Stig Olsen

We continue our DaVinci Resolve 17 training with a new high-end course in Color Management Workflow. This is an intermediate course for colorists and visual effects artists taught by our instructor Lee Lanier. In this training series you will learn to work with both display-referred and scene-referred management including ACES, matching camera profiles with color space transforms and DCTLs, how to set up your projects for multiple color space outputs, everything about RED IPP2 and RAW workflow, how to use the Gamut tool, LUTs, CSTs and OpenColorIO in Fusion, and much more. The DaVinci Resolve project files and footage are available for download so that you can easily follow along. Download project files The DCTL that comes with the project files is created with a tool called Resolve Math Extra (OFX) developed by Paul Dore. It can be downloaded from this site. About the instructor Lee Lanier has created visual effects on numerous features films for Walt Disney Studios and PDI/DreamWorks. Lee is a world-renowned expert in the video effects field, and has written several popular high-end software books, and taught at the Gnomon School of Visual Effects in Hollywood. Who is this course designed for? Colorists Visual effects artists Lessons overview Lesson 01: Introduction and terminology Lesson 02: Display vs scene referred Lesson 03: Display referred space and LUTS Lesson 04: Mixing Camera footage in display referred Lesson 05: Matching cameras with an OFX plugin Lesson 06: Color management in Fusion Lesson 07: Using RCM Resolve color management Lesson 08: Working with ACES Lesson 09: RCM and ACES inside fusion Lesson 10: Adding color transforms in resolve Lesson 11: Adding LUTS and using opencolorIO Lesson 12: Switching to RCM wide gamut Lesson 13: New color space aware tools and HDR palette Lesson 14: RCM input and and output DRTS Software required A free version of DaVinci Resolve or DaVinci Resolve studio

This is the ultimate course for editors and conform artists who want to learn everything about conforming inside of DaVinci Resolve! With 21 lessons and almost 5 hours of in-depth DaVinci Resolve training, Kevin McAuliffe will take you through every step and technical detail of the process from conforming media to mastering the final picture. About the instructor Kevin is an award winning editor and visual effects creator based in Toronto with over 15 years of teaching and training experience. Over the past years Kevin has delivered world-class work for clients such as Warner Bros, Walt Disney Company, 20th Century Fox, Universal and Elevation Pictures. Who is this course designed for? Editors Conform Artists Colorists Software required A free version of DaVinci Resolve or DaVinci Resolve Studio. Avid. Premiere and Final Cut X are used in some of the lessons. This training series is sponsored by our friends at digitalrebellion.com

