Documentary Color Correction inside FCPX

Hello guys,

I'm about to start the CC of an indie full feature documentary. I'll have to do it all by myself. At first I was thinking going to Resolve, but the learning curve and the tough deadline will not work together. So, I have to do it inside FCPX.

The question is: should I do it manually everything inside FCPX or should I buy some mLUT or Red Giant Magic Bullet to give a better look? When I used Magic Bullet a few years ago, I thought that the plugin produced noise in the footage, but maybe today is way better.

What do you think? Any suggestions?
Thank you.

Color grading and visual looks are so subjective, there's no solid, cut-and-dried answer. This is pure gray area. But, my two cents...

If the plugin has a look you want, get it. But be aware, they don't give every shot in the world the exact same look. How it was shot can greatly effect all of that. The camera's white balance, color handling, internal settings that effect color, can make what you see in the demo not look exactly the same in your own clips. And if you shot in one location, with one huge, cast, etc, that plugin will give one result, and a different result in a shot taken at a different time of day, in a different location, etc.

So, they can be good starting points, which could possibly save you time, but you'll have to correct on top of that also. Again, they can be a good starting point, but rarely give you a 100% finished grade. You can't get away from manual correcting.

Start by answering this question; "What look, what visual qualities, do you want your film's style to have?"
After you have wrestled with those details, then go for the best method to achieve your specific needs.

Actually I use a mix of both for the content I create - which is for National Episodic, TV Broadcast.

I use Da Vinci for specific content - like special narratives and interviews.

I find FCP X good for quick clip-by-clip corrections and adjustments. I wouldn't use it for looks as you don't have the qualifiers and S-curves that 'proper' tools have.

LUTs can be handy but be careful as they often need to be dialled down in intensity. Also as has been mentioned, you need to ensure a basic correction and matching of clips has been completed, first.

If you are editing a doco, you should learn colour grading techniques rather than just 'plug and run'...

Do you understand scopes? That's a great start.

Dean...

I'm pretty much doing the same as you.

My problem was I was a one man documentary team. I even had to conduct the interviews myself.

Because of that reason I had to target and focus the camera on to the subject, then lock it off and hope for the best while I sat to the right of the cam to ask the questions. This was so my interviewees had someone they could look at when they responded. It didn't help that I couldn't isolate the lighting in the room which ended up being quite small so I had absolutely no depth of field.

The content itself was good, but the image ended up being quite poor. Unfortunately, there was no way I could reshoot either, you know how it goes....

Anyway... The point to this lengthy explanation is to give you an idea of the type of footage I had to work with.

I first started fiddling around with it in Final Cut, but I noticed the more I clean up, the more other things started to look bad too. So I had to fix more and more of the shot and FCPX would start grinding to a halt.

This was when I decided to do it in DaVinci Resolve, where I had a lot more power and control with its tracking, power windows and architecture.

XML to go in and out of Resolve for the corrections, but because there will be so much detail in the correction I decided to keep the grading rather simple, within reason and stick with Magic Bullet Looks. I also want to get value out of the money I spent before discovering Resolve. I have Tiffen DFX as well, so that might get thrown on to some degree not sure yet.

Because my shots were so difficult to fix, this move makes sense. But because I put so much detail into correction and balance, a simpler grade also makes sense, to some degree. The type of shots and style of documentary also contributes to the deciding factor as well.

Now I know this has been one entire anecdote and I've failed to answer your question... but i've done this so I can highlight something important.

Reasoning....

Look your options constructively. How much work do the corrections need?? How about the grade?? Are they simple complicated, mixed?? Are you going to need to do a lot of tracking, a little, or none at all??...

Take a few key examples of your own work and ask your self questions like this. Take those examples and do some tests on them in Final Cut. Can you get the look you want without too much fuss or is it causing you grief.

If it starts being too difficult or causes FCPX to become sluggish or you need to do too many selections and too much tracking... Use Resolve or equivalent.

Sorry for the ramble. Hope it helps

It depends how much time you have to color. If limited, I would stay within FCPX but if you want to add more to your grade then plugins can help.

First I would manually balance/match your shots with FCPX. Learn all the short cuts for your video scopes or invest $99 to get Divergent Media ScopeBox so you can see all the scopes without having to switch between each one.

If you haven't, check out Color a Grading Central tutorials on Vimeo or his website to expand your knowledge on the grading tools within FCPX. I think it's fast & powerful if you know what you're doing. I would also use adjustment layers for grading so you can just turn off the grade by selecting the layers & 'disabling' them in the case that you want to export to another app to grade in. SliceX is also great if you want to simulate some depth of field to some shots or remove unwanted objects in the frame.

Also, keep in mind that the heavier the effects the slower FCPX will be but it depends on your machine too. So adding Magic Bullet looks on many clips could slow things down but grading within FCPX would not. Just my 2 ¢.

Yeah. I've been living without the adjustment layers, but AI am kind of hoping FCPX dev team come up with their approach to tackling that issue.

Yeah SliceX does bring some of that custom shape masking and tracking ability into Final Cut that is desperately needed. It uses the Mocha engine under the hood, for a good price too, that's quite impressive.

Again hoping this subject also gets tackled by Apple

simon.a.billington wrote: Yeah. I've been living without the adjustment layers....

There are adjustment layers available for FCPX & I've been using the one from Color Grading Central.

I made my own adjustment layer. Simply launch Motion, start a new Titles for FCPX project, delete all text layers, save. That's all it is. There's lots of them available to download all over the place.

Yeah. I'm well aware of the work around that's out there. Even made my own Adjustment Layer.

But the fact is it's a work around and not the best solution. For the most part I just use the compound clips, that's what they were designed to do. It too has some limitations as well, but I'm hoping for improvements there.

