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The Tao Colorist

Issue CXXI                                                           Brought to you by: Tao of Color.com

Editor's Note: Congrats to the winner's of last week's Treasure Hunt: James Wicks (@JimWicks) and Greg Leslie (@gredit). They both correctly found the phrase 'Uncanny Valley' in the video about Comic Sans and each won themselves a copy of 'Color Grading with Media Composer and Symphony 6', to which I contributed. Congrats gentlemen and thanks to everyone who played along!

This coming week I'll be basking in the sun (Cancun, Mexico) with dozens of professional editors, some of whom will be attending a full day of workshops where I'll be learning them DaVinci Resolve, Grade-Along style. Therefore, no Newsletter next week.

I'll see you in two weeks as we make our big push into NAB 2013. Speaking of which, in this Newsletter I've got a full section dedicated to NAB 2013 stuff you'll want to check out, sign up for or otherwise put into your planning calendar.

Start planning for NAB now.

The Craft

• [Video] Dale Grahn: Timing His First Feature, 'Predator' - An inspirational story from the the color timer behind the Crumple Pop app. Dale shares how he got his big break going from night-shift color timer to timing his first feature film; which just happened to be the 1987 classic action film, 'Predator'. Classic story of how many post pros get their first big break. (Vimeo.com via @JimWicks)

• Grading Silver Linings Playbook - An interesting discussion with the colorist of this film and the creative goals for the color grade. (StudioDaily.com)

• An Eye for Color - Whether you have a 'natural' eye for color or have to struggle and train your eye... colorist James Wicks offers up useful training tips and a nifty story about teaching yourself to 'see'. (JimWicks.com)

• The Grading of a Sundance-Winning Doc - This piece offers good insights into color grading a documentary. And why a good doc colorist doesn't just look to keep things real, they look to create compelling images - which often helps clear up the storyline. This is a good read. (StudioDaily.com)

• [Video] Primary Color Correction: Using Scopes - This tutorial bites off a lot for a single chew. If you're new to using waveform monitors and vectorscopes, there's something in here for you. Most interesting to me was the bit from about 4:30 - 6:00 where a ramp is used to show how luma is processed differently when Resolve is set to ACES versus YRGB color processing. (YouTube.com via @post_vfx)

• 16 Lessons in Color Theory - If you've emailed me looking for a good source for understanding color theory... this is it. Written strictly from the perspective of paint there's a TON in here for a digital video colorist to sink her teeth into. (WetCanvas.com via Steve Hullfish)

• What Is A Digital Imaging Technician (DIT)? - As explained by a DIT. (Screenlight.tv)

• [Video] Editor Michael Kahn - He learned to edit on Hogan's Heroes and eventually became Steven Spielberg's go-to editor. This is a terrific 40-minute interview. Lots of insights on becoming a craftsman. Seems like a good guy to hang with in an edit suite. (YouTube.com via @JimWicks)

 

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The Tools

• [Video] Baselight Overview - Finally, a strong overview of Baselight... with an episode of BBC's Dr. Who as the backdrop. If you're grading in Resolve and haven't seen Baselight in action - set aside 20 minutes for this. (YouTube.com via @JimWicks)

• Davinci Resolve PowerGrades: The Instagram Collection - Need to replicate an Instagram look? Take a look at this inexpensive collection of PowerGrades. (coloristferoz.wordpress.com)

• Looks, Mojo, and FCPX 10.0.7 - Basically, these things stopped working together at the end of January... and Apple has yet to come up with a fix. (redgiantsoftware.com)

• Flagging Autolinked Clips in Resolve - Great workflow tip... but still not the most elegant of solutions to the problem presented. Heck, I've been personally advocating that the 'linked clip icon' be intelligent and let me know if there are linked clips before it... If not, then I'll immediately know not to go through the contortions in this blog post. (vanhurkman.com)

