Last month I used this space to ask you if you'd take the Over or the Under on the next major version of DaVinci Resolve shipping by the end of July? With just 5 business days left this month, it's not looking hopeful for the Under crowd.

But that's okay.

It's summer. Plus, everyone has bigger things on their mind. 

As mentioned last week, in normal years this would be the last edition of this Newsletter before my summer break - returning the 2nd Sunday in September.

This year, we're going to an every-other-Sunday schedule through the end of September. After all, it's not like I've got somewhere to go during these lockdowns (even in sunny Florida, options are limited). Then, it'll be business as usual until the end-of-year holiday season.

I'll see you in two weeks, on August 9.

Stay busy. Stay healthy. Get some sun. Take some breaks.

Happy Grading!

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

- Patrick Inhofer
Colorist | Publisher | Coach

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 corona viruses 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! 

Super cool initiative if you've been thinking about wanting to learn and grow your career around the Unreal Engine: "Epic Games are now accepting applications for a new curated educational initiative: Unreal Fellowship, with four-week training intensive and $10,000 stipend for 50 Fellows. Classes start August 21."

"[color bars] represent some of the first electronically produced graphics ever displayed on a screen—a pretty significant development in a world where graphics are everywhere." A really interesting look at the history of the most famous graphic ever created. (via Marc Wielage)

"This was the first ever effort made to standardize a dedicated colour space in the digital signage industry. But then it quickly fell into oblivion . . . unlike [in] the print industry." Some interesting insights in this article - especially if you think consumer digital display manufacturers should embrace a more serious effort at accurate color reproduction.

"Strategies from creatives on how to get unstuck and move forward in your work."

Interesting: "Fiber networks are future-proof, with most offering up to gigabit speed to consumers and businesses. But upgrading to 10 Gbps will “add little to the cost” once demand for such faster speed appears"

(video) Colorist Luke Ross shows you "how to use the "DSpot" and "Paint" operators to fix film dust and to duplicate parts of the image."

(video) Colorist Luke Ross shows you "how to create occlusion mattes (negative mattes) in your Baselight grade."

[videoa] In this webinar replay, "Mistika Expert Adrian Gonzalez Diaz answered questions related to color-grading, VFX, conform, VR, S3D or other operations or workflows."

If you've got some time this summer to pick up a new tool, the new Nuke Indie license might be up your alley. Plus, Mike Seymour explains what's new in the latest releases of Nuke.

This new plug-in suite for all the major NLEs, "simulates optical camera filters, specialized lenses, film stocks and grain, lens flares, optical lab processes, color correction, keying, and compositing as well as natural light and photographic effects."

Friend of the Tao, Scott Simmons, tells us what Postlab *doesn't* do before explaining the problem it does solve - which is remote collaboration between editors.

(webinar) "Powerful, yet simple, collaborative Adobe Premiere Pro project management alongside adaptive media production management." The webinar has passed but the sign-up page will allow you access to the replay (for the cost of your email address).

An overview of this update that works as a panel in Premiere Pro: “With the release of Curator Arrival, we’re making it easier to remotely edit and collaborate on video projects in addition to simplifying administrative functions in Curator, improving user onboarding, and reducing cloud and hybrid cloud infrastructure costs.”

Written with editors in mind, Oliver Peters walks you through best practices for improving the single most important element in most digital video projects... the dialog track. His techniques can easily be applied in DaVinci Resolve's Fairlight.
 

(video) "In part 1 of a new series, learn the essentials of how to interpret and read references for contrast, tonality, and other key factors. To help you reproduce those looks."

(video) "Learn how to use Resolve's Gallery for comparing and sharing color corrections or nodes between different shots."

(video) "Learn powerful keyframe editing techniques in DaVinci Resolve's Fusion page, using the built-in spline and keyframe editors."

"The new rumors for AMD Big Navi, or RDNA 2 aka NVIDIA Killer have it up to 225% faster than RDNA which powers Radeon RX 5700 XT." Lots of links in here, plus an embedded YouTube video. (via Robbie Carman)

From a reader: "John Brawley has a comprehensive behind the scenes view on the new BMD 12k camera. Includes colour science, editing etc." (via Martyn J Bull)

"Over the past ten years, our engineers figured out how to cram four more platters into that same one-inch case and to also use other innovations to increase capacity 10x from the aforementioned 2TB to 20TB for the highest capacity available using Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR)." A very interesting article on the tech advancements that makes these densities possible. (via Marc Wielage)

(video) In the early days of digital post-production, if you had to boot up your edit room on a Monday morning then you were very worried if you'd get any work done that day. Why? Watch this video for the trip down memory lane of a vintage Fairlight Digital Audio Workstation as it boots up. Slowly. Loudly. With fingers crossed. (via Joey D'Anna)

"The last Qantas 747 flies over Sydney today as the "Queen of the Skies" heads into retirement . . . but leaves an unusual flight path behind as a salute to the country." Definitely fun (with a tinge of sadness). (via Robbie Carman)