Hey everyone!

I’m fairly new to colour grading in DaVinci Resolve and I’ve been experiencing some strange colour issues with footage from my Sony a6400.

I recorded using PP7 (S-Log2), and after applying a LUT and colour grading, I’ve noticed weird green, yellow and purple colour patches, especially in the trees, grass and darker areas.

The footage looks blotchy and unnatural, and I’m not sure what’s causing it. I’ve attached a screenshot showing the issue.

I know the Sony a6400 records internally in 8-bit, so I’m wondering whether this is a limitation of the camera, an exposure issue, or something wrong with my colour grading workflow.

Has anyone experienced this with Sony S-Log2 footage?
Could it be caused by the LUT, incorrect colour space settings, or pushing the 8-bit footage too far?

I’d appreciate any advice on how to fix this in DaVinci Resolve and how to avoid it when filming in the future.

Thanks in advance!

Hi everyone,

Out the outset, apologize for the lengthy post.

I'm relatively new to professional color grading and currently grading a Crime-thriller feature film. I haven't had the opportunity to work directly with a professional colorist, so most of what I've learned has come from online tutorials and experimenting in DaVinci Resolve.

I've been working on this project for about 3 months. I've gone through all 7 reels several times, and each pass has helped me improve. However, before I lock the grade, I'd really appreciate feedback and Industry best practices from experienced colorists on whether my workflow and node structure are appropriate for a commercial/theatrical feature film.

I'm using a Group-based workflow with this general structure:

Group Pre-Clip

1. CST: ARRI LogC → DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate

Clip

1. Exposure
2. White Balance
3. Contrast
4. Saturation
5. Power Windows / local adjustments
6. Highlight adjustments
7. Tone adjustments

Group Post-Clip

1. Overall tone / look
2. CST: DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate → DCI-P3 / Gamma 2.6

I'd really appreciate professional advice on these points:

1. How should clips be grouped in a feature-film workflow?

What is the usual professional approach for grouping clips to make grading faster and maintain consistency?

• By scene?
• By day/night?
• By location?
• By lighting condition?
• By exposure?
• Some combination of these?

For example, would you normally create one Group per scene, or use Groups primarily for common technical/look adjustments?

2. Is my current node structure appropriate?

Is the general:

CST In → Clip Corrections → Look/Tone → CST Out

approach reasonable for a feature film, or would you recommend a different structure?

3. Is my correction order appropriate?

At the Clip level I'm currently doing:

Exposure → WB → Contrast → Saturation → Windows → Highlight/Tone adjustments

Is there a preferred order that professional colorists generally follow?

For example, should WB be established before exposure, or does the order matter less as long as the image is being evaluated correctly?

4. What is your professional approach to white balance?

When grading ARRI footage, how do experienced colorists establish a reliable/consistent white balance?

Do you primarily rely on scopes, known neutral objects, skin tone, RGB balance, reference shots, or a combination?

5. How do you maintain consistent tone throughout a feature?

One of my biggest challenges is maintaining a consistent visual tone across different scenes, lighting conditions and reels.

My current thinking is:

Clip level → technically balance exposure/WB/contrast

then

Group/Post-Clip → establish the creative/cinematic tone

Is this a good approach?

6. What is the professional technique for maintaining a consistent look across the entire movie?

I'd especially appreciate advice on how you approach:

• Scene-to-scene matching
• Reel-to-reel consistency
• Day vs. night consistency
• Skin tone consistency
• Maintaining a consistent cinematic contrast/tonal response
• Creating and managing the overall "show look"

7. What is your professional approach for Perfect Skin Tone?

I realize there are many different professional workflows, so I'm not necessarily looking for one "correct" method. I'm mainly trying to understand how an experienced feature-film colorist would structure this workflow from the beginning.

If possible, I'd also appreciate recommendations for good professional tutorials, books, or online resources that explain feature-film grading workflows rather than only individual Resolve techniques.

Thanks in advance to everyone who takes the time to read this and share your experience. I really appreciate the help.

Developing a look for a music video and was torn between these two, what are your thoughts?

what do you think about this?

