallel node instead of a
Layer node.You can right-click it and morph
it into one. Then the color disappears.
• Why? Because a Layer node layers one
image on top of the other, while a parallel
node means to do two things at the same
time. We’ve asked to desaturate with one
node and then in the other just SELECT a
section, but not DO anything to it. If we
crank the sat up again, we’ll end up with a
similar correction using parallel.
 Resolve Node
• With a parallel node, the order of inputs
(top input or bottom on the recombined
nodes) doesn’t matter.
• With a LAYER node, the order of inputs is
VERY important. Oddly enough and slightly
counter-intuitively, the BOTTOM node
input is keyed or layered on top of the TOP
node input.
 Resolve Nodes
• Right-click on a layer node to be able to
determine the compositing of that node’s
layers. For example screen or add.
• Normal - no compositing.
• Add - superimposed.
• Subtract - bottom layer subtracted from
the top layer.
• Difference - top minus bottom
• Multiply - multiplied emphasizes darker
parts of the image.
 Resolve Nodes
• Screen - pixels values are inverted then
multiplied then the result is inverted.
Emphasizes lighter parts of the image.
Basically the opposite of Multiply
• Overlay - combines screen with Multiply.
Bottom layer above 50% is screened, below
50% is multiplied.
• Hardlight - opposite of Overlay. Bottom
layer BELOW 50% is screened, ABOVE 50%
is multiplied.
 Resolve Nodes
• Right-click on a layer node to be able to
determine the compositing of that node’s
layers. For example screen or add.
• Parallel node is similar but different. Instead
of creating layers from the windows that
overlap, it BLENDS them where they meet.
• Right-clicking on the parallel or layer nodes
allow you to switch the type between
types.
 Resolve Nodes

• Right clicking on a serial node allows you to

disable different channels. By default these
are the RGB channels, but you can change
that. If you disable the red and green (1+2)
channels, that means any operation done to
that channel will only happen to the BLUE
channel in that node.
 Use lots of nodes
• You can do multiple corrections all in one
node.
• The problem with this is that you lose
control. For example, if you add a LUT to a
node, then do a Hue vs. Sat curve, then
decide to window that Hue vs. Sat curve in
the same node, the window will ALSO
affect the LUT. So use a separate node for
each.
 The order of nodes
• The order of operations - nodes - matters.
• Early nodes should work on getting an
overall tonal range and balance set.
• Next, perhaps work on localized exposure.
This is secondary work creating masks that
allow specific exposure work in very
limited exposure ranges.
• Next, perhaps work on localized color. This
is secondary work on specific color ranges.
 The order of nodes
• Next, if you are creating a specific “look”
beyond the basic look, this is the time to
apply it. It helps that your “look” is being
added to an image that is otherwise
balanced and matching other shots.
• Final adjustments may be necessary with
the “look” applied.
• Also a final LUT may need to be added,
though in reality it’s applied FIRST, but that
the other grades are done looking through
it.
Overview of Edit page
• Upper left pane is for timelines and media
and is basically your link to the Media Pool.
• Selected clips in the Media Pool in the Edit
Page will also be selected if you go back to
the Media page, which is a good way to
check the metadata if you have questions
about the footage.
Overview of Edit page
• Source and Record windows in top right
similar to Avid, Premiere and FCP.
• Drag clips into source or directly to
timeline or even into Record window
bringing up an FCP-like overlay allowing
you to choose edit mode (overlay, insert,
etc.) Load any selected clip in the media
pool into the Source with Return key.
Overview of Edit page
• Also, edit icons directly below the Source
and Record monitors allow edits.
• shift-Z, maximizes the timeline (zooms in
or out to show full sequence filling the
timeline) just like FCP.
• You can customize the timeline view with
the little icon in the far bottom right that
looks like a commuter train.
• Bottom left pane is basically an EDL
Overview of Edit Page
• Above Source and Record are timecodes.
Record side TC is a pulldown to switch
between source and record TC.
• Above Record monitor is name of the
sequence which is a pulldown allowing you
to switch between timelines.
• Toolbox icon in bottom left switches to
show transition options and OpenFX
instead of EDL.
Overview of Edit Page
• To start a new timeline, switch from Media
Pool to Timeline in the top left corner and
right-click in the blank space where it says
“No Timeline.” That will call up a dialog to
name the timeline.
• Timeline and Media Pool can both be
viewed in list view or thumbnail view with
the icons at the top.
• Eliminate the Edit Index pane to expand the
timeline by clicking lower left icon.
Overview of Edit Page
• In the timeline the little GRAY V1 indicator
is the Source. The little gray A1 indicator is
the audio 1 track. The OTHER v1 and a1
indicators are the active sequence track
where the gray track will go, so this is like
the track patching in Avid or Adobe. It
determines what tracks the source tracks
are patched to.
 Exporting a Resolve
grade as a LUT
• Grade a shot in the COLOR page.
• Hover over the graded shot in the timeline
thumbnail.
• Right-click and choose Generate 3D LUT
from contextual menu.
• In the resulting dialog box, give it a name
and put it in the default LUT folder or
some other spot.
 Importing a LUT into
Resolve
• Go to Project settings - the Gear icon in
the bottom left corner of Resolve
• Go to Lookup Table tab of resulting dialog
• Choose Open LUT Folder.
• Place desired LUTs in that folder.
• Update Lists in Project settings, then Apply.
 Importing a LUT into
Resolve

