IntroductionWelcome| 00:00 |
(MUSIC).
| | 00:04 |
Hey there, I'm Simon Walker and welcome to
| | 00:06 |
the The Art of Color Correction, Color
Grading for Locations and Times of Day.
| | 00:12 |
In this course we'll look at Color
Corrections and grades for different
| | 00:16 |
locations ranging from interior spaces to
outside landscapes with the emphasis on
| | 00:20 |
lighting, light source, and color.
We'll begin with locations looking at how
| | 00:27 |
you can use simple color adjustments to
move a shot from its original location to
| | 00:31 |
a different place entirely as well as
stylizing shots to emphasize a mood.
| | 00:37 |
Next we'll see how footage shot during one
time of the day can be made to look like
| | 00:41 |
another time altogether.
We'll even take a look at the famous day
| | 00:46 |
for night technique to make daytime
footage look like it was shot at night.
| | 00:51 |
Different interior locations can hold
great significance in a story.
| | 00:55 |
So we'll see how to make footage take on
the mood of certain types of rooms,
| | 00:59 |
including offices, bedrooms and hospitals.
We'll finish by looking at how to simulate
| | 01:06 |
a popular camera technique, narrow depth
of field, using color grading tools.
| | 01:12 |
This simulated depth of field can help
draw a viewer's eye to specific parts of
| | 01:15 |
an image.
During this course I'll be using Adobe
| | 01:19 |
Premiere Pro with Red Giant's popular
grading plugins Magic Bullet Looks and
| | 01:23 |
Colorista to demonstrate these techniques.
But many of them are generic color
| | 01:28 |
corrections which can be achieved using a
wide range of different software applications.
| | 01:34 |
So, it doesn't matter if you haven't got
these programs.
| | 01:36 |
You can still watch the course, learn from
the techniques I'm going to show you, and
| | 01:39 |
then apply them to your own work.
So, let's get started with locations and
| | 01:44 |
times of day.
| | 01:45 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Telling a story with color| 00:00 |
Color forms are significant part of how we
interpret scenes in video.
| | 00:04 |
Different colors can suggest different
moods.
| | 00:07 |
If we see muted colors with dark green or
dark blue in the shadows, it can suggest
| | 00:10 |
tension in the scene.
Which is something we'd see as part of a
| | 00:14 |
thriller or an action movie.
Whereas bright saturated primary colors,
| | 00:18 |
give the impression of a much happier more
positive mood.
| | 00:22 |
A lot of effort is made by the lighting,
costume, location, and set-dressing
| | 00:26 |
departments to introduce specific colors
into the scene to reflect the story being
| | 00:30 |
told in the script.
But the great thing is, that we can also
| | 00:35 |
simulate colors and lighting conditions in
post-production.
| | 00:38 |
We can use standard editing software to
change the colors along after the footage
| | 00:42 |
has been shot.
This means that at the editing stage,
| | 00:45 |
there's another opportunity to add a
creative treatment to a scene.
| | 00:49 |
To reinforce the mood being suggested, or
even to change it.
| | 00:53 |
For example, for story reasons, it may be
necessary to change the time of day for
| | 00:57 |
certain sequences, a classic example of
which is to shoot during the day then
| | 01:01 |
treat the footage so it appears as if the
action is taking place at night.
| | 01:07 |
Simulating color and lighting also means
that shots filmed at different times of
| | 01:11 |
day, or even at different locations or
shot under different lighting conditions,
| | 01:14 |
can be matched.
Or given a similar color treatment so that
| | 01:18 |
they can be cut together seamlessly,
suggesting that all the action was filmed
| | 01:22 |
at the time, at the same location.
So if your script calls for multiple
| | 01:27 |
scenes, set in a variety of different
locations.
| | 01:31 |
It can be much cheaper to simulate the
lighting conditions of those locations,
| | 01:34 |
rather than to physically travel to them.
But I think the most interesting part of
| | 01:39 |
the use of color, though, is to support
your story.
| | 01:43 |
You can use colors to set a mood and
communicate what your protagonist is going
| | 01:47 |
through all without using dialog.
You can also use color to separate
| | 01:52 |
characters from their backgrounds.
To make it easier for the audience to see
| | 01:55 |
what they are doing.
Or even mix them in with their surrounding.
| | 01:58 |
It's very common to see certain characters
or locations treated with a signature color.
| | 02:04 |
So you instantly know as a viewer, which
location or which setting is being shown
| | 02:07 |
on the screen.
| | 02:09 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using the exercise files| 00:00 |
If you are a premium member of lynda.com,
you have access to the exercise files used
| | 00:04 |
throughout this course.
The exercise files for the course are
| | 00:08 |
provided in a downloadable zip file.
Once you've downloaded and expanded it,
| | 00:13 |
you'll find the folders for each chapter.
Inside each folder, are the project files
| | 00:18 |
for each chapter, for each of the movies
you'll be watching.
| | 00:21 |
There's also a media folder, which
contains all the source material for each chapter.
| | 00:28 |
When you open a project, Premiere Pro may
ask you to relink to the location of the media.
| | 00:33 |
If this is the case, then you can relink
to the media files inside the media folder.
| | 00:39 |
If you're not a premium subscriber to
lynda.com, you won't have access to the
| | 00:42 |
exercise files, but you can still follow
along from scratch with your own material.
| | 00:47 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
1. How Light and Color Sets the Mood for ShotsWhat different colors tell the audience| 00:00 |
Telling stories with video is all about
prompting an emotional response from the viewer.
| | 00:05 |
And different colors can prompt different
responses.
| | 00:08 |
For example, pink and purple can be
associated with romance, or friendship.
| | 00:13 |
Yellow and gold can suggest warmth and
postive feeling.
| | 00:16 |
Whilst, blue has the contotation of cool
temperature.
| | 00:20 |
And cool emotion.
Visually, certain colors can appear nearer
| | 00:24 |
and certain colors can appear further
away.
| | 00:27 |
Warm colors, like red and orange, seem to
project forward, while blues tend to recede.
| | 00:33 |
This means that you can make sure that
whilst you're shooting, different colors
| | 00:36 |
are placed in the foreground and
background, to create a sense of depth.
| | 00:41 |
But you can also enhance these colors at
the editing stage to exaggerate this depth.
| | 00:46 |
Shots that are edited together, but don't
match, can confuse the audience and
| | 00:49 |
unexpected colors or even ungraded shots
can lack atmosphere and can also take the
| | 00:53 |
viewer out of the story.
So it's important to keep corrections and
| | 00:58 |
grades consistent.
These are some of the core concepts to
| | 01:01 |
consider, and we're going to investigate
them more as we go through this chapter.
| | 01:05 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| How our eyes see color| 00:00 |
The first thing to learn about how we
perceive color, is that we can't trust our eyes.
| | 00:05 |
The way our eyes interpret color changes
according to which colors we're looking at
| | 00:09 |
and which colors are placed next to each
other.
| | 00:12 |
You can easily demonstrate this with a
simple spreadsheet.
| | 00:16 |
I've created a spreadsheet here with two
orange panels.
| | 00:20 |
And a blue panel in the middle.
And it's a very light blue panel and the
| | 00:25 |
oranges are constant.
They're not gradient, but the interesting
| | 00:29 |
thing is that they may appear to be a
gradient because of the viewing angle, or
| | 00:32 |
that you're looking at the screen.
Or your type of screen you're looking at.
| | 00:37 |
And all these things combine to change the
color on screen.
| | 00:40 |
The reason that you can see the central
column as blue, and the panels as orange,
| | 00:44 |
is because they are complimentary colors,
they are colors that are on opposite sides
| | 00:49 |
of the color wheel.
And on the digital color wheel that we
| | 00:54 |
work with on the computer, oranges are on
the opposite side of blue.
| | 00:59 |
And so they compliment each other.
And it means that when these color work
| | 01:02 |
together, we see the difference between
them.
| | 01:05 |
And it's an esthetically pleasing effect.
But what happens when these colors are
| | 01:10 |
from the same hue.
So here's the original slide again.
| | 01:15 |
And all of these slides the central colomn
stays a light blue.
| | 01:19 |
If I change the panels on the left and the
right to a lighter blue.
| | 01:24 |
Then the central column appears to be much
less blue.
| | 01:27 |
It's much more desaturated, it's almost
white.
| | 01:31 |
And then if we enhance the panels along
the left and right to be an even darker
| | 01:34 |
blue, then the central column appears
white, but actually it's the same blue as
| | 01:37 |
we saw in the very first slide here.
So it's an important thing to think about
| | 01:43 |
when you're placing colors in a scene.
What color are you placing the next two
| | 01:49 |
because the perceived color that we see
changes according to the surrounding colors.
| | 01:55 |
And we can demonstrate how colors can make
a difference in a typical video scene.
| | 02:00 |
I'm in the color and story Premiere Pro
project, and I'm using the Seeing color
| | 02:07 |
sequence here.
And, this is one of the series of shots
| | 02:12 |
that we created especially for this course
to demonstrate the sort of colors that
| | 02:16 |
turn up in standard video shoots, and the
sort of things to look out for.
| | 02:22 |
So, in this shot, we've got a scene of two
people choosing some material.
| | 02:27 |
And if I just play it back, our focus is
centered on them.
| | 02:33 |
And in a very similar setup we placed
something orange in the background.
| | 02:38 |
And on this second clip, this orange
clothing here.
| | 02:42 |
(LAUGH) Now you've seen it it's really
difficult not to see it.
| | 02:46 |
It's because it's so dominant.
The orange colors in a shot tend to
| | 02:49 |
project forward and they attract
attention.
| | 02:52 |
It's interesting though, that when he
picks up this material here.
| | 02:57 |
That is actually quite pleasing to look at
this scence.
| | 03:01 |
Because the orange is balancing nicely
with the blue.
| | 03:04 |
They're complimentary colors.
So a good practice when your'e setting up
| | 03:07 |
a scene, is to have a look at the colors
in the background.
| | 03:12 |
This scene is much less distracting than
this one just because we're not distracted
| | 03:16 |
by this orange color.
And over the course of this chapter we go
| | 03:22 |
into techniques about how to target this
particular color on this clip here, I've
| | 03:26 |
got a secondary color correction which
desaturates the color of the shirt here.
| | 03:33 |
So here's the untreated clip, and here's
the desaturated one.
| | 03:37 |
And I'll show you how to target that one
specific color.
| | 03:40 |
The other thing to think of though, is our
interpretation of color at the
| | 03:44 |
subconscious level.
Sometimes we observe things in our
| | 03:47 |
surroundings, and we don't know we're
observing them.
| | 03:50 |
We are just used to seeing them.
So for example in this shot of New York, I
| | 03:55 |
mean it's a great example of how the
atmosphere of the earth filters light to
| | 03:59 |
create a bluish tint to items that are
further away.
| | 04:05 |
So you know I mentioned that orange tends
to jump forward.
| | 04:09 |
And blue tends to recede.
Well it's a practical way that our eyes
| | 04:12 |
work, but we're also used to seeing this
effect in real life when you look at
| | 04:15 |
mountains in the distance and this is why
they appear slightly blue.
| | 04:20 |
Because light is being filtered by the
atmosphere turning it blue, so in a scene
| | 04:24 |
like this these buildings are the same
color as the buildings in the foreground here.
| | 04:30 |
But because of the filtered light that's
why they appear blue and a similar thing
| | 04:34 |
can be seen in a landscape shot.
This is a view of North Wilcher near to
| | 04:39 |
where I live in the UK.
And it's a good example of how the hills
| | 04:43 |
in the distance here are colored slightly
blue because the atmosphere is filtering
| | 04:46 |
the light over a distance.
You can use this to your advantage though.
| | 04:51 |
And you can exaggerate the position of the
building for example or some hills, by
| | 04:54 |
coloring them slightly blue.
Selecting a specific area of the screen.
| | 05:00 |
And then grading that to suggest to the
audience a greater distance.
| | 05:03 |
So it's something to be aware of as a
natural phenomenon.
| | 05:07 |
But also something that you can use in
your practical, day-to-day grading.
| | 05:11 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Making sure color is consistent across multiple clips in a sequence| 00:00 |
It's important to have the same color from
shot to shot, so that you don't risk
| | 00:03 |
taking the viewer out of the story.
But they're also things that can go wrong
| | 00:07 |
when you're shooting.
We've previously looked at the effect of
| | 00:10 |
having an erroneous color orange in the
background, and how distracting that can be.
| | 00:16 |
And it can also be distracting to your
audience if you got the wrong color
| | 00:18 |
balance on your cameras.
I'm using the continuity sequence here,
| | 00:23 |
and I've got two shots.
One of which was set up correctly with a
| | 00:27 |
correct white balance, and other one
wasn't.
| | 00:29 |
So this white has much more of a blue
cast.
| | 00:33 |
When you're shooting indoors with tungsten
yellow lighting, and you have your camera
| | 00:36 |
set to be shooting outdoors where the
light is much cooler, then when you shoot
| | 00:39 |
indoors on the wrong white balance, you
get this blue color cast.
| | 00:44 |
And it's a common production problem.
The nice thing is of course that we can
| | 00:48 |
correct this inside our editing software.
A great way to see the difference between
| | 00:53 |
colors on shots is to use the Color
Correction workspace.
| | 00:57 |
And if I switch to that, then you get the
chance to see the scopes in your layout.
| | 01:05 |
This is the reference monitor.
If you can't see this particular one, you
| | 01:08 |
can always click on the Settings button
and choose one of the other scopes.
| | 01:13 |
If you select All Scopes, then it shows
all the scopes that Premiere provides.
| | 01:18 |
For example, I'll show you a close up of
this one.
| | 01:22 |
This is the YC waveform which shows you
the brightest levels in your shot and the
| | 01:26 |
darkest ones.
By default, it has the chroma switched on
| | 01:31 |
as well.
But I like to see it without so I can see
| | 01:33 |
the brightness at a glance.
And there's also the Vector Scope which
| | 01:38 |
allows you to see how saturated your image
is.
| | 01:42 |
The closer the trace gets to the edge of
the Vector Scope, the more saturated your
| | 01:46 |
shot is.
But the one I use more than anything else
| | 01:50 |
is the RGB parade.
Because it shows me a red, green and blue channels.
| | 01:54 |
And it also shows me if they're balanced.
You can see here that this shot isn't balanced.
| | 02:00 |
It's got more blue in the highlights and
then at top of the mid turns here what you
| | 02:04 |
can see quite clearly.
And so our job is going to be to just
| | 02:08 |
balance this clip and match it with the
previous clip.
| | 02:13 |
So I'm going to just zoom out of my
timeline a little bit using the Minus keys.
| | 02:18 |
So I can see these two shots.
And I'm going to jump to the first room of
| | 02:21 |
the second shot with the Up and Down Arrow
keys.
| | 02:24 |
You can jump between shots like that.
Right so to apply a Color Correction
| | 02:29 |
filter to the second clip, I can go up to
the Effects tab and inside the Color
| | 02:32 |
Correction folder, I can choose the three
way color corrector and drag it on the clip.
| | 02:40 |
There is so much quick adjusted type in
three and then it limits the choice that
| | 02:44 |
filters with whatever you've typed in.
So I'm going to drag that onto here and
| | 02:49 |
then you need to click the Effects
Controls pallet to show you the controls
| | 02:52 |
for that filter.
And a core concept in color grading in the
| | 02:57 |
computer is that the complementary colors,
the colors on the opposite side of the
| | 03:02 |
color wheels, cancel each other out.
What I mean by that is that rather than
| | 03:07 |
reducing the blue in this shot.
It's quite common to introduce its
| | 03:12 |
complimentary color to actually neutralize
that color cast.
| | 03:16 |
So I can see here there's lots of blue in
the highlights and the mid tones.
| | 03:21 |
So I'm going to choose the color wheel
here and just push the pin towards it's
| | 03:25 |
opposite color which is this yellowy
orange.
| | 03:29 |
And as I push it towards there, then you
can see that the blues in the highlights
| | 03:33 |
are being reduced and the reds are being
increased.
| | 03:38 |
I can do the same in the midtones as well
and that balances those general midtone levels.
| | 03:44 |
And you can then go ahead and start to
tweak with the slider on the control here.
| | 03:49 |
And this is a process which takes more
than a few minutes to do.
| | 03:54 |
Balancing shots is one of the core
disciplines of a colorist.
| | 03:58 |
And they would go through it and spend
some time.
| | 04:00 |
Carefully crafting each particular grade.
