PDF-chapter on Color Grading in Premiere Pro

 

Finally, the first complete chapter from The Cool Stuff in Premiere Pro is ready for download! Using the techniques explained on these 69 pages on Color Grading in Premiere Pro will bring your film to a new level of awesome!

Download the PDF file below and learn everything about Primary and Secondary Color Correction, Shot Matching, Creating Looks, Using the scopes, Color Correction Workflow, Memory Colors, Masks, Vignettes, Qualifiers, using Presets, dealing with LOG material, grading ARRIRAW, CinemaDNG and REDRAW, Sky fixes, and much, much more!

Update July 2017: This chapter is no longer available

The updated version of The Cool Stuff in Premiere Pro will be available this September, and the single chapters from the 2015 version are no longer available. See the web page for the updated book here.

Primary and secondary color correction explained

Learn how to properly adjust the color balance, contrast and levels and how to use masks and qualifiers to separately tweak specific areas or colors in the image. You’ll learn how to use the scopes to take the guesswork out of your color grading and how to grade different types of material, including DSLR recordings, footage shot on RED, Arri and the BlackMagic Digital Cinema Camera.

Create your own Looks and presets

Looks creation in Premiere is dealt with in great detail, with four methods for achieving the oh-so-popular Bleach Bypass and Teal & Orange looks. Cross process looks, Black & White, Blooming Whites, Sepia and Color Negative are also explained – and you’ll even learn how to make more commonly used presets like Cooling and Warming Filters and Highlight Roll-Off.

 

Download the chapter now! Only NOK 50.00 (about US $9.00)

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This chapter is now obsolete. The chapter has been updated to cover more features added to Premiere Pro since this was released, and is now part of the book. Read more about The Cool Stuff in Premiere Pro here.

Sorry, this chapter is no longer available

The updated version of The Cool Stuff in Premiere Pro will be available this September, and the single chapters from the 2015 version are no longer available. See the web page for the updated book here.

This chapter was downloaded 559 times before it was EOL.

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Table of content

 

If your film isn’t graded, it isn’t finished

It’s not black magic

You can use the monitor you have

Color correction, grading or look design?

Why color grade in Premiere?

Dedicated grading software forces a convoluted workflow

Is this chapter for you?

How much can you push it?

8-bit or 10-bit?

Karl’s “clicks on a knob” analogy

LIN, LOG and RAW formats explained

Why we get clipped highlights and crushed and noisy blacks

How cameras interpret image data

Linear image capture

LOG image capture to the rescue

LOG is basically a gamma curve

What about LUTs?

Tweaking the camera settings

Standard gamma settings

Cine-like gamma settings

LOG space if possible

Recording format

Expose to the right

Working with LOG material

Working with ARRIRAW material

REDCODE RAW Workflow

32 bit magic

It’s a matter of accuracy

Please don’t transcode (Box-out?)

See the 32-bit magic in action

Clipped and crushed levels

YUV?

GPU accelerated color precision explained

Multi-generation production workflows

Using the scopes

The Reference Monitor

Scopes in real-time

Scopes don’t lie, do they?

YC Waveform Scope for Noobs

Vector Scope for Noobs

RGB Parade Scope for Noobs

Cropping for accurate measurement

Title for accurate measurement

Using the Histogram

Miss the Y′CBCR Parade scope in this walkthrough?

Accurate vs. pleasing

Color correction workflow overview

1: Decide what’s important in the frame

2: Make primary corrections

3: Make secondary corrections (optional)

4: Create a look (optional)

This order is not accidental!

Adjustment Layers as Grading Tracks

Know when to stop

Workflow for primary color correction

Setting Black and White Levels

Setting midtone contrast

Lift, gamma, gain

Avoid Brightness & Contrast (Boxout)

Curves – my grading tool of choice

Why I like Curves so much

The S-curve

Don’t take my word for it

The versatile Three-way Color Corrector

How much is enough?

Keyframed color correction (boxout)

Memory colors

Skin tone

Sky

Sunsets

Foliage and grass

Perceived color and contrast

Secondary Color Correction

Qualifiers

CTRL samples 5×5 (boxout)

Blur your matte

Masks and shapes

Moving mattes and manual tracking

Center your masks box-out

Track it in AE

Workaround for variable feathering

Vignettes

Vignette using Circle

Vignettes with style

A highly flexible vignette approach

Combine Qualifiers and shapes

Shot matching

Multiple monitor panel set-up

Procedure for matching shots

Step 1: Set your workspace

Step 2: Find a hero shot

Step 3: Adjust the clips using scopes and your eyes

Step 4: Play the whole piece

Walkthrough of a simple shot matching job

Miscellaneous tips on shot matching

Crop it

Are more fixes needed?

Reuse the grades

Balance, then stylize

Find all instances of a clip in the timeline

Fixing problematic video

Flat and dull images

Underexposed footage

Overexposed footage

Colored clipping

Pushing skin tones

Add some blue sky

Get back the blue sky

Relighting an image

Changing autumn to summer

Don’t fake it too much

Achieving a “look”

Sepia

Bleach Bypass

Method 1

Method 2

Method 3

Method 4

Method 5

Teal & Orange

Method 1

Method 2

Method 3

Method 4

Presets – your secret weapon

More useful presets you may need

Black & White

S-curves

Roll-Off

Color Negative

Cross processing

Warming and Cooling filters

Warm and Cool Highlights

Blooming highlights

Blooming Blacks

Crushed blacks

Blue, blurred highs

Day for night

Additional tips on color grading

Kuler is your friend

Use textures to add lighting effects

Don’t make color grading your only tool