• Then when you right click on a node in the

node tree, you get a contextual menu with
a choice for 3D LUTs, then a choice of
folders of 3D LUTs to choose from, and
then 3D LUTs inside the folders.
 Resolve Scopes

• Command-shift-W (Mac) Control-shift-W

(PC) calls up scopes window.
• 16:9 or 4:3 aspect view
• 1, 2 or 4 scopes in window.
Resolve flagging shots
• Right-click on a thumbnail in the timeline to
flag it with a color.
• With all of the shots flagged, you can use
the little magnifying glass icon below the
timeline to the right to filter the timeline
based on various properties, including color
flags.
• Mini-timeline stays with all shots,
thumbnails are just the flagged shots.
 Colorista controls
• Exposure: overall brightness. In After Effects
only, you can use up and down arrow
buttons to increase exposure, with Shift
button to make bigger jumps in exposure.
• Saturation defaults to 0 (no change in the
image) and goes from -100 (black and
white) to +100 (maximum saturation.
 Colorista controls
• Hue: changes colors around the color
wheel
• Highlight: affects the top third of the
exposure basically, trying to leave the
midtones and shadows unaffected. 0 is
default (no change).
• Shadows: affects the bottom third of the
exposure basically. Similar to highlights
 Colorista controls
• Pop: Set to positive values, Pop adds local
contrast to your image for more visual
'pop' or clarity and sharpness. Set to
negative values, Pop removes sharpness and
creates a softened smoothing effect. Good
for complexion smoothing.
• Vignette: decrease brightness around the
edges of the frame. 0 (default) will not
affect the vignetting. Positive values add
vignetting. Negative values will remove
vignetting that already exists in the image.
 Colorista controls
• Strength: allows you to mix your original
image and blending it with the corrections
you made. The default is 100%, with all
color corrections fully applied. At 0%, the
Colorista III is effectively turned off.
3 way color corrector:

