Speaker 1: One of the most consistent topics that I get asked about in color grading is consistency. Whether we're trying to get a match between two tricky shots, create flow from one scene to the next, or make our current grade look as good as our last one did, we're all trying to get more consistent in our grades. And while this can be difficult for a variety of reasons, most often it comes down to the fact that we're seeking consistent results despite having an inconsistent process. So today we're going to take a look at three ways that we can level up this aspect of the way we approach our grading. So let's take a look at some strategies we can use to create more consistency in our grading process and thereby achieve more consistent results. Strategy number one is to deploy your look globally. Let me show you what I mean. As I look over my ungraded timeline here at the start of my grade, I recognize that one of my key tasks as the colorist is to impart a consistent creative look on each of these shots. So let's begin that process here on shot number one. And you guys have seen me do this in the past using my custom curves here to draw an s-curve, maybe do some split toning and push some cool colors into the shadows and some warm colors into the highlights. Today we're going to do things a little bit differently and we're going to use my colloid print plugin because it's going to allow me to quickly drop in and fine-tune a look for my shot. So once I've dropped it into my node graph I'm going to go to my open effects tab here and I'm going to look at my settings available to me and I'm going to say I want to do a little bit less contrast, maybe like a 65. And for my print curve I want to go with a Fuji 3510 instead of this stock Kodak curve. And once I've done those things I'm pretty happy with this as my initial rough look. So if we go back to the strategy we're discussing to deploy our look globally, what this means is that this node or any other node or combination of nodes you might be using to create your look be applied in the same exact way across all of your shots. You're going to get a baseline consistency out of this that's really going to help glue all of your images together. So there's a number of different ways you can do this. Most simply you could just copy and paste this node on each of your shots, but the problem arises when you need to make refinements and adjustments to this look to say, oh I actually want to do a hair more contrast or I think a different print curve is actually a better choice. I want to be able to make those adjustments based on the images that I'm seeing pass through this look and not have to remember to manually ripple them across all of the different shots where I have this look going on. So there's a couple of different ways I can do this, but one of the best is to use what Resolve calls shared nodes. So if I right click on this node and I say I want to save this as a shared node now I'm going to right click on it again and I want to change the label of it. I want to give it a bit more of a descriptive name than shared node one. Let's call it look. I now have a node that can be copied and pasted across all of my shots and in any particular shot if I decide I want to go in and refine my look those adjustments are automatically going to ripple out across any other shots where I've pasted this node. So it's a really handy way of deploying a look that's going to stay consistent across all of your shots. So that's strategy number one to deploy your look globally. Strategy number two is to use a fixed node structure. So now that we have our look and we're ready to begin making our per shot individualized adjustments, using a fixed node structure basically means that we use the same process for every shot that we tackle. Let me give you a good example here. So I'm going to close my open effects tab and I'm going to create a couple of prepended serial nodes upstream of my look node, which is generally where I'm going to want to do all of my grading work after I've got that look node in place. So let's go to node three here and let's right click on it and I'm going to label it and I'm going to call it PRIM for primary. This node is where I'm going to do all of my individual contrast exposure adjustments, whatever I feel like the particular shot needs. Maybe it's a little overexposed, maybe it's a little crunchy, whatever the case may be. Next, node number two here, I'm going to right click and I'm going to label this BAL for balance. And this is where I'm going to deal with any initial color adjustments that I want to make. So maybe it's coming in a hair too green or I want to add a little saturation or pull a little saturation. Those are the kinds of adjustments that I'm going to make here in my balance node. And you guys are going to be amazed if you just employ this fixed node structure and stick with it on every shot, how much more efficient and how much more consistent your grades will become. And this leads me right to strategy number three, which is to use a small set of tools. So anytime you're dealing with a large tool set like we have in DaVinci Resolve, there's this subtle but very real pressure to use every knob inside of the software because we want to take full advantage of all the power that's at our fingertips. But the truth of the matter is this really just adds unwanted variability and makes things less efficient for us. So I'm really going to encourage you guys to use a small set of tools when you're grading. Now what that small set of tools is is going to be up to you. You're going to have to spend some time and figure out which tools you're most comfortable with, which tools produce the results that you're happiest with, but once you do you really want to stick with those and remove the variable of using different tools on every shot you encounter in your timeline. So for me it would look something like this. Here in my primary node it's almost always going to be some contrast and some pivot to initially set my exposure and contrast. And then in my balance node it's just going to be a little bit of offset adjustment, maybe in the case of this shot, to cool things off just a hair. But whatever the case may be you really want to find that small set of tools and stick with it for the duration of your project. And the last thing that we're going to do together today is I'm going to reset my balance node for now so that both my primary and my balance node are empty for the time being. And I'm going to go to shot number two and I'm going to shift click all the way to shot number nine and now I'm going to hover over shot number one and I'm going to middle click to paste its grade onto all of these other shots. Now since my primary and my balance nodes were both empty, all that's going to happen to these shots is they are going to take on my shared look node. And as we discussed before, this simply means that for any one of these shots if I go in and adjust the parameters of my look node, those parameters will automatically update on every other shot where I've pasted that look node. So this is a very simple, very practical framework that you guys can put into play on your next project that's going to give you more consistent results. As we've seen today, creating consistency in our grades is as much about what we don't do as what we do. If you can implement some of this basic structure and discipline in your process from the outset, I guarantee you're going to start to see stronger and more consistent results. See you next time.