Poisson D'avril!

Thanks to reader, colorist and Newsletter contributor Joe Owens for sharing with me the French saying for April Fools! After doing a web search (to figure out what the heck Joe had written), I read this on the Wikipedia entry for April Fools Day:

"in the UK, and in countries whose traditions derived from the UK, the joking [ceases] at midday. A person playing a joke after midday is the April Fool' themselves."

Since I don't want to become the fool, rather than waiting until Monday to send this Newsletter (my original intention)... it is shipping midday, at Noon Pacific time!

Tao Colorist Newsletter NAB Update

If you're at next Sunday's Colorist Mixer or on the show floor then be sure to stop me, say hi, and let me know you're a reader. I'm also posting myself at two different booths (Flanders Scientific and Lumaforge) on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday - representing my alter ego business.

NAB announcements started flowing in on Thursday and Friday, many of them missing this week's Newsletter. 

Never fear.

This Newsletter IS publishing next Sunday - the day before the show floor opens. We will have all the color related announcements we can find for your reading pleasure.

Coming Soon: Free DaVinci Resolve 14 Quickstart Training Series on MixingLight.com

Mixing Light has been working on a 2-part introductory training series for DaVinci Resolve 14. Part 1 is free and is slated to be released this week or next. It's free. It's downloadable. It has projects, exercises and a :60 commercial for following along.

Did I mention it's free? To help on-board newcomers to the software in a logical, organized manner.

Part 2 of the series will ship the week after NAB. It's a paid add-on that prepares you to take Blackmagic's official Introduction to Resolve 14 Assessment Test for Certification.

I know, I know. The timing could have been better - competing with Blackmagic announcing whatever they're announcing next Monday. But if you're brand new to DaVinci Resolve then stick to a stable release because learning the software on Public Beta leads to much more confusion than necessary (assuming Blackmagic follows their recent tradition of releasing their Public Betas the first day of NAB).

My hope is: Now when you're on message boards with people asking for good, reliable Resolve training for newbies; you'll have a perfect place to point them ;-)

Thanks again for playing along with my April Fools Joke!

I appreciate the email replies; they've been fun! And I'll be meeting some of you in exactly 7 days!

Your Publisher,
Pat Inhofer

Have a great week. See you next Sunday

Happy Grading!

• Do You Ever "Make it?" - "There are probably only a handful of colorists in the world who have reached the mountaintop of the highest tiered work...I have to imagine even those colorists are always striving to do bigger and better." On staying consistent with your approach to career advancement. (robbessette.com)
  
• The Color Palette of Titanic - "Colors are used to tell stories, they support the story being told." A good post on the colors used to tell James Cameron's blockbuster. (adeepoberoi.com)
  
• Netflix: Metadata annihilates Annihilation -  what happens when your Dolby Vision grade get uploaded to Netflix but they mess up the metadata tagging? (liftgammagain.com)
  
• Post-Productions lessons from a Star Wars Restoration - "This offers an interesting and highly detailed look at a VFX workflow when preparing assets, tracking process, directory and file naming conventions, and staying organized across a long project." (premiumbeat.com)
  
• When your ideas get stolen - it happens to all the great craftsman. (sethgodin.com)

• How many LUFS for ideal audio loudness? - "Here is the current list of relevant standards I compiled as of publication date of the article, from softest to loudness." Because color apps now do audio. (provideocoalition.com)
  
• Firefly Cinema Color Grading S - “Firefly Cinema offers a complete suite of color management tools for the digital cinema era, including . . . high quality on-set live grading tool . . . Digital dailies management and . . . powerful color grading for post.”  (toolfarm.com)
  
• [video] Remove Person From Any Video with Mocha Pro - using the Remove Module of the Mocha Pro plugin! Entertaining and informative. (youtube.com)
  
• Useful Geekery: A Database Maintenance Tool for Resolve - "Here's a bash script of MacOS 10.12.6 to automate backing up and optimizing DaVinci Resolve 12 PostgreSQL databases." (provideocoalition.com)
  
• CineLenses App - a database of 2,000 lenses, plus a list of 500 rental house worldwide. To send to your favorite DP. (newsshooter.com via David E. Bell)

• Capitol Hill Panel Explores Piracy Threat Of Streaming Boxes - "Not surprising, sales of these 'private boxes' are taking off - a 2017 study from Sandvine found that roughly 6 percent of North American households were using one to stream unlicensed content." (etcentric.org)
  
• Company 3 Restructures - CO3 now has more independence from parent company, Deluxe, and was "Finally confirmed to Deluxe staff via a company memo… and now marks a shift in the post landscape." (hollywoodreporter.com)
  
• NAB 2018: Artificial Intelligence in the spotlight - "NAB 2018 will be the place to discover what the future will bring and the changes we're already going through." (provideocoalition.com)
  
• Regulation of On-Demand Cinemas Could Boost China's Box Office - "The Industry will bid farewell to the gloomy operation of the original phase and move toward formal legalization." (celluloidjunkie.com)
  