Click the switch (color

wheel-like circle) icon
to enable numeric
entry of RGB values.
 Colorista controls
• 3 way color wheel’s Auto-correction tool
(Below the wheels): color picker control
to allow the selection of an area on the
screen that should be white and have it
automatically balanced to white, with the
black being adjusted the same way, but
not midtones.
 Colorista controls
• HSL Correction: allows you to grab the
color you want to adjust, and move it
toward the color you want it to become,
nudging the HSL of individual colors or
ranges of colors. Two color wheels with
nine different color dots representing
colors.
• Can also be controlled with Numeric
Entry view (circle icon) that has columns
for entering specific values of HSL.
 Colorista controls
• Curves: similar to Avid’s and Premiere’s.
• However, the Curves here are “weighted”
and auto-curve in order to best retain
highlight and shadow detail.
• There are individual buttons to enable
RGB, R, G or B Curves.
 Colorista controls
• Keyer: This is essentially the secondary
color corrector for Colorista. It allows
you to isolate colors and tonal ranges.
• Create the key with a color picker, then
soften, choke or invert it.
• The default color for the key is a skin
tone.
• The Edit button launches the Keyer in its
own window.
 Using Red Giant
LUT Buddy
• Open After Effects and create a new comp
with a layer of footage. Make sure the comp
is set to Full resolution.
• Apply the LUT Buddy plug-in. Initially you
will see no change to the comp.
• Set the Action to Draw Pattern. Set the
Pattern to 1D 256.
• This will record your color correction.
 Using Red Giant
LUT Buddy
• Grade your footage using Primary color
correction tools.
• In the Effects window, duplicate LUT Buddy.
Move the second instance below the color
correction effects.
• Keep the Pattern set to 1D 256.
• Change the Action to Read Pattern so that
LUT Buddy reads and stores the grade.
 Using Red Giant
LUT Buddy
• Click the Options button in the second
LUT Buddy instance. This brings up the
Options dialog.
• Click the Export LUT... button to bring up a
Save dialog. Set the format to 'Color
(.cube)' and save the file as 'mylevels.cube'
to your desktop.
 Using Red Giant
LUT Buddy
• Open this LUT in any other application.
• If you have LUT Buddy installed in other
software, like FCP-X or Premiere, you can
use the LUT Buddy effect.
• Click the Options button and choose
Import LUT and point to the LUT you
want to import.
 Magic Bullet Cosmo
• Cosmo helps create beautiful skin softening
which is part of the colorist’s job.
• It has a predefined mask that keeps the
softening limited to skin tones.
• Skin Color lets you adjust the hue/sat
• Skin Overlay shows you the mask
• Skin Squeeze smooths blotchiness
• Skin Softening is kind of like an airbrush
 Magic Bullet Film

• Reproduces the look of certain film stocks

• “My Footage Is” pulldown is important.
• Most of the other controls we’ve covered
in other programs and plugins.
 Magic Bullet Looks

