———— 23 October 2008 ————

Membership has its benefits, so here’s a few screen grabs of Travel Channel’s upcoming America’s Scariest Halloween Attractions 3.  Premiere will be this Sunday, October 26th, at 11pm following Ghost Adventures.

Had a lot of fun editing and grading this show.  A whole lot of around the clock work.  We averaged 125 shots or more per 4 minutes, which trumps the hell out of the 600 shots per 44min show average I read somewhere.  Here’s the final time line before going to tape.  Mind you, this is after conforming for the grade in Color, QC’ing flattened titles and what not, and syncing audio stems:

00:44:45;00 to the frame per Travel Channel clock.  Ow, my brain…

And just because I love you guys, here’s a sample screen shot from the color grade.  First pic is 30″ left hand Apple Cinema Display, second pic is right hand 23″ Apple Cinema Display:

Oh yeah, and here’s the two main errors I experienced during post:

Not too bad, but I recommend the hell out of getting 8GB of RAM for posting any 1×60 HD program.  Got this show printed to tape by the skin of our teeth after crashing 4 minutes in on the first try.  Seriously, yes, 4GB of 667Mhz RAM is worth the extra 1200 bucks.

————————————————————————————

Epic shout outs:

Susan Norton – Executive Producer

Thomas Quinn – Supervising Producer

Arthur Hsu – Associate Producer

James Morley – Editor & Segment Producer

Ashley Kalena – Production Assistant

Joel Reyes – Engineering Support

Archie Bustamante – IT support

Mom & Dad – Love & Support

————————————————————————————

So, tomorrow is the move to the new apartment 4 miles away.  Saturday the new leather sofa arrives.  Sunday, resorting it up at the Travel Channel offsite.  I’ll have a beer and a shot in my hand 11pm Sunday night for the premiere, hope you enjoy it!

proactively • HD 1×60 in the can • peter

———— 18 October 2008 ————

Here’s the all-in-one video tutorial showing you how to cut, color, and compress 1080p video captured with Canon’s upcoming 5D Mark II Digital SLR with three Final Cut Studio 2 applications: Final Cut Pro, Color, and Compressor. I recommend clicking thru for the hd version to better see the application interfaces.

In this episode I walk through the steps to edit your footage in Final Cut Pro, perform a broadcast safe grade in Color, and then make a web compression for upload to YouTube and Vimeo using Compressor.

I work directly with the source H.264 video Vincent Laforet made available for download (no H.264 -> Apple ProRes 422 transcode this time around). I also discuss some system specs and rant about High Dynamic Range video. A quick tag surf lead me to this post that has an example of HDR video captured by something called the HDRC® MDC04 CL camera system.

What’s High Dynamic Range (HDR), you ask? Check out yet another Chad Richard HDR timelapse (click thru for the full HD effect):

Mr. Richard has done a lot of heavy lifting to convert a series of HDR stills into 1080p video (and then compress for Vimeo, of course). Check out his tutorial for this process here.

We’re at the forefront of a paradigm shift where digital photography and high definition video are converging. Check out Romy Ocon’s 5dmkii bird photography, err, video:

Right now is an exciting, exciting time.

proactively • sitting in a front row seat • peter

———— 15 October 2008 ————

Here’s part 2 in an initial 3 part series of Final Cut Prose video tutorials working with footage from the new Canon EOS 5D Mark II digital SLR. I recommend clicking thru for the HD version to better see Color’s GUI.

One considerable addendum to the tutorial. I loaded the h264 source files into Color and observed far different measurements in Color’s waveform monitor. Check this out:

Broadcast safe on:

Broadcast safe off:

So it would appear there were some luma and chroma changes taking place during the conversion from h264 to ProRes. Almost as if Compressor applied a broadcast safe filter during conversion. The h264 source video that Vincent Laforet provided for download does indeed appear to be sans color correction.

Bleh, the h264 to Apple ProRes 422 workflow will need improvement. Well, it’s a working model. You are witness to my real world self-analysis, right here before your eyes, humble reader.

If there’s an FCP, Color, and / or Motion topic you would like me to cover, then post a comment and let me know. Check back soon for FCProse Episode 3 – Compressing 5dmarkii Footage for Web.

In the meantime, here’s some HDR timelapse footage (click here for a how-to) shot on a digital SLR in San Francisco by Chad Richard.

Know any $2600 video cameras that can produce these results?

proactively • sculpting my brain to comprehend this new world of possibilities • peter

———— 18 September 2008 ————

Just posted by Terrence Curren of Alphadogs fame to the FCP-L:

>From the Color list:

<< Hi there,

I was at the FCPUG Supermeet in Amsterdam and the first presentation was a
working
new Version of Color featuring R3D support. You can edit your footage in FCS
with the proxy
files created by the camera – send to Color and Color will access the R3D
files. First light will
be done in a new advanced tab in the primary in room!
I know that there are already screenshots about the new features floating
around.
But this was a working version!
No infos about release date.

