[Joseph Owens]

For those others who may be interested, the REAL requirements for Resolve on a Mac:

https://www.blackmagic-design.com/downloads/davinci/pdf/DaVinciResolveMacConfigGuide.pdf

I dunno, they built it, so maybe they know something…

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

I’ve been kicking the heck out of mine — it goes out on remotes and… well, maybe just lucky so far, I guess.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

[Vladimir Kucherov] “Basically I’d assume that Resolve converts sRGB/Rec709 to XYZ assuming a D65 whitepoint”

Maybe that’s the problem. Is DCI D65? I’d assume its quite a bit lower, more like cinema projector carbon-arc.

Actually closer to Xenon, somewhere in the vicinity of 5500K.

Maybe someone on the avs forum might be able to help in more detail.
https://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1126589 starts dealing with some of these issues.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

[Robert Houllahan] “I would not want to ever work without a control surface, a mouse and a tablet just is not going to cut it IMO. “

For people who absolutely do not have the resources, anything that works, sort of, I guess, becomes the “REAL” requirements — and all that go-faster, more efficiently stuff is … what? just window dressing?

Amazing the number of operators who have no inkling that speed IS the issue. “I don’t have anyone hanging over my shoulder” is not an excuse for not being able to proceed directly to where you need to be.
The human visual system is not an absolute reference. Everyone, anyone, is subject to about 20-30 second adaptation — after that, there is no objectivity because the eye-brain has started to self-correct to the new lighting condition. That is just a hard-and-fast fact. I’m very aware that clients invariably remark that they “just got used to” the way their dailies looked, and they were fine with them. Just like being “fine” with a mouse — very, very few people ever want to see one again after they have had the opportunity to work with a control surface, just like no one ever, ever wants to go back to their “dailies” look.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

Ok. … like me. I admit it.

But seriously, you’d be amazed at how little is shared among colorists. In nearly 20 years of reading and contributing to various forums and support sites, groups, schools, etc., since before there was an internet and email at the time was for geeks, far and away the most discussed topics (among professional colorists) are lamenting the drop in quality of things in general, and day-to-day troubleshooting — either software problems or dealing with screwed up projects/codecs… etc. Just like here on the COW. The other reality is that there are probably more people who embroider with their feet, and they probably do have a magazine, available on newstands everywhere.

Technique is never discussed. Its like a Fight Club rule. If I were to try to interpret the atmosphere, ever since the non-category of ‘colorist’ came into existence, it was peopled by those who were interested in an artistic/artisanal pursuit of craft, pursued on a highly individualistic basis. Lord knows, there are no other rewards. Although there are those who frame it in terms of getting their “award” every two weeks. From which your local government takes a delightful share. But it was a fairly closed space, in which “secret sauces” often made a difference in career longevity and appeal. Now that the “general public” has been invited to the party with the almost-free distribution of applications that either mimic or provide a ported version of the instruments used by the formerly secret society, a lot of legitimately naive suppositions enter the mix.

Grading is not editing. Its not compositing, either. Its more like post-cinematography, although DPs would cringe to hear that — don’t you realize all that brilliance just rolls out the back of the camera all by itself? Ansel Adams is famously quoted that the ‘negative is like a composer’s score — the print is the performance’. A good colorist should be the golden voice or gifted performer that lifts a written script off the page and breathes life into it, creates that seamless world in which the story truly lives. A lot of what goes into that, the element that seals the deal for a viewer’s suspension of disbelief, isn’t so much a matter of raw technique, anyway. Yes, elements of it… but how to fuse all those things together — maybe it can be taught — mostly its a question of a massive amount of hands-on experience of what works, and what doesn’t — and usually has to be re-invented for the next scene, act, story, anyway. How to impart that kind of relentless innovation?

It would be like all those pre-cooked “looks”. You just can’t trowel them on and expect a movie to pop out the other end, in the first case, and for colorists who probably have an entire library of secret herbs and spices, most of those really look like good old “salt ‘n peppa”. When, maybe, the client is really looking for Joe’s Secret Nawlins Cajun, which is mostly paprika, but I digress. What the rest of it is, I’m not sayin’.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

I agree, you’re going to eat up 240GB in a big hurry — even faster if its a blazing fast SSD.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

[Illya Laney] “The TIG?”

is for film/telecine snobs.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

yeah, “do no harm”.

By now, I’ve been involved in about 40-50 feature length projects, which really do have different expectations, but not mechanics, as compared with series, commercial, doc, etc. In the days when we were grading intermediate prints straight from telecine to video (which were supposed to be already timed for composite print) we got about 20 hours (total billable time) allocated to load, mark, grade and export the thing — usually 5 or 6 lab rolls. You learn to economize your effort.

With digital originals in the past 5 years, I’m finding that that’s about enough to get 90% through a good first pass (first ‘answer’ if you like), and then spend about half that amount again fine-tuning the absolute color continuity.

You can blow a major amount of time just playing it over and over if you’re working with someone else who needs to keep seeing it playing. We used to calculate the time to do things by the number of people in the room — but not just 2x or 3x, but raised to the power of that #, like squared, cubed, etc.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

No, he’s talking about the matrix transforms that are happening in the background — not the apparent previews (how the image manipulation is presented to the colorist) that are log/lin conversions. Most operators are not aware of how complex the math actually is.

As regretful as the log/film working environment would be to lose, the barbarians have not only arrived at the gates, they are in the city. When I see posts by photographer/filmmakers posting that they would like to hear other experiences by people who have been able to make their 13″ Macbooks run COLOR so that they could work in “fullhd hdslr”, it makes me groan with despair.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?

[Joseph Owens]

[Margus Voll] “laser pointer for client to show specific areas :)”

I can thoroughly endorse this idea. Most projectors (Christies in particular) have a laser built into the remote. I prefer sitting beside the client and there is only one (1) grade monitor, and the rest is scopes that they are absolutely not interested in.
But 90+% of the time, I’m working alone. Two approaches… after a discussion of a new project, I do a pass, we view the movie, make notes, and if not numerous, go back in and tweak on the spot, or alternatively grade key scenes together in a “spotting” session, then go do the whole movie, put it back together and view/review. Adjust seasoning to taste.

jPo

You mean “Old Ben”? Ben Kenobi?