• After applying and choosing Edit, the MB

Looks interface comes full screen.
• Scopes and Looks are on the left. The Tool
Chain and Preview Window are in the
middle. The Control Panel and Tools
Drawer are on the right.
 Magic Bullet Looks
• Tool Chain is where the Look is built. It
represents a virtual subject, virtual camera,
to post.
• The effects flow from left to right through
the tools.
• The entire chain can be bypassed (/) or
individual tools.
 Magic Bullet Looks
• Adding Tools to the Chain: double-click a
Tool in the Tool Drawer, or Drag and drop
to the chain or drag and drop to the
Preview Window. Or clicking a Look will
load all of the related Tools for that Look.
• Tools have a pre-set order. If you want to
break that order, alt-drag them (Windows)
or opt-drag them (Mac).
 Magic Bullet Looks
• Looks Drawer: These are preset looks.
• Call it up by mousing over the LOOKS
button in the bottom left (spelled
vertically), or with the keyboard shortcut
(L), or I think hovering at far left side.
• Looks are in categories.
• Any edited and re-named Look becomes a
custom Look that is saved in Custom
category.
 Magic Bullet Looks
• To rename a Look or a category, right click
on it and choose Rename in the drop down
menu that comes up.You can also delete
Looks this way.
• Looks are saved with file suffix .MBLooks
so you can search for them at the root or
finder level.
 Magic Bullet Looks
• The Tools drawer is where the individual
components of a Look are kept, hover over
the far right to call it up or use the
keyboard shortcut (T) or click on the
TOOLS (spelled vertically) in the bottom
right corner.
• Tools are in categories: Subject, Matte, Lens,
Camera, and Post. Mouse over Tools to get
a descriptive ToolTip.
 Magic Bullet Looks
• Look through the effects in each category.
Drag interesting effects down into the
Toolbar at the bottom.
• Hide the Tools with the control on the side
to reveal the controls for each effect.
• Click the check mark in the bottom right
corner to apply the look and get out of the
interface or the X to cancel and get out.
 Baselight
• Applied as an effect. Can be applied to filler
above which allows same correction on
multiple shots.
• Effect is in the Filmlight column of effects.
• Need to display specialized UI
• You should use a three-button mouse with
a wheel. The center mouse button and
wheel play important roles.
Baselight UI
 Basics
• Layer based. P adds a new layer.
• Mona Lisa - primaries
• L toggles inside outside controls. Inside the
matte to the left. Outside to the right.
• Video grade probably most common
• White Mona Lisa is qualifiers - shape/mask
• Add layers. Layers are processed in order.
 More Basics
• Space bar toggles playback
• To stay in Baselight UI and move from clip
to clip you have to map REW and FWD to
your F5 and F6 buttons, respectively.
• Baselight Effect has to be top effect in nest.
• F11 bypasses all layers in effect
• F8 toggles full screen
• Purple operators are active/altered
Video Grade operator
• CG2 on MC Color adds Video operator
• Hue Offsets or sliders - ganged or
unganged
 More Video Controls
• Lift Gamma Gain track wheels/sliders can
be swapped out for any number of other
controls, though LGG make most sense.
 Snapshots

• Clicking A grabs a snApshot or think

frAmegrAb.
• Option-Command-3 shows a wipe
between grade and bypass. 1 resets to
normal. 2 shows side by side.
 Mattes and masks

• O (the letter, not zero) reveals the key as a

white on black shape.
• shift-O cycles through several viewing
options for the key.
• The reference operator tells you where
you’re pulling your key from.
More on mattes/masks
• Hitting G switches you back and forth
between the key and the grade.
• Remember left for inside the key and right
for outside.
• You can name mattes and masks (keys)
• DKey is selectable with U and then drag on
color to select. Rotate cube with middle
mouse drag.
 Even more on masks
• S on the keyboard enables shape mode.
• To combine a luma key (for example) and a
shape key, they have to be in the same
column in the same layer.
• When you do that the key disappears, so
use “Fill on Empty” checkbox at bottom of
matte controls area to left.
• You can use the Intersect button in the
matte area to subtract one shape from
another.
Keyframing and tracking
• Left and Right Square brackets jumps you to keyframes within Baselight.You can use the keyframe
button to toggle a keyframe on OR off at a specific position. So deleting a keyframe is the same
button as ADDING a keyframe.

• To track a shape, select it and choose one of the tracker options, like New One Target Tracker. usually
you should choose the option to Acquire Search Template Every Frame, which updates the search
shape each frame which helps with changing shapes and relationships. The tracked box is displayed and
updates to the far left as a black and white image.

• If the tracker goes awry, you can step forward through the track and when it starts going off, choose
"Delete forward results." Then you can move forward until the shape isn't obscured anymore and click
Reset Reference.You can use the square brackets to jump to restarts or splits in the track and also
track backwards using the Track Backwards button if you started the track in the middle.

