CS4 vs SVP – Grading From Shane Hurlbut

[Thomas Roberts]

This is the Article!

https://www.hurlbutvisuals.com/blog/2012/01/20/7-tips-for-hd-color-correction-and-dslr-color-correction/

Well worth to follow these guys. Shane rules with DSLR filmmaking. #ActofValor

[Al Bergstein]

While more pros like John could likely have more to say on this, I’ve been using both Vegas for a couple of years, and Pr for the last month or so and yes, this all sounds totally generic as to the outline. However you might want to invest in some third party add ons in Vegas, like Frederck B’s excellent white balance plug in. Also I find Vegas’ scopes too small. I like using adobe and even FCP scopes as they can fill the screen or close to it. (have I been missing some trick to make the scopes bigger in Vegas all this time?).

I really find his workflow interesting, as denoising is first in his workflow. I guess I have never thought of when I would do that. Just last night I was struggling de-noising some concert footage I had to shoot with a 2x extender on my 7D 250mm lens. A thought… just don’t add extenders! They really caused some noise problems. But I digress.

Also, this is timely because I was just watching a tutorial on Lynda.com by Jeff Sengstack of the color correction workflow. While also specific to Adobe, it’s all very generic. For the sake of others finding this thread, here’s a link to his tutorial (which I think you have to subscribe to get).

Course link: https://www.lynda.com/home/DisplayCourse.aspx?lpk2=51609.

Al

[Angelo Mike]

You can make the scopes larger in Vegas. Just drag the borders on it to resize it, or pop it out into a separate window by dragging the dots on the upper left side of the scopes monitor.

http://www.scenethroughglass.com

[Dustin Moore]

Fine point for people studying this workflow:
I don’t see an obvious reason to denoise in the beginning. If you
have any rounding errors (say 8bit math) in steps 2 through
6 they are just going to compound. Vegas is kinda cranky in
32 bit mode.

If you do the noise reduction around step 6.5 you can smooth
out some of the rounding error and get less banding in the
final image. Also, to the extent that step 7 adds noise, it
is silly to remove noise and then add fake noise back in.

In the process of removing noise you will probably remove
a bit of signal. If you can leave some of the noise in
because you want more grain in the end, you will probably come
out ahead because you get a tiny bit more signal.

Also, if you are publishing to the web, the H264 acts like
a serious denoising filter anyway so you might want to
leave some noise to avoid plastic looking video.

[Thomas Roberts]

The noise they are adding back in is to emulate “Film Grain”- ACT of Valor was shot on mostly 75% DSLR’s and is amazing to see on the BIG screen.

[Al Bergstein]

Thanks for the feedback, but when I add the color corrector via the Video Fx menu, I open the second tab and see the three scopes. I cannot make them bigger, I can only open the tab and expand the “whole tab window”. The scopes remain the same no matter what I do. And oh, by the way, Vegas crashes on me while trying to reopen them a second time… (G)

But good feedback on the noise workflow…thanks

Al