The Tao Colorist

The Craft

• DreamWorks Q&A with Jeff Olm - I missed this post back in March. An interesting Q&A with colorist Jeff Olm, including the 8 different deliverables he needs to deliver for each film he grades. (iColorist.com)

• Why Do Cultures Always Name Red Before Blue? - It seems across cultures and through time, people have named colors in a very specific order. Very interesting. (io9.com via @hurkman)

• Post-Haste: Because Organization IS Craft - I'm a big believer that to rise to the level of craftsman in our business you must first and foremost stay organized. This is a good overview of Digital Rebellion's 'Post Haste' app that will help you develop and then enforce a solid folder structure for your projects. (mac.appstorm.net)

• The Purple Blockbuster - Some good ideas on how to segment your image to create a look. Notice, of course, how Aaron starts first with a balanced image. (AaronWilliams.tv)

• Color Correction Practice Game - Steve Hullfish thinks this game might improve your grading skills. Try it and see. (ProVideoCoalition.com)

The Tools

• [Video] Color Correction in Avid Symphony 6 - Dylan Reeve has a great overview of the color correction toolset in Avid Symphony. If you're a Media Composer owner deciding between the $999 Symphony upgrade deal or the similarly priced Baselight plug-in, pay attention at 6:20 into the video as Dylan walks you through the relational tools that considerably speed up the color grading process... and won't be available with any 3rd party color correction plug-in. I'm not sure why Dylan doesn't find a similar feature in Resolve to be as fast but I'd love to see Resolve support an equivalent to Avid's 'Program Segment' option. (Vimeo.com)

• [PDF] Avid Import / Export: Color Level Remapping - When importing or exporting from Avid do you know what to select when Avid asks if you want to map to 601/709 or RGB. What should you select? Here's an excellent PDF from award winning editor Job ter Burg. Seriously, it's excellent. Download and file it for future reference. This is a direct link. (terburg.home.xs4all.nl via @editorbelga)

• [Video] Scratch Lab 6.1: New Metadata Tools - Many excellent utilitarian features. The folks at Avid should take a look at this for inspiration. Myself and many others have been having a terrible time managing Reel Numbers in Avid. And I'd love to see Resolve support this kind of robust time-base manipulation for export. (Vimeo.com)

• The Adobe Tax: Rent vs Upgrade - Is it worth $600 per year to rent your software from Adobe? (MacPerformanceGuide.com via @diglloyd)

• What's New with NVIDIA CUDA Acceleration - Well, not so much 'what's new' as 'what's up'. If you're not familiar with CUDA this might help provide a few insights. From NAB 2012. (RichardHarringtonBlog.com)

• [Test Footage] A-Cam dll: CinemaDNG Files - Download files from the A-Cam dll in the CinemaDNG format to play with. Scroll down to the very bottom of the page. They're also available in ProRes. (ikonoshop.com via @ResolveTips)

• [Video] The Element, iPad and iPhone - Using the 'Keypad Pro' iApp to supplement your colorist control surface. (Vimeo.com)

• [Review] ScopeBox 3.0 - This review covers all three aspects of ScopeBox: Monitoring; Scopes; Recording (StreamingMedia.com)

• FinalDCP Free & Commercial Editions - Create DCI-compliant DCP files for digital cinema and dailies distribtution. The Free edition will superimpose their logo on your footage (which will let you test your workflow before committing to buying the software). Most interesting... film festivals can join their partner program and offer a 25% discount to festival selectees for the Commercial edition. (MagnaMana.com via @David_Newman)

• Syncronize Pro X - Bootable System Backups for the Mac OS. (SpliceVine.com)  

A D V E R T I S E M E N T

The Next Step Is A Doozy

• Optimus Polaris: The $1,000 Keyboard - Are you looking to augment your $29,995 DaVinci Resolve control surface with a similarly impressive keyboard? The Polaris might be right up your alley. (SpliceVine.com)

A Step Too Far?

• Lioness Tries to Eat Zebra-Dressed Baby - The Lioness doesn't succeed. But how long would you have allowed your toddler to sit there - no matter how thick that glass is? Unless, maybe, you're thinking, "YouTube"? (YouTube.com)