Lesson 4 · 17 min
Shots generated on different days and in different tools arrive with different colors, and raw AI imagery has telltale marks: aggressive contrast, oversaturated color, crushed flat blacks. Color correction matches the shots and gives the film a single look. You leave with the recipe written down, and it works in any editor.
Start the lesson
Goal: write the film's color recipe: feeling, palette, contrast, blacks, temperature, saturation, skin and grain, the same in every shot.
Five steps, in this order. Click each one.
Save the look in a color file (LUT, .cube extension) or in an editor preset, and apply the same one to every shot.
In the batch edit (lesson 3), in any editor with color adjustment.
In the prompt, ask for the scene's light and palette (course 0, lesson 4), not the finishing. A neutral image, with neutral skin and shadows that keep detail, accepts any look later.
Raw AI imagery tends to arrive with aggressive contrast, strong red and orange color and pure black. Those three points are what color correction tackles first.
Pick the best-looking shot as your reference and match the others to it: brightness, temperature and contrast. Always compare with the neighboring shot, not the shot on its own.
In the first batch, the street is cold and the bakery is neutral. The change happens in a single cut, on purpose, not gradually shot by shot.
Complementary cold and warm give tension; warm, earthy and soft gives intimacy; desaturated with high contrast feels heavy; clean steel blue feels technical.
Clashing combinations, like pastel with neon, break the film. Write the palette in one line and hold every shot to the same one.
Grain goes last, fine or coarse depending on the feeling, never on top of grain that already came with the clip. Halation only where there is strong, visible light, like the lit shop window.
Aspect ratio communicates: 2.39:1 feels like cinema, 16:9 is TV and web, 9:16 is phone. Black bars (letterbox) on a 16:9 give a cinema look without changing the file.
The recipe the page checks, and a request for the AI assistant to propose a recipe from your scene.
Feeling: <what the audience should feel> Palette: <dominant colors and where they appear> Contrast: <low, medium or high; how> Blacks: <lifted or crushed; and the whites> Temperature: <cold, neutral or warm; where does it change?> Saturation: <low, medium or high; which color leads> Skin: <how the skin looks> Grain: <fine, medium or coarse; the same in every shot>
You are a film colorist. From the scene and the feeling below, propose a color recipe with exactly these 8 lines: Sensação, Paleta, Contraste, Pretos, Temperatura, Saturação, Pele, Grão. Rules: - one palette for the whole film; - neutral skin, no pull toward orange; - blacks slightly lifted and whites not blown out, unless the feeling calls for something else; - grain applied last, the same in every shot; - do not cite a film, director or brand as a reference. Cena: <the scene in 3 or 4 sentences> Sensação: <what the audience should feel>
Paste the file (or upload the .txt). Test first with the example that passes and the example with errors.
Only for people who already use a terminal. In the course folder downloaded from GitHub; for your own file, replace --exemplo with its name (cor.txt).
python3 conferir.py cor --exemplo; echo "saída: $?" python3 conferir.py cor --errado; echo "saída: $?"
$ python3 conferir.py cor --exemplo; echo "saída: $?" OK: receita de cor com 8 campos saída: 0
$ python3 conferir.py cor --errado; echo "saída: $?" Ainda não. O que falta: - Falta a linha Pretos: com a descrição (pelo menos 4 letras). - Falta a linha Pele: com a descrição (pelo menos 4 letras). - Falta a linha Grão: com a descrição (pelo menos 4 letras). saída: 1
Your film's recipe and the scene 3 edit with the look applied.
Write the eight lines of the recipe for your film. Paste it into "Check your color recipe" and download the cor.txt to the project folder.
Done when: the page answers OK: receita de cor com 8 campos and the cor.txt is in the project folder.
In the editor, apply the recipe to the lesson 3 edit (before burning in the subtitles): first match the shots, then contrast and color, and grain last. Export again as MP4 H.264 and check the file in lesson 3.
Done when: the "Check your edit" section in lesson 3 answers OK: … for the file with color, and the file is in the project folder next to the cor.txt.
Four questions. The explanation appears after each answer.
Question 1 of 4
Why ask the generator for a neutral image and add the look only in the edit?
Question 2 of 4
Shot 3 came out warmer than shots 2 and 4. What do you do before applying the look?
Question 3 of 4
When does halation (the reddish glow around a light) make sense?
Question 4 of 4
Your recipe says "Saturation: high, to grab attention". What does the lesson suggest?
Choose an answer. The explanation appears after you try.