I actually don't mind compound clips, they keep my work structured and easier to manage. It is possible, for the project to become too nested, I'm consciously aware of this and try to avoid it. Hell, I don't even like it when my file system has too many nests as well.

As a general rule, nothing should be more than 3-4 clicks away, especially if it's used a lot!!

So far I've done 3 television documentaries all graded in FCP X. I think unless there some really serious work needed to fix stuff FCP X works just fine. All Docos passed QC without one issue. I do use the adjustment layer just for Broadcast safe as a fail safe. But I do know how to read scopes and have graded a lot of Tv in the past.

I would not call Adjustment Layers a workaround, not at all. They're super handy to have around, work great. And save you from overloading your system with too many CC's. Yes, too many CC's can bog a system down.

Plus, in my Stock Media library, I have a CC called Adjustment Layers. Inside of that CC, I include Adjustment Layer clips that have grades and effect combos that I want to use repeatedly.

No, it's not a workaround, it is a very powerful, practical tool.

And I have to agree with Seanus, I've not actually touch Resolve in a long time, except for some very picky specialty stuff. I'm doing more of my grading in FCPX. Learn to use scopes, you'll be fine.

No you misread me.

Adjustment Layers in general arent a workaround....

Using Motion to create an empty text layer you can add filters to in FCPX because Apple doesn't offer a native version IS a workaround.

It's a very clever hack that someone discovered, that is incredibly useful to most, bu wouldn't be as useful or as powerful as if the Apple Dev team came up with a version themselves. A native solution would also be better integrated as well

So it is or isn't a workaround?

Making your own is way to simple to worry about. I'd not call it a hack, either. Is using Favorites and Rejected ratings a "hack" if I use them for Interview and Cutaway shot marking? No, it's just a tool box, do what you want.

I would class it has a "hack" (or maybe an Easter Egg) because it's not something Apple lists as a feature in FCPX, unlike After Effects, Premiere or Photoshop, whence the adjustment layer concept derives. The fact that you can apply certain effects (visual, but not audio for example) to a Motion behavior and have them affect stuff below it is not documented, hence the term "hack" sounds about right. I agree that if Apple were to implement this officially it would be a good thing, however....

Yeah... Hack in this context isn't a nasty word. In fact, I did say it was incredibly useful... Quite brilliant in fact.

I'm not here to stir up trouble or insult a technique that so many have found so useful, that's not my style

I was just trying to explain that it's a text layer that has been cleverly modified to act as an adjustment layer. Call it an Easter Egg if you want, like PaulG has, it's just a semantic thing.

There's nothing wrong with it, it's not evil. It's an incredibly useful idea, but it's still a text layer, not a fully qualified, fully supported, full featured adjustment layer supported by Apple's dev team. So yeah it does classify as a workaround by that definition.

I'm just saying it would be nice to have an official solution, because they also have the potential to take it to the next level.

i mentioned it in passing, because I think many wish for the same. It wasn't meant as a huge digression on the original subject matter... Color grading inside and/or outside of Final Cut

PaulG wrote: I would class it has a "hack" (or maybe an Easter Egg) because it's not something Apple lists as a feature in FCPX, ....

It's about User-Interface-Guidance:
all FCPX' stuff is clip-based, not track-based.

There is no single feature in FCPX effecting a 'track' (storyline, secondary, audio track... ), it's always per-clip-only.

So, if you have the need to 'group' clips, you can compound them <shiver> ; or, you apply a 'clip', which is spread across the whole timeline: a water-mark-title effects all clips underneath either = fully within UI-concept …

Actually, could I enquire... What does everyone have against compound clips??

I'm not sure if I have all the details??

simon.a.billington wrote: ... What does everyone have against compound clips??

LOL, no, compounds are a valuable tool of the FCPX family of features - I haven't found out yet, what for (aside MultiCam), but I'm sure, CCs are ... <patting head gesture> nice.

I'm the (crazy) one, who's Mantra is "Compounds Are Evil", and there's some truth in that exaggeration:
a) in many cases, they're simply not needed - 'cause Magnetic Timeline does the job, or, to avoid clutter, just cmd-alt-arrow-down = overwrite to primary, done.
b) compounds, as MultiCams, 'eat' performance: your Mac has to shovel ALL content simultaneously of that CC from the drive ...
c) … and, those who miss 'tracks & bins', they start to compound compounds .. eeks! THAT smells like real trouble ...
d) re-usage of 'old' CCs = from other Projects, and editing them in the new Project, creates all sorts of "What have I done??!" reactions.....


... back2reality:
there ARE scenarios, you can not avoid CCs, some handling of comps for instance ask for it...
But in many cases, usage of CCs is an indication, you're not familiar with some handy FCPX features.

…just me who is 'catholic' about CCs in FCPX :woohoo:

Yeah I have particularly noticed the impact of point (b) actually, so it's good to have confirmation that others are experiencing the same issues



I do like them on the whole, but the performance of nested clips need to be greatly improved.

Stacking multiple effects and or multiple color grade selections can also grind down performance I have noticed. However, I have upgraded recently to a new rig with 4GB graphic crunching power. Hopefully that will help.

As I side note, I really like how Red Giant has handled the scenario concerning GPU grunt. I don't know if any other developer has embraced this technique, but everyone should...

What they do, is if the engine notices that there is a bit of a cue to access the GPU in order to carry out their calculations, the it will detect that as being an issue and start reallocation the processes to the CPU instead. The idea is to leave as little in the cue as possible. Decreasing the overall processing time.

So in this instance they get the best of both worlds instead of locking out certain renders until other renders have taken place.

Very wise indeed