Getting an excellent monitor and the correct software program
When you might be modifying a video it’s at all times a good suggestion to have an excellent monitor, it’s much more necessary once you’re doing colour correction/grading.
I’m not going to let you know which monitor to purchase as that’s dependent by yourself private finances, however I’ll give a fast tip to test whether or not you may have the proper of monitor.
When shopping for a monitor make sure that it does a minimum of 90% of the vary for sRGBor REC.709 colour area. Both are necessary as they are usually what most HD monitor or initiatives will show your video at.
UHD displays and projectors will very quickly begin utilizing REC.2020, so if wish to get forward of the sport, then I counsel in search of what that matches inside that class.
As far as software program goes, but once more you have to to resolve how a lot cash you wish to spend on software program. But when you’re enthusiastic about doing video recording significantly, then you definately in all probability have some first rate software program.
Premiere Pro and Apple’s Final Cut each have very first rate colour correction software program already with them. These are very intuitive and straightforward to make use of and do an honest job.
Luckily although if you’re strapped for money, BlackMagic do have DaVinci Resolve Lite, which is a free and extremely highly effective colour correction program. I might extremely suggest downloading this and use this when colour correcting. It is a considerably superior piece of software program, however it’s straightforward to get used to and there are sufficient tutorials on YouTube that may provide help to.
Do bear in mind to verify your PC can deal with the DaVinci software program although, not that you simply obtain it and discover out you may’t use it…
Using graphs will make your life a lot simpler!
There are 3 graphs that it is advisable make the most of: Waveform, Histogram, and Vector graphs. I like to recommend you absolutely study what each does, as I’ll solely be protecting what to search for to realize a fast colour stability from them.
The greatest benefit of understanding the graphs is that when you can’t afford or don’t have a monitor that hits the correct color spectrums then you may intuitively work from the knowledge the graphs are supplying you with and nonetheless successfully color right, color grading could also be tougher as that’s extra private desire that uncooked knowledge.
The 3 essential areas that you simply’ll be in any shot are the Shadows/Midtones/Highlights. Each program calls this listing of luminescence variations barely in another way, you might also see Blacks/Mids/Whites or Lift/Gamma/Gain. They are nearly all the identical, and a few applications could even provide the possibility to leap between numerous of every one.
The greatest strategy to discover out what each does to your shot and what sort correction is being given is by experimenting. I typically take a look at it by placing every setting to the intense after which again. Now that I’ve a benchmark I can modify to what I would like.
Using the graphs, there are just a few straightforward tricks to get you began in balancing your picture to a extra impartial state. In the Waveform and Histogram graphs, you’ll see that every one the knowledge lies between 0 and 100 IRE. Use the instruments for the Shadows/Blacks and the Highlights/Whites to usher in line between the 0 and 100 spots.
So, Shadows ought to solely actually hover simply above 0 IRE and Highlights must be dropped in order that they’re slightly below 100 IRE. This will make sure that nothing is dropping outdoors of the broadcast vary to your picture.
Midtones are somewhat trickier, we’ll discover these somewhat bit later, however a fundamental rule of thumb is that mid tones ought to reside between 60–70 IRE. Don’t fear although, altering the mid tones has little or no, to no impact on the place of the Shadows and Highlights.