But, what I'm going to do is just show you
| | 04:05 |
what I can do within a few seconds to show
you the general concept of balancing these
| | 04:09 |
colors together.
And moving the color wheels so we can get,
| | 04:15 |
there we go, in a few seconds I've got
something which is much more balanced than
| | 04:19 |
the previous shot.
Here's the before and after, so I'm
| | 04:23 |
going to turn off the filter here.
Here's the blue shot, which doesn't match
| | 04:27 |
at all with the previous shot.
And here is the one with the Color
| | 04:31 |
Correction applied, which balances much
more.
| | 04:34 |
So this essential concept of balancing
colors and manipulating colors is
| | 04:38 |
something we come back to time and again
during the course.
| | 04:42 |
As well as the idea of actually looking at
your shot whilst having one eye on the
| | 04:45 |
scopes, to seeing what the colors are
doing in each particular area and
| | 04:48 |
highlights, mid-tones, and shadows on each
particular clip.
| | 04:53 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Understanding the correct order to apply color correction adjustments| 00:00 |
There is in general a correct order to
make corrections to your clips.
| | 00:04 |
I'm using the color correction sequence
here in Premier Pro, and I'm going to
| | 00:09 |
switch over to the Color Correction layout
so, I can see the RGB scopes.
| | 00:15 |
On this shot, I can see that the RGB
channels are reasonably well-balanced, but
| | 00:20 |
they're not very bright.
The brightest of these traces only reaches
| | 00:25 |
about 60% on the scale.
And if I wanted to increase the contrast
| | 00:29 |
or increase the brightness of the shot, I
need to raise these up to a higher levels.
| | 00:34 |
I'm going to use the three way color
corrector here.
| | 00:37 |
And drop it on to the clip, and open up
the Effect Controls tab to see the settings.
| | 00:45 |
So, if I use the input sliders here, this
controls the highlights and this controls
| | 00:49 |
the shadows with essential pin controlling
the midtones.
| | 00:54 |
So, if I direct this one to the left, it
reduces the width of the slider and
| | 00:59 |
increases the brightness of the traces.
Similarly, if I drag the input levels and
| | 01:06 |
drag them down, it makes the shadows
darker.
| | 01:10 |
And what you want to try and avoid
generally is impacting these levels on
| | 01:14 |
either the bottom or the top of the scale,
because you then begin to lost detail.
| | 01:19 |
Here, I'm crushing the shadows against the
bottom scale and we're losing detail in
| | 01:23 |
the darkest areas.
If I increase the contrast so much so that
| | 01:28 |
I begin to clip against the top, then not
only does it look quite sterilized, but I
| | 01:32 |
begin to lose detail in the brightest
sections.
| | 01:37 |
I'm just going to reset this filter so, we
get back to the start.
| | 01:41 |
So, the general thing you do first is
adjust how bright you want the image,
| | 01:45 |
including how bright you want the
mid-tones.
| | 01:49 |
There's quite a lot of information in the
mid-tones in this shot, and I can control
| | 01:52 |
that with this central slider here.
I can bring those up slightly and then
| | 01:58 |
bring down the brightness slightly.
Here's the before and after.
| | 02:04 |
And you don't have to spread this out to
actually fill the scope.
| | 02:08 |
It's a matter of choice by keeping one eye
on the final image.
| | 02:12 |
And here I've increased the exposure, and
made the image a little clearer to look at.
| | 02:18 |
Stretching an image all the way to the top
of the scope gives you a high contrast image.
| | 02:25 |
And high contrast means that you that you
got a larger distance between the
| | 02:27 |
brightest and the darkest areas of the
image.
| | 02:30 |
Sometimes, you may want to deal with a low
contrasting image.
| | 02:36 |
And you can do that using the Output
sliders here.
| | 02:39 |
So, I can limit the brightest pixels here
and limit the darkest ones as well.
| | 02:45 |
And by doing this, I'm making a low
contrast image, there's the shorter
| | 02:48 |
distances between the brightest and the
darkest parts of the image.
| | 02:53 |
And I can control where that spreads over
the scope with the central slider here.
| | 02:59 |
And these sorts of images tend to look a
little washed out, there's not so much
| | 03:03 |
detail in the shadows, and the highlights
an't to bright.
| | 03:08 |
And they tell a different story really.
And low contrast images tell a different
| | 03:12 |
story to high contrast images.
It really depends on the story you're telling.
| | 03:16 |
I got to reset this again and adjust for
some exposure, there we go.
| | 03:25 |
The next stage is to apply an artistic
adjustment, for example, a tint.
| | 03:29 |
Once you set the contrast, you can then go
on to move to the color wheels and make
| | 03:33 |
color adjustments.
Have a look at the scopes just before we
| | 03:37 |
do this, they're all quite balanced.
Each channel has a very similar shape and
| | 03:41 |
a very similar position on the scope.
It's a general rule of them, that's if
| | 03:46 |
each channel matches, then you have a well
balanced image.
| | 03:49 |
If they don't match, then you have a cast
or a colored tint.
| | 03:53 |
If I drag the mid-tone color wheel towards
blue, you can begin to see I'm adding blue
| | 03:59 |
into the image, and the blue channel is
higher than the red and the green channel,
| | 04:04 |
which indicates a blue cast.
If I move this over to the oranges, then
| | 04:11 |
I'm introducing a warmer image, a more
orange tint, and the red channel is higher
| | 04:16 |
than the other two.
Balancing your images first gives you more
| | 04:21 |
control over the tint you want to then
add.
| | 04:24 |
But the core concept is, adjust your
contrast first and then go on to adjust color.
| | 04:30 |
There are a variety of tools that you can
use in Premier Pro to adjust your colors
| | 04:33 |
and to adjust the balance of an image.
On this next shot here, there is an
| | 04:38 |
identifiable blue cast, because the white
balance on the camera wasn't set correctly.
| | 04:45 |
As well as using the three-way color
corrector, we can actually use the RGB curves.
| | 04:51 |
And they live in the color correction
folder here.
| | 04:53 |
I'll drag that one to the shot here, this
is what they look like.
| | 04:57 |
You can control the contrast with the Luma
curve.
| | 05:01 |
I can reduce it by dragging down, or
increase it by dragging across.
| | 05:07 |
You can also set points on curves, and I
can decrease the shadow and increase the
| | 05:11 |
highlights to get that classic film curve
the s curve, which increases the
| | 05:15 |
highlights deepens the shadows and
increases the contrast.
| | 05:21 |
Here's the before and after.
I'm going to reset this filter, and show
| | 05:25 |
you that its really quick to balance an
image with curves.
| | 05:29 |
In this case, we've got a much
identifiable blue cast which we can see in
| | 05:32 |
the height of the blue channel.
What I want to do is slightly bring down
| | 05:37 |
the contrast of the whole image, then I'm
going to increase the red channel by
| | 05:42 |
dragging left on the reds curve till I
more or less match the blue channel.
| | 05:49 |
And then I'm going to do the same for the
green channel.
| | 05:55 |
And very quickly, here's the before and
after.
| | 05:58 |
We have a balanced image, because we're
able to target each particular channel.
| | 06:03 |
But having said that you have to balance
channels first, there may be an artistic
| | 06:07 |
reason why you don't necessarily want to
do that.
| | 06:11 |
I'm going to go to this last clip on the
timeline, and here we have somebody shot outdoors.
| | 06:16 |
And there's a slightly warm hue to this
image, which is illustrated by the higher
| | 06:20 |
levels of red in the red channel.
If I use the RGB curves, type in RGB to
| | 06:26 |
show you the quick way of getting there,
and drop those onto the shot and go over
| | 06:30 |
to the Effect Controls.
If I balance this image, let me show you
| | 06:35 |
what happens, I'm going to bring down the
contrast slightly and then bring up the
| | 06:40 |
blues to match the reds.
And then bring up the greens a little bit.
| | 06:48 |
And the more I adjust and balance each
channel, the whiter the light becomes.
| | 06:54 |
Here's the before and after.
This was shot on a sunny day and it has
| | 06:57 |
the implication of a slightly warmer
atmosphere than this particular look.
| | 07:04 |
To some extent, it depends on your
deadline, it depends how much time you've
| | 07:07 |
got to craft each particular shot.
And it depends on the story you're telling.
| | 07:11 |
I actually prefer the warmer look of this
image.
| | 07:14 |
And so, I wouldn't necessarily have to
balance this image perfectly, especially
| | 07:17 |
if this was in keeping with the story I
was wanting to tell.
| | 07:21 |
Many times, grading is subjective and you
have to balance your technical corrections
| | 07:25 |
with the artistic aim of the piece.
So, do keep checking the channels to have
| | 07:30 |
a look at whether there's a color cast or
whether the channels are in balance.
| | 07:35 |
But also have one eye on your main image
to make sure that the colors in the story
| | 07:38 |
that you're wanting to tell are being
represented.
| | 07:42 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with Premiere Pro and the Colorista II plugin| 00:00 |
There are lots of tools you can use to
make color correction adjustments.
| | 00:04 |
I'll be using Red Giant's Colorista two
and Magic bullet looks during this course,
| | 00:08 |
and they are both plug-ins, they work as
filters inside the host software, in this
| | 00:12 |
case, Premiere Pro.
But they also work in a range of software
| | 00:17 |
like, After Effects, and Final Cut Pro,
and Motion, and also in programs like Avid.
| | 00:22 |
And in Sony Vegas, when you've installed
the plugin in turns up, just like any
| | 00:26 |
other filter, inside the video effects
folder.
| | 00:30 |
Here we go.
Magic Bullet Colorista and I'll drag it
| | 00:33 |
onto this first clip, and switch my work
space over to Color Correction so I can
| | 00:37 |
see the scopes.
And switch over to RGB parade.
| | 00:44 |
And if I highlight the clip, and then go
over to Effects controls, I can see the
| | 00:48 |
controls inside Colorista two.
A lot like many other color correctors, it
| | 00:52 |
has the three color wheels: shadows,
midtones, and highlights.
| | 00:55 |
It does have the ability to be able to
control the deepness of the shadows with
| | 00:59 |
the luma control on the outside of the
color wheel.
| | 01:03 |
As well as on the midtones and the
highlights.
| | 01:06 |
And for some editors moving across between
software platforms, this is very
| | 01:10 |
comforting, because these act in a very
similar way as the controls in Final Cut
| | 01:13 |
Pro 7, for example.
And so, people who are moving from Final
| | 01:18 |
Cut to say, Premiere Pro have the same
controls inside the interface with,
| | 01:21 |
certainly with Colorista, because it works
in both programs.
| | 01:26 |
So you can use these to deepen the shadows
and increase the highlights and increase
| | 01:31 |
the contrast over an image.
Colorista also has the ability to target
| | 01:36 |
single colors in an image, and just drag
on these pans to either desaturate so I'm
| | 01:41 |
desaturating the oranges, which tend to be
skin tones, or to saturate them by
| | 01:46 |
dragging them outside the wheel like this
here's the before and after.
| | 01:55 |
I'll just reset the filter for a second
and pull up this disclosure triangle to
| | 01:58 |
show you there are three separate
different rooms, or areas if you like, for
| | 02:02 |
making color corrections.
And we'll come back to secondary in a second.
| | 02:08 |
I just wanted to show you the master
section.
| | 02:11 |
And in the master section here you have
the ability to drag on the curve sliders.
| | 02:16 |
So I can decrease the shadows for example
and the mid-tones, here.
| | 02:22 |
So I can make the whole image darker.
That the reason that I'm doing this is
| | 02:26 |
because I want to switch on the master
power mask here.
| | 02:30 |
And I can switch this to be an ellipse.
And then it shows up a mask on the screen.
| | 02:36 |
And you can reposition this mask around
the image.
| | 02:40 |
And that correction I made to the shadows
here, means that, that correction is being
| | 02:44 |
limited just to the mask.
Of course this doesn't work particular on
| | 02:49 |
this image it would be much better if the
shadows around her face were being
| | 02:52 |
deepened but you can do this of course by
inverting the master mask here and then
| | 02:55 |
this becomes a vignette which you can then
drag out and reshape and rotate.
| | 03:02 |
And if I just deselect the filter we can
look at it with and without the effect.
| | 03:07 |
And the reason why it's nice to do this
with Colorista is because you can
| | 03:10 |
key-frame these effects.
In Adobe software, anything with this stop
| | 03:14 |
watch icon means that you can turn it on
and key-frame as it says here an animation.
| | 03:19 |
Or more crucially key frame the position
and parameters of a mask.
| | 03:24 |
One thing that's worth pointing out though
with Colorista which I'll do on this
| | 03:28 |
second clip here is how it processes the
color.
| | 03:32 |
I've already applied an instance of
Colorista to this clip which I'll switch
| | 03:35 |
on here.
And I'll make an adjustment here I'll
| | 03:39 |
decrease the shadows slightly and increase
the highlights.
| | 03:45 |
And you can see here, that the saturation
has increased.
| | 03:49 |
Here's the before and after.
And that's because Colorista operates in
| | 03:53 |
the RGB color space, within Premier Pro.
If I make the same correction with the
| | 03:59 |
in-built three way color corrector, inside
Premier Pro, where I increase the highlights.
| | 04:06 |
And deepen the shadows.
There isn't this increase in saturation.
| | 04:11 |
That's because the three-way color
corrector in Premiere Pro uses the YUV
| | 04:15 |
color space.
Or more technically the YCbCr.
| | 04:19 |
It's called YUV because.
Let's type in the three here.
| | 04:24 |
You got this little icon here, YUV, an
that means that, every filter with YUV
| | 04:28 |
next to it, is using that particular color
space.
| | 04:32 |
I'll hit this button here, an we can show
all the filters that use that.
| | 04:36 |
An I can show you the practical effect
using the scopes.
| | 04:39 |
I'm going to switch on the YCbCr Parade.
And making these adjustments with, the
| | 04:44 |
highlight adjuster an the three-way color
correcter, in the one native to Premier Pro.
| | 04:50 |
Means that I'm just affecting the Y
channel.
| | 04:53 |
This is the luminance channel that
controls most of the information for the video.
| | 04:57 |
And the other two channels combine
together to form the color image.
| | 05:02 |
This is slightly different to the RGB mode
in which a color corrector such as
| | 05:06 |
Colorista targets all the channels.
So if I make a correction in Colorista
| | 05:10 |
It's effecting not just the white channel,
but the other ones too.
| | 05:15 |
And if I switch over to the RGB parade,
here it is effecting all of them.
| | 05:22 |
So it is just something to be aware of.
When you increase the contrast in Colorista.
| | 05:28 |
You may have to play with the saturation
to bring it down according to how you
| | 05:31 |
adjusted things.
But this is a very standard way of working
| | 05:35 |
Final Cut Pro 7 works in this way and many
other color correction software operate in
| | 05:38 |
RGB space.
But it's important to know the difference
| | 05:42 |
between the different tools that you're
using.
| | 05:45 |
Another reason I'd like to use Colorista
is, it's keya /g.
| | 05:48 |
It's got one of the most useful keyas for
working in premier pro.
| | 05:51 |
I've already applied Colorista to this
clip, and what I want to demonstrate is
| | 05:55 |
the ability to target just a single color.
In this case, our errant orange jumper and
| | 06:01 |
desaturate it.
So, I'll open up Colorista, and I'll close
| | 06:06 |
up the primary section, and open up the
secondary, and the secondary allows me to
| | 06:10 |
use the Kia here.
So, if I launch this, I get the Kia
| | 06:15 |
interface, and it's reasonably
straightforward to use.
| | 06:20 |
You just select a color, and that creates
a mask and then you fine tune the mask to
| | 06:25 |
select just that color.
