Warming up DV footage

[hugoreynolds]

Would love to know how to warm up my DV footage to look more like the glossy stuff you see on tv shows or films. I use imovie and final cut express, are there filters that can achieve the effect ?

 

[LethalWolfe]

Would love to know how to warm up my DV footage to look more like the glossy stuff you see on tv shows or films. I use imovie and final cut express, are there filters that can achieve the effect ?

Yes and no. Most of what makes professional films and TV shows look professional happens during shooting. Typically the only things that are done in post is color correction. For lower budget stuff trying to emulate film people will sometimes apply 24p filters to try and have the 30i footage mimic the 24p frame rate of film (these usually don't look that good) and tweak the contrast just a bit. Also sometimes people will add a bit of color to help achieve a visual effect (if this wasn't already done in production). For example, if have people struggling thru the desert you might want to give the footage a slight orange cast and this will make it feel warmer, where as if you have someone stuck at the North Pole you might want to give it a blue cast to make it feel colder.

There are people that do nothing but tweak and massage the way the video looks (in the video world they are typically referred to as "on-line" or "finishing" editors) so there filters you can use to make the images look better if you know how to properly use them, but there's no "magic filter" that does all the work for you.


Lethal

 

[spicyapple]

You need to use a curves filter, something that's not included in iMovie or FCE, unfortunately. I have a few curve presets I use to create the effect of warming up footage, but I use a combination of Final Cut Pro and Color Finesse.

You may try using the overlay mode with a orange solid and place this overtop the FCE timeline and adjust opacity to taste.

 

[Sharewaredemon]

Lethal when you said there was no "Magic filter" I thought of Magic Bullet, which can help "warm up" your clips a bit.

I actually don't know much about Magic Bullet, is it a 24p effect, or does it do something else.

 

[Carl Spackler]

Would love to know how to warm up my DV footage to look more like the glossy stuff you see on tv shows or films. I use imovie and final cut express, are there filters that can achieve the effect ?

I don't know which effects submenu it's under, but I'd start by adding a little Gamma. It will deepen the blacks and make your highlights pop a little. That should give your images a little more depth. Though I wouldn't exactly describe the end result at "warm" by any means, it will give your footage less of a "video" look.

Magic Bullet Editors is worth a look, but maybe not worth the price, depending on your needs. Nattress Filters and/or Joe's Filters might help and they are priced right.

 

[skimaxpower]

As others have previously mentioned, the best thing to do is get it right during filming:
-Set your white balance (then set it again, and again... in each room ... for each angle.)
-Use good lighting. And lots of it.
-For outdoor shots, remember "good" sun is too much sun. A bright sunny day will BLEACH the hell out of DV.

If we're talking post production, I find that upping the contrast nearly always helps. With color correction, you can get a "warmer feel" by upping the reds/yellows, but be subtle with it.

For DV/video that is converted to black and white, you nearly always need to drastically up the contrast to get a good noir look. For some reason, I prefer the look to the way Adobe After Effects does this to FCP, ... but it's a whole lot harder to do it through After Effects.