• A Thank you note to Dwaine and Mark at Black Magic - It's nice when you get a Thank you! (forums.creativecow.net)

• Pro Player - Looking for a souped up movie player without having to launch your NLE? Look no further. From friends of the Tao: Digital Heaven. (splicevine.com)

NAB 2013

• Full Day Color Grading Training: 42 Days Until Show Time - On Sunday April 7 join MixingLight.com co-founders for a full day of color grading training: Colorists Robbie Carman, Dan Moran and myself are hosting a full-day training series on color grading. Buying a Post | Production World One Day Pass for that Sunday will give you access to ALL the classes available that day, including ours (there's no need to individually register for our training sessions).
  
  If you buy before NAB begins it'll save you $70. Pricing details are here. Registration is here. The breakdown for our color grading training is here.

• Color Graders Unite! Join us for a Colorists@NAB Mixer - TaoOfColor.com, MixingLight.com, the Telecine Internet Group [TIG] and the International Colorist Academy (iColorist.com) are hosting an informal color grading gathering. There's no corporate sponsorship, no free drinks or food, no presentations - but we are inviting the vendors who make the awesome tools we use and there might be some free swag to be had... maybe. Arrange your plans to be there and bend arms with like-minded professionals!
  
  Where: Monte Carlo Hotel, 'Keg and Pub Room'
  When: Sunday, April 7, 8p - 10p
  Registration: None, just show up... it's a really big room.

• Your Free Code for NAB Exhibits-Only Pass: LV5183 - Use this discount code from Tao Newsletter sponsor Flanders Scientific to save $150 and get into the Exhibit Halls for free: LV5183. Expires March 22. This link takes you to the sign-up page for NAB. (NABShow.com)

• Attend the 12th Annual Las Vegas Supermeet - It's Tuesday night at the Rio Hotel. Go for the presentations, stay for the mega-raffle. I've got my tickets, get yours now. They sell out every year. (Eventbrite.com)

• Attend the 16th Annual Media Motion Ball - No, no dancing at this event. Nor is it formal attire. But it's a sit-down dinner & dessert with a few presentations and a raffle. It's a much more intimate version of the Supermeet and tends to be a Who's-Who of vendors, authors, bloggers, podcasters, trainers, web forum leaders and the community they serve. Highly recommended. It usually sells out before NAB. Get your tickets now and we'll see each other there: (Eventbrite.com) More details here: (MediaMotionball.com)

• Discounted Online-Only Las Vegas Monorail Tickets - If you stay at a hotel on the Monorail line, then you'll want to skip the buses and pre-pay for unlimited ride 4- or 7- Day Monorail passes. They're not available in Vegas... save time and money by buying them now through this link for NAB attendees. This page also has the names of the 7 hotels on the Monorail route. (tickets.lvmonorail.com) 

The Business

• The Benefits of a Vector-Based Codec - A few months ago we had a story about a vector-based codec for moving images. This article expounds on the benefits and pitfalls of such a codec, with speculation on how it's mostly likely to emerge in day-to-day usage. (RedSharkNews.com)

• What to do when Amazon decides to jump into your business - Specifically, the business of transcoding video in the cloud. (gigaom.com)

• How to get into and survive Film, Advertising and TV post-production - I haven't read this yet. Hopefully nothing nefarious ;-) (survivingpostproduction.wordpress.com)

Outside 'The Box'

• What it Takes to Become an Oscar Sound and Film Nominee - Yeah, my nod to the Oscars tonight. (community.avid.com)

• Diary of an Avid Switcher Part 1: Humble Beginnings - Good read. (jonnyelwyn.co.uk)

• 10 Things Cinematographers Do That Annoys the Rest of the Crew - Don't be that person. (howtofilmschool.com)

 

Current Colorist Control Surface Drivers

JL Cooper Eclipse	Avid Artist Color	Tangent
Software: v2.9.3	Mac: v2.6.2	Color: v3.8
Color Plug-in: v 1.0.5	PC: v2.6.2	Wave Firmware: v1.9
Updated: Jan. 2	Updated: October 20, 2011	Updated: Feb. 7, 2012