Printer points were mechanical adjustments that affected the color balance and brightness of film before the digital age, and the technical process was done by a color timer. The systems used a series of dichroic filters that split the light into red, green, and blue, and each color then passed through 'light valves'. These were metal vanes that opened and closed in precise increments to allow the exact amount of light through to replicate the exact value for each light point. The three colors were then recombined back into full spectrum light and output to the film. In digital grading, printer points are still very popular and common corrections for setting the primary balance, but also for creating looks. One of the reasons for its popularity is that printer points move the signal in its entirety and alter the entire tonal range in the image. This way, we stay true to the way the original image was shot, and the result can be very clean and cinematic. To illustrate this we can look at the waveform when we add red and subtract green to a grey-scale image. The relationship between the shadows, midtones and highlights stays consistent, and the contrast never changes. By using controls that separate tonal ranges such as lift, gamma and gain, we betray the natural relationship between the shadows, midtones and highlights. This is illustrated with a gain adjustment in the example below. Other reasons for its popularity are that printer points are extremely accurate corrections that can be measured, and they are easier to communicate than wheel values. Printer points in DaVinci Resolve Printer points are equivalent to the Offset Controls that can be found underneath the 'primaries bar' menu inside of DaVinci Resolve. By default, the exposure of each color channel is set to 25 as a starting point, which refers to the center of the scale in most standard printer setups. By moving the sliders of the individual color channels up and down, the color balance will be altered. The combination of red, green and blue and the opposites cyan, magenta and yellow in varying degrees of intensities can create a variety of different colors. When working with the color channels we also need to take the brightness into account. By moving all the three color channels ganged together the brightness of the image changes. Moving all the color channels ganged together one time will change the brightness equal to about 1/12th of a full camera stop, and by moving them together twelve times the brightness will change equal to a full camera stop. Adjusting the individual channels also affects brightness, but at different levels. Changes in the red channel affects brightness more than the two others, and green slightly more than blue. However, to say how the eye would perceive these differences would be difficult as we have our greatest sensitivity in the green spectrum and our eye is more sensitive to changes in brightness than color. The combination of brightness and color can be used creatively, and in the example below we get dark yellow by subtracting blue and green. Some other interesting combinations are to remove blue and green to get red, remove red and green to get blue and to remove red and blue to get green. In the next example, we add red and green to get to yellow instead but this time the brightness increases. Other examples are to combine red and blue to get magenta and green and blue to get cyan. Corrections through the curve of a LUT The Offset Controls are calibrated to work on the narrow range of log encoded images only, and the results of the corrections are designed to be viewed through the curve of a LUT. This way the offset controls will act more like a traditional exposure control, as the image will expand and compress based on the shape of the curve. We can apply our corrections on a node prior to the LUT to keep the node structure clean, but the result will be the same if they are applied on the node with the LUT itself because corrections will take effect prior to the LUT. Creatively we can choose to apply the offset corrections in video gamma space after having normalized the image, but the controls will act differently than what it's designed for and the result will be different. Adding a point of red to the exposure in video gamma space gives you lifted red shadows, which isn’t the way exposure should work When we look at the corrections through the curve of the LUT, we will see more changes in the straight line portion of the curve rather than in the ends. It means that we can push color into the image without affecting the blacks and highlights as much as the midtones. Just the way different film stocks would act in the past when film was color timed chemically. The color balance of the image may also be altered depending on the color variables in the LUT. Some LUTs are also designed to push cooler tones into the shadows and yellow into the highlights even though we only adjust the brightness. The more aggressive the curve is, the more changes happens when working under the LUT. In this representation of the popular Fujifilm 3513DI D55 LUT (that can be found in the DaVinci Resolve 3D LUT list), we can see how the color channels interact with one another. Even though the exposure vary and color shifts happens, the contrast don't change. We can view the offset corrections through any curve, but the only way to keep the relationship between the tonal ranges and stay true to the way the original image was shot, is to use the exact same LUT that the DOP exposed for on set. If the DOP shot on Alexa with the Alexa K1S1 LUT in the camera, that is the one we should grade under and watch the corrections through. Balancing with Offset Controls With different light sources and color temperatures, it's sometimes necessary to balance an image to remove a color cast. Usually the color cast is apparent in the entire image and can for that reason effectively be removed with simple offset adjustments. Sometimes it's sufficient to only adjust one of the color channels, but in the example below we need to adjust two channels to bring the image into balance. To reduce blue, we can add yellow by lowering the numerical value of the blue channel, and then we can add red by raising the numerical value of the red channel. By pivoting the red and blue channel around the green channel that is placed in the middle, we don't change the exposure to much from how it was orignally exposed. In addition to color temperature, images can also have a tint issue. While color temperatures ranges within the orange/blue spectrum, tint ranges within the green/magenta spectrum. If the color cast is magenta, we can add green to correct the color balance, and vice-versa. Davinci Resolve has a Tint Control to deal with these situations but it's calibrated to work in video gamma space. That means the range can be a bit narrow on log-encoded images if the cast is too strong. Offset corrections can therefore be a better choice in those situations too. Balance the image or not Remember, white balancing usually means adjusting the colors so the image looks more natural -not necessarily «correct» on a scope. If a blue color cast works for us, there’s no rule that says we must neutralize the white balance. Sometimes we also deliberately ignore the balance for artistic reasons. This particular image is supposed to be blue and it’s perfectly natural. Just as a sunset needs to stay nice and warm. It's up to us to adjust the white balance, or to adjust it at all. Balance or not, it's essential to apply the LUT before judging how to approach the image. Full, half and quarter increments The offset controls can be available on the numerical keypad section of the keyboard by activating the hotkeys in the color drop-down manu. They are also available in half and quarter increments. A more sophisticated way to work with the offset controls in DaVinci Resolve could be to map the keys to a Keypad. By Lowepost Thanks to John Daro, Paul Dore, Douglas Delaney, Florian 'Utsi' Martin, Tyler Roth, David Cole, Walter Volpatto, Adam Inglis, and Paul Ensby for contributing to this article.