In this case I can click on the plus
| | 06:30 |
button and just keep drawing on the color
I want to remove until I've got a decent
| | 06:34 |
mask here in the matte.
I can slightly soften the edges which is
| | 06:42 |
always good to make it sit better in the
final composition.
| | 06:47 |
And you can also adjust the different
settings on the scope here to make sure
| | 06:49 |
that you're targeting the color you want
to.
| | 06:52 |
I dragged to far here I begin (INAUDIBLE)
to reveal more hue in the image.
| | 06:55 |
So I want to just make sure I'm targeting
that color only.
| | 07:00 |
And then when I hit OK, I can go up to the
saturation controls for the secondary area
| | 07:05 |
and bring down.
The saturation of that selected area.
| | 07:10 |
This was a very quick selection.
And I might have to do a little more
| | 07:14 |
detail in here to make sure I've got the
entire jumper selected.
| | 07:17 |
But the point was I just wanted to show
you the concept of making primary
| | 07:20 |
adjustments where you use the color
wheels.
| | 07:24 |
Typically in the primary section here, to
adjust the brightness of the whole image.
| | 07:28 |
And then you use this secondary
corrections, or the secondary section
| | 07:32 |
here, to adjust in this case saturation,
but to adjust elements of small details
| | 07:35 |
that you have selected in the image and
those are called secondary corrections.
| | 07:42 |
It doesn't matter which tools you use
these are core concepts for making either
| | 07:46 |
smaller secondary corrections on specific
colors in the image or primary corrections
| | 07:49 |
where you're adjusting a color for the
whole image.
| | 07:54 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with Premiere Pro and Magic Bullet Looks| 00:00 |
One of my favorite color correction
programs is Magic Bullet Looks by Red
| | 00:04 |
Giant Software.
And we'll be using this a number of times
| | 00:07 |
over this course to make certain
adjustments and corrections.
| | 00:10 |
So I wanted to show you how to apply it
and where to find it inside Premiere Pro.
| | 00:14 |
It's a plug-in so it lives inside the
Effects tab.
| | 00:18 |
And if you go down to Video Effects, here
it is Magic Bullet Looks.
| | 00:24 |
So I can drag it onto a clip, and then
apply it.
| | 00:28 |
So, interestingly though, I just wanted to
show you another concept.
| | 00:31 |
Here is a clip to which I've already
applied an instance of color Arrestor, and
| | 00:35 |
now I've applied an instance of Looks.
And you can stack multiple filters on top
| | 00:40 |
of each other, but a really good
discipline to get into is making a color
| | 00:44 |
correction for a clip.
And then applying, Magic Bullet looks to
| | 00:49 |
an adjustment layer because usually looks
is involved in making a stylistic grade.
| | 00:55 |
And is very useful to be able to have the
flexibility to manage your grade with an
| | 00:59 |
adjustment layer.
So, what I'm going to do is actually
| | 01:02 |
delete this from this clip, and show you
how to make an adjustment layer.
| | 01:06 |
So, I'll just delete this adjustment layer
there.
| | 01:11 |
And you can create adjustment layers
either by going to a New Item button and
| | 01:14 |
pressing Adjustment layer or from the File
menu.
| | 01:18 |
File > New > Adjustment layer and the
Adjustment layer automatically recognizes
| | 01:22 |
the resolution of your current sequence
and the time base.
| | 01:27 |
So I'll click OK.
And then from the Project panel you can
| | 01:31 |
drag on the adjustment layer to your clip,
and then trim it to suit.
| | 01:37 |
So now I'm going to go back to the Effects
holder, drag on looks onto the adjustment layer.
| | 01:42 |
And on this layer underneath, I have put
an instance of colorista two with the highlights.
| | 01:48 |
So I've made my technical correction on
this shot.
| | 01:52 |
Now, if I select the adjustment layer
inside the Effect Controls tab, I can hit
| | 01:55 |
Edit Look and bring up the Looks
interface.
| | 02:00 |
One of the reasons why I like Magic Bullet
Looks so much is the huge range of tools
| | 02:04 |
it has.
You can make the Tools drawer pop out just
| | 02:08 |
by moving your mouse over the Tools area
here, and then you can see all the tools
| | 02:12 |
that Looks uses.
They're arranged in these five sections.
| | 02:17 |
And they're processed in the same order.
And this group of sections echoes the real
| | 02:21 |
life processes you'd go through when
you're setting up a shoot.
| | 02:26 |
But some of these tools are generic color
corrections so here in the subject area,
| | 02:30 |
is a three way color controller.
And, it's just the same one as in Colorista.
| | 02:36 |
It's been borrowed from Colorista, or at
least the technology's been borrowed.
| | 02:40 |
So it's very familiar to use.
You can increase the highlights by
| | 02:43 |
dragging on the luma control here.
Decrease the shadows and then you can also
| | 02:49 |
drag the color pin over to tint an image.
In this case, make it either warm or cool.
| | 02:56 |
And then you can reset each parameter up
in the tool controls.
| | 03:01 |
In this case my brightness adjustment has
already been made.
| | 03:04 |
And this is being echoed by the RGB parade
up here.
| | 03:08 |
Which showed that I'd already increased
the brightness on the clip underneath.
| | 03:11 |
So what I want to do here is to give a
slight artistic look to this image.
| | 03:17 |
I'm going to push the Highlights towards
orangey warm color here.
| | 03:22 |
And then I'm going to move the Shadows
towards purple to give her a very
| | 03:26 |
flattering look.
Here's the before and after.
| | 03:30 |
Here's the button you use to turn on and
off the tool.
| | 03:35 |
And here's the balanced image.
And here with the stylistic image we got
| | 03:39 |
the red channel is much higher than the
green and blues because we've been pushing
| | 03:42 |
the colors toward orange and purple.
You can stack multiple tools together in
| | 03:48 |
the tool chain.
I'm going to choose a diffusion tool from
| | 03:52 |
the Mat section.
And I'm going to scroll down and choose
| | 03:56 |
pop hits.
Here we go.
| | 03:57 |
And this has the advanced targeting just
the highlights.
| | 04:02 |
We'll turn it off and on.
You'll see very subtle glow around her
| | 04:06 |
face here.
And that's because the diffusion is being
| | 04:09 |
applied to the highlights only.
I can drag down this parameter and then
| | 04:13 |
the diffusion is being added to more of
the image.
| | 04:17 |
Here's the before and after.
And this is a subjective decision you have
| | 04:23 |
to make about how much diffusion you want
in a particular shot.
| | 04:26 |
I think here I'd like to limit it much
more to the highlights, maybe about 80 or
| | 04:30 |
90 or so.
Just to give a nice flattering look.
| | 04:34 |
And then what I want to do is focus the
viewer's attention on the center of the image.
| | 04:40 |
So I'm going to go to the Lens section and
get out my old favorite, the Vignette tool.
| | 04:46 |
Which is very easy to drag the controls on
the screen and to move it around and to
| | 04:50 |
change the spread, for example.
And then also change the strength.
| | 04:58 |
And this is a classic tool to be able to
subtly focus your viewers attention on the
| | 05:03 |
center of the image.
Here's the before and after.
| | 05:10 |
And if you deselect the tool like this
then you remove the screen controls so you
| | 05:13 |
can see the image.
And if you want to look at what the whole
| | 05:17 |
grade looks like compared with the
untreated footage.
| | 05:21 |
You can click on the Tool Chain button
here, and that turns off all the tools at once.
| | 05:26 |
And there is a shortcut for this.
It's the Backslash key, which I'm pressing
| | 05:31 |
now, and that's located on your keyboard,
typically around where the Return key is.
| | 05:36 |
And having the keyboard shortcut makes it
very fast to be able to switch this on and
| | 05:40 |
off without having to move your mouse
across the screen.
| | 05:44 |
Over the next few chapters, I'll be
looking at some more of the tools over in
| | 05:48 |
these different sections.
But for now I'm happy with this particular
| | 05:52 |
look and I'm going to press Finished here.
And this look is applied to the whole clip.
| | 06:00 |
Here I'm scrubbing through the clip
because it's been applied to the whole of
| | 06:02 |
the adjustment layer.
And the really nice thing about adjustment
| | 06:06 |
layers is that they affect all the clips
underneath.
| | 06:09 |
So you can drag out an adjustment layer.
And see what the effect is like to the
| | 06:14 |
underlying clip.
So I'll just turn off my audio a second.
| | 06:19 |
Here is the clip underneath with the look
applied to it because it's underneath the
| | 06:22 |
adjustment there.
And here it is without the effect.
| | 06:27 |
So this standard practice of adding a
technical grade to the clips on the first
| | 06:30 |
layer, and then adding a stylistic grade
to an adjustment layer.
| | 06:34 |
Means you can save a lot of time when the
editor or the client comes back and says
| | 06:37 |
please can you adjust this look.
Because you can just go into the
| | 06:41 |
adjustment layer.
Click on the Edit Look button and jump
| | 06:44 |
back into looks and make some changes.
we've got a preview image of the second
| | 06:49 |
clip here because that's where the play
head was located.
| | 06:53 |
I go back to the original clips, it was
located over here.
| | 06:57 |
Alternatively, if the client says that the
look's too strong, can you adjust it?
| | 07:01 |
You can just drag down on the opacity
layer here.
| | 07:05 |
And changing the opacity on the adjustment
layer applies less of the effect to the
| | 07:08 |
clips underneath.
So we've made a number of color
| | 07:11 |
corrections, some to the underlying clips,
and some to the adjustment layer.
| | 07:16 |
And all these color corrections combine
together to form a grade.
| | 07:20 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Making contrast, lighting, and mood changes: A general rule of thumb| 00:00 |
Just before we jump into some more
specific color corrections in grades, I'd
| | 00:04 |
like to share with you two core concepts
that I found really useful when I'm grading.
| | 00:10 |
And the first is contrast, the
relationship between high and low contrast.
| | 00:15 |
So that, in an image, you can reduce the
shadows.
| | 00:18 |
I'm using the Luma control on the shadows
here to deepen the shadow.
| | 00:24 |
And then I'm using the same control button
on the highlights to raise the highlights
| | 00:28 |
slightly, and that increases the distance
between the brightest element and the
| | 00:32 |
darkest element in the shot.
Here's the before and after.
| | 00:38 |
And that increases detail and makes the
image jump out, and suggests a higher
| | 00:42 |
drama or tension in the image.
And the other side of this coin is reduced
| | 00:48 |
or flatter contrast.
So, low contrast where you reduce the
| | 00:52 |
highlights with the highlight Luma
control.
| | 00:55 |
And you make the shadows lighter, and this
has the effect of a softer image.
| | 01:01 |
Or a more mysterious grade that can be
interpreted a number of different ways
| | 01:05 |
according to the story being told.
So, that's the first core concept about
| | 01:09 |
what kind of story and where I'm going
with any particular grade.
| | 01:14 |
And the second is, the relationship
between what is real what we actually see
| | 01:19 |
in life and what is real in terms of
movies.
| | 01:23 |
What mood or what stylized effect you tend
to see in shots.
| | 01:27 |
What mood or stylized effect you'd like to
introduce into a shot.
| | 01:32 |
And that can be summed up reasonably
easily.
| | 01:34 |
Whenever the light changes, whenever you
get either slightly cool light or warm
| | 01:38 |
light, in general, it tends to affect the
highlights.
| | 01:43 |
So, if I wanted to suggest this was lit by
a warmer light, maybe the sunshine, I
| | 01:47 |
could push the highlights towards this
kind of yellow light.
| | 01:52 |
And that suggests the actual real physical
lighting I would see if I was looking at
| | 01:56 |
this with my own eyes.
I don't intend to use the mid-tone slider
| | 02:02 |
for a similar correction to increase the
mood in a shot.
| | 02:06 |
So, if I push this mid-tone slider in the
same way, I push it into the oranges, I
| | 02:10 |
exaggerate the first correction I've made
with what I would consider a mood correction.
| | 02:17 |
Would you necessarily see these colors in
real life in this amount of saturation, or
| | 02:21 |
possibly not depending on the lighting of
course.
| | 02:26 |
But in general, for nondramatic lighting
sources, this is the rule of thumb that I use.
| | 02:32 |
Use the highlights for something which is
slightly more realistic, and use the
| | 02:36 |
mid-tones for something which is leaning
towards mood.
| | 02:40 |
I'll just reset both of these and push
them in the opposite direction.
| | 02:44 |
Much of the light that we get on earth is
blue.
| | 02:46 |
It's the way that the atmosphere filters
or scatters the different wave lengths of
| | 02:51 |
light, and that can be demonstrated by
pushing your highlights slightly towards blue.
| | 02:58 |
This isn't the over exaggerated blue that
we see on many movies, this is a more
| | 03:02 |
technical correction to actually let us
simulate the slightly bluer light that we
| | 03:07 |
see outdoors if you have a slightly
overcast sky.
| | 03:13 |
I can then use the Mid-tone to exaggerate
this.
| | 03:19 |
And then push those towards the same
blues, and here we are changing the mood
| | 03:22 |
of the shot.
We're making the shot much cooler.
| | 03:25 |
This is something we investigate more in
the next chapter.
| | 03:29 |
But I just found this core concept quite
useful when I'm trying to decide which
| | 03:33 |
particular grade I'm working on.
And what particular look I'd like to give
| | 03:37 |
a certain image.
The exact corrections that you make for
| | 03:41 |
any particular shot has to vary, because
you've got so many different considerations.
| | 03:46 |
You've got the exposure, lighting, the
time of day, and the situation in which
| | 03:49 |
you're shooting, and the colors in the
background, and the colors that the actors
| | 03:52 |
are wearing.
But in general, I found it to be quite useful.
| | 03:57 |
The relationship between the technical
tweak and a mood tweak if you like.
| | 04:01 |
Something that I would consider that
changes the tone of the movie, which is
| | 04:05 |
outside what I've actually seen in real
life.
| | 04:08 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
2. LocationsUnderstanding how cool color frames emotion| 00:00 |
As an audience we have an emotional
response to different colors.
| | 00:04 |
One of the most evocative colors is blue.
We perceive blue to be a negative emotion
| | 00:09 |
or to have a negative feeling for a
variety of reasons.
| | 00:14 |
Overcast skies, especially in cold
countries have a bluish light.
| | 00:19 |
And because it's cold we associate this
blue with the discomfort of actually
| | 00:23 |
feeling cold.
Also when we become cold the blood flow to
| | 00:27 |
our skin is reduced.
So skin tone becomes less red.
| | 00:32 |
We're used to seeing it all the time,
which is another reason why we associate
| | 00:35 |
blue with feeling cold.
In fact it's one of the ways we can tell
| | 00:39 |
the audience the temperature in the scene.
We can demonstrate cool emotion in this
| | 00:44 |
shot here quite easily.
I'm going to select this clip, go into the
| | 00:49 |
effects area and find looks, drag it onto
the clip.
| | 00:53 |
And then in the Effects Controls tab click
Edit Look to load up the looks interface.
| | 01:00 |
In general the color of light can be
changed very easily with a three way Color Corrector.
| | 01:08 |
The way the Earth's atmosphere filters the
different wavelengths of light means that
| | 01:12 |
it filters them out according to their
wavelength.
| | 01:16 |
Blue has the shortest wavelength and this
is one of the reasons why daylight is blue.
| | 01:21 |
We can replicate this with the highlight
control.
| | 01:24 |
In general the highlights contain the
difference between the difference types of light.
| | 01:30 |
So if we make a highlight correction and
push this towards blue then this is a more
| | 01:35 |
technically accurate representation of
outside lights.
| | 01:41 |
Here's the before and after.
Just click on the tool button to disable
| | 01:44 |
it and re-enable it.
This is a subtle difference between those
| | 01:48 |
two shots.
I can push this out even more here, to
| | 01:53 |
give you more of an indication.
So there's a definite cooler atmosphere in
| | 02:00 |
this shot.
By the way, one of the things to look out
| | 02:02 |
for when you are adjusting highlights is
to make sure that you don't go over the
| | 02:06 |
100% digital line.
Or in looks the 1.0 line, which is the
| | 02:10 |
same thing.
