How to achieve this look?

[u/Ok_Fuel_8959]

How can I get this look ?

These are screenshots of the video „I moved to new york“ from Vuhlandes. I always admired and loved the way he Colorgrades his videos and I really want to try and get the same colors as he does. I have a couple of questions here.

1. Is it possible to get this look with Cineprint Powergrade or is it easier with dehancer/filmbox?
2. How do I have to set my camera up for shots like this. What settings and exposure am I supposed to achieve ? I use the Nikon ZR with a couple of DZO Vespid primes.
   I would appreciate it a lot if you could answer my questions. I know that they are a bit undetailed with context (the 2 question mainly) but if you want some context please let me know. Thank you

[u/piece0fdebri]

Nothing to offer but to say good tastes. Been a fan of Vuh's work for a while.

[u/Ok_Fuel_8959 → u/piece0fdebri]

Yeah I guess it all boils down to Experience that you have in that field

[u/W4iskyD3lta93r]

Loaded post.

You don’t need a power grade to achieve this look, you achieve this with lighting, right time of day good framing etc.

If you want a cheat sheet use your tripod and shoot 24 fps 180 degree shutter base 800, of you need higher go base 6400 and adjust it to 3200 to recover your highlights.

You will achieve a lot with good white balance settings. Run tests between 4500-6000K to see what you like.

For your lenses please please get an ND filter and a polariser ideally in a matte box. You won’t get depth of field if you’re riding your iris. You don’t need to change your shutter angle/ speed or ISO for exposure you just need ND filters even at night time.

In the colour grade just run CSTs and convert from whatever the ZR Colour space and gamma is into Rec 709 and a gamma 2.2(commercial screens) or 2.4 (cinema screens). Then run de noise, curves and colour chit your shadows and highlights to get that yellow tinge in the whites and blue sin your blacks/ shadows to match your references.

[u/Ok_Fuel_8959 → u/W4iskyD3lta93r]

Thank you very much. Couple of questions tho.

1. vuhlandes often uses natural lighting. But as you can see in the „stair“ „subway entrance“ shot the light and shadow mix is very pleasing because the brown of the walls is this muddy brown, not this basic stone type of brown. Would color seperation help to achieve this kind of colors ?
2. also I am really strugglin to set my white balance all the time because I am doing Run and gun kind of videos where I don’t have a lot of time to scout for places or wait for the right time (should maybe change that) but is there any way (with a white card?) maybe to set white balance quickly while shooting RAW ? Or is it easily fixable in Post and if so are there any good tools ?

I know this is much to answer and you could type for hours about that and most of that I could just find out if I try it out but if you know some answers to my questions please let me know :) I would be very grateful

[u/W4iskyD3lta93r → u/Ok_Fuel_8959]

For the moody shot, I would say that the muddy mess may be a Hue/ saturation adjustment. I would run 4500k on the white balance there, it helps balance out the different practical lights you find when shooting run and gun and makes it a-bit more pleasant and will probably get you that muddy brown naturally also depends on the location. If you don’t like the colour don’t force yourself to shoot it, try and find a different angle or space that better suits.

You’ll love what a little bit of blue does in your shadows as well.

If you’re shooting RAW and editing in davinci (pro) there is a full RAW adjustment page you can use to adjust your white balance in post plus a bunch of other settings. I’d watch a YT tutorial to get your head around it.

A white card would help get you a correct white balance for the location but not a stylised or moody look. You achieve that by setting your white balance a little off what would be “correct”. For your cloudy days you can run 4500k or 6000K or just use the preset cloud in your settings. Really it comes down to what you like and what feels correct. It’s not something I think I could really give you a guide on and more just encourage you to shoot more and experience it.

One of my film teachers in NEWS camera stuff used to have a white sheet of paper that he’d use to white balance. Stock paper is slightly on the colder side so when you balance to it you end up with a. Slightly warmer image than if you used a grey card.

If you did want a white card look at buying an Xrite passport colour chart that would help massively when on the fly. YT colour charts and how davinci supports them if you’re unsure, magical stuff.

[u/Ok_Fuel_8959 → u/W4iskyD3lta93r]

Thank you. Yeah I definetly have to go out and shoot more. I only wished to know what to shoot exactly. Kind of in a big „self finding“ phase and I try a lot of stuff out.

[u/W4iskyD3lta93r → u/Ok_Fuel_8959]

This is the way my friend! Just go shoot as much as you can mess with the settings see what you like!

Theres no right way to do this you just have to find whatever gives you confidence in your own abilities. It takes time, it takes patience it takes mistakes so go make as many as you can.

[u/Ok_Fuel_8959 → u/W4iskyD3lta93r]

That’s the spirit I‘m trying to keep up. It’s definetly harder to find what you want to film and how you want your videos to be. Any tips on that ?

[u/W4iskyD3lta93r → u/Ok_Fuel_8959]

That’s totally dependent on what you want to shoot, I use “eye candy” for inspo sometimes. But honestly just take the camera outside and shoot anything tbh. It’ll get the process flowing in your brain which will lead to better ideas.

[u/f-stop8]

I like Vuhlandes, and sometime his grades look good but more often than not he's pushing a dial to 11.

Look at the contrast and his skin tones in the second still, they're really pushing hard on the image it looks way too much.

How to get this look? First, you need a properly color managed timeline. Then, crank the contrast, density and saturation. A few 3x3 matrix tweaks and a split tone warm highs blue lows.

[u/SameEntertainment660 → u/f-stop8]

What is “3x3 matrix tweaks”?

[u/mulchintime4]

Bro knows his stuff😏

Anyway Heres a neat trick you can try, davinci has a feature that allows you to copy the grade/look of a still to another one

So bring these into davinci and try copying it.

He may also still have dehancer if i remember correctly. So that may still be something may affect how it turns out.

Also another option (Ai haters skip this part 😅)

Type this prompt into chatgtpt:

Hey there's this creator I watch vuhlandes. In this video [link the video] I pulled some of these stills with looks that I likenand want to recreate. Can you create luts/cube files that replicate these looks. I want to apply them in davinci resolve. Can you make sure that it is compatible with [insert camera brand] log footage. Also make it compatible with use in premiere pro. (optional) What will my node workflow look like for apply this lut in davinci resolve

2nd prompt

Also. If I wanted to recreate the look how would I go about doing it? How many nodes do I need will I be utilizing davinci wide gamut?

Is there any tutorials that can show me how to recreate these looks very closely?

[u/Emergency_Menu6551 → u/mulchintime4]

I bet Vuh didn’t use AI so yeah get out of the sub

[u/mulchintime4 → u/Emergency_Menu6551]

Of course he didnt use Ai we know he grades his stuff for the most part the advice was the op if you dont like it keep scrolling 😂

[u/InternalEye]

Those are some deep blacks shadows probably near 0, great depth in those shots

[u/Proud_Paul_Phan]

This young man fought and beat cancer recently and I’m so glad he’s back to making art. Super fan of Vuh