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FCPX and color correction tools
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[Andrew Kimery] ” For years I used Colorista for my in-NLE grading needs (both in PPro and FCP Legend), but I haven’t thought about it since the second round of Lumetri updates.”
I just don’t “get” the logic behind the Lumetri controls. I much prefer Colorista. Lumetri doesn’t have a keyer, the vignetter can’t be off-set from center – it acts like a stills color corrector adapted for video. I find Colorista IV to be worth paying for even though Lumetri is free.
Herb Sevush
Zebra Productions
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nothin\’ attached to nothin\’
\”Deciding the spine is the process of editing\” F. Bieberkopf -
[Herb Sevush] “Lumetri doesn’t have a keyer, the vignetter can’t be off-set from center – it acts like a stills color corrector adapted for video.”
I’m not sure what you mean by no keyer. There certainly is a secondary keyer, which works exactly like it did in SpeedGrade. The rest are valid points, though.
Lumetri seems like a bit of a hybrid between SpeedGrade and Lightroom. The biggest difference from SpeedGrade is that it had a 12-way color corrector and originally no curves, while Lumetri uses a 3-way and curves. The SG team was against curves, because they are more destructive to the image than lift/gamma/gain/hue-offset adjustments, but with Adobe, they ended up adopting curves after all. FWIW – Color Finale had problems with curves, too, during their original beta period, because there’s an inherent trade-off.
As far as Colorista IV, it’s great that they can work within Adobe’s panel structure. ☺
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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[Michael Gissing] “I recently interviewed BM’s Paul Saccone for a magazine article. You will be pleased to know making a single tool that does edit, grade, sound and finish delivery is exactly what they are focused on doing. Adding collaborative workflow and round tripping to Fusion is exactly that idea of a complete post ecosystem. And there are people and facilities like me that do actually need that total tool set.”
The big question mark I have with Resolve (and this will take years to answer) is can they make it good enough that it will get users of X, MC or PPro to switch (or put it into regular rotation for those of us that commonly use more than one NLE)? Resolve 14 in 2011/2012 would’ve been a very compelling option for FCP Legend users needing to find a new NLE, but in 2017 all that low hanging fruit is pretty much dried up. The NLE is really the hub of post and w/o it then the compelling aspects of Resolve’s grading ability, Fairlight, etc., don’t carry as much weight.
‘Is Resolve good enough to do the job’ is a different question than ‘is Resolve good enough to get users to switch’. I know it could be a dream come true in your situation Michael, but on a broader scale I hear a lot more people talking about it than actually using it.
[Herb Sevush] “I just don’t “get” the logic behind the Lumetri controls. I much prefer Colorista. Lumetri doesn’t have a keyer, the vignetter can’t be off-set from center – it acts like a stills color corrector adapted for video. I find Colorista IV to be worth paying for even though Lumetri is free.”
I haven’t used Colorista IV, but previous versions always felt a bit clunky to me in terms of their integration into the NLE (both FCP Legend and PPro). For a lot of the work I do with Lumetri it’s fast adjustments uniformly across the image so a keyer or flexible vignette isn’t required. Also, since Lumetri is built in I know it’s always going to be there. If I’m freelancing someplace else odds are they won’t have Colorista installed. I still use Colorista on occasion, but it’s no longer to the go-to tool for me if I’m staying inside the NLE to grade.
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[Andrew Kimery] “‘Is Resolve good enough to do the job’ is a different question than ‘is Resolve good enough to get users to switch’. I know it could be a dream come true in your situation Michael, but on a broader scale I hear a lot more people talking about it than actually using it.”
My impression of Resolve these days is that it’s a great finishing tool, but not necessarily a good creative cutting (offline editing) tool. Sort of the Symphony/Flame/DS/Smoke replacement. Especially with Fusion in the mix. It would certainly benefit if it had a tighter integration with X than it current has. If you could simply “flip” your X timeline straight into Resolve, without any translation loss, that would be a wonderful thing. Start in X, finish in Resolve (no roundtrips). The best of both worlds.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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[Andrew Kimery] “‘Is Resolve good enough to do the job’ is a different question than ‘is Resolve good enough to get users to switch’.
Amongst editors that feed through to me I still have a lot of FCP7 hold outs so there is still a fair bit of low hanging fruit. Different markets will vary. Many dabble with Pr, X and Avid but it almost seems like they have waited for something better. Is Resolve that? Don’t know yet but the interest will likely translate for some. They are also risk adverse which is fair enough when you are contemplating a big project. Resolve before 14 just didn’t have the basic performance and features, particularly audio. Until it comes out of beta these people are just looking and talking, but the need is definitely still there.