It's just a slightly different unit of measurement.
| | 02:14 |
So in order to bring these down what you
can do is apply the Auto Shoulder tool
| | 02:18 |
from the post section.
And it nicely rounds down the highlights.
| | 02:25 |
There are also clamping tools in a variety
of different programs.
| | 02:29 |
Auto shoulder nicely rounds down the
highlights there so you don't get any
| | 02:32 |
color banding or any odd colors in the
highlights.
| | 02:37 |
We can exaggerate this cool look even more
using the ranged HSL tool.
| | 02:42 |
And I'm going to put this just before the
auto shoulder.
| | 02:46 |
And this tool allows you to target
specific colors and de-saturate them.
| | 02:52 |
You can exaggerate them, and saturate them
by dragging them outside the wheel, but
| | 02:55 |
you can also de-saturate them by dragging
them inside the wheel.
| | 02:58 |
So if I de-saturate these two, I don't do
it too dramatically, that gives the
| | 03:02 |
audience an extra indication of the cool
emotion in this scene.
| | 03:08 |
This is where we're starting to move
towards a stylizing rather than a
| | 03:12 |
technically accurate grade on our clip.
Because we're taking the original slightly
| | 03:19 |
bluish correction and then exaggerating
it.
| | 03:22 |
This is the difference or the balance that
you have when making color corrections and grades.
| | 03:27 |
You want people to feel comfortable with
what they usually see but then you also
| | 03:30 |
what to be telling a story.
Just want to have a quick word about skin
| | 03:35 |
tone when you're adjusting these blue
shots.
| | 03:38 |
I'm going to hit finish and jump to the
second clip here.
| | 03:42 |
Here's our actress again but in a
different location and she looks normal,
| | 03:45 |
she looks like she's sitting in a room and
she's separated from the background.
| | 03:49 |
But I've already applied a color
correction to this.
| | 03:53 |
I have applied an instance of Colorista.
And I've actually cooled down the highlights.
| | 03:59 |
So here's the before and after.
This is the original shot which is nice
| | 04:03 |
and warm.
And this is the corrected shot where I've
| | 04:07 |
just moved the highlights towards blue.
The reason this is working is because the
| | 04:11 |
slight blue in the highlights is balanced
with the darker, warmer colors in the background.
| | 04:18 |
But in grading it's a good discipline to
keep your skin tones within an acceptable
| | 04:22 |
set of parameters.
And you can demonstrate this by looking on
| | 04:26 |
the vector scope.
I'm going to switch over to the color
| | 04:29 |
correction workspace.
And if you haven't got vector scope
| | 04:32 |
already set up you can click on the
Settings button, and choose Vector Scope here.
| | 04:37 |
This gives you an indication of the sort
of colors that you've got in your image.
| | 04:41 |
And this trace here represents all the
colors together.
| | 04:44 |
If I diable Colorista, then the trace
moves over towards the warmer area of the
| | 04:48 |
scope, because this is a warmer shot.
What I want to do though is just check
| | 04:54 |
what the color is only on her skin tone.
So I've applied an instance of the Crop
| | 04:59 |
tool here, to actually crop out the left
and right elements of the image.
| | 05:04 |
You can find Crop tool inside the effects.
Just search for crop and you can drag Crop
| | 05:08 |
tool onto a clip.
So without the correction applied, her
| | 05:12 |
skin tone is much warmer, and it's sitting
on this I-bar.
| | 05:17 |
This is the bar in which you tend to put
your skin tone.
| | 05:20 |
This is good practice, to make sure your
skin tone exists along this line.
| | 05:24 |
If you move your color too much this way,
then your colors become more green, and
| | 05:27 |
too much this way, they're more red.
As a viewer we're used to seeing skin tone
| | 05:32 |
all the time and so keeping it on this
i-bar means its more technically accurate.
| | 05:38 |
But it also depends on the scene at hand.
It has to be balanced with the other
| | 05:42 |
colors in the shot.
If I turn on the correction then instantly
| | 05:46 |
this looks a bit cooler.
Here's the before and after.
| | 05:51 |
But if I turn off crop it sits much more
naturally in this shot because of the
| | 05:53 |
balance of colors.
It's just something to be aware of when
| | 05:57 |
you're grading but so much of grading is
subjective.
| | 06:01 |
You are communicating a story to your
audience so it's okay to break the rules.
| | 06:07 |
And in general corrections to the
highlights are more accurate for lighting
| | 06:11 |
conditions whereas corrections to the mid
tones tend to be more mood setting corrections.
| | 06:18 |
So if I drag this over towards the blue
here and I'm completely changing the mood
| | 06:22 |
of this shot from an audience's point of
view.
| | 06:26 |
We can see instantly that this is slightly
stylized.
| | 06:30 |
Its telling a particular story that's
showing us to pay attention to what's
| | 06:34 |
actually happening on screen.
That's also an important part of grading
| | 06:38 |
the connection between the colors that
you're effecting and the actual content.
| | 06:44 |
That is being portrayed or that is being
carried out on screen.
| | 06:47 |
Lets just jump back to this first shot,
and change my workspace back to editing.
| | 06:52 |
Blue as a color isn't inherently cold or
negative, our interpretation depends on
| | 06:57 |
the circumstances.
For example, a beautiful bright blue sky
| | 07:02 |
can be quite uplifting and give us a very
positive feeling.
| | 07:05 |
An important part of how color is
communicated and interpreted is
| | 07:08 |
contextural, it references the content in
the image.
| | 07:13 |
In this shot, although her skin tone has a
bluish tinge, we don't associate it with
| | 07:17 |
physical temperature.
It doesn't seem physically cold in this
| | 07:21 |
shot, just emotionally, because she's not
exhibiting the sort of behavior we'd
| | 07:25 |
normally associate with being cold.
She's not shivering.
| | 07:29 |
And she is not wearing cold weather
clothing.
| | 07:32 |
These visual clues together with the blue
in the highlights tell a story about what
| | 07:36 |
she is actually feeling.
| | 07:38 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Stylizing a cold location with color grading| 00:00 |
Let's have a look at how we'd color
correct a location to make it seem colder.
| | 00:05 |
I'm using the cold landscape sequence, and
I've applied magic bullet looks to this
| | 00:10 |
clip, but without any settings.
And I'm going to hit Edit Look to bring up
| | 00:15 |
the interface.
When the sky is overcast and there is very
| | 00:20 |
little sunshine, the way the Earth's
atmosphere scatters the various
| | 00:23 |
wavelengths of light, means that we see a
slight blue tinge in the brightest areas.
| | 00:30 |
We can simulate this with a three-way
color correction by just moving the
| | 00:34 |
highlights towards blue.
Just a little bit like so.
| | 00:38 |
Here's the before and after.
And this is actually what snow looks like.
| | 00:45 |
It's predominantly white with a slight
bluish tinge.
| | 00:48 |
In the original photograph, it's very
likely that the camera has a white balance
| | 00:52 |
setting or has been adjusted for this
particular shot to seem so white.
| | 00:58 |
But in real life, we do see an ever
(INAUDIBLE) slight blue tinge in real
| | 01:02 |
world lighting conditions.
But when we see snow in movies, why is it
| | 01:07 |
always so blue?
Well, it's a stylized effect.
| | 01:12 |
What tends to happen in movies is that the
mid-tones are pushed towards blue, whilst
| | 01:17 |
the highlights are kept quite white.
This has a nice stylistic exaggerated
| | 01:24 |
effect, and actually seems quite cold.
This seems colder than the previous correction.
| | 01:31 |
It's less technically accurate, because
when we look at a snow scene in real life,
| | 01:34 |
it doesn't look this blue, but this feels
colder.
| | 01:38 |
This is one of the stylized ways that we
can exaggerate a location or even move the
| | 01:42 |
location we're in to an even colder
country.
| | 01:46 |
You see this all the time on TV.
The nest time you watch the TV show, game
| | 01:50 |
of thrones, have a closer look at what
they're doing to the grading in the snow scenes.
| | 01:56 |
They exaggerate this even more, they push
the blues in the mid-tones towards a much
| | 02:00 |
darker blue.
And they also push the shadows towards
| | 02:04 |
blue as well, and then deepen the shadows.
Deepening the shadows increases the
| | 02:09 |
contrast of the image and makes it seem
more dramatic.
| | 02:12 |
And in fact I have seen the grades pushed
towards this greeny blue to make it even
| | 02:17 |
more stylized.
And this reflects the content that is
| | 02:22 |
happening on the screen.
Another popular effect is desaturating the
| | 02:27 |
shadows as well.
So, if I drag on the Arrange Saturation
| | 02:31 |
tool, I can desaturate the shadows, and
maybe some of the mid-tones as well.
| | 02:37 |
And so, this is a much more dramatic
colder scene than the untreated snow scene.
| | 02:43 |
What I find really interesting is the
difference between what is technically
| | 02:46 |
accurate in real life and what is
portrayed in movies.
| | 02:50 |
This might be partly convention and partly
because we've seen this stylized treatment
| | 02:55 |
in so many films.
But it's a very useful method for
| | 02:58 |
exaggerating temperature and for moving
locations.
| | 03:03 |
It's important to remember though that as
viewers, we place ourselves in the
| | 03:06 |
environment we're watching.
We connect to the image subconsciously,
| | 03:10 |
and sometimes quite consciously.
Imagining what it would be like to be
| | 03:14 |
there, and how we would feel in those
circumstances.
| | 03:17 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Understanding how warm color frames emotion| 00:00 |
We have a very positive emotional reaction
to warm colors.
| | 00:04 |
They remind us of literal warmth, such as
basking in the warm sunshine or sitting in
| | 00:08 |
front of a warm fire.
The yellow and the orange light that the
| | 00:13 |
sun and the fires give off reminds us of
their physical warming properties.
| | 00:19 |
We also associate warm colors with
relaxing and even romantic feelings.
| | 00:24 |
For example, in this case, a candlelit
dinner.
| | 00:27 |
We can enhance the effect of candlelight
and help suggest more warmth and more
| | 00:32 |
romance in an image very easily with a
Three-Way Color Corrector.
| | 00:37 |
I'm using the warm sequence, and I've
applied Looks to this first clip, let's
| | 00:42 |
open the Looks builder.
I can drag on from the subject area as
| | 00:48 |
(INAUDIBLE) Color Corrector, and because
most of the changes to light that is given
| | 00:52 |
off by a light source happen in the
brightest areas, I can push the highlights
| | 00:56 |
towards a warmer color.
And I'm warming up the scene.
| | 01:04 |
I can then enhance the mood by moving the
mid-tones towards a warmer color as well.
| | 01:10 |
And here's the before and after.
Our reactions to these sorts of colors on
| | 01:16 |
screen are much more positive.
We can also enhance the mood by simulating
| | 01:20 |
some of the properties of light.
So we could throw on a small bit of
| | 01:24 |
diffusion into the shot, and something
that is targeting just the highlights, so
| | 01:29 |
I've got the highlights only set to 100%
here.
| | 01:34 |
Here's the before and after, and we can
then push those defused highlights towards
| | 01:39 |
a warmer color too.
This helps set a positive mood that we've
| | 01:47 |
introduced with the warmer colors and the
highlights.
| | 01:51 |
We could do the same thing with natural
light as well.
| | 01:53 |
I'll just hit Finished here, and I'll jump
to the second clip, and open Looks on that clip.
| | 02:02 |
Here we can push the outside lighting from
a slightly white or bluish tinge towards
| | 02:08 |
yellow using the highlight.
And this already has the effect of
| | 02:15 |
increasing our positive vibe towards this
mood.
| | 02:21 |
It also changes the weather.
It's also suggesting that the sun is out,
| | 02:24 |
outside the window.
Let's enhance this mood even more by
| | 02:28 |
pushing the mid-tones towards that same
color.
| | 02:31 |
And just as a little finishing touch,
let's put some diffusion in here to
| | 02:36 |
simulate how the sunlight might diffuse
through these windows.
| | 02:44 |
Let's put some diffusion on there and
bring down the amount of glow.
| | 02:50 |
Instantly with these very simple changes,
we're changing the mood.
| | 02:54 |
You can do this either technically, to
make sure it's just light the changing, to
| | 02:58 |
give it a warmer look.
Or you can increase the mood with the
| | 03:03 |
mid-tones and the diffusion.
Of course it depends on how you want to
| | 03:07 |
portray the scene.
But it's interesting that these small
| | 03:10 |
little Color Corrections can be an
extension of the emotional temperature in
| | 03:13 |
the room.
| | 03:15 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Stylizing a hot location with color grading| 00:00 |
Changing the warm colors in a shot can
also help us to identify how we feel about
| | 00:04 |
that particular location.
I'm going to open Looks on this first clip
| | 00:12 |
which was shot in Venice.
And I can use a 3 Way Color Corrector .
| | 00:18 |
Here we go.
To move the highlights towards the yellow
| | 00:22 |
that the sun typically gives off, or
rather the yellow light that's influenced
| | 00:26 |
by the sun's position at different times
of day.
| | 00:31 |
And then I can also extend or exaggerate
the mood, how I feel about the warmth of
| | 00:36 |
this image, by increasing the oranges and
mid-tones.
| | 00:42 |
The more you do this, the more you begin
to stylize the colors in the image and the
| | 00:45 |
more you begin to talk to the audience in
terms of how you want them to feel about
| | 00:49 |
the shot.
Just these two corrections have a much
| | 00:54 |
warmer feel to them.
You can just feel the extra warmth if you
| | 00:58 |
were sitting in Venice in these lighting
conditions.
| | 01:02 |
But many filmmakers extend this stylizing
to actually make a distinct separation
| | 01:06 |
between two locations to communicate what
characters are doing to the audience.
| | 01:12 |
On my next clip, I've got a scene in rural
Wiltshire, close to where I live, which
| | 01:16 |
was shot on a late spring day and it's
very English.
| | 01:22 |
And what I want to demonstrate is how you
can use these color correction techniques
| | 01:25 |
to make it seem as if this was a
completely different country.
| | 01:29 |
And I'll select this clip and open up
Looks.
| | 01:32 |
In Steven Soderbergh's Traffic movie,
there's a very interesting look that he
| | 01:36 |
applies to the scenes set in Mexico, that
makes them very distinct from the scenes
| | 01:40 |
that are set in the United States.
And he does this by stylizing the colors,
| | 01:46 |
over exposing the highlights and messing
around a lot with the contrast of the image.
| | 01:52 |
So I'm going to replicate this as much as
I can inside magic bullet looks.
| | 01:56 |
Firstly I'm going to take a curves tool
put, it at the beginning of the chain and
| | 02:00 |
flatten the contrast slightly by reducing
the highlights and increasing the shadows.
| | 02:07 |
And then I'll take a colorist, three way
tool and increase the warmth in the
| | 02:12 |
highlights to simulate the sunshine and
then also increase the warmth in the
| | 02:17 |
mid-tones to emphasize the warm mood.
And at the same time bring down the
| | 02:23 |
contrast in the shadows.
I'll also overexpose the highlights and
| | 02:31 |
some of the mid-tones.
So, we've got a really over exposed sky.
| | 02:40 |
Since I'm playing with the highlights,
it's always a good thing to get an Auto
| | 02:43 |
Shoulder tool from the post section, which
rounds down the highlights.
| | 02:49 |
So I'm keeping my image legal, by staying
under 100% digital.
| | 02:52 |
I'll also desaturate, some of these
colors, in the mid-tones.
| | 03:00 |
Desaturating the mid tone and also the
shadows.
| | 03:04 |
And then use a curves tool to re-bring
alive this look, make it seem much more
| | 03:11 |
stylized and Mexican.
I'm going to target the red mid-tones,
| | 03:19 |
bring those up, increase the contrast.
Increase some of the reds in the shadows
| | 03:29 |
and then bring down the blues in the
shadows and the greens.
| | 03:41 |
This stylized look was very successful,
the only in separating the two locations
| | 03:45 |
but also echoing the circumstances that
were happening on screen in the Mexican scenes.
| | 03:51 |
But it's very effective to actually
separate this from rural Wiltshire to
| | 03:56 |
somewhere much warmer.
