4 replies to this topic

[craigbuckley]

So I have been learning so much from this forum in the past few months and also going out shooting with my camera. Throughout my path I have run into trouble, which I then researched, asked the forum, and figured out my problem.

 

 

My current problem and where I am at "skill" wise is regarding white balance and then post production color correcting. I feel comfortable with focusing and getting a good cinematic shot, but when it comes to color I am screwed. I play around with the ISO and the aperture on my manual lenses to get the right light, but still sometimes I will look at my footage and say damn that looks amateurish. I usually leave it on auto white balance so I was thinking maybe this was my problem? Its the only auto function I use. (I dont know how to use the histogram).  I also am not great with color correcting. I have final cut pro x and its easy to use but I don't know what I am doing with it, I don't know what color to make it. Do you color correct everything?

 

So maybe you see where I am at and can suggest a good read or video for me to  learn about this stuff, or maybe some of you will even have some advice yourself: mainly on white balancing and color correcting.

[Bioskop.Inc]

Found this link the other day & it totally revolutionised the way i went about colour grading in FCPX!

http://www.colorgrad...ble-of-contents

 

This was also useful (explained a bit about histograms/waveforms as well):

http://www.hurlbutvi...lor-correction/

 

And the LAPUG is an amazing resource:

http://www.lafcpug.org/

 

And this is all things FCPX:

http://www.fcp.co/?view=featured

 

Also found these free plug-ins for FCPX by Alex4D (i'd used his old ones for FCP6/7):

http://alex4d.wordpress.com/fcpx/

 

The first link is great to route around in, lots of stuff there.

As far as white balance is concerned, go Manual & try using a grey card or just go with what looks natural/neutral to you.

[jgharding]

A few from my time at Sound On Sound:

 

Beginners guide to making video part one:

http://www.soundonso...akingmovies.htm

 

Beginners guide to making video part one:

http://www.soundonso...moviespart2.htm

 

Colour grading:

http://www.soundonso...by-numbers .htm

 

Nearly three years old now, but still have good stuff in them.

[richg101]

this is a really nice explanation of colour correcting. vimeo.com/14396098

because he does it by the numbers it allows a easier way to get your head around the logic of colour correction. once you can get something looking 'right', you can then understand what changes are needed to get the look you really want. This is aimed at users of adobe, but fundamentals are the same.

IMO AWB is often nice to use. More often than not it makes a better choice than I do when it comes to getting white balance right in multiple light sources.

[craigbuckley]

thanks guys I will check all those links out...

 

I have read that some DSLRs have a "set white balance" function and you can point and shoot at something white and then it uses that as your white balance... Can you do this with the gh2?