What tools to use and not to use for grading

[sammysammy]

Hello everyone, I have been playing around for almost six months with vegas and grading clips..For me grading has been tough thing to learn, it took me a while to get the hang of it on vegas..what tools (plugins) with- in vegas are your go to tools for grading clips, and what tools you try to stay away from or feel vegas has not done a good job implementing them (or even may hurt the image), thanks for any input...for me the unsharp mask and sharpen tools have gave me headaches, i would love to use them, but for some reason within vegas these tools dont look right, maybe im over using them or not using them right..

 

[Eugenia Loli-Queru]

I use a multitude of the ones that come with Vegas, plus Magic Bullet, plus the freeware Aav ColorLab. I don't have trouble with unsharpen mask btw.

 

[Richard Jones]

Yes, I also use quite a few of rhe Vegas FX plus Mercalli to remove shake and Mike Crash's DeNoiser but I suppose the ones I use most are Levels and Colour Curves followed by the two Colour Correction fixes. It really depends on the event you are looking at and what you are trying to achieve so there's no one sequence that is of universal application.

Richard

 

[Efexone]

.for me the unsharp mask and sharpen tools have gave me headaches, i would love to use them, but for some reason within vegas these tools dont look right, maybe im over using them or not using them right..

I use convolution kernel to sharpen when I need to. IMO, it does a better job sharpening video then the unsharp mask plugin, since it brings out more detail. start with the sharpen preset and experiment from there. increasing the number in the middle box mellows the effect out. I usually run it between 30-45.

 

[sammysammy]

Thanks all for the input, I just tried the convolution Kernal, its a great tool that i have not used,thanks!
Also, i just tried Aav ColorLab, its also great.Thanks!