You can further stylize images like this
| | 04:01 |
to make suggestions that you're in a
completely different location on another planet.
| | 04:06 |
For example, if we grab a Warm, Cool tool,
position it towards the end of the tool
| | 04:10 |
chain, and then change the reds and the
whole dominance of the image to be very
| | 04:14 |
stylized to suggest you're on an alien
planet.
| | 04:19 |
Perhaps Mars, in this case.
Of course Color Corrections like these are
| | 04:22 |
contextual with the story you're telling
and also what you're actually depicting on screen.
| | 04:27 |
So, whether or not we actually have grass
in a mashion shot is entirely up to your
| | 04:31 |
particular story.
But, it's the effect you can apply to
| | 04:35 |
different scenes to stylize them, which is
the important thing.
| | 04:39 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Isolating and adjusting skies| 00:00 |
There are some colors that we're so used
to seeing all the time, that we have an
| | 00:03 |
expectation of what they should look like
on the screen, and the sky is one of those.
| | 00:08 |
But, the sky changes at different times of
day and it changes according to different
| | 00:13 |
weather conditions.
I'm using the skies sequence.
| | 00:20 |
And in this shot here from North Welcher,
there's a bit of haze going on in the
| | 00:23 |
distance and so the this guy is a reduced
blue.
| | 00:26 |
It's probably quite often that a client or
a director might say to you why is the sky
| | 00:30 |
not blue?
The sky is not blue in that because the
| | 00:34 |
color of the sky that they have their
memory isn't the same as the actual
| | 00:37 |
physical color of the sky that you
captured on the camera.
| | 00:41 |
This is sometimes referred to as memory
colors, and it's our perception of what
| | 00:44 |
actual specific colors should look like
from our own memories.
| | 00:49 |
It's also useful to know why the sky is
the color it is and how those colors are
| | 00:53 |
made up.
Light is scattered by our atmosphere.
| | 00:58 |
And the more it's scattered, the more
white it becomes.
| | 01:01 |
And it's especially relevant for blue
because blue has the shortest wavelength.
| | 01:06 |
And that effects how it's scattered.
So, in general, if you look up at the sky,
| | 01:11 |
the sky above you is going to much more
blue than the sky at the horizon.
| | 01:15 |
That's why there's a definite gradient in
the sky towards the horizon.
| | 01:19 |
It's always more blue the higher up you
get.
| | 01:22 |
A simple method to be able to correct this
is something you can do in Looks.
| | 01:26 |
I'm going to select this clip and hit Edit
Look, and if I wanted to correct just the
| | 01:31 |
blues in the highlights, I could select a
Colorista 3-Way correction and position
| | 01:37 |
the highlights more towards blue.
If I turn this off and on though you'll
| | 01:44 |
see that I'm changing the blue of the
entire image.
| | 01:49 |
So, a more successful approach inside
Looks is to use a graident.
| | 01:54 |
I can use a gradient from the matte
section.
| | 01:58 |
By default, it has a very nice orange
gradient on it, but you can just move the
| | 02:02 |
color towards blue and select the blue
that you want.
| | 02:07 |
And then just move up the gradient with
the onscreen controls to suit your
| | 02:12 |
particular look.
But its important to remember that if
| | 02:15 |
you're correcting a grid in the sky make
sure that the horizon is lighter than the
| | 02:19 |
sky higher up because that's more
technically accurate.
| | 02:23 |
That's what happens in real life.
Sometimes, though we're happy with the sky
| | 02:28 |
that we captured on camera, we just want
to enhance its color.
| | 02:32 |
On this second clip on the timeline, this
is shot in Venice at the middle of the day
| | 02:36 |
and I'd like to make this sky a little
more appealing.
| | 02:41 |
I'm going to jump over to the Effects tab
and drop on an instance of Colorista onto
| | 02:46 |
the second clip.
If we just tried the highlights over
| | 02:52 |
towards blue we effect the sky but also
we're effecting all of the blues and the
| | 02:56 |
highlights in the image so we're effecting
the water color.
| | 03:01 |
So, the trick here is to isolate the sky
and then effect that independently of all
| | 03:05 |
the other colors in the shot.
I'm just going to reset Colorista.
| | 03:12 |
You can do this with this secondary
section in Colorista.
| | 03:15 |
So, I'll close up the primary and open the
secondary, but there's an order to this,
| | 03:19 |
which works quite nicely if you want to
select the clouds and the sky separately.
| | 03:24 |
So, in this case what I'm going do is, I'm
going to select these clouds first, give
| | 03:28 |
them a little more contrast and then
select the rest of the sky.
| | 03:33 |
So, then we'll have a much more
interesting sky to look at.
| | 03:37 |
So, here's the technique.
I'll click on the Keyer button, Edit key
| | 03:42 |
and drag to select the color of some of
these clouds.
| | 03:48 |
Then I can select the Plus key to select
the colors I'm drawing on screen and also
| | 03:52 |
then the Minus key to remove any colors
that I don't want to select.
| | 03:58 |
It's typically a process that you jump in
between these two buttons to select or
| | 04:02 |
deselect certain colors on the screen.
It's also important to add some softness
| | 04:08 |
to you map selection, so it fits more
nicely in the shot.
| | 04:12 |
I'm going to increase a little more of
those clouds there.
| | 04:17 |
And a little too much of that area.
There we go, that'll do, slightly softer.
| | 04:25 |
Click OK.
Then I can go back up to the secondary
| | 04:29 |
color wheels.
Increase the highlights of those clouds
| | 04:33 |
and as I increase them, it's just the
white highlights that have been selected
| | 04:36 |
that are increasing.
So, I'll just pop them a little bit and
| | 04:41 |
then stage two is to drop another instance
of Colorista onto the clip, close up the
| | 04:45 |
primary section, open up the secondary and
launch the keyer.
| | 04:51 |
Now, I'm going to select the blue of the
sky and do a similar procedure where I
| | 04:57 |
draw on the image.
Making sure I'm selecting all the blue I
| | 05:02 |
want in the matte, I got the blue in the
top right hand corner and there we go add
| | 05:06 |
a little bit of softness.
Deselect some of the area I don't want.
| | 05:11 |
I don't want to select all of this cloud.
Increase the softness slightly.
| | 05:16 |
So now, when I make a color correction I'm
going to effect just the sky because that
| | 05:22 |
is the area selected in my matte.
Let's just check that I've got these
| | 05:28 |
colors selected, yep, a little less on the
clouds there, and click OK.
| | 05:33 |
Jump back up to the color wheels and now I
can move the highlights towards blue and
| | 05:38 |
I'm getting a much more interesting sky
because I've got a more saturated blue and
| | 05:43 |
these clouds are popping out nicely.
I'll turn off these filters and show you
| | 05:50 |
what it looks like before.
Here's the before.
| | 05:53 |
Here's with the clouds popping slightly
and here's with the slightly more
| | 05:57 |
saturated blue.
So, is this technically the correct sky?
| | 06:01 |
The same sky that you shot and captured on
camera?
| | 06:05 |
Well no, of course not, because we
corrected it.
| | 06:08 |
But its a common concept in color grading
to further stylize or further improve what
| | 06:13 |
you recorded to match the expectations of
your director and also of your viewer.
| | 06:19 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
3. Times of DayChanging the times of day with color| 00:00 |
It's great to be able to effect and change
scenes in post production with color
| | 00:03 |
correction adjustments.
But it's useful to remember just a few
| | 00:08 |
short details about how light works.
Light appears at different strengths at
| | 00:13 |
different times of the day.
And our eyes see different colors under
| | 00:17 |
bright and low light conditions.
So, replicating real world or natural
| | 00:22 |
colors, helps the viewer involve
themselves with the story.
| | 00:27 |
We can simulate natural light in
artificial lighting sources, and we can do
| | 00:30 |
this in post production to match scenes
together, or make them look as though they
| | 00:33 |
were filmed at different times.
But we can also stylize and emphasize
| | 00:39 |
certain moods and simulate filmic
processes.
| | 00:43 |
Which can in turn suggest a change in
location, or specially in this case a
| | 00:46 |
change in the time of day.
| | 00:49 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating an early morning look| 00:00 |
It's quite common that you'll actually
need to change the time of day to be a
| | 00:04 |
different time that you actually shot your
footage shot.
| | 00:08 |
There are a number of core concepts
involved when you're changing the time of day.
| | 00:13 |
But the key to interpreting colors to
great shots for certain times of day is observation.
| | 00:19 |
You can see for yourself, if you watch how
the light changes from before dawn til
| | 00:23 |
after daybreak.
Or from midday to into the afternoon, or
| | 00:27 |
even at night just before sunset and after
sunset.
| | 00:31 |
It's very useful to be able to stand
outside and just physically watch how the
| | 00:34 |
colors are changing.
What the shadows are doing, how dark they
| | 00:38 |
are how bright they are.
And it's this method of observation that
| | 00:42 |
will really help you when you are doing
color correction for different times of day.
| | 00:48 |
This shot was filmed late morning towards
lunch time.
| | 00:51 |
And so obviously doesn't look like the
early morning.
| | 00:53 |
So what corrections can we add to this to
make it seem like early morning?
| | 00:57 |
Let's open up the Looks folder.
One of the core concepts for changing the
| | 01:03 |
time of day is this slider, the Midtone
slider.
| | 01:07 |
You can reliably simulate light changing,
ambient light changing during the day by
| | 01:12 |
adjusting this control.
So in early morning, the ambient light is
| | 01:19 |
much lower.
Also crutially the shadows are much darker.
| | 01:24 |
The shadows are very dark in the early
morning.
| | 01:27 |
The highlights are less in the morning too
but they key control is the mid-tone.
| | 01:33 |
You're probably noticing something looking
slightly incorrect here, and that's the saturation.
| | 01:37 |
Saturation doesn't look like this in low
light situations.
| | 01:40 |
Our eyes are designed to see detail first,
and colors second especially in low light situations.
| | 01:49 |
So to simulate this we can add a
Saturation tool and desaturate the light.
| | 01:55 |
The other component of early morning light
is how blue it is.
| | 02:03 |
Its surprising how blue light is just
before dawn.
| | 02:07 |
This is partly due to the actual color of
light itself.
| | 02:10 |
Which we can replicate by moving the
highlights over towards blue and it's also
| | 02:15 |
something to do with the way our eyes see
light.
| | 02:19 |
In low light situations, it easiest to see
light with the shortest wavelength, which
| | 02:24 |
is blue.
So to simulate this you can also move the
| | 02:28 |
blue mid-tone, or the mid-tone correction
towards blue.
| | 02:32 |
This combination of corrections now is
looking much more like early morning.
| | 02:39 |
Here's the before and after.
Then the original shot but there is
| | 02:43 |
another key element to involving this
particular shot because there's too much
| | 02:46 |
light coming from above.
This was filmed in a part of the day where
| | 02:51 |
the ambient light is very bright.
So in a shot like this what I need to do
| | 02:55 |
is darken the top of the frame.
I can do this with the Gradient Exposure
| | 03:00 |
tool in looks by dropping down the
Exposure by a couple of stops.
| | 03:06 |
And then adjusting the on screen controls,
just to suit how much light is coming from
| | 03:12 |
the top of the frame.
I might drop this down a little more actually.
| | 03:18 |
I don't want to darken it so much it's
sterilized but I just want to adjust for
| | 03:22 |
how much light appears at the top of the
frame.
| | 03:25 |
Which wouldn't be happening at this time
of day.
| | 03:28 |
So this correction was to much, maybe
around two and half, something like that.
| | 03:33 |
And then I can stretch and drag down the
gradient according to what I think suits
| | 03:37 |
this shot.
So actually these corrections are quite simple.
| | 03:42 |
Remember to desaturate, because this is a
low light situation.
| | 03:46 |
Move your Mid tone slider down to emulate
the lack of ambient light.
| | 03:53 |
Move your highlight control towards blue,
to simulate the actual color of light.
| | 03:57 |
And then use your Midtone Color wheel to
adjust for the fact that we see more blue
| | 04:02 |
in low light situations.
However, it doesn't stay this dark during
| | 04:07 |
the morning for long.
The lighter it gets, the less blue the
| | 04:11 |
light appears.
And the lighter it gets, the more ambient
| | 04:14 |
light is present in the day, then the less
dark the shadows are.
| | 04:19 |
So this would be a grade for first thing
early morning, just before dawn.
| | 04:24 |
And as the day goes on, as the sun begins
to rise, you'll have an increase in
| | 04:29 |
ambient light.
The shadows won't be quite as dark.
| | 04:35 |
The gradient exposure won't be as
necessary, so I can bring that down or
| | 04:39 |
rather bring it up couple of stops.
And also the saturation won't be quite as
| | 04:45 |
desaturated, so you can increase the
saturation here.
| | 04:50 |
So this correction is probably around
about 20 minutes later than the previous one.
| | 04:55 |
It's certainly later in time, because the
light has increased and the saturation has increased.
| | 04:59 |
And this is sort of changing light you
need to keep an eye on.
| | 05:02 |
One last thing though, you'll notice that
the channels in the RGB parade have a very
| | 05:06 |
low setting in them.
And this is natural.
| | 05:09 |
You don't have to stretch your contrast
right from zero up to 100 on every shot.
| | 05:14 |
So the lower levels, in your RGB parade
would be right, because they would
| | 05:18 |
simulate the lower light that you'd have
at this time in the morning.
| | 05:23 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating a midday look| 00:00 |
Let's have a look at the color of light at
midday.
| | 00:03 |
I've got two shots here, one shot at
midday and the other shot in the afternoon.
| | 00:07 |
And it's very clear the difference in
color between these two shots, shot from
| | 00:12 |
the same bridge in Venice.
The second clip is much cooler, and that's
| | 00:17 |
because it's much later in the afternoon.
And the first shot was shot around by lunchtime.
| | 00:23 |
Apart from anything else, it is warmer
especially because the sun is out.
| | 00:27 |
So how would we go around making this shot
look as though it matched the first shot
| | 00:31 |
in that it was earlier in the day?
Let's select this clip, and apply looks.
| | 00:39 |
And then open the looks builder.
Lighting effects can generally be
| | 00:46 |
attributed to the highlights in an image.
So, let's move our slider towards, yellow.
| | 00:57 |
And when the highlights are quite bright,
then the shadows can become a little
| | 01:00 |
darker, you can get a little more contrast
in the image.
| | 01:04 |
Let's move the highlights a little warmer,
and then get a slight more contrast.
| | 01:12 |
And the other thing we need to do, is
actually increase the ambient light ever
| | 01:15 |
so slightly in this shot.
And then also to match the mood, and the
| | 01:21 |
feel of the first shot, we can increase
the mid-tones.
| | 01:25 |
So it can warm those up too.
So you get much more of a sense of a
| | 01:28 |
warmer part of the day or an earlier part
of the day than late afternoon.
| | 01:33 |
Here's the origional.
And, here's the correction.
| | 01:38 |
If you give it too much contrast, if I
just move the shadows down a little more,
| | 01:42 |
then it becomes slightly stylized and not
exactly what you might see in real life.
| | 01:49 |
Also, when the sun isn't out and the sky
is overcast, then the shadows wouldn't be
| | 01:54 |
as dark.
So you can bring the shadow control up a bit.
| | 01:58 |
But in general, the color of the light is
controlled by the highlights.
| | 02:02 |
The ambient light is controlled by the
mid-tone luma adjustment, and then play
| | 02:07 |
with the shadow levels, or how deep the
shadows are, according to the sort of
| | 02:11 |
light that you want to replicate.
One other thing to consider, though, is
| | 02:18 |
that when there is no sun, then the
general midday light can be a bit cooler.
| | 02:23 |
So you might have to back off the
highlight adjustment.
| | 02:26 |
Because the way the light is scattered
through the atmosphere, it means that you
| | 02:31 |
can still get a bluish tint, even if it's
the middle of the day.
| | 02:36 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating an afternoon look| 00:00 |
Late afternoon has a look all of it's own.
We can simulate this sunny feeling of the
| | 00:05 |
time that approaches golden hour, that
last hour before sunset quite simply with
| | 00:09 |
only a couple of color corrections.