• You can do stabilization in Baselight using the Transform operator (which is not one of the standard
ones… you'll have to add it.) You can also apply tracks from other shots or other tracks by copying
and pasting the name of the track into the Tracker Strip.
 DAY 5

• WORKFLOWS
• LOOKS
• I saved a Word doc with links to the
server
 Prepping a timeline in
another NLE for
Resolve
• Simplify the timeline as much as possible. If
everything can be on a single video track,
then put all clips on a single video track.
• Take note of speed changes and resizes and
repositions. Delete unnecessary tracks of
video and audio.
 Exporting a sequence
to Resolve
• In Premiere Pro select the sequence and
choose File>Export>Final Cut XML.
• Name it and save it someplace specific
that’s easy to find and manage.
• Export a reference movie to help colorist
make sure that Resolve conforms it
properly
• XML export also creates a text document
describing any possible errors in the export
Importing into Resolve
• In the Edit page, right-click on empty space
in the Timeline pane and select
Import>XML. In the resulting dialog box,
navigate to the XML file that was just
exported from Premiere.
• If you want to conform at the same
resolution as the original edit, leave all
“automatic” check boxes selected. If you
want to UPREZ to a higher resolution, like
the same as the camera 4K original, then
enter those new parameters in.
Importing into Resolve
• On clicking import some files may not have
been found. Might be titles… Locate them
• There will be a dialog box showing you the
success or failure of the import
• In the Media Page, navigate to the reference
movie that was created and right-click on it
and choose “Add as off-line reference clip”
• In the Edit page, right-click on the sequence
imported from XML and choose “Link to
offline reference clip and point to ref clip.
Importing into Resolve
• On the source side, underneath and to the
left is a small checkerboard icon (like alpha
icon in Adobe). Click on that and the
reference clip appears in the Source side.
• Up and down arrows jump to previous and
next shots - to the first frame. Then left and
right arrows move a frame forward and
back to ensure that the edits are happening
at the right spot.
• Right-click on the source (with offline
enabled) select a wipe style to check errors
 Grade

