Wednesday, April 18, 2012

N A B and Colour-Grading

Some of you may think that the letters NAB stands for the North American Brewery association. At ColorBurst Video, we know that NAB is the National Association of Broadcasters convention in Las Vegas, an annual extravaganza of "all things video."

When we first attended in the late '70s, it was a huge convention primarily aimed at big-dollar broadcasters, station owners, and networks. Over the years, it has grown to include the various cable networks, large and small content creators, and the various content delivery folks like Netflix and YouTube. From low-quality cellphone video to 8K theatrical movie cameras, from desktop editing systems to room-filling server-farms, if it has to do with moving images the latest-and-greatest is always unveiled at the NAB.

This year is no exception and, while ColorBurst is too small to have a booth on the exhibit floor, we are nearly overwhelmed at all the new goodies being displayed and discussed in several venues up-and-down the Vegas Strip. There are talks and presentation from industry leaders and trendsetters, technology gurus, and content creators, new equpment and upgrades, and miles of exhibits and salesfolks. There is no way anyone can see it all, so even reading about NAB 2012 requires careful planning and selection.

For ColorBurst, we're limiting ourselves to editing and postproduction. Adobe is there, of course, taking the wraps off Creative Suite 6. It generates a lot of very positive response by everyone who sees it. Overall, it looks a major step forward from the Adobe team. Canon is showing off the new C500 camera (an up-spec'ed C300) and new EOS 1Dc with new PL and EF mount zooms and primes. And... and... and...

Rather than my list of stuff you can learn about elsewhere, let me give my opinion of what seems to be a big theme at NAB:

--> NAB 2012 may be remembered as the year that advanced colour grading goes mainstream <--

Color-grading, where tint and exposure is corrected, contrast is enhanced, lighting effects are tweaked, and colors are made to... well, drool, is what separates home-movies from cinema and makes moving images feel so authentic.

Dating back to the linear post days, colour grading was done in expensive editing/grading suites with rates that could go well north of $1,000 an hour. It wasn't until the late 90s that we saw the start of advanced colour correction tools on the desktop. Today, for a small investment, you can have a post colour grading and finishing solution that will make everything else look like old VHS tape by comparison -- editor, colour grader and motion graphics via After Effects, all in one unified system with a seamless workflow.

ColorBurst has always been about making great-looking video to tell personal stories in a compelling way. Based on what's happening at this year's NAB, it looks like it can now be done with modest skills and means.

We certainly live in interesting times.

Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Star Wars Crawl Creator Free Released!

Back in 2010, we posted about a Star Wars Crawl Creator you could use for fun. It doesn't look like you can easily download or export the crawl video when you are done, but it was still fun.

Soon afterwards, Foley Productions commented about a free iPhone / iPad application that lets you create the crawl and actually save it as a video. Checking back into it today, I've found that they have released a free version of Crawl Creator. Do you have an iOS device? Go have fun with it!

Coming Up on ColorBurst

You may have noticed very few updates at ColorBurst over the last few weeks. That's because we've been working on the changes we have planned for later in the year. ColorBurst is all about making good–looking video and we have developed some new techniques to improve existing video. We'll be showing some examples of the types of improvements that can be made. Then we will follow that with a small series of tutorials showing you how to improve your video. For instance, we'll show you how to take an old video (like the one at the left) that is too dark and noisy, has weak color, wrong color balance, and poor-framing ...

....and quickly make it look like it was shot with a better camera, better lighting, and correct framing.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Top Ten Video Editing Software Programs

Host Rich Bonaduce rolls us through a quick list of the Top Ten Video Editing Software Programs from TopTenReviews.com.

Now you don't have to call in a favor from a friend to make your movies shine. With video editing software, you can produce your own professional looking videos and share them with friends and family.

Thursday, April 05, 2012

Is it Real or Special Effects?

Here's a marketing video for a touch sensitive flexible LCD screen. First let me say that I want to live in the future where this is possible. The video shows a bunch of cool concept products digitally created in a 3D program of some kind, perhaps CAD.

However, the video concludes with Mariel Van Tatenhove, the Director of Marketing, showing off what is supposed to be a real working prototype. I was real excited... until I looked a little closer.

You may have to watch it more than once. But if you are eagle-eyed, you'll notice the green tinges around her hand. You might also notice that when she is writing with her stylus on the screen, the text is hidden by her hand. I'm guessing she is holding a green prop and all of the simulated screen images were added in later.

But I could be wrong. What do you think? Comment below.