I have got looks applied to this clip.
| | 00:15 |
So, I'll open the Looks Builder and Late
Afternoon, which is to us the colorista
| | 00:20 |
three way, has a little less ambient light
because the sun is approaching the horizon.
| | 00:28 |
And of course you can use the mid-tone
Luma adjustment to simulate falling
| | 00:32 |
ambient light just by reducing it
slightly.
| | 00:36 |
But it also has, especially in a sunny
situation, an orangy yellow light to it.
| | 00:43 |
So, pushing these two together begins to
simulate the sort of light we'd see.
| | 00:49 |
But there are some interesting colors that
can happen late afternoon.
| | 00:53 |
The famous impressionist artist, Monet,
painted many paintings in the afternoon
| | 00:57 |
and began to notice certain colors in the
shadows.
| | 01:01 |
He began to notice that the shadows had a
bluey red tinge to them.
| | 01:06 |
And so, he began to add in purple into the
shadows in his paintings.
| | 01:10 |
It's very interesting that we can add a
little purple into the shadows here and it
| | 01:15 |
begins to suggest that particular time
late afternoon.
| | 01:21 |
Grading is a lot like focusing a camera.
So, if you push something too far just
| | 01:24 |
like if you focus too far, then you can
see that, that's not the result you want
| | 01:27 |
to have.
So, you can always bring it back again,
| | 01:31 |
but experiment with pushing your shadows
towards purple for late afternoon look.
| | 01:37 |
And it really is quite evocative of the
sorts of colors that you can see in late
| | 01:41 |
afternoon in a sunny situation.
Here it is without any purple, and here it
| | 01:46 |
is being pushed towards purple.
And here's the before and after.
| | 01:58 |
You can further exaggerate this look by
adding in a bit of a flare effect in Magic
| | 02:02 |
Bullet Looks.
They've got in the lens section, a Haze
| | 02:07 |
Flare tool, which I can set without a
reflection, and increase the spillage here.
| | 02:14 |
So, these two corrections together, the
color and the flare effect, combine to
| | 02:19 |
give much more of a sense of that light
afternoon feeling, especially with this
| | 02:23 |
simulated haze coming in over the
buildings.
| | 02:28 |
The color of the sun does change though,
the more it approaches the horizon.
| | 02:32 |
This is because of the way that the light
from the sun is being filtered by the atmosphere.
| | 02:38 |
I'm going to copy this effect onto the
next clip, I'm going to hit Finished, and
| | 02:43 |
then right click on this effect, Copy.
And jump to the next clip, and then
| | 02:49 |
right-click and paste the effect inside
the effects controls.
| | 02:53 |
We've got that same effect applied now to
this shot.
| | 02:57 |
I'll open up the Looks Builder for this
shot.
| | 03:01 |
It's useful to be able to simulate those
times towards sunset just by moving the
| | 03:06 |
highlight control.
The closer it gets to sunset the redder
| | 03:10 |
the sun becomes, or redder the light
becomes.
| | 03:13 |
So, you can just move this towards red to
simulate the change in light.
| | 03:19 |
Here it is before, here's with an orangy
light.
| | 03:22 |
And just have a look at this, we're
changing the effect.
| | 03:25 |
We're making it seem a bit more like this
was bathed in a sunset light just by
| | 03:29 |
moving this one control.
If you want a more subtle effect, you can
| | 03:34 |
back off how much intensity applied to the
highlights, but I find it's really
| | 03:37 |
interesting that you completely change the
time of day.
| | 03:40 |
In this case towards late sunset, just
with a simple few corrections.
| | 03:45 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating an evening look| 00:00 |
Technically, there's not a lot of
difference between the sort of light you
| | 00:04 |
get early evening after sunset to the sort
of light you get early morning just before sunrise.
| | 00:11 |
We seem to have a more romantic connection
to early evening and sunset, though.
| | 00:16 |
Maybe that's because, most of the time,
we're still asleep before the sun rises.
| | 00:20 |
But the corrections for both are
remarkably similar.
| | 00:23 |
Here is the Venice clip of the gondola.
And let's launch the looks builder and add
| | 00:30 |
a 3-Way corrector, and reduce down the
ambient light using the Midtone corrector.
| | 00:40 |
And then, also push the light towards blue
because, in the early evening, just like
| | 00:45 |
in the early morning, the light is much
bluer.
| | 00:50 |
We can also bring down the highlights
slightly because the highlight are a
| | 00:53 |
little less bright.
And, instantly, you've got a much more
| | 00:57 |
convincing scene.
Here it is, before and after.
| | 01:01 |
This is a much later time in the day.
(SOUND) A finishing touch to this is to
| | 01:07 |
desaturate the color slightly because the
less light we have, the less color we see physically.
| | 01:13 |
And then, you can continue to just slide
down the Midtone luma adjustment to make
| | 01:21 |
it later and later and later in the day.
As you're doing this, the more you're
| | 01:29 |
sliding it down the more you need to
compensate by adjusting the Saturation.
| | 01:33 |
And another little tweak you can make is
that you can change the mood or you can
| | 01:38 |
enhance the mood by moving the Midtone
Color adjustment over to start to go into
| | 01:42 |
blue as well.
This is, again, to do with the fact that
| | 01:47 |
our eyes see blue more readily than they
see red or other colors in low-light conditions.
| | 01:54 |
It's not necessarily that we see things as
brightly vivid blue at this time of day.
| | 02:00 |
But it is a suggestion to the audience
that you are telling them that the scene
| | 02:04 |
was shot at that time of day.
Here's the original, and here are the
| | 02:10 |
combined corrections, which give a really
convincing look of early evening.
| | 02:17 |
I'm going to press finished and here is
what the whole clip looks like.
| | 02:23 |
And you correct stuff with match able
looks although you work with one single
| | 02:27 |
image in the preview frame the effect is,
of course, applied to the whole clip.
| | 02:32 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Composing a day-for-night shot| 00:00 |
Crafting a day for night look really is an
extension of the early evening look.
| | 00:05 |
Where we are reducing the ambient light
and we're adding in some blue into the highlights.
| | 00:13 |
This is the shot we're going to correct.
Here is the untreated look which was
| | 00:17 |
obviously shot during the day, and this is
where we're going.
| | 00:22 |
This is the shot which now has much more
of a feeling of night time to it.
| | 00:27 |
So let's just jump back to the first shot,
select the clip and open up Looks.
| | 00:35 |
So the first thing to do is to adjust the
colors and the brightness settings.
| | 00:40 |
I'll drag a three way color correction
from the subject section.
| | 00:45 |
And I'm going to reduce the ambient light,
or simulate reducing the ambient light,
| | 00:50 |
using the LUMA control on the midtones.
I'll also reduce the highlights a little,
| | 00:58 |
and I'll reduce or deepen the shadows.
So the loomer levels are becoming much
| | 01:07 |
more we would expect.
But this is a low-light situation so I
| | 01:11 |
need to add some desaturation.
I'll grab a desaturation tool or a
| | 01:15 |
saturation tool and then desaturate.
And I will drop the midtones even more, I
| | 01:22 |
think like so.
So we're beginning to put together the
| | 01:28 |
pieces of the puzzle that create this
look, but there are a number of key things
| | 01:31 |
to consider.
Firstly, in low light situations the light
| | 01:36 |
does have this tendency to be blue, you
definitely get a blue tinge to the light.
| | 01:43 |
So let's add some into the highlights.
And also, let's jot down the shadows a
| | 01:51 |
little more, because at nighttime, you can
go out and observe this outside, that the
| | 01:54 |
shadows are quite dark.
You do lose a lot of detail in the shadows.
| | 02:00 |
You can see on the RGB scope, we're really
crushing the shadows, we're making the
| | 02:04 |
shadows dark and deep.
Which simulates what actually happens in
| | 02:09 |
real life.
So we've got low light situation, dark
| | 02:12 |
shadows, we need some more blue in this to
simulate the sort of blue that happens
| | 02:15 |
that night.
It's an interesting combination of things
| | 02:20 |
about this blue, the light at night is
literally bluer.
| | 02:25 |
But also, the way our eyes see light, is
that they're designed to see detail first
| | 02:29 |
and color second.
And in low light situations, colors not
| | 02:33 |
only become more and more desaturated.
But the colors with the lowest or the
| | 02:38 |
smallest, shortest wavelength, which are
blues, are the ones that are most visible
| | 02:42 |
to us.
We see blues much more readily than we see reds.
| | 02:47 |
This doesn't necessarily mean that night
time is bright blue, but it does have a
| | 02:52 |
certain blue tinge to it.
This is where reality and stylistic grades
| | 02:58 |
kind of overlap, because in so many
movies, night time is depicted as blue.
| | 03:05 |
This is partly convention and partly
because we're used to seeing this on screen.
| | 03:09 |
And partly lodged in the original truth
about light being slightly blue and our
| | 03:13 |
eyes tending towards blue at night time.
We have to cope with both these instances
| | 03:18 |
when we're grading.
This is why often when you grade, you find
| | 03:22 |
yourself moving both the mid tone and the
shadow wheels towards blue to get this
| | 03:28 |
kind of night time effect.
Sometimes, you really have to move it
| | 03:34 |
towards blue to make this effect stand out
and to drag both these pens towards this
| | 03:38 |
blue color.
You'll notice that I haven't decreased the
| | 03:43 |
highlights a huge amount because at night
time you still see detail in the brightest
| | 03:48 |
areas at night.
Its not overly bright but there is a
| | 03:52 |
distinction between the darkest shadows
and some of the details you see.
| | 03:58 |
So I tend to leave the highlights not as
dark as they could be.
| | 04:02 |
But there is a glaring issue in this shot
which needs to be corrected.
| | 04:07 |
And that is the sky is a dead giveaway.
Here's the before and after.
| | 04:12 |
The sky is very bright.
And in this shot, we would not be
| | 04:15 |
convincing anyone that it was actually
filmed at night.
| | 04:19 |
A good discipline when shooting night
scenes is to try and avoid any sky in them.
| | 04:24 |
If you know you were going to shoot day
for night.
| | 04:27 |
In this case, though, I have to fix it in
post, which is possible by covering up
| | 04:31 |
this bright area where the gradient and
the spot exposure.
| | 04:35 |
I'll grab a gradient exposure from the
subject section, drop down a couple of
| | 04:40 |
stops and then drag this gradient over the
picture.
| | 04:45 |
Try and reduce the amount of light that's
coming in from the top of the frame.
| | 04:50 |
Notice that because I've added this
gradient exposure after the colorista
| | 04:54 |
3-way, It's picking up the blues and the
shadows.
| | 04:58 |
If you thing your blues and your shadows
are too much, you can always just back off
| | 05:02 |
a little bit on them.
So if you're going for more accurate
| | 05:06 |
rather than stylized look, adjusting the
shadows in the tool chain before the grad exposure.
| | 05:13 |
Also adjusts the shadows in the grad
exposure because these tools are processed
| | 05:18 |
in order from left to right.
We're reducing the amount of light coming
| | 05:23 |
in from the top of the frame.
But we also need a Spot exposure tool to
| | 05:27 |
reduce this even more.
I'm going to change the shape, and the
| | 05:33 |
spread here on screen.
Position it up into place, and then just
| | 05:38 |
bring down that exposure slightly.
You can drag the Aspect controls.
| | 05:46 |
On the Spot exposure just to change the
shape so its not a complete circle.
| | 05:52 |
It can be an oval shape.
You can look at the before and after, and
| | 05:55 |
if you want to look at it without the
screen controls you can deselect the tool
| | 05:59 |
and then turn the entire tool chain off
and on.
| | 06:03 |
That's a much more convincing scene of
something at night.
| | 06:10 |
I have to mention this happy accident here
though, something which really helps sell
| | 06:14 |
this look is artificial lighting.
The fact that this room has its lights on
| | 06:18 |
really helps this shot because it
simulates actually what happens at night
| | 06:22 |
is that people have their lights on.
So if you are setting up a shoot like
| | 06:26 |
this, if you're shooting a car driving
through a scene and you know it's is going
| | 06:28 |
to be shot in the evening.
Make sure that the car has its lights on,
| | 06:32 |
cause that will really help your gray.
We'll make sure you have some artificial
| | 06:37 |
lights in the shot itself.
Let's have a look at this on the timeline
| | 06:41 |
and playback.
It's very useful to be able to apply
| | 06:44 |
shadows in post production.
Because as great as modern video cameras
| | 06:49 |
are, in low light situations, they still
introduce noise.
| | 06:56 |
Some cameras are better than others.
Plus, if you've shot more neutrally, then
| | 06:59 |
you'll have more options to change the
mood, or look, of the piece when the
| | 07:02 |
director or client changes their mind.
If they've decided that they didn't want
| | 07:06 |
it quite as dark.
It's an easy fix to jump back into Lux,
| | 07:11 |
and increase the level of the mid-tone
control.
| | 07:18 |
So, doing this post-production method can
be cheaper, but it also can give you more
| | 07:22 |
options in post-productions for changing
the look and feel of your video.
| | 07:26 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating a flashback look| 00:00 |
Having a stylized look is a classic
cinematic method of talking to your audience.
| | 00:05 |
And telling them that the scene they're
watching now isn't part of the current narrative.
| | 00:11 |
Just like cross-dissolve transitions can
suggest a passage of time or a change of
| | 00:15 |
location, flashback looks are a classic
way to change the narrative structure.
| | 00:22 |
So how do you create this effect and what
are the rules.
| | 00:26 |
There are some general conventions but
there aren't any hard and fast rules.
| | 00:30 |
This is my first clip the dinner date
clip.
| | 00:33 |
I'm going to open up Looks classic method
of doing a flashback is to desaturate and
| | 00:39 |
go black and white.
So I've grabbed a Saturation tool.
| | 00:45 |
Saturation tools live in a number of these
sections.
| | 00:49 |
There's one in the Post section.
But this one fits in the subject section
| | 00:53 |
and I can click on it and bring down.
The saturation.
| | 00:59 |
What tends to happen though is when you
see this effect they tend to be combined
| | 01:03 |
with a diffusion effect.
I'll throw in a quick diffusion onto this shot.
| | 01:11 |
And you can choose to have the diffusion
apply to more than this shot or just onto
| | 01:17 |
a section.
In this case mostly the highlights, but it
| | 01:21 |
really is a question of choice depending
on how stylized you want to make this.
| | 01:26 |
Once you've added a bit of diffusion, you
can then tint it.
| | 01:29 |
Tinting is another classic way of
suggestion a flashback look.
| | 01:34 |
I'm going to drag on the Warm Cool tool,
and then tint it with a sepia themed color.
| | 01:42 |
There are no definite rules as long as
you're treating your footage differently
| | 01:45 |
to how the rest of the timeline is set up.
Your audience will understand the
| | 01:49 |
convention that you're suggesting.
Flashbacks are great opportunity to be creative.
| | 01:55 |
You can apply all sorts of effects to
them.
| | 01:57 |
Magic Bullet Looks has a complete set of
presets that you can apply to different
| | 02:01 |
clips to get these different looks.
There's some nice ones in the diffusion
| | 02:07 |
and light section.
Sultry Tron has a really interesting
| | 02:11 |
glowing look.
Most of the work in this preset is being
| | 02:16 |
done by the Telecine Net tool which
softens and add bloom to the shadows in
| | 02:20 |
the image.
Which is the opposite effect of the
| | 02:24 |
Diffusion tool.
Here's the Diffusion Max preset, which
| | 02:29 |
softens and glows the highlights.
I designed and configured all the presets
| | 02:34 |
for Magic Bullet Looks.
And I was able to include a very subtle
| | 02:39 |
one based on removing certain types of
color from the image.
| | 02:44 |
Here it is warm isolation.
It's based on this tool the Ranged HSL tool.
| | 02:51 |
The Ranged HSL let's us desaturate colors
by dragging these color pins toward the
| | 02:55 |
center of the wheel.
