🎨 Colorist Newsletter #501

Published: Sun, 11/21/21

Issue DI: The Holidays Are Here Edition
The Tao of Color Grading Newsletter
Curated links of news, reviews, thoughts, career advice, and humor for professional Video / Film Colorists & Finishers. Delivered Sundays.
From The Publisher
Thank you to everyone who emailed me as this Newsletter celebrated its 500th edition last week!

This week is the Sunday before our Thanksgiving holiday break - so I'll be skipping a week and will return on Sunday, December 5.

Happy Grading! I'll see you in two weeks.
- Patrick Inhofer
Colorist | Publisher | Coach

(and remember - if you have a story that's a fit for this Newsletter, hit reply or email it to '[email protected]'! Include a quick reason for the suggested link.)

Join the 'Color Cartel' Protein Folding Team - Rosetta@home allows you to donate the spare CPU cycles of your rig to the scientific fight against coronaviruses and cancers! The Tao Newsletter's Color Cartel is a Top 5% team and climbing. Join Rosetta@home, set up an account, start 'folding', and connect to The Color Cartel team.
The Craft
Featuring the work of creative craftsmen, the theory of color, and industry news. Learn practical workflows, useful theories, and actionable insights from existing (and emerging) leaders and teachers in our industry.
There are some interesting deals here: "Find the best Black Friday deals for editors, colorists and other post-production pros in this huge round-up of sales, discount codes and bargains!"
The final, virtual, Colorist Mixer is happening soon, timed with IBC (did you realize that IBC hadn't happened yet this year? Me neither.) Mixing Light is a sponsor and I was pleased to see the Mixer folks have us sponsoring Alexis Van Hurkman's Mixology session. Saturday, 4 December 2021. Registration is required.
Congrats to the winners!
"Veteran colorist Cullen Kelly offers 8 lessons on dealing with common client requests like "make it pop" and "the colors don't match."
(podcast) "You will be pleased to learn that he has just been nominated for the outstanding color of a theatrical release at the Hollywood PostAlliance Arts and Crafts awards for his work on Green Knight."
"Here’s an interesting [Twitter thread] by Devan Scott about the differences in color between the James Bond films SKYFALL and SPECTRE." (via Marc Wielage)
This is a PERFECT podcast to listen to on a long holiday drive. It oozes craftsmanship. I loved it: "Jeremy Lasky co-founder of Perception discusses Science Fiction and Science Fact design projects."
Recognize your internal self-limiting questions and transform them into positive questions to help you better serve yourself and the people you work with. Very stoic.
(podcast) I enjoy listening to Sonny Bunch talk movies. I thought you might find this podcast episode interesting since it deals with a fundamental concept of the work we create: What does it really mean to 'own' a piece of digital content? Are the customers of our clients getting what they think they're getting when pressing the 'buy' button on iTunes or at Amazon?
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The Tools
Our craft keeps changing. And growing. Learn about updates to your favorite software. Discover new tools to help you work faster or more creatively. Build your toolchest with new techniques and approaches. 

I'm linking to the Read Me. This is largely a bug fix with a focus on Fairlight and ResolveFX plugins.

From Bernd Klimm, "Get started with editing in DaVinci Resolve and explore the full post-production pipeline. From rough cut to polished edit with titles, sound effects, color grade, and more." This is a Resolve Certification course that follows BMD's free PDF course.

(video) "Improve your masks, fill holes and fix edge problems. Master the Matte Control tool for simple and advanced problem-solving."

"These settings and workflow tips can help you work faster in DaVinci Resolve, without upgrading your hardware." If you're experienced in post, you'll want to scroll halfway down to find a tip or two you may find useful.
"Frame.io has expanded its Camera to Cloud Workflows platform by adding support for Aaton Cantar X3 recorders, and Pomfort Livegrade, ZoeLog and Magic ViewFinder apps."
"What can you do on a Virtual Machine? These are the questions I put to tech and post-workflow savant, Michael Kammes which he so kindly answered, in detail."

"Consolidate comments, take action on feedback, and finalize your videos, all in one place, with the Dropbox Replay beta. Try Replay for free."

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Pushing Photons
These stories are from MixingLight.com's membership Library of color grading articles, tutorials, and podcasts (Tao Of Color is co-Owner). Do you want to read a story listed here but not a member? Sign up for a free 7-Day Test Drive.​​​ There's also color correction Practice Projects for purchase. 
(video) "Colorist Cullen Kelly finishes off coding a split-toning Resolve DCTL plugin with a visual overlay showing how the RGB channels are modified."
(video) "In part two of his series, Colorist Joey D'Anna shows you how to color manage graphics when trimming a project from SDR up to HDR."

(video) "In this Insight Dan (well known for his gritty looks) tries to bring a bit of that style to a cleaner, HDR-ready show look created in Baselight."

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Gear Heads
Stay updated on the latest hardware that's shipping - because the craft of color grading isn't just about software. Plus, keep an eye on future equipment trends and hardware odds-and-ends.
I just upgraded to their new icon pack for Resolve (I have two StreamDeck XL panels). I was always ambivalent about their icon styles - but they saved me a ton of time getting the StreamDeck setup. The new icon style is much better. I used them when I did a complete rethinking of my StreamDecks this past week. Color me a satisfied customer.
After looking at these benchmarks, riddle me this: Why is that 13" MBP in the Pro category, still?
Editor Scott Simmons: "I had several folks reach out and tell me I really needed to try the current Premiere Pro public beta as it has some targeted updates addressing speed on the M1 Max." He did try it. And then he wrote about it.
Well, this is unfortunate - especially if you've been considering a new Mac Mini as a backup render station.
This is interesting. Rather than paying for (or financing) a Jellyfish Mobile - rent it for 12 months and return or upgrade it. This pricing model isn't for everyone - but could be a great solution for a show or film where you need the power for a longish period of time but don't need to walk away with it when the production is over. And you can pay for it over the length of the project.
Are you looking for a better way to control audio playback in your grading suite? There's an interface for that - this is a roundup of interfaces with differing amounts of features.
"We are finally getting high-speed switches that are small and affordable enough for nearly any user that needs connections in excess of 1Gb." A review of an affordable QNAP 10G ethernet switch.

"The only REAL reason we see to adjust the pagefile is if you run into trouble. If you're experiencing issues with pagefile/virtual memory(BSOD), your device doesn't have enough memory, or you're trying to improve the system performance, Windows 10 allows you to increase the size of the virtual memory in at least two ways using the Settings app and Command Prompt."

Sunday Fun(nies)
Random thoughts, tidbits, and fun stuff that caught my attention this week. Maybe it's color grading related. Maybe not. Ya gotta read to the end of the Newsletter to find out.
Okay. I went for the cheap headline color connection! But hey, Thanksgiving is this week, and what's more fun than photo-worthy turkey fixings? "Onion skins are highly pigmented, so much so that they’re often used as a natural dye. When added to stock, they impart a deep amber color, but not too much flavor."

You KNOW this topic is coming up at the Thanksgiving table with your family. Click through to edumacate yourself so you can have fun pretending you know what you're talking about: "Want to invest in blockchain, but don't know where to start? This guide covers the entire blockchain ecosystem and how to access it."

(video) If you're clued into the Facebook 'Meta' announcement and watched Zuckerberg's presentation, then you'll get a kick out of this inspired parody: "Some said an open-world experience this immersive wasn’t possible. But it’s already here. And you don’t even need silly VR headsets. "
 
Th- th- th- that's all folks! I'll see you in two weeks.