• The Accidental CFO: The Section 199A Deduction - "understanding the qualified business income tax deduction for pass-through businesses". If you're a US freelancer, S-Corp or LLC then you're a pass-through business and this article will help you understand the recent tax reform passed at the tail end of 2017. (provideocoalition.com)
  
• The Accidental CFO: Tax Flow for Freelancers - "as we better understood our tax return, we changed our investing and retirement strategy to be more tax efficient, thus saving a significant amount in taxes . . . this article, plus the resource links, will help you start your journey to slay the tax dragon." (provideocoalition.com)

• [video] DaVinci Resolve 14: Re-Revisiting Multi-Channel Output - "we’ll start by exploring making an output using ‘Timeline Tracks’ on the audio tab of Delivery Page settings.  We’ll do this with six mono surround stems + a stereo mix, as well as with an interleaved 5.1 mix and a stereo mix. But this method is also very useful for outputting traditional splits." (mixinglight.com)
  
• [videos] From The Grading Room: Is Yellow The New Orange? - "the last couple of years there has been a shift away from teal and orange to teal and yellow. Dan investigates that transition and looks at his own grades. He also asks do you miss teal and orange?" (mixinglight.com)
  
• [video] Understanding DaVinci Resolve’s Parallel Mixer Node (and when to use it) - "learn how the Parallel node works and the difference between it and the Layer node." (mixinglight.com)

• 6th Annual Colorist Mixer - mark your calendar, set your plans: Sunday April 8, 7:00p. Virgil's BBQ at the Linq Promenade. It's the premiere social event for color-loving post-production pros. Mingle with your peers, chat with your vendors. (coloristmixer.com | eventbrite.com)

• Get Your Exhibits Pass (and save) - the Early Bird registration deadline has ended for an Exhibition Pass. Use this code from our Tao Newsletter sponsor Flanders Scientific to save $50: LV2746 (nabshow.com)

• NAB 2018: The Official Toolfarm Guide - the classic guide to getting around NAB like a pro. (toolfarm.com) 

• 21st Annual Media Motion Ball - "the MediaMotion Ball serves as the unofficial industry kickoff and reunion event for the production, post production and motion graphics communities." A very popular social event attended by many well-known industry personalities and companies - with a new location. Early Bird pricing ends March 19. (provideocoalition.com | eventbrite.com)

• 17th Annual Supermeet - join "digital media creators and collaborative video user groups from around the Globe in Las Vegas for the largest gathering of creative and collaborative editors, Adobe, Avid, Final Cut Pro and Autodesk gurus, collaborative Digital Storytellers and Filmmakers in Las Vegas in 2018." (supermeet.com)​​​​​​​

• FCPWorks: Events At NAB 2018 - like the title says. (fcpworks.com)​​​​​​​
  

• NAB 2018 Final Cut Pro X: Post Without Limits - "a special evening of Final Cut Pro X workflows and case studies from creative professionals that are breaking the boundaries of what’s possible in post". Registration required. (fcpexchange.com)
  

• Nvidia Volta GPU connected by NVSwitch create world's largest 'GPU' - "This system has 512GB of HBM2 memory and total bandwidth up to 14.4 TB/s." Some of us call this... fun. (videocardz.com)

• Bring Your Own Linux to Windows (with new open source tool) - "if an off-the-shelf Linux distribution doesn't float your boat, why not build your own?" (arstechnica.com)
  
• The Nvidia GTC 2018 Keynote - CEO Jen-Hsun Huang's keynote address at the "the premier AI and deep learning event". It's long, so brew a fresh pot of coffee. (ustream.tv)
  
• Hands on with Samsung's new NFI SSDs: 36x16 TB in IU - "at the OCP Summit this week, the company exhibited it's NFi SSDs in a dual-socket Supermicro server running 36 drives". (anandtech.com)
  
• Understanding Dolby Atmos from supporting LG TVs - a primer on the current state of immersive audio connectivity issues. (hdguru.com)
  
• Understanding Dolby Vision in Sony Premium 4k Ultra HDTVs - "we got a thorough explanation of what it will take for any owners of 2017 of 2018 premium Sony 4Ks to enjoy Dolby Vision from supporting 4K Ultra HD . . . Dolby Vision supporting devices." (hdguru.com)
  
• Meltdown & Spectr: Analyzing Performance Impacts on Intel's NUKaby Lake - "what we've found so far is that the impact of the Meltdown and Spectre varies with the workload and type of test." (anandtech.com)

• The Department of Energy figured out how to 3D Print Structures made of Water - "according to the researchers, this advance is the first step toward creating liquid electronics that can conform to any shape and be implemented in stretchable devices." Doozy, indeed. (motherboard.vice.com)

• Scientist Think They Found a New Human Organ - ahhh... is this going to be another Pluto situation? (arstechnica.com)