But leaving the two main warm colors here,
| | 03:00 |
the oranges and the reds as saturated
while desaturating everything else.
| | 03:05 |
I think is a really subtle way to suggest
a flashback.
| | 03:09 |
I'll show you how it looks when it's
applied to a different clip.
| | 03:12 |
Here's the second clip on the timeline.
I'll select it and open Looks.
| | 03:18 |
This has the effect already applied.
I'll just break down how it's built up.
| | 03:24 |
First of all, there's a little bit of the
Skin Softening tool that you'll find in looks.
| | 03:29 |
This just helps soften the skin tone in
shots.
| | 03:34 |
The main tool doing most of the work here
is the Ranged HSL tool.
| | 03:38 |
So we've desaturated all the color pins
except orange and red.
| | 03:42 |
Here it is before and after.
The major change in this shot being the
| | 03:46 |
change of her green dress.
Then there's also a little bit of
| | 03:52 |
desaturation in the mid tones of the
shadows and a slight boost in the highlights.
| | 03:59 |
This is a very subtle soft effect but what
I like about this particular effect is the
| | 04:04 |
addition of some film grain.
The film grain tool is over in the post section.
| | 04:12 |
And because it's designed to give the
effect of older filmstock.
| | 04:16 |
I think in a flashback sequence it's
really nice because it helps suggest a
| | 04:21 |
greater passage of time because the film
grain echoes the effect of old film.
| | 04:28 |
And that helps sell the idea of a larger
passage of time.
| | 04:32 |
In the Film Grain tool, you can also
adjust how much of the grain is applied to
| | 04:36 |
the highlights.
If you adjust the Highlight Suppress and
| | 04:40 |
move that up towards a hundred, then you
get more grain in the midtones and the
| | 04:43 |
shadows than you do the highlights.
And I think it's a nicer effect, because
| | 04:48 |
you, you get a nice contrast between
cleaner highlights and more grain in the midtones.
| | 04:54 |
And it's also in a shot like this useful
to turn off the color.
| | 04:57 |
So you get more of a monochromatic grain
over the top of the footage.
| | 05:01 |
This is what it looks like when it's
applied to a clip.
| | 05:10 |
An obvious stylized look will be enough to
communicate to the viewer that this is a
| | 05:14 |
flashback or a memory.
Or this is just an event that doesn't fit
| | 05:18 |
into the current timeline being played out
on screen.
| | 05:21 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
4. InteriorsChanging colors to match the mood of the story| 00:00 |
Different locations have different
lighting and different color aspects that
| | 00:04 |
can help us distinguish between them.
And the interior decoration of different
| | 00:08 |
rooms and the different materials found
inside them, also help the viewer to
| | 00:12 |
visually identify that location.
But most interestingly, we can manipulate
| | 00:18 |
the audience's expectations by changing
those colors in post production, and also
| | 00:22 |
changing the mood in the story that's
being portrayed in the scene.
| | 00:27 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Stylizing an office scene| 00:00 |
One of my favorite things about
post-production is being able to change
| | 00:04 |
the story through the use of color.
So, let's have a look at how we could make
| | 00:09 |
this a good office day and a bad office
day, just through changing some color corrections.
| | 00:15 |
I've already applied an instance of looks,
so let's open the looks builder.
| | 00:19 |
We all love work, right?
Don't we?
| | 00:21 |
So, in this particular case, you could
exaggerate how much you love work by
| | 00:25 |
adding a little bit of diffusion into the
scene.
| | 00:29 |
And then, add some saturation.
Let's choose the Saturation tool from the
| | 00:35 |
Post section and boost the Saturation.
Here you go.
| | 00:39 |
Here's your first day at work.
Before and after.
| | 00:45 |
As we know, things don't go quite
according to plan.
| | 00:48 |
So let's reset this look and let's see
what happens after you've had a little too
| | 00:53 |
much time at work.
And in order to make this office seem more
| | 00:57 |
like a prison, we could apply some
desaturation and just move the colors
| | 01:01 |
towards a cold environment, so that we're
representing a cool emotion.
| | 01:08 |
So let's grab a hue in the Saturation tool
and slightly desaturate the colors here.
| | 01:17 |
Then, I'm going to choose a three-way
color corrector, position that after the
| | 01:23 |
hue and saturation, and move the lighting
towards a little more blue lighting.
| | 01:33 |
(SOUND) This is already (SOUND) a negative
feel about this space.
| | 01:38 |
Increasing the shadow depth, so deepening
the shadows also increases the contrast.
| | 01:45 |
So it's a little more visually striking
because there is a wider distance between
| | 01:49 |
the darkest and the lightest pixels.
And to exaggerate this even more, let's
| | 01:56 |
add a vignette to make this the office
from hell.
| | 02:03 |
There we go.
This is how it might look (LAUGH) in the
| | 02:05 |
morning, but by evening, you've probably
had enough of work.
| | 02:09 |
Joking aside though, it is important to
reflect what your protagonist is going
| | 02:13 |
through with the colors in this scene.
In general, darker shadows and brighter
| | 02:18 |
highlights increase the contrast and cause
a greater tension, whereas slightly
| | 02:23 |
saturated colors and warmer lighting can
make their environment seem much more appealing.
| | 02:29 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating a bedroom color style| 00:00 |
Some of the techniques we used in the
previous chapter, about changing the time
| | 00:04 |
of day and simulating the evening, can
also be used on interior shots.
| | 00:09 |
I'm going to bring out looks on this
bedroom image, in the same way that we
| | 00:13 |
were able to simulate late afternoon and
early evening.
| | 00:20 |
We can use the mid-tone Luma slider to
change the ambient light, or the virtual
| | 00:24 |
ambient light, to make it later in the
day.
| | 00:27 |
And we could also push the highlights
towards the bluish lights that you get in
| | 00:32 |
the evening, and then deepen the shadows
slightly.
| | 00:39 |
Don't forget the other addition of lower
light situations in needing a slight
| | 00:43 |
desaturation, because of the way our eyes
see colors in lower light scenarios.
| | 00:48 |
Maybe I'll adjust the mid-tone slider a
little lower.
| | 00:52 |
But a standard lighting or color grading
situation associated with a bedroom is sleeping.
| | 00:58 |
And so, this can be later on in the
evening or it can be a night time scene.
| | 01:03 |
So, these same corrections for exteriors
still apply to interior.
| | 01:08 |
Notice that the increasing contrast makes
the shadows much darker.
| | 01:13 |
I'm going to reset this look file New
Look, and suggest that if you want to make
| | 01:17 |
the bedroom seem like a more relaxing
place, then you don't necessarily need
| | 01:22 |
dark shadows.
I'll apply a three-way color corrector,
| | 01:28 |
and deepen the shadows a bit.
Increasing the contrast, deepening the
| | 01:33 |
shadows, makes the room seem a little more
serious.
| | 01:36 |
So, let's reset that wheel.
This image doesn't have a high contrast,
| | 01:40 |
and the shadows aren't too dark, which
kind of fits this setting.
| | 01:45 |
If we wanted to make this scene more
relaxed, we could increase the warmth of
| | 01:49 |
the lighting in the highlights.
And if you wanted to seem a little more
| | 01:55 |
romantic, you could add in a little trick
that the Impressionist artists began to
| | 01:59 |
use in their paintings, which was to add
in a pink and purple.
| | 02:06 |
And you can hint at these colors which
could hint at the relaxing or romantic
| | 02:10 |
nature of the particular scene.
Certainly in this case a bedroom, but
| | 02:15 |
these techniques can apply to a whole
series of interior locations.
| | 02:19 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Designing a hospital look| 00:00 |
This is how hospitals look, isn't it?
Dark, dramatic, lots of contrasting
| | 00:05 |
colored lighting.
Well, actually no, they don't look
| | 00:09 |
anything like this, this is a treated
shot.
| | 00:12 |
A hospital actually looks like this.
Lots of the colors quite bright, often
| | 00:16 |
they've got friendly, warm colors on the
walls.
| | 00:19 |
But why do we constantly see hospitals
portrayed with these green colors,
| | 00:23 |
especially in the walls or on the bed
linen.
| | 00:27 |
Well, it might be because we're used to
seeing these sort of colors in hospital on
| | 00:30 |
the gowns.
Where you've got lots of bluey green or
| | 00:34 |
blue gowns worn by either the patients or
the surgeons.
| | 00:38 |
And this works remarkably well for drama
because, these color gowns reflect nicely
| | 00:42 |
the skin tone, they contrast against the
skin tone.
| | 00:45 |
They're complimentary colors, they come
from the opposite side of the color wheel.
| | 00:50 |
So, we tend to get these colors in
hospital dramas or settings within a
| | 00:53 |
hospital quite often.
I'll just jump back to the first clip.
| | 00:58 |
So, if you wanted to recreate this look,
I'll just reset Colorista and open up the
| | 01:01 |
color wheels.
You could increase the tension and the
| | 01:07 |
drama by increasing the shadows,
decreasing the saturation and then moving
| | 01:12 |
the colors towards this tealy blue.
Change the mood with the midtones, and
| | 01:21 |
then you change the tension and the drama
quite significantly.
| | 01:27 |
Here we've got these darker shadows with a
slight tint to teal, balanced against a
| | 01:32 |
really bright set of highlights.
You can tell as a viewer, that this is a
| | 01:38 |
dramatic scene.
What if you wanted to have a reasonably
| | 01:42 |
accurate look and reflect things that
hospitals are known for, which is their
| | 01:46 |
clinical nature and sterile environment?
Let's disable Colorista and open up Looks /g.
| | 01:56 |
One way you can do this is by grabbing a
Three-Way Color Corrector and slightly
| | 02:00 |
exaggerating the shadows.
So, you've got a nice, crisp contrast
| | 02:05 |
between the shadows and the highlights.
Of course because we're operating RGP
| | 02:11 |
space in Looks, every time we increase the
contrast, we get a slight boost in the saturation.
| | 02:17 |
So, I might in this case just slightly
tweak the saturation down so, its not
| | 02:21 |
overly colorful.
I'm going for a more naturalistic look and
| | 02:26 |
the other tool I like using for this sort
of effect in Looks is the Pop tool, which
| | 02:30 |
lives over in the post section.
This increases the local contrast, it
| | 02:36 |
helps define sharp edges in an image
without increasing the saturation.
| | 02:41 |
So, increasing the Pop to say something
like 50, helps define these edges.
| | 02:48 |
So, here's the before and the after.
It removes any slight haze in the image
| | 02:53 |
and gives extra definition.
So, let's have a look back in the timeline.
| | 02:59 |
Here's the difference, here's the before
and after.
| | 03:04 |
Before and after.
So, this isn't an especially dramatic
| | 03:08 |
look, but it's clean and it's clinical and
it's got defined lines.
| | 03:12 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Stylizing a morgue shot| 00:00 |
Sometimes it's important to show the
viewer the physical temperature that is
| | 00:03 |
usually associated with a certain room.
In this case in a morgue, these rooms tend
| | 00:09 |
to be cold.
So this untreated image doesn't quite look
| | 00:12 |
like the sort of place, so it doesn't have
quite the sort of temperature that a
| | 00:16 |
viewer might expect it to.
We can easily fix this though.
| | 00:22 |
Let's open up the Looks builder, add a
Three-Way Color Corrector, and use our old
| | 00:29 |
trick of cool lighting, to suggest a cool
mood.
| | 00:36 |
This is beginning to change the
temperature but these places are quite
| | 00:40 |
dramatic and whenever a morgue is featured
in a movie (LAUGH) it's never a friendly
| | 00:44 |
place, so let's increase these shadows
slightly.
| | 00:50 |
And also, a nice thing to do here is to
add a pool of light or a lighting effect.
| | 00:57 |
Which you can do quite easily with a
gradient, in this case the Grad Exposure
| | 01:01 |
tool from the Mat section.
Drop down the stops a little bit and
| | 01:06 |
balance some negative lighting if you like
from the opposite side of the room that
| | 01:11 |
the main lighting is coming in from.
You could decide to go a little bit more
| | 01:20 |
eerie than clinical and move the highlight
over to the green that we often see on the
| | 01:24 |
camera that's captured by florescent
lighting.
| | 01:29 |
And this would give off a slightly
stylized, slightly sinister mood, a little
| | 01:32 |
bit more sinister than blue.
So you're changing the emotional
| | 01:36 |
temperature as well as the physical
temperature.
| | 01:40 |
But it's also important to consider the
materials that you've got in a particular room.
| | 01:44 |
In a morgue, you've got lots of metal.
It's either aluminum or steel, and that
| | 01:50 |
surface tends to be stark and shiny.
So, it's good to reflect that in a grade,
| | 01:56 |
we can use the Pop tool inside Magic
Bullet Looks to do this.
| | 02:01 |
And just as a reminder this looks at the
edges in an image and increases their
| | 02:05 |
local contrast, so it acts like a
sharpening tool, so let's bump this up
| | 02:09 |
right up to 100%.
Here's the before and after, and it has
| | 02:16 |
the effect of bringing out the bright
highlights, as well as increasing or
| | 02:20 |
exaggerating the texture that's already
present in the image.
| | 02:26 |
One last creative treatment that you might
like to include is something that I see in
| | 02:31 |
many of these types of scenes, which is as
well as coloring the lighting, let's move
| | 02:36 |
this back to blue.
We get a really heavy mood push towards
| | 02:41 |
blue, quite often in the mid-tones,
sometimes in the shadows as well, which
| | 02:45 |
really changes the scene.
This makes it much more dramatic and
| | 02:50 |
hopefully communicates to your viewer that
this is the sort of place where they don't
| | 02:53 |
really want to be.
| | 02:55 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Coloring an interrogation scene| 00:00 |
When you're preparing for grades, it's so
important, so useful to talk to your
| | 00:04 |
costume department and coordinate your
efforts.
| | 00:08 |
In this shot, we've got a scene inside a
warehouse and this is going to be the
| | 00:11 |
standard thriller shot where we push the
shadows towards a blue or maybe a bluey green.
| | 00:17 |
And they're balanced against the orangery
skin tones.
| | 00:20 |
This is a standard thriller effect that's
used on lots and lots of movies these days.
| | 00:25 |
There's one inherent problem with this
though.
| | 00:27 |
Although we've got a nice gray background,
which will accept a color change to green
| | 00:32 |
quite nicely.
And our character is dressed in a dark
| | 00:35 |
gray jacket, you don't always have
complete control over your entire set.
| | 00:41 |
Notice the nice yellow post here.
So, when you're color grading, you want to
| | 00:47 |
make sure that the audience is looking in
the right place and they're not being
| | 00:49 |
distracted by elements in the background.
So, let's have a look at how we might do this.
| | 00:55 |
I'll get a copy of Colorista.
And drop that onto this clip.
| | 01:01 |
Here's the rest of the clip by the way.
This is a bad guy walking towards the screen.
| | 01:06 |
Inside a primary correction, let's push
the shadows down a bit, let's deepen them
| | 01:12 |
slightly and let's push them towards this
classic.
| | 01:19 |
Bluey green.
At the same time let's bring up the
| | 01:22 |
highlights every so slightly and push
those towards orange so we're getting a
| | 01:28 |
nice color balance.
Orange is on the opposite side to the
| | 01:34 |
color wheel than the bluey green.
So, these colors work together nicely
| | 01:38 |
they're complementary colors.
And what it means is that your character
| | 01:42 |
is separated from the background.
And becomes the focus for your attention.
| | 01:46 |
Unless there's a nice yellow post in the
background which is really distracting.
| | 01:52 |
So, how do we deal with this?
In the secondary area of Colorista, we've
| | 01:56 |
got the keyer, of course, so the standard
treatment here is to launch the keyer.
| | 02:04 |
And sample that particular color and then
desaturate it.
| | 02:08 |
So, let's draw our selection marquee
around it.
| | 02:12 |
And what we're trying to do is get that
element separated from all the other
| | 02:17 |
elements by a matte.
And that's working pretty well.
| | 02:22 |
Let's extend the controls in the scope
here.
| | 02:25 |
And just see how much of that yellow we
can select without selecting the rest of
| | 02:30 |
the image.
