Eye Training

RAW - MY VERSION - GRADED

Example 1:

     At first, it seems hard to recreate these styles or looks because first of all, I don't know what specific software the colorist used to achieved these styles. But I'm glad to at least get almost the similar results. It's not 100 percent the same though. For this example, I used a lot of nodes because I don't want my grades or work flow to mixed on a single node.

Example 2:

     For this example, I balanced the over all image first then added some warm tones. I also darkened the image a bit and added some blues/green to both the shadows and the lift. I isolated her skin tones so I could give it a little more brightness. I also added some blur effect on her skin and some orange/red to make her look more alive.

Example 3:

     This example is a bit tricky. After balancing the image, I lowered down the curves to make the feeling similar to my reference. Then I added some blues tones, green tint in lift and a blue tint in highlights. I also added some orange in its midtones.

So these are the new sets of eye training that I've done. I can say that I'm progressing with these and I'm learning a lot as a colorist, I actually starting to get faster in grading so that's a good sign. Thanks

Scenes belongs to:

Valerio Liberatore

Grading

     For this entry, I'll be showing you a few of the grades I have created.

Before - After

 

     As you can see, it's the same scene from my previous post.  But this time, I applied different grading on this one. My goal is to make it look interesting and a bit edgy since it was shot in Cambodia. I wanted it to have that ruins kind of look/feel.

     The very first thing I did to achieve this kind of look is I balance the image first. Then I added some warm tones and some green tint. I added some blue to the temperature so it wouldn't look too greenish and then I increased the lift a bit and added a little magenta to it. The next thing I did is I adjusted the luminance of the image using curves then I added a vignette and a Power window to brighten the child.

Before - After

 

     I wanted this scene to look very interesting with a bit of strong colors but not too saturated. For the primary color correction I did is first, I balanced the image to get that right amount of blacks and whites. Then  I added some blue tones to give more colors to the sky. I added some orange and teal colors as well to balance it without over-grading it. 

     For the secondary color correction, I added more blues and orange and teal to make the sky and ocean look cerulean. I added orange to gamma to balance the amounts of blue. I then added a vignette and decreased the amount of shadows and increased the amount of highlights. I added more orange to gamma and increased the amount of the overall contrast. Lastly, I brighten the whole image using the curves.

Color Grading

Original image

(credits to the owner)

The original image looks neutral, though the blacks are not that black.

Grade 1 : Davinci Resolve 12.5

     

     For this, I tried to do the sin city look again. I did some few steps in here to achieve this look. First, I desaturated the picture then I adjusted the amount of contrast and midtone details. The next thing I did is I added a parallel node. It's for the blur and sharp effect of the entire image. Then I increased the amount of highlights and the dark parts using the curves.

Grade 2

3D Lut Creator to Davinci Resolve

 

     I tried to use the same photo for the LUT creator. I just did the basic way of grading, like adjusting the contrast and saturation. Then I used some random curves until I found the desired look that I want. The next thing I did is I took a screenshot of the image and then import it to davinci. I make other additional adjustments there. I increased the contrast a bit and fixed the luminance using curves. I also added a little orange to the skin using gain and some blue/green and warms tones to the shadows and lift.

Color Grading Breakdown

Original Image

A.) This is the original image as seen above this post

B.) I increased the amount of luminance in here using the curves.

C.) I increased the color boost and added a little bit of saturation

D.) I lowered down the gain 

E.) In here I added some bluish temperature to balance the image.

F.) I also added some warm temperature and a little green tint on this one.

G.) Lastly, I fixed the the entire image using curves. I also increased the amount of highlights on the last part.

AFTER IMAGE

I wanted it to look somewhat dark and I also wanted the midtone details to pop out a bit so it wouldn't look boring.

3D Lut creator pt3

     Grading with 3D Lut Creator

     For the past few weeks I've been using this software so I could be familiarize on how things works. The image below is a sample of my work.

     I did some minor grading here. I emphasize the sky, trees and the sand by increasing the amount of saturation and also the contrast. What I did first is I arranged the image using the tools below. Then, I started tweaking the A/B until I get the desired look that I wanted to see. I also did some adjustments with RGB curves (not in the image).

BEFORE - AFTER 

     Here is how it looks like before grading and after the grade. The grade that I have done makes the scene more lively and pleasing than before.

      Color Matching

     I've talked about color matching before. Here in this example above, I used both the graded and the ungraded version of this image (not my photo). The graded versions is the one on the left under reference while the ungraded is the one on the right. I used the same image to color match so I could see if there are differences or not. When I pressed command + m (short cut key for matching) a new window appeared, and I didn't get the result quickly.

The new window looks like this.

     You may not get the results quickly but you have to tweaked the tools until you get the similar results. I tried every method until I got the look closest to my reference then after that, I started fixing the image using the analysis and the matching. As you can see on the image above, both pictures looks the same.

Eye Training

Hey guys, so here are the new set of eye training that I have done for today.

RAW - MY VERSION - GRADED VERSION

     At first, I couldn't figure out how to recreate the look. I isolated the skin first and added some orange to it then I increased the temperature to blue. After that, I increased the contrast to achieve the dark look. I also added a vignette and a power window to the guy. Lastly, I added some blue but I think my final look is more greener that the graded version I'm copying. It's a bit difficult because I'm trying to add colors without affecting the white bars that much.

     After balancing the image, I increased the amount of contrast and lower the gain and lift. Then I decreased the saturation a bit and added some blue and green tones to enhance the color of the suit. I play around with the RGB curve to add a little green to it then I increased again the amount of the contrast. I then put a vignette to darken the elements around. I also increased the amount of saturation then select some colors and lessen it so it wouldn't look so strong. Finally, I added some warm tones to it. 

     For this one, I feel like it's almost the same. I'm trying to figure out this one as well, on how did the colorist managed to achieved this look. As you can see, it's not just dragging the gain to blue. First, I balanced the image. Then I dragged the gamma to blue and the gain to orange to make it look like orange and teal. After that, I added a little blue temp and green tint. I dragged down the brighter parts using the curves then I add another blue tones by dragging the gain to blue and adding a little green to the gamma. To make it look more darker, I decreased the saturation and increased the amount of contrast, I also added a little orange to the highlights so he wouldn't look pale and blue to the lift to make the darker areas more sharper. And lastly, I selected the brighter parts and increased it a bit to give a little shine to the face.

LUT creator vs. Davinci Resolve

     For this entry, I tried to do the same looks using the same image but with different programs.

This is my reference image from google (Sin City)

3D LUT Creator

     As you can see, the image above is a little flatter. The red color has lesser contrast. This one looks like a plain black and white photo with a desaturated red color in the middle. First of all, I'm still not that familiar with the tools of the lut creator. I'm still trying to figure out how things work in this program. I managed to isolate the shirt but I can't seem to increase it's saturation without affecting the whole image. I also can't find a way to enhance the details more.

Davinci Resolve

     If you compare this image to my reference photo, it's more similar than the one created using the LUT creator. I'm more comfortable using davinci because I'm already familiar with the software and how things work. The red is more darker, the blacks and whites are more stronger and the details are more sharper. I like how every details in this photo pops out.

     It's understandable that I wasn't able to do the same with the lut creator. I really need to learn more and maybe in a not so distant future I will be able to do more than just this lol. This post is not about which software is the best for grading because as you can see, I'm not familiar (yet) with the lut creator. It's about comparing my grades using two different softwares based on the things that I've learned so far. I think I can do more if I get used to using the creator.