Color Grading 101 - Everything You Need to Know - YouTube
A technical deep-dive into the complete color grading pipeline—from understanding LOG vs RAW capture to ACES workflow and proper LUT usage—that teaches the foundational knowledge separating amateur color work from professional results.
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TLDR
• Shooting in LOG is the sweet spot: preserves highlight/shadow detail like RAW but without massive file sizes, using logarithmic curves to push shadows up and pull highlights down before encoding
• ACES workflow preserves full color range throughout grading by working on original files and only converting to delivery color space (Rec.709, HDR, etc.) at export—avoiding baked-in limitations
• LUTs are tools, not magic: creative LUTs should be applied at 25-50% intensity as a finishing touch, not at 100% which destroys your image
• Scopes (waveform, RGB parade, vectorscope) are more reliable than your eyes—use them to verify exposure, white balance, and skin tone positioning
• Color correction (neutralizing/matching shots) must happen before color grading (creative look), with proper workflow order saving massive time
In Detail
The tutorial establishes that color grading is a systematic technical process, not post-production magic. The workflow has two distinct phases: color correction (harmonizing footage to a neutral base, matching shots, fixing white balance) comes first, then color grading (applying creative look) follows. This order is critical—trying to grade uncorrected footage wastes time and produces inconsistent results.
The core technical insight centers on capture formats and color spaces. Rec.709 (standard 8-bit) clips highlights quickly and limits grading flexibility. RAW captures maximum sensor data (12-14 bit, billions of colors vs millions) but requires enormous storage and complex debayering workflow. LOG profiles are the practical middle ground—they use logarithmic curves to deliberately push shadows up and pull highlights down before encoding to 10-bit video files, preserving detail in both extremes without RAW's file size penalty. The key technique: expose LOG footage as bright as possible without clipping highlights to maximize usable data. ACES workflow takes this further by preserving each clip's full native color gamut throughout grading, only converting to delivery color space (Rec.709 for YouTube, P3-D65 for Netflix, HDR for theatrical) at final export—avoiding baked-in limitations from working in a restricted color space.
The practical grading techniques emphasize precision over guesswork. LUTs are conversion tools (LOG to Rec.709) or creative filters, but should be applied at 25-50% intensity as finishing touches, not slammed at 100%. Scopes provide objective truth: waveform shows exposure clipping, RGB parade reveals color cast imbalances, vectorscope confirms skin tones fall on the proper line. Advanced curve tools enable surgical adjustments—Hue vs Sat for boosting specific color ranges, Sat vs Lum for controlling color intensity in highlights/shadows, Hue vs Hue for shifting skin tone hues without affecting overall image. The demonstrated workflow: apply LOG-to-Rec.709 conversion at final node, color correct first (white balance, exposure, contrast), then grade creatively, then apply LUT as subtle finishing layer.