Stage 3: Color grading

 Blue - green color mask

As the general consensus and out own artistic choice, we decided to color grade our product a tint of blue and green, as it's also fitting to the sunset atmosphere

This is the first color grading draft, done by Rene and Zon Zon (26/3)

        Rene and Zon Zon worked together (and seperately, to reflect and choose the better version). They both use the Davinci Resolve. This program interface is very visually assisted and having a lot of choices, with is crucial for us in intermediary between beginner and casual users. 

            As the poll result roll out, we were hesitating on both green and blue color grading, or the mixture of two when dealing with frames with different lighting due to the time of the day, as well as camera setting of ISO and apenture. Filming outside makes us not having a preset setting, but adjust accordingly due to the daytime and color.  

            It is worth noting that Rene and Zon Zon were really anticipated in this task, as they both edit the progression and color correct onwards, through using their base knowledge and constantly watching, reading, rereading more tutorials, and consult with our teacher for the best adjustment. Flowers to my teammates. 

• Left:  Rene color grading the first rendition, with blue midtone and green highlight
• Right: Zon Zon's first rendtion, with green midtone and orange highlight (due to natural sunset lighting)

________

Some issues we identified while color grading:

• Color correction before color grading. A few of our footage was under saturated or overly bright, so that we had to adjust the general correction of saturation and white balance beforehand, to have a more consistent roll out when we color graded, as well as saving more time when moving on to color grading. 
• Inconsistency of time was harder to ignore than we anticipated while filming (and refilming). The scene in the alleyway, although appeared later, was brighter than the running sequence, and no color correction could salvage that. A proposal of mixing of day and night time in the plot was raised, but the majority of us thought that it was even harder to convey and visualize than commiting to a time frame of sunset until night time. 
• Midtone, highlights and shadows were inconsistent from frame to frame, as some frame having a predominantly yellow and pink midtone and highlights (in Rene's photo), and some with orange (in Zon Zon references). Therefore, adjusting the shadows and tint of the overall frame would also shift the midtone and highlights, which would have to be adjust by hand accordingly to have consistent color as a whole
• Color wheel and curves: Are different in color adjustment, as color wheel address the midtone, highlights and shadow overally, the curve tackle each color pixel with component of RBG to underlay the image. In different frame, we would want to adjust the curves first, then reeling the color wheel.
• Noises: In heavy editing and color correction, noises were prevalent in our video, especially in area of the alleyway when there is artificial lighting. We fixed some of it in Adobe Premiere Pro, using the Median tool in Effects, but subsequently would blur out harsh outline, making the frame less realistic. 

    ➡️➡️ In general, this first rendition helps us with visualization of our end product would be, and assess the mood of the production. We learned a lot about the knowledge and skillset for color grading, as well as looking at out product in more details (which lead us to decide to reshoot the alleyway scene), and more artistic decisions, such as mixing of green and blue, and shifting to a predominantly green afterwards.