Yeah, one problem with Color is it's integration with FCP. I imagine that will be fixed in the newest version of FCS. After all, Apple purchase the application only a few months before they released FCS2, and I'm sure happy they did.

You know, it's that integration with FCP that makes it not worth it for me. I'm a huge fan of "Looks" - the Magic Bullet software mentioned above. I just finished a show on it and found it so intuitive and impressive. Once loaded, you just access it from the Effects Palette, like you do other FCP effects. So, you don't need to go out of FCP, you can continue to make edits and it readjusts, like other FCP effects. It does have extremely cool presets, but you can get right in there and tweak at a very in-depth level, as well. You can stay as simple as you want, and get as complicated as you want. This is all said having an Avid Symphony background, which is a pretty complicated interface.

My ONLY beef is I haven't found a way to have a reference video or still up in Looks, which makes things kind of tricky. If anyone knows how to do this, please let me know.

I would have to agree. I think that color is an amazing stand alone application, but it's like walking into a whole new unfamiliar world, where it's nothing like any of the other final cut studio suite of applications. I think that Apple needs to create tighter integration between all it's applications the way Adobe has in the last three versions of their graphic and video suites, paying particular attention to Color.

Final Cut Studio touts tight integration, but it's still far behind what Adobe has been able to achieve.

cscturulo wrote:


I also love Color. It does have a very different look compared to other Final Cut Studio apps. I've heard this integration complaint before and as a result I was initially afraid Color was so high end that it would only accept DPX files. To my surprise I found it incredibly simple to send a Final Cut Pro sequence to Color, then color correct, add effects, and render it all out, sending it back to Final Cut Pro as a new sequence. I also love work with the node trees.

Works great, got no complaints!

I trust it does work great - I have heard great things about the Color capability as a color corrector. But understand that there are systems/software out there where you don't have to export out of the software and then go into a colour correction software and then render/export out and import back in to your editing software. That's the integration difficulty that was spoken of in previous posts.

I hate to mention the "A-word" but Avid Symphony/Media Composer software is an example. You don't have to render after you colour correct and you can extend mess with your edits after you've coloured, and you don't have to re-export, and then render, then import. IE You don't have to have picture lock before you colour. I don't like to show clients un-coloured work. And this becomes especially significant with the crappy-looking RED footage I've seen. (It NEEDS to be coloured so your client doesn't panic.) So it's really cumbersome to use Color in my workflow.

The Looks software I mentioned also has this capability (except I did have to render). That's why it's awesome to have it on the FCP system.

The 3-way color corrector along with other filters found in FCP compares to anything I've seen in Avid or any other NLE. FCP lets you view your scopes so you can get color correcting to an exact science.

Color is a more serious app. It competes with high end color grading suites like the Da Vinci but at an unbeatable price point. It cannot just be a simple plugin like Magic Bullet Looks. I defend the current integration of Color in the FCS suite. The workflow on any other comparable system makes you deal with importing/exporting XML data, DPX files, or footage from telecine HDCAM SR tapes. Color on the other hand lets you keep working on your current Final Cut editing system and takes care of things like XML data automatically for you so you can just focus on being creative.

I forgot to mention in my last post that I found making changes after going back to FCP incredibly simple. I just relaunched Color, made some changes, rendered it, and it was automatically relinked in FCP. Simple.

After I got over my fear of Color's workflow I found color correcting to go much faster than it did compared to when I only used what was available in FCP. I still use the 3-way color corrector in FCP when it's something simple, but when I need something more serious done Color is the way to go.

As far as RED footage goes, RED provides RED ALERT! and REDCINE for a reason. Using those apps as a first pass at color correction should reassure any client.

I really like the fact that Color looks nothing like the other FCS apps. It looks exactly like other grading applications that i have seen and i think in higher-end uses it makes a client who is accustomed to those programs comfortable. I think the interface can be challenging to grasp at first, but the ability to learn these higher programs keeps me working i think. besides do you really want a program with as much backbone as color has to have a bubblegum wrapper, just to carry a theme through the FCS.

My Thoughts
Thompson

Very unbeatable price point. I got the cost of Final Touch (Color before it got purchased by Apple) from Walter Biscardi :

$1,000 for SD

$5,000 for HD

$25,000 for 2K

Color is the 2K version of Final Touch.

That basically means you get Color for free. That is a hard to argue with price point.

For the sake of others on this user group, I want to correct some misinformation in an earlier post:

An Avid Symphony has been considered a defining color correction (color grading, whatever you choose to call it) system for years. It is a "serious app" with secondary colour correction/grading ability. It is most definitely on the level of and a competitor of Apple's Color software. It is not in the same league as the basic FCP 3-way Color Corrector. It is fully integrated into the Avid software and you don't leave the software to use it or run into the trimming issues/render issues you do with Color.

Price difference is unquestionably higher, which is why Color is preferable when you consider the pocketbook. But since I don't pay for the systems I work with and I have both, I much prefer the Symphony to Color, only because of the integration. I wasn't knocking Color's ability as a color correction/grading software. If the lack of integration doesn't affect your workflow like it does mine, then Color is clearly the software of choice. If someone can give me another reason as to why I should use Color over the Symphony despite workflow and price, I'm open to hearing it -- that's what these forums are for!

My other point was in my experience Looks did what I needed to do without the nuisance of lack of integration in Color. Again, I wasn't arguing that it was "better" than Color. I was simply suggesting it as a great alternative if Color workflow wasn't workable for editors in a similar situation as mine -- when color correction/grading needs to happen early on in the editing process and the client is constantly changing his/her mind until final output.