I have an old .xls file from the mid 2000s that was made with information correcting Film_Rec from a Varicam camera. I'm trying to figure out how to get this information into either Davinci Resolve Lite 11 or Apple Color 1.5 to use with Film Rec material.

I just had a lengthy discussion about LUTs with a close friend who manages the edit teams at LinkedIn. We both agree, LUTs are basically modern-day eye-candy to sell product or add-ons.

The problem with using any LUT is that you're literally adding a color filter into a timeline or as part of the finishing process, rather than using classic color-correcrion techniques to create your final look.

It's like using any auto feature on the camera, it won't fix problems and gives the novice a false sense of security that the automation will "just work" and look good.

Best advice is to learn proper color correction and finishing techniques and if need be, create presets in your NLE to replicate the look consistently in your timeline.

There are deeper reasons LUTs are counterproductive but that's a long conversation.

OMG, you and your ill-informed friend are so wrong you don't even have any idea what the hell you're talking about. LUTs are extremely useful as a first step in color grading, particularly if one has shot with LOG or RAW. Obviously, dropping a LUT on footage is not the end, it's just one part of color grading, but a very important and time-saving tool.

It's also possible to grade without a LUT, but to call LUTs just "modern-day eye-candy to sell product or add-ons" just shows your ignorance. Most LUTs can be downloaded for free and are much more than eye candy. It's okay to be ignorant, but best not to offer advice to others when you have no experience about something you are speaking about.

It's funny that you advocate for using presets, but that's exactly what some LUTs are -- just presets Make up your mind. Do you have any professional color grading experience whatsoever? May I ask with which cameras and what software you use for grading?

The problem with using any LUT is that you're literally adding a color filter into a timeline or as part of the finishing process, rather than using classic color-correcrion techniques to create your final look...

it won't fix problems and gives the novice a false sense of security that the automation will "just work" and look good.

There are deeper reasons LUTs are counterproductive but that's a long conversation.

On the surface of it, I would agree with your comments. They are someone else's preset. Whilst LUTs can be very useful, they can have major drawbacks unless you know the background of the LUT's creation. Some of which are banding and out of gamut color handling. Creative LUTs for a final look are one thing, but technical LUTs that don't match the maths of the files being processed can be quite damaging if used incorrectly.

All this becomes a major consideration if you are editing high-end 12 and 16-bit video files. So many people working with these formats are using LUTs that were developed for the 8 and 10-bit world. Using these LUTs can cause major quantization errors.

For every brightness or color value in an image, which can change dramatically from scene to scene, has a numerical value assigned for it to be stored into a video file. And for a LUT to work, you need to have a matching value in that LUT for every single value in the image. If you don’t have enough values in the LUT, the nearest available value will be assigned to unmatched values in the image. This will cause artefacts.

Because this has become more of a problem in later years with development of cameras with greater dynamic range and bit depth FRAME.IO has issued a web page on their site outlining some of the pros and cons of LUTs and the pros and cons of the ACES workflow.

Rather than go over well trodden ground, it's probably best to check out FRAME.IO's page, which fairly concisely covers the subject.

All said and done. LUTs are used extensively on movie sets to approximate an end 'look' but 95% of movie post is done using CSTs and the ACES workflows as they are dynamic and not locked to the inflexible values locked into a table. Which is what a LUT is, a lookup table. Using transforms and the ACES workflow ensures that you can extract the maximum values and bit depth out of the footage being graded.

For example, with Davinci Resolve. The CSTs in that NLE are based on the exact sensor data supplied by the camera manufacturers to ensure a mathematically correct transfer of that data to a chosen color space.

Chris Young

https://blog.frame.io/2020/04/27/luts-vs-transforms/

https://frame.io/

And these might help …

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Cheers.

OMG, you and your ill-informed friend are so wrong you don't even have any idea what the hell you're talking about. LUTs are extremely useful as a first step in color grading, particularly if one has shot with LOG or RAW. Obviously, dropping a LUT on footage is not the end, it's just one part of color grading, but a very important and time-saving tool.

It's also possible to grade without a LUT, but to call LUTs just "modern-day eye-candy to sell product or add-ons" just shows your ignorance. Most LUTs can be downloaded for free and are much more than eye candy. It's okay to be ignorant, but best not to offer advice to others when you have no experience about something you are speaking about.

It's funny that you advocate for using presets, but that's exactly what some LUTs are -- just presets Make up your mind. Do you have any professional color grading experience whatsoever? May I ask with which cameras and what software you use for grading?

Brother, your reply is rude and borderline reason to cut you off from the forum. Chris frowns heavily on head-smacking people regardless how strongly you may feel about your opinions. Careful with your language in the future.

Secondly, the guy I'm referring to is the head of live production at LinkedIn. They just spent millions of dollars on creating a near-perfect color correct schema for the entire company so the output color looks correct and proper regardless who's shooting or editing. No LUTs were part of the process.

In fact the color science he created was recently adopted by Adobe and was reelased live to the world for anyone with a current PP license as part of the finishing module.

So I highly doubt these people and that kind of money represents ignorance of any kind.

We both agree, LUTs are basically modern-day eye-candy to sell product or add-ons.

I don't really care who your friend is or how many millions he spent on setting up his operation. If he doesn't want to use LUTs there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Nobody has to use LUTs. But to characterize LUTs as "basically modern-day eye-candy to sell product or add-ons", is so off the mark it is amazing you actually posted it. If you believe what YOU wrote, you are completely wrong and ill-informed and it needs to be called out as asinine information that might unduly influence others to make poor decisions. If you don't believe what you wrote, then you shouldn't have posted it in the first place. Either way, I make no apologies, brother. Stay in your lane.