• With everything imported and checked

against the originals, you can do your grade,
get your approvals from your client and get
ready to export your final sequence back
to Premiere.
Exporting from Resolve
• Before exporting, in the Color Page you
can use the little “flame” icon at the far
right of the secondary tools to burn in data
and timecode. Usually you’d only do this if
you were exporting a full self-contained
movie, like for a review and approval from a
client. This way you have common timecode
numbers on each shot and you can discuss
changes more accurately.
Exporting from Resolve
• Deliver page: Top Left: Easy Set Up>Final
Cut XML Roundtrip. Easy set up option
sets all of the preferences for you based on
the most common needs and workflows.
• You can check through the settings and
export codecs if you want. Select an export
location (folder and subfolder.) Also
possibly add handles.
Exporting from Resolve
• In the export settings, make sure Data Burn
in is set to none, just in case.
• Under File>Custom Names set render to
unique filenames to keep shots with similar
or identical names from overwriting each
other.
• Make sure all clips are selected for export.
There is a small icon above timeline to the
right next to magnifying glass icon.
Exporting from Resolve
• Then Add Job to Render Cue at the
bottom of the pane under the Easy Setup
• Click through any warnings
• Choose Start Render bottom right corner.
• Wait for the render to complete.
• Go to Premiere Pro and Import the XML
file. (right-click on the Project Pane select
from pulldown menu)
 Avid to Resolve
Workflow
• Using DNxHD media from Avid.
• Make sure color space in Avid is set to 709,
not RGB.
• File>Export. Export as AAF in Export
Settings. Link to media, don’t export, unless
you’re moving to another machine.
• Remember where you exported the AAF.
 Avid to Resolve
Workflow
• In Resolve, go to the Project settings and
the Master Project setting tab.
• Use timecode embedded in the source clip.
• Assist using reel names from Embedding in
source clip file.
• Sort timeline using reel name and timecode
• Possibly check Handle Mixed framerates.
• Click Apply.
 Avid to Resolve
Workflow
• In the Resolve Conform page, select
File>Import AAF.
• Load AAF dialog comes up, check that
frame rate and resolution match.
• Automatically set project settings is
checked
 Avid to Resolve
Workflow
• To conform transcoded Avid media:
“Automatically Import source clips into
Media Pool.”
• To conform to camera originals:
“Automatically import source clips into
Media Pool” & “Link to source camera
files.”
• To conform from a different directory:
“Automatically Import source clips into
media pool” and “Ignore file extensions”
 Resolve to Avid
roundtrip
• If you don’t make editing changes: You have
the option to have Resolve use the Avid
AAF file that you originally imported to
generate an updated one. This preserves
audio and all other unsupported effects
from the original AAF file, so that they
reappear when you export a new AAF back
to Media Composer. If you use this option,
you need to make sure the original AAF file
you import remains in the same location.
 Resolve to Avid
roundtrip
• If you do make editing changes: Then you
need to use the “Generate New AAF”
command to export an AAF of the reedited
timeline from Resolve back to Media
Composer. This newly generated AAF file
will not include audio, nor will it include any
effects that are not supported by Resolve.
 Resolve to Avid
roundtrip
• Go to the Deliver view and select the Avid
AAF Round-trip preset.You will need to
render your grades first. DNxHD is the
best option for codec output.
• In the Output options, Render each clip
with a unique filename. Enable flat pass: off.
• The rendered files will need to be copied
to or rendered to the Avid Mediafiles
folder.
 Resolve to Avid
roundtrip
• choose the export method depending on
whether you’ve edited anything in the
timeline. Click Save and the AAF is created.
• In Avid go to File>Import and import the
AAF just exported from Resolve.
• With the rendered Resolve media in the
Avid Mediafiles folder, you should be done.
Build a library of looks
• You can create libraries of looks that you
like in any software and save them. This is
not cheating. It’s a great way to get
feedback quickly from clients.
• If you’re really in to color grading, you
should start developing a book of images
that have looks that you love. Fashion
magazines, film magazines, movie posters.
 Purpose of Looks
• Looks should serve a purpose.
• They can help to create a product that
stands out against a crowd of other media,
like CSI (the US TV show).
• They can create attitude.
• They can tell the story.
Other important things
• Communication with the client.
• Find a “language” or words that are
communicating the same thing. Try to
communicate like the client.
• Jargon is not helpful unless it is shared.
• Adapt your “language” to that of the client.
 Understanding Looks
• Find an image that you like and start to
study it. Start with tonal range.
• Note the detail in the highlights and the
blacks.
• Note any color casts in highlights, shadows
and gamma.
• Note glows or blurs or other effects in the
highlights or shadows
 Understanding Looks

• Look for any signs of a vignette.

• Look to “known quantities” like skin tones,
sky and grass.
• Look to things that should be black or gray
or white. What color are they REALLY.
 Understanding Looks
• Understand if any colors that already exist
in the raw footage will hamper or literally
“color” your attempts at a look.
• If, for example, you want cool skin tones,
should you first desaturate the entire image
so that the warmth of the skin doesn’t
“pollute” the coolness you’re trying to
achieve?
• How will secondaries work to achieve your
look? Can you do it with Primary only?
 Day for Night
• Understand the way your eyes work in the
dark. Experiment in real life. Look at a
color in the light, then dim or turn off the
lights. What does it look like now? Move a
color from indoors at night to outdoors at
night. How does its appearance change?
• Use that knowledge when you create a day
for night shot.
 Day for Night
• In the dark, our eyes are less sensitive to
red.
• In the dark, our eyes are less sensitive to
color/chroma in general.
• In the moonlight, contrast is enhanced
because there is no “sky” light to serve as a
bounce.
 Notes

• Tektronix tutorials - presets - gamut

• Budgeting time - watch the sequence
through, take note of difficult shots, difficult
or bad matches, important shots like
making skin tones of “hero” look good.
• creating a look book
Deconstructing a Look
with Resolve Curves
• Josh Petok’s trick of importing a shot,
balancing the look OUT of the shot, then
reversing the sliders out.
• Then saving that look and reapplying it to
any new, clean shot to apply the same look
you just balanced out.