If I drag out the control here, I start
| | 02:34 |
selecting more of the hues and the loomer
elements in the rest of the image.
| | 02:40 |
Thing about this post though that it's got
some graduated shading in it.
| | 02:44 |
So, I want to make sure the whole post is
selected, and when I desaturate it, I
| | 02:46 |
desaturate the whole post.
So, if I drag these out, I can make sure
| | 02:51 |
that I've selected most of the post, give
it slight softening to let that correction
| | 02:56 |
composite better in the image.
So, there's no sharp edges.
| | 03:04 |
But the problem here is I'm selecting
other elements in the shot.
| | 03:08 |
It's quite often that you get overlapping
colors like this, so most color correction
| | 03:12 |
programs have the ability to select a key
and then also mask out a particular area.
| | 03:18 |
So, you can combine both the key and the
mask together, and Colorista lets you do
| | 03:22 |
that as well.
So, I'm happy with this selection for now.
| | 03:26 |
I'm going to click OK.
And go up to the secondary controls and
| | 03:30 |
start to desaturate that color.
That's working pretty nicely but if I move
| | 03:35 |
the desaturation control quickly you can
see that I'm desaturating our character's
| | 03:40 |
face as well.
So, what I'll want to do is draw a mask
| | 03:44 |
and only desaturate that post.
So, desaturate it so that it's beginning
| | 03:49 |
to drop out of the image, there we go.
And turn on the rectangle mask.
| | 03:55 |
Now, the thing about Colorista is that you
don't see the mask on the screen until you
| | 03:59 |
go up and you select the filter itself.
Then you can start drawing on screen and
| | 04:04 |
moving this mask manually.
I want to get the height right first, and
| | 04:09 |
then get the width and move it over the
post.
| | 04:13 |
There we go.
Now, if I change the secondary saturation,
| | 04:20 |
I'm only changing the saturation in the
post and not on my subject.
| | 04:27 |
If you've got a moving camera or you've
got an element in the shot that's moving
| | 04:30 |
that you want to mask as well, you can
turn on the ability to keyframe the
| | 04:33 |
position of the mask.
In Adobe software, every time that you see
| | 04:38 |
one of these stopwatch icons, it means
that you can toggle on the ability to key
| | 04:41 |
frame, and then key frame either the shape
or the height or the position of your mask.
| | 04:47 |
Let's desaturate this even more.
Here we go.
| | 04:50 |
And then deselect the mask and we can also
bring down the exposure slightly at the pole.
| | 04:59 |
There we go.
So, it's fitting into the other items in
| | 05:02 |
the shot much better and we still got our
nice treatment with our actor separated
| | 05:06 |
from the background with the tealy
blue-green color balancing nicely with his
| | 05:11 |
skin tone.
Once you made any secondary color
| | 05:16 |
corrections, for example, changing the
color of the post in the background,
| | 05:19 |
you're not stuck with a color that you
just did in the primary section, you can
| | 05:21 |
still go back and change your mind.
You can make this even more stylized and
| | 05:26 |
push it more towards green or.
Change your mind and then decide how much
| | 05:31 |
blue that you want to add into the shot
and how dark the shadows you want to make.
| | 05:36 |
But this ability to change the mood by
changing the color is such an important
| | 05:40 |
part of the film making process and is why
grading is a creative tool to be able to
| | 05:44 |
tell your story.
| | 05:47 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
5. Depth of FieldSeparating characters from the background| 00:00 |
Part of the job was making color
corrections, is making it easy for the
| | 00:03 |
audience to see what's happening in the
image, and to know which details in the
| | 00:06 |
shot are important.
One techinque is to use vignettes, to
| | 00:11 |
subtly lead the viewers eye, towards the
area you want them to be looking at.
| | 00:16 |
Depth of field also helps focus the
audience attention on certain elements in
| | 00:20 |
the shot.
And, creating depth of field, in post
| | 00:23 |
production mimics the use of more
expensive lenses and gives a more filmic
| | 00:28 |
look to your shots.
Which can also lend a higher production
| | 00:32 |
quality and a higher value to your
projects.
| | 00:35 |
So this is what we'll be looking at in
this chapter, creating fake depth of
| | 00:40 |
field, in post production on the (UNKNOWN)
timeline.
| | 00:44 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating fake depth of field in Magic Bullet Looks| 00:00 |
One of the nice thing about Magic Bullet
Looks is it's extra tools that allow you
| | 00:04 |
to do fake depth of field.
So, I'm going to choose the Magic Bullet
| | 00:09 |
Looks sequence here, and apply it to this
clip.
| | 00:13 |
I'll just grab the Looks from the set of
effects filters and I'll click Edit Look
| | 00:18 |
to bring up the Looks builder.
Over in the Lens section, we've got a
| | 00:26 |
vignette tool.
And the Vignette tool with its screen
| | 00:30 |
controls, lowers the luma values of the
edge of the image to allow us to focus on
| | 00:35 |
the subject in the center.
Here's the before and after.
| | 00:42 |
But next to it, there is also in the Lens
section, an Edge Softness tool.
| | 00:47 |
The Edge Softness tool is used in a very
similar way as the Vignette.
| | 00:51 |
You can change the aspect, and you can
move it around the screen.
| | 00:56 |
And everything inside the center area of
this tool, is not blurred, and everything
| | 01:00 |
outside is blurred according to the blur
quality amount in the settings.
| | 01:06 |
I've always found that the blur size of
three is a little too much for this
| | 01:09 |
effect, so I tend to reduce it down to one
or one and a half.
| | 01:14 |
And the idea is to isolate our individual
and just subtly to make the background
| | 01:19 |
less interesting to look at and so we're
looking at him.
| | 01:25 |
Here's the before and after.
I'll turn off the Vignette so we can just
| | 01:31 |
see the effect.
And that's very subtle.
| | 01:35 |
You'll can see on the line here that this
is without the effect applied.
| | 01:40 |
And if I apply it there's a very subtle
blur so perhaps I need to increase the
| | 01:45 |
amount of blur there to maybe right about
two for after.
| | 01:51 |
And deselect the tool so I don't get the
onscreen controls.
| | 01:55 |
Now I can turn the tool chain off and on.
And that's a bit less subtle, but it's
| | 02:01 |
easier to see the effect.
We'll probably go for somewhere in between
| | 02:05 |
one and a half and two say one point
seven.
| | 02:08 |
But the thing to remember about this
effect is that it's not as technically
| | 02:11 |
accurate as shooting depth of field in
your camera.
| | 02:15 |
You can see here that his shoulder is on a
similar plane to the side of his face but
| | 02:18 |
it's still not in focus here whilst his
face is.
| | 02:22 |
And I see this effect all the time on TV
shows.
| | 02:27 |
Whether it had to work on a budget and
work quickly, and this is the trade-off.
| | 02:31 |
Somewhere in the line between the most
perfect elegant workflow and actually
| | 02:35 |
getting the job done in time to transmit
the program.
| | 02:39 |
When you're on a deadline, every second is
precious.
| | 02:42 |
So, having access to easy subtle methods
like this, of exaggerating depth and
| | 02:46 |
focusing interest is extremely useful.
| | 02:50 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating fake depth of field in Colorista II| 00:00 |
Having depth of field with magic bullet
looks to a static shot is very useful.
| | 00:05 |
But the problem with our characters
onscreen is that they tend to move and
| | 00:08 |
here our actress moves from the left to
the right through the shot.
| | 00:13 |
So if we added a static frame or a static
soft edge vignette then she would move in
| | 00:17 |
and out of it.
So, this would be a job for the plug-in
| | 00:22 |
Colorista rather than Looks in this
instance, because you can animate vignettes.
| | 00:27 |
I'm using the Colorista II sequence, and
I'm going to apply Colorista to this shot.
| | 00:37 |
In the secondary and in the master
sections of Colorista, we have the ability
| | 00:43 |
to apply a mask.
I'm going to use the secondary section
| | 00:48 |
because that has the Pop tool that I'm
going to use to soften the outside of the mask.
| | 00:55 |
One of the important things to do when
you're applying a mask to Colorista is to
| | 00:58 |
set the filter, because then you see a
preview of the onscreen controls.
| | 01:04 |
And I'm going to go down to the mask area,
the secondary power mask, and I'm going to
| | 01:10 |
turn on the ellipse.
And now we can see it on screen.
| | 01:15 |
We can drag on the onscreen controls to
re-size this, and I'm going to re-size it
| | 01:21 |
to suit her face and reposition it also to
cover her hair.
| | 01:28 |
So the idea is I'm going to blur
everything outside this vignette.
| | 01:33 |
So I need to invert the mask here.
And then go up to the pop control, inside
| | 01:40 |
the secondary section.
And set it to a negative value so
| | 01:45 |
everything is being slightly smoothed.
In fact, I'll set it to 100% and then
| | 01:52 |
switch the filter on and off, so you can
see the effect.
| | 01:56 |
You can see on her shoulders here and on
the shoulders of the waiter as he passes.
| | 01:58 |
This is more of a subtle blur at this
level, rather than out and out blur.
| | 02:07 |
The Pop tool is analyzing the edges and
slightly softening them.
| | 02:11 |
So I can experiment with the amount of
softening by sliding the Pop tool.
| | 02:17 |
But I'm going to leave it 100% for now and
just see what happens as she moves and the
| | 02:23 |
waiter moves through the shot.
Okay.
| | 02:28 |
So what I need to do, is I need to set a
key frame for the position of this
| | 02:32 |
vignette at several stages during the
shot, so I'll choose the first one.
| | 02:38 |
In fact, the whole thing can move over
slightly, and brought a bit more tightly in.
| | 02:44 |
I'm going to check that my feather size is
around about 40 or 50, which means that
| | 02:49 |
the blur gently starts at the edge of this
vignette.
| | 02:54 |
We can see this here.
It's a very, very subtle effect.
| | 02:59 |
Here it is with no effect.
We could see the sharpness of her hair.
| | 03:02 |
And here it is with the blur.
And this is good because what we're trying
| | 03:08 |
to do is add an effect to the shot without
advertising the fact that we added an effect.
| | 03:12 |
We want to slightly focus our attention on
the main character here.
| | 03:17 |
So this position is more or less working,
let's try she moves there so let's just
| | 03:22 |
set a key frame here.
I'm going to set a key frame on the center
| | 03:27 |
position of the mask which is here.
I'll turn on the ability to make key
| | 03:31 |
frames which automatically adds a key
frame at this point in time.
| | 03:36 |
Then, as I move forward, move to the right
there.
| | 03:39 |
Move the whole mask.
It automatically adds key frame for me.
| | 03:44 |
Then I can move back again, move it here,
that's another key frame, and so on.
| | 03:49 |
So I just go through and work out where
she's going to finish up rather up there.
| | 03:55 |
And then work out where she's going to
move back to, right there.
| | 04:01 |
Okay so as we move through the shot here,
it's automatically moving the vignette for us.
| | 04:08 |
Now this is an interesting effect because
our waiter moves around her as he reaches
| | 04:13 |
the same plane as her shoulder in real
life he would be in focus.
| | 04:20 |
If we were doing this effect in camera.
And there's an interesting balance between
| | 04:23 |
doing something in post and doing
something in camera.
| | 04:27 |
You could make an argument that doing it
in camera makes it more technically
| | 04:30 |
accurate, but doing it in post-production
does give you a chance to be able to
| | 04:33 |
change your mind and subtly alter the
scene.
| | 04:37 |
Our intention here in this scene is to
focus our attention on the main subject.
| | 04:44 |
So you could totally make the argument
that it's good that our waiter isn't
| | 04:47 |
coming into focus.
But these decisions do depend on a lot of things.
| | 04:53 |
They depend on the budget, the sort of
camera you're using and how much time
| | 04:55 |
you've got to set up each particular shot.
So it is of course a matter of choice in
| | 05:00 |
your particular production.
The nice thing though about making a mask
| | 05:05 |
like this is that we can then perform
color correction outside the mask.
| | 05:09 |
So we can further exaggerate the attention
on the main subject by bringing down the
| | 05:13 |
shadows outside the mask and keeping her
in a virtual pool of light in the middle
| | 05:17 |
of the shot.
And I'll just finish off by deselecting
| | 05:23 |
the tool and then scrubbing through the
shot here.
| | 05:29 |
So we definitely know as an audience where
to be looking at on this particular image.
| | 05:34 |
So as filmmakers, we do want to draw
attention to the areas that we want our
| | 05:37 |
viewers to be looking at, but we do have
to cross-reference this with budget and
| | 05:40 |
the ability to do it either in-camera or
in post production.
| | 05:45 |
But I still think it's nice to be able to
perform these small little tricks on the
| | 05:48 |
timeline relatively quickly.
| | 05:50 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
ConclusionNext steps| 00:00 |
Well thanks for watching, I hope you've
enjoyed this course as much as I've
| | 00:03 |
enjoyed putting it together.
And I just wanted to leave you with a few
| | 00:06 |
things that I think will help you, on your
future grades.
| | 00:11 |
And one of the most important thing to do
is to observe the world around you.
| | 00:16 |
Have a look at the colors outside at
different times of day.
| | 00:18 |
The more you start looking at the color of
highlights and shadows in the morning, and
| | 00:22 |
at lunch time, and in the evening.
The more you'll be able to replicate these
| | 00:26 |
colors in your grades.
Also, study the color techniques being
| | 00:31 |
used in TV shows, yes this is homework.
And try and recognize how certain types of
| | 00:35 |
genres tend to use certain types of
colors.
| | 00:38 |
Sometimes of course, colorists break with
the established colors and deliberately
| | 00:43 |
grade movies with different looks to
manipulate the audience's expectations.
| | 00:48 |
So it's interesting to look out for these
grades.
| | 00:51 |
Also, have a look at the colors being used
to depict different countries onscreen.
| | 00:55 |
Many times, these colors are exaggerated
for effect.
| | 00:58 |
But clients watch these shows too and
you'll often get asked to replicate the
| | 01:02 |
look of a specific TV show or film.
Grading is subjective for an artistic
| | 01:06 |
grade there isn't a right or wrong
especially if it helps tell the story, so
| | 01:10 |
don't be afraid to experiment with
different effects.
| | 01:15 |
There are also some interesting websites
that I think will be useful for you.
| | 01:18 |
redgiantsoftware.com or redgiant.com they
both take you to the same place is the
| | 01:23 |
home of Magic Bullet Looks and Colorista.
You can find more information about those
| | 01:28 |
two programs if you follow the product
link.
| | 01:31 |
And they also have a sister site called
Red Giant People.
| | 01:34 |
And this contains loads of presets many of
which are free that you can download and
| | 01:38 |
use to experiment with your grades.
Also lynda.com has some fantastic further
| | 01:43 |
technical courses on things like color
correction enhancement.
| | 01:47 |
And this is a great course with Jeff
Singstack.
| | 01:50 |
And he goes into detail about how to set
up your interface and how to do some more
| | 01:54 |
practical technical corrections within
Premiere Pro.
| | 01:59 |
And the implications of those corrections.
Additionally fixing video exposure
| | 02:03 |
problems in Premiere Pro with Richard
Harrington is an excellent course.
| | 02:09 |
As is migrating from Final Cut Pro by
Robbie Carman /g.
| | 02:13 |
So I encourage you to have a look at
those, and also, I really insist that you
| | 02:16 |
have a look at these two books.
One is The Art and Technique of Digital
| | 02:22 |
Color Correction by Steve Hulfish /g.
And the other is the Color Correction
| | 02:27 |
Handbook by Alexis Van Hurkman.
Both of these books have a large amount of
| | 02:32 |
technical and inspirational information
about color corrections and grades.
| | 02:38 |
Many of the techniques I've been showing
you are classic color correction
| | 02:41 |
techniques and these books go into lots of
details about these techniques.
| | 02:46 |
I'd also encourage you to check out the
really interesting section on skies that
| | 02:50 |
Alexis van Hurkman has in his color
correction handbook.
| | 02:54 |
Which really gets into the science about
how light looks the way it does when it
| | 02:57 |
filters through our atmosphere.
So thanks for watching.
| | 03:02 |
Goodluck with your grades and most
importantly have fun.
| | 03:04 |
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