Do they all need the grade & sound facility? No but I do have a few local film makers who are in the one man band category and so I have agreed to run a master class in two weeks where they want to learn more about grading & sound post specifically. Ironically it is the need for small operators to be able to do classy finish as well as edit that has sparked a group that have been using 7, X and Pr but are prepared to switch. Amongst that category Pr is currently preferred but they are all looking hard at Resolve14 and want to do the class. The other category is editors who consider workflow to be important so knowing they can pass on a job without translation errors is important. The very reason I set up an FCP4.5 grade and finish suite all those years ago was the frustration of editors that translation errors between systems like FCP offline/ Avid online drove them nuts. So 16 years later I am hearing the same sentiments again.
Given Resolve has only had stable beta for a couple of months I am not surprised it is mostly talk at this stage.
[Oliver Peters]”If you could simply “flip” your X timeline straight into Resolve, without any translation loss, that would be a wonderful thing. Start in X, finish in Resolve (no roundtrips). The best of both worlds.”
The reality is that will never happen. Even though Apple has stopped changing fcpxml there always seems to be issues with scaling, compounding clips, funny reconnect issues and always the problems with generators like text and plugins. Also any basic grade stuff can’t translate. However the charm of Resolve to Resolve is that we are down to the basics – a missing plugin perhaps or not having the font installed. It worked so well for me all those years ago with FCP jobs and I am going to be happy when those days return.
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[Michael Gissing] “I can assure you I have never seen focus and intent like they have in Apple, Adobe or Avid, nor their pace of development.”
Interesting, because Adobe people have told me directly last fall (and again to a colleague attending SXSW) that focus and consistency was a known issue and they are working to be better at it. Tough to do with 15+ software packages in CC.
Avid is certainly focused on their core market but struggling to be in the conversation outside of that market.
BMD seems everywhere and Resolve (to me) shows it.
Just my humble opinion based on observations, experience and direct conversations.
Scott Witthaus
Owner, 1708 Inc./Editorial
Managing Partner, Low Country Creative LLC
Professor, VCU Brandcenter -
[Scott Witthaus] “Interesting, because Adobe people have told me directly last fall (and again to a colleague attending SXSW) that focus and consistency was a known issue and they are working to be better at it. Tough to do with 15+ software packages in CC.”
And how many FCPX users use those 15+ software titles? Adobe has always been focused on offering a full multimedia solution for the web, print, the internet as well as audio and video. I like that aspect of Adobe.
What is Adobe’s Core market? Is it Illustrator, Indesign After Effects or Audition? Who knows and who cares as long as the products work?
What is Apple’s Core market? Is it the iPad, iTunes, the iPhone or maybe the iMac? Let me know which one is the core market. I didn’t even list FCPX or Motion for a reason.
If Apple has several offerings it is totally cool but if Adobe or BMD has several offerings it is not cool?
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I wish they would at the bare minimum increase the travel you need to affect color. I use a Wacom and if you blink or twitch the color board lets you make everything ugly very quickly.
I was in Priemiere the other day and was so happy with the sliders and general flow of the lumetri panel. It was very natural to have a stylus and just flip back and forth on each slider for just exposure and balancing of already pretty good footage.
FCPX is a freaking nightmare of mousing and switching between tabs. Now that you can have the inspector run the whole length of the screen they need to fix everything about how color correction happens. And No the touch bar is not the answer. (Please work with Tangent and kick BM where it hurts.)
I am still waiting for Resolve to let me map things to the panel I can afford. (Sold my elements before the new panels came out as I now understand they will never let that happen) The new BM panels are dead on arrival to me as they only work the Resolve.
James
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[Oliver Peters] “- Add a UI preference setting to use color wheels in place of the color swatches.
“I have a small problem with this.
If you give people what they expect – that’s the choice they’ll make 9/10 times.
If they’d given me the option of color wheels from day one – I, like many, would have just set THAT as my default and NEVER really learned the color board.
Instead, I was forced to learn something new. Something that for the type of correction I need to do most often – turns out to be significantly faster. I don’t have to juggle three separate wheels for every correction.
Maybe sometimes, prioritizing innovation over conditioned comfort is a useful idea?
I get that some editors won’t see it as innovation, just “wrong.” but that’s MAYBE the trap. Is it actually “wrong” or just “unfamiliar?”
Food for thought, anyway.
Creator of XinTwo – https://www.xintwo.com
The shortest path to FCP X mastery. -
[James Sullivan] “FCPX is a freaking nightmare of mousing and switching between tabs. Now that you can have the inspector run the whole length of the screen they need to fix everything about how color correction happens. And No the touch bar is not the answer. (Please work with Tangent and kick BM where it hurts.)”
I agree. The FCPX GUI needs a serious overhaul.
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