I just bought it and I've played around with it a little but I'm hoping to grade my short film "Wastage" and make it look super legit for festivals. The problem is, I'm not quite sure how to use everything it offers but it seems like a simpler interface than Apple Color, which I also have.

Right now the film looks really raw and I'm hoping to make it look a bit more finished. Any tips on how to bridge the gap between the "in camera" look and the "looks good on a 56" HDTV" look?

First off, your best bet is to color correct your entire film to be natural color BEFORE adding Magic bullet. Whether you use color corrector in FCP or Color you need to balance your blacks and whites and get everything looking smooth and nice. Then, one that is done add your Magic Bullet look.

Do you know Color? That would be the way to go because you can easily crush your blacks and raise your white levels until they look good and are balanced correctly. The same thing can be done with the 3-way color corrector in FCP, but turn on your waveforms and check your black levels and white levels.

Best of luck.

I agree. Looks does just that, ads a look. It does not grade. If you use Color you will see there are rooms to go from one to the next and the last one is where you add a look. If you don't want to learn Color use the Three way Color Corrector and then looks. If you want to learn Color check out Creative COW's training DVD, Stop Staring and Start Grading with Apple Color: store.creativecow.net/p/66/stop_staring_...ing_with_apple_color