darktable ep 093 - Another video on colour grading

[@pronoe]

I personally use the colour balance for color grading, this gives me more flexibility in the colours I choose and their saturation. Very handy to apply the good ol' teal and orange colour grade.

[@audio2u]

Each to their own! :) The Color Balance RGB module is amazing.

[@pronoe]

@@audio2u Absolutely, everyone has their own workflow, that's the beauty of darktable. I was talking about the "Color balance" module though, not the RGB one. I only use the RGB one to improve my contrast a bit and my color vibrance. I use the built-in preset "add basic colorfulness" with some tweaking here and there on almost all my shots .

[@audio2u]

Aurélien suggests NOT using the contrast slider in the color balance RGB module, because it will not respect the white relative exposure and black relative exposure settings on filmic RGB (if you used that module). I have a video coming later this week in color balance RGB.

[@pronoe]

@@audio2u Awesome, looking forward to it. Thank you for all your work :)

[@jonscawin9531]

Hi Bruce. Another great video, thanks. A suggestion for a future video. When out and about, or on holiday, taking pictures that include the Mrs and perhaps also our female friends I sometimes get comments that the photos are too sharp and facial skin blemishes stand out too much (it doesn't bother me but the ladies seem to differ). Since we are both well into our 60s our skin no longer looks the way it once did :-). How would you go about (subtly) smoothing these away (to some extent, don't want that awful BoTox look)? Obviously the retouch module has a place for small discreet blemishes (and works very well) but other modules may help - soften? Bloom? Grain? Any thoughts? For the record, I use a Fuji X-H1 with the XF16-55 f2.8 almost welded to it, and that is one sharp lens.

[@audio2u]

Yep, that could be a video!

[@LucaOrlandi]

Well done! I already watched Joanna Kustra's video and I couldn't really find my way in darktable to follow her advice, I'll give a chance to colorize module in the way you show'd it.

[@audio2u]

Cheers!

[@Giles29]

This is great. Color Zones also might prove useful in following Joanna's suggestions in some cases.

[@audio2u]

Fair enough!

[@Giles29]

I'd second the recommendation for Joanna's video. I don't use half of what I learned on there, but its very informative.

[@audio2u]

Was this about affinity photo?

[@Giles29]

@@audio2u It was the color theory video that you mentioned in this one by Joana Kustra

[@audio2u]

Right!

[@-_8438]

Hi Bruce, thank you for another very informative video. Now in the photo you used the complementary color to orange and disregarded green. In a portrait, it's probably normal to use the face color, but how do you make that decision? From the color area, green is also very much in the foreground.... and how would you make the decision here? Greetings from Germany Marcus

[@audio2u]

As I said in the video, my first priority was to get the skin tone of her face looking "normal", which required balancing out the cyan hue. Hence why I went the way I did. Again, there's no right and wrong here... It's subjective. You might choose to focus on different colors, and that's ok. As long as you understood the process, that's the main thing.

[@joaovtaveira]

These "import" panel features look like absolutely awesome. I can't wait to use them.

[@audio2u]

In 3.6? Yeah, it's certainly better, but I feel like there's still room for improvement. I'll be sticking with rapid photo downloader for now.

[@joaovtaveira]

@@audio2u no, in the version you are using here, I think it is 3.5.0, but still not the final one, nor and not the one that will be released, obviously (I forgot to mention that). And yes, I think one thing critical that is missing is "import files recursively".

[@audio2u]

That is there.

[@joaovtaveira]

@@audio2u oh, that's great, that can't be seen. I'm sure that that will be great in the 3.6 final version.

[@hurshasnarayan]

Bruce, do you always use the default "Exposure Module" that Darktable recommends for your Camera/Lens type? I remember an episode where you turn it off and use "Tone Curve" module and other modules before further postprocessing the raw picture. Thanks.

[@audio2u]

For a basic exposure adjustment, yes, I use the exposure module. You could use the basic adjustments module, but I think that is still using the exposure module code behind the scenes. I don't remember using the tone curve module in place of exposure, but ok! I guess you could, but I'm not sure it's going to make much difference (unless you were adjusting separate channels in the tone curve module).

[@ErebosGR]

Raise the oranges in the highlights, raise the blues in the shadows, desaturate the whites and the blacks = Instant "cinematic" color grade

[@audio2u]

Yep! 😃

[@mmusabozturk]

16:11 understanding this episode

[@audio2u]

Cheers.

[@mickehog76]

Sounds like you have a cold. Have you tried the last version of lightroom? ;). Take care. I hope you will feel better soon.

[@audio2u]

Thankfully, I didn't, but I was sounding a bit froggy! 😃

[@mmusabozturk]

Yeni bir şeyler daha öğrendik. Teşekkürler.

[@audytor111]

👍👍👍

[@joaovtaveira]

5:23 the right meaning is, definitely, "convert to orange".

[@audio2u]

Fair enough!

[@christianfandel6963]

Theory: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_wheel

[@audio2u]

I should probably read that, too! :)

[@1290DR]

I pushed the thump up Button before I even watched the vid, just because about every video of Bruce is awesome and once again I was not mistaken...

[@audio2u]

Hehe...thanks!

[@francois17290]

Thank's Bruce, D'habitude tu parles moins vite, pour les mauvais en langue, c'est plus facile ;)

[@audio2u]

I have no idea what that means, sorry.

[@francois237]

@@audio2u Sorry Bruce, I forgot the Google translation "Usually you speak less quickly, for the bad at language, it is easier " Cordialy

[@audio2u]

Cheers!

[@pronoe]

Translation: "Usually you speak slower for those you don't speak english, it's easier." Francois, tu peux utiliser les sous-titre qui sont tres bien fait. Je ne sais pas si la traduction Francaise est bonne par contre.

[@francois237]

Bonjour @@pronoe et merci. Je le fais généralement, bien que pour un Australien il soit bien compréhensible, mais le souci est qu'il faut guetter la traduction et ce qui change sur le tuto, donc rapidement fatiguant.

[@timoteiafanasie4894]

Don't change cigarettes so often. It hurts your voice 😜

[@audio2u]

Bwahaha! I don't smoke! :)

[@timoteiafanasie4894]

@@audio2u maybe you put more than 4 ice cubes in your whiskey. This could be very dangerous for health.