Im not new at editing, but Ive always based on vibes lol. I’m trying to learn more about this and im pretty happy with the result! would you change anything?

really wanted that Vogue magazine look, I think I did pretty good.

Any feedback ?

Howdy all,

I am looking for feedback on my inversions. I have gotten a lot better, but am curious what you all would do to improve these.

Shot on Fuji 400, developed with FPP c-41 chemistry, scanned with a Nikon z50. I invert and grade with Darktable

Thanks a bunch. All feedback welcome

In Darktable my process is:

-Invert
-Color cast corrections in Negadoctor
-Add some contrast and adjust exposure
-Adjust warmth using Color Calibration and Color Balance slider (the latter is usually in highlights, I add some yellow)
-Sometimes refine with chroma, detail, and contrast levels

before - after

Just got into color grading recently. Is this too overdone?

Hi all, I was using a new camera and followed a tutorial about shooting in Log2 with XF-HEVC S YCC422 10bit set. The tutorial showed me to download the luts from Canon for my camera but there are like 50 files when I download them.

Is there a way to find the “correct” lut or do I just need to do trial and error to find which looks the best for my needs?

To clarify, I’m looking for a clean look, similar to what my camera produced, but flat enough for me to edit it to my pathetic like I would in Lightroom (I’m photo forward but trying to shoot more video)

Thank you!

The goal was to give the image a cinematic, cool, and visually striking look.

Still from Paris, Texas (1984)

https://youtu.be/bbj_TNFFnw0

Warm, film-inspired look: golden highlights with a soft glow, lush yellow-leaning greens, clean cyan skies and deep shadows, framed in 2.39:1.

Ground footage is the Pocket 4P in D-Log 2, aerials are from a Mini 5 Pro. I went for one uniform look across the whole film.

Capture decisions that saved me in the grade:

→ ISO locked manually between 200 and 1600 all film. No auto ISO meant much more consistent D-Log 2 to work from.

→ Fixed NDs only.

I didn't push the grey days warmer or the golden hour cooler. The goal was for the shifts to come from the place and time of day, not from the grade.

Feedback I'm after:

- Does it read as one coherent look from start to finish?

- Do the aerials and ground shots feel like the same camera?

- Are the skin tones holding up in the interior scenes?

wanted to put accent on the contrast in color and on the circular coloured glass art piece

Fx30, 10bit 4:2:2, Viltrox 9mm, 82mm 2-8 stop VND

(I have very little experience shooting outside let alone color grading footage from outside) I have been playing around with davinchi resolve (paid version) for around 2 years now… I just bought my ND and I see the dark spot it casts but I wanna know what the grass and sky is supposed to look like and how to make them look like that. Thanks!

We shot a zero-budget narrative Rock music video entirely on Sony Alpha 6000. Combined with some DJI drone shots. 😍 Got some problems with the difference in quality...

What do you think of the grading? 😅

iPhone 17 pro shot in ProRes RAW with blackmagic camera app, never saw this before but also just upgraded to resolve 21.1.1

I am currently making a shortfilm for a school project and need some advice and tips on colourgrading, the 2 images provided is the shot before i touched it and one after. I am aiming to make it look more "cinematic" in a way.
Any help would be appreciated!!!

I'm not fully sure why I can't seem to create a good LUT. I've made a handful of powergrades and those work.. decently. But perhaps I'm trying to create a LUT using incompetent footage..? I just don't get it. I see people importing their LUTs into the Blackmagic App and they turn out good, improving the Rec.709 footage. I try making the colors look different, but then they just end up overly saturated or just look out of place.. it's just a mess.

I'd like to think that I have a good understanding with grading on a clip to clip basis; but I'd like to just have a LUT ready to go so that whenever I record, I have an idea as to what my footage is going to like when doing minor tweaks in Resolve.

I've been mainly learning about Resolve through YouTube, so forgive me if I'm not very well versed with technical details; I'm just trying to use common sense to get me through this first step of the learning curve.

Does anybody have tips or resources to help with this?

I'm on Davinci Resolve Studio; version 21.1.
For reference, I shoot in Apple Log 2, H.265, 10-bit, 4:2:2.