 

Sunday Morning Fun(nies)

• Hollywood Gets A Facelift - A fun article about the iconic 'Hollywood' sign and last year's makeover. Includes two embedded videos showing the evolution of the sign over the years. (theASC.com)

• 100 Diagrams that Changed the World - These are all utterly fantastic. (brainpickings.org)

• This Alarm Clock will Shock you out of Bed - Funny. Definitely funny. (mashable.com)

• Build your own Adobe Creative Suite with Free and Cheap Software - An interesting set of solutions... if you never ever need to collaborate with anyone. Ever. (lifehacker.com)

Weekend Warriors

• How to build a Rain machine - Just be careful when mixing water with electricity! (diyphotography.net)

• Build your own Power-Efficient DIY Remote Storage system - This is a weekend project for a serious DIYer. Hack a router to automatically boot your home-based PC to offload photos you're taking while on vacation. (lifehacker.com)

• Building a PC Part 1 - Tej Babra tackles this project - from the perspective of a post pro - and takes you along for the ride.  (tejbabra.com)

Gear Heads

• Videoguy's 2013 Update on Thunderbolt - Yes, this post is littered with ads to all sorts of Thunderbolt gear that they sell... but there's good info in here on a wide range of Thuderbolt-based products - including 6-foot Thunderbolt cables. (videoguys.com)

• Fiber Optic Thunderbolt Cables Begin Mass Production - Once again MacRumors lives up to its URL by giving us hard news... about Intel approving manufacture of fiber-optic Thunderbolt cables with potential runs of up to 30-feet.  (macrumors.com)

• Matrox DS1 Thunderbolt Docking Station - One Thunderbolt Input. Many many outputs. (redsharknews.com)

 

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New Kids on the Block

• ARRI's New ALEXA XTs - Internal Arriraw, True Anamorphic Capture, Better Lens Metadata. The author laments the absence of 4K on this camera... which in my mind is precisely why people buy this camera. A simple high-quality workflow for projects that don't want to be encumbered with the extra baggage of 4K. A specialty camera for an audience that knows precisely what it wants. (hdvideopro.com)

• At Last... integrated Arriraw - If you want a RAW workflow the Alexa could always accommodate it... with a bit of pain. This blog post explains how the new XTs alleviate one big on-set problem when shooting Arriraw. (negativespaces.com)

• Nikon D5200 Review - "The D5200 shames a fleet of much more expensive DSLRs by having a much nicer, cleaner, more cinematic image in video mode."  (eoshd.com)

Career

• Read Body language, Not Facial Expressions - To really judge emotions. (lifehacker.com)

• 15 Things you should give up to be Happy - I tried to pick out one item in this list that I thought particularly useful... but there are too many from which to choose. Click through for ideas... (purposefairy.com)

• How to think like Sherlock Holmes - "Our brains are bombarded by something like eleven million pieces of data -- that is, items in our surroundings that come at all of our senses -- at once. Of that, we are able to consciously process only about forty." Interesting stuff. (brainpickings.org)

Tweet of the Week

If you want to succeed in the world you must make your own opportunities as you go on. - John B. Gough via @forbes

The Next Step is a Doozy

• CSS 3D Clouds - Very cool... doing this with your browser. (clicktorelease.com)

A Step Too Far?

• Why the idea of a Google Driverless Car is Nonsense - The author offers no proof of this nonsense other than... it's Google. Kind'a like saying that Henry guy could never succeed with the automobile because he had never produced Concord Buggies. Forbes, this is the best you got? (forbes.com)

  

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Th- Th- That's ALL Folks! See you in two weeks. Happy Grading!
  
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Curated + Edited by: Patrick Inhofer, photon-wrangler & founder, TaoOfColor.com

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