Cheers,

Holger
>>

Simultaneously, Mike Curtis is reporting similar news over at pro video coalition:

Apple Color support – same way last year there was a demo of Redcode import into FCP, they are demonstrating native R3D support in Color. You can work with up to 2K resolution from 4K footage (only extracting the 2K layer from the wavelet). You can then work with that footage at 2K, 1080, 720, 480, whatever res you want that is below the 2K source extraction. But YES, you can bring your 4K Redcode RAW files into the future version of Apple’s Color and work with the full frame, but only at up to 2K deliverable. You can also access the source RAW metadata, just like on camera and in Red Alert/Redcine, to adjust Saturation, Exposure, Tint, Black Level, Exposure, RGB gains, etc. (No Brightness (gamma really) or Contrast (S-curve really), but you can do those with Color’s tools). Merely a technology demo, no ETA on ship date from Apple – so I’d GUESS in next major release, which could be what – NAB next year? Dunno, my guess, not based on hard data.

Red One Redcode RGB mode is still under development – read that two ways if you will – pessimistic – “darn, still not done/shipping!” or optimist – “GOOD – they are still working on it, it IS coming.”

If you’ve got links to screenshots please post, my hasty google searches have proved fruitless thus far…

proactively • ready to grade some R3D right now • peter

———— 8 September 2008 ————

This just in from the FCP-L!  Steve Hullfish writes:

I just started doing a weekly series of color correction tutorials on
www.provideocoalition.com. They’re free. Each is between 3 and 12
minutes. Some will be quite basic and fundamental and others will be
very in-depth and “pro level.” Most of the tutorials utilize Apple
Color, but others use Final Cut Pro, Avid or Color Finesse. You can
subscribe to the tutorials via RSS if you want. The tutorials are
part of the newly revised edition of “Color Correction for Digital
Video” which Jaime Fowler and I wrote in 2002 (the first color
correction book on the market). The book is completely revised and
the new edition will be out in December.

Screen from Steve's first video: Color Primary Video Tutorial

The direct link to Steve’s blog at Pro Video Coalition is here.  And if you haven’t read Steve’s amazing book,

click thru here for the Amazon link.  Looking forward to your Color tutorials, Mr. Hullfish!

proactively • helping to shed light on the dark art • peter

———— 1 September 2008 ————

So you’re moving up in the world and spending more time grading with Apple Color.  And you’ve finally warped you’re brain around nodes and noodles and Shake’s last GUI vestiges present in the current line of pro apps.  Man, wouldn’t it be nice to dial in some soft diffusion inside that user shape vignette!  Well friends and colleagues, look no further than Graeme Nattress Plugins for Color.

A quick survey of Graeme’s awesome website provides not just a listing of the plugin tools you will be purchasing but also a great paint by numbers approach to explaining the color fx node trees and how to make them work just right.

From Graeme’s site:

G Highlight Glow.cfx
G Highlight Glow.cfx shows how you can used the G Blend node. If a multi-input node, like G Blend has one of it’s inputs disconnected, it defaults to pulling in the normal un-affected video. Therefore, the G Blend, is blending between the blurred video and the normal video. In this case, we chose the screen blending mode, but try others for interesting effects. The Scale RGB node is used to increase the contrast of the blurred video.

It looks as if the G Blend node is worth it’s weight in gold by its lonesome.  And of course, it’s easy to place these pre-made node trees into your own personal pre-made color fx presets.  Also check out the awesome corrective power of G Smart Denoise featured as a rollover on the homepage.

For the price of dinner for two and a good bottle of wine you can up the ante in your color grading sessions to really impress the clients.  And yourself.

proactively • peter

———— 24 August 2008 ————

Starting to research control surfaces to use with Color in the finishing suite. So far, the three setups in consideration are, in no particular order:
Option 1: JL Cooper Eclipse CX

Option 2: JL Cooper MCS-Spectrum

The MCS-Spectrum additionally requires the JL Cooper MCS-3000 Media Command Station W/ No Faders

Option 3: Tangent Devices CP200-K, available in black or silver

And visiting Tangent’s site I’m reminded of the Wave which I blogged about some months ago when it debuted at NAB

Unfortunately at this stage in the game, the Wave DOES NOT WORK with Color. We’re waiting for a Color point release to enable interoperability with USB devices.

All of this stuff is available at TekServe. Thanks to Jeff for the awesome customer service!

So right now I’m leaning towards the simplicity and elegance of the Tangent Devices CP200-K. But I’m going to do some calling around, specifically to my Color mentor Alexis Van Hurkman, and see what folks are saying on the street.

If you’re looking for some good colorist literature, be sure to check out Alexis’ books on Amazon.

proactively • stepping up to the next level • peter

———— 5 August 2008 ————

Came across this link some time ago but never posted it. Power to the people!

coloruser.net

See anything you like?

