color correcting in Final Cut 7

[kookooframe]

I'm working in FCP7 having trouble color correcting a 1920X1080 ProRes 422 HQ file. It's a telecine of some Super 8 film footage I sent out to have converted. The file has a dingy, purplish cast. It seems to me I should be able to get rid of this dinginess with the three-way color correction tool, which I have used in the past on my HDV footage to generally good results. But somehow the tool just doesn't seem powerful enough to fix the ProRes file. I know a little about Color, however the application on my system seems to have developed some glitches as installed (it freezes in the Secondaries room, and elsewhere...) I'm battling a deadline so I really can't troubleshoot right now.

I was wondering if anybody might suggest a few tricks with the 3-way color corrector that I could try? Alternatively, I have access to a computer that has Final Cut X installed. I haven't used it but I might try it if there is more powerful color correction available there. Any Final Cut X users out there? I've heard the color correction process is simplified compared to FCP7, but is it more powerful, in your opinion???

Or could you suggest some good color-correction plug-ins or stand-alone applications?

Any help truly appreciated!

 

[starcentral]

Can you post a high quality frame grab?

 

[kookooframe]

Yes, I will be happy to...just give me a few minutes and it'll be up...

 

[kookooframe]

Here it is. Note the purplish pavement of driveway in foreground. Dinginess here is not as bad in some other places, but I just can't seem to get the colors to be vibrant

 

[starcentral]

So what I immediately notice is purple in the highlights (seen in the sky) and also purple in the mid-tones. I normally use Premiere or After Effects to make my color adjustments but the computer I'm on right now has FCP installed so I did this really quick to show you my settings and the effect on the image. I pushed down the mid-tones and high-lights as noted, it seems to have pulled out a lot of the purple from the image. The only thing left might be to adjust exposure in the lower tones (shadows) just to bring up the blacks a bit, but its really preference from there and what you like.

 

[kookooframe]

Thanks, Dennis! That looks much better. I may try Final Cut X then!

Appreciate you going out of your way to demonstrate. That really helps me out.

 

[starcentral]

No problem, it was very quick to do.

If you prefer to try it in adobe Adobe then add the 3-way color corrector and do the same sort of thing. On the midtones dial drag the center of the dial away from purple, and do the same on the highlights dial.

It should produce the same correction as what I did in FCP. You can tweak the strength of the coloring later using the "Balance Magnitude" setting. Maybe start with a setting of 15 and see.

 

[Ryan-Guy]

This is a quick color balence. Match my settings the best you can. A little hard working with the low quality JPG, I'm sure the prores 422 will perform much better and you will be able to see how hard you can push it. The reason you're having a hard time with good color tonality is becuase the source footage is pretty much shades of purple/magenta. Its like asking a whale to be a bird. With enough force you can get it to fly for a second, but it is what it is. You're asking a light hue of purple to become red, or green, or yellow. There may be some info in there that can simulate yellow or green, but its not much.

 

[kookooframe]

Thanks, Ryan. I'll try those settings and see how far I can go. Yeah, the source film footage was not perfect, but with closer supervision it might have been telecined better. I'm just trying to produce an image that at least elicits the time period (1970s) without too much effort on the viewer's part.

 

[starcentral]

kookoo - when can we see finished product? :happy:

 

[kookooframe]

Well, it's actually a 45-minute collection of Monty Python-esque comedy sketches and a companion piece -- a 26-minute Mission Impossible parody. All produced on Super 8 film without sound when I was 19 or 20 years old. The comedy sketches have never had a real soundtrack. So its exciting and poignant to finally be finishing something I started 35 years ago!

I would like to get everything finished in order to submit by deadline to a local film festival here in Massachusetts.

Just to give you an idea, this piece I'll show you is basically an outtake I was practicing on -- it's not part of the narrative. The source footage is only DV, but I think I could do more with the color based on the advice I've gotten here! https://vimeo.com/59526560