Yeah, I haven’t uploaded any of mine yet because, well, their mine. But if your feeling a bit socialist, or even communal, give this site a shot. I know I’ll be taking a second look.

proactively • thinking about sharing some of my grades • peter

———— 26 April 2008 ————

Thanks to Brian Conner from on the FCP-L for pointing this out. Read the knowledge base article here or simply click the picture for a full rez screen grab

proactively • updating my Color FX presets • peter

———— 15 April 2008 ————

Lots of awesome and cool things going on at NAB this year. As mentioned previously I’m contributing to the official NAB Show Blog. Here’s a list of my Color-relevant NAB Show Blog posts:

Tangent Devices: The Wave

Matrox MXO 2 Drops

Matrox Booth SL320

proactively • blogging • peter

———— 14 April 2008 ————

Just learned about a new website, coloruser.net, where users are posting their Color grades. Also, check out del.icio.us for a cool place to post links to websites you like. Thanks to Clay Asbury for the heads up.

proactively • peter

———— 11 April 2008 ————

Stu Maschwitz over at ProLost just posted that his company, The Orphanage, has recently purchased a Nucoda Film Master and used it in the production pipeline for finishing Frank Miller’s new film The Spirit.

It’s always fun to see what tools people with money get to play with, so here’s a thumb of the Film Master interface (click to see full rez):

Looks a bit different from Color’s interface, eh? I can see it has the ability to create user shapes, for starters. And it appears to have a left-to-right node tree under the timeline.

More interesting than the screen shot (ok maybe not) is a very well crafted article by Kevin Shaw titled

Colour Correction, Enhancement & Creativity: Advancing the Craft

His thesis states:

[Colorists] want a high quality, random access source on an open architecture system in a standard format. We want fast, easy access and real time playback and we want the Holy Grail – one master that can produce multiple formats and versions.

It’s interesting to consider the work flow Color presents and take note where it may fall short in the eyes of seasoned and talented colorists out there like Mr. Shaw. I feel lucky enough to have Final Touch / Color available to begin my path down the colorist road.

Even better, Mr. Shaw offers up some definitions in the sidebars:

By color correction I mean adjusting the color balance and contrast of an image to compensate for unwanted flaws or deficiencies in a capture or conversion process, so that the image more closely matches the original. Examples of flaws are overexposure, underexposure, or colorcasts, while deficiencies include limited dynamic range or change of color space. Both labs and telecine suites color correct images.

Color enhancement is a change to the image that does not necessarily reflect reality, but which is intended to add emphasis or meaning to the image. Enhancements may or may not be planned at the shooting stage. Enhancements are usually applied to elements within an image and therefore the implication is that it involves a colorist with a more sophisticated post-production color system.

Color creativity does not have an established industry definition, but I use it here to mean the use of color and contrast to define a look or style that is not necessarily related to the original image, but more to an abstract theme or message. The term therefore is wider in concept than color enhancement, and would include art direction and photography as well as direct color manipulation. In theory it should be a preconceived collaborative effort, but that is not always the case.

It’s really cool to see the big boys showing off their toys and shedding light on what they can do. All I know as far as price point goes is that the Film Master requires Bluefish 444 hardware and Bluefish is notably the most expensive, and highest quality, third party hardware on the market (when compared to a Blackmagic Intensity Pro or the like). So it ain’t cheap.

But then if you’re in the feature biz you aren’t thinking in terms of thousands of dollars, you’ve moved on to money aside, what tool will do the best job thought processes. One can only dream.

proactively • dreaming • peter

———— 19 March 2008 ————

Drove to the UPS deliver center in Laurel to pick up my Matrox MXO.

This has been a purchase 4 months or so in the making. My setup of a MacBook Pro 17″ Santa Rosa, Dell 2407WFP LCD monitor, Matrox MXO, and Color makes for one of the most portable and versatile broadcast color grading suites smart money can buy IMHO.

Bought the Leopard family pack so I can install 10.5.2 on the laptop and dual 2.7 G5 tower to host the Matrox MXO 2.1.1 driver.
Trader Joe’s chicken burrito’s just came out of the oven, so fo those of you interested in reading more about what the Matrox MXO can do, check out the Creative Cow forum. I’ll work on the setup tonite and tomorrow and hopefully will have some pics and first impressions by the weekend.

proactively • peter

———— 18 March 2008 ————

Steve Hullfish recently posted a link to his video tutorial for secondary corrections in Color on the FCP-L:

I wanted to give some “props” to the guy that taught me almost
everything I know about color correction.

Bob Sliga, my mentor, created a set of short tutorials on FinalTouch
that are still applicable to Color.

They’re available for free in the iTunes Store. Just do a search for
FinalTouch under Podcasts.

Also, though many people were able to view my podcast with no
trouble, there were many more who couldn’t see it, so I put it in two other places. One was on my .Mac site as a podcast, and the other – through the suggestion of Martin Baker – was on a video site I’d never heard of called Vimeo.

so:

If I am veering to the “commercial,” I apologize and will desist.

Veer away, Mr. Hullfish. And please, veer often!

I just received his new book, The Art and Technique of Digital Color Correction, and I’m psyched to have a tome that delves into the theory and technique of the colorist’s dark art with Color as the bell weather application. As an Apple Color Certified Trainer and working Editor / Colorist I’m sure this book will prove to be an invaluable resource.

Look forward to reviewing quotes from this book in upcoming posts. And check back for Color video tutorials by yours truly.

proactively • peter