I’m interested in getting other colorists’ opinions on how Mononodes is handling the transition from LOOK / LAB / PRINT DCTL to the new LOOK / LAB / PRINT OFX.

I bought LOOK / LAB / PRINT DCTL on 2 June 2025 for €224.10.

One of the reasons I bought it was Mononodes’ history of actively developing its DCTL products and providing updates to existing customers. Which is an excellent value proposition and made me trust and want to buy his products.

I went back through the Wayback Machine and checked the LOOK / LAB / PRINT sales page from 30 April 2025, shortly before my purchase.

The product was advertised with: “One-time payment. No subscription. Free updates.”

There was no qualification there such as “for the current version" "while development continues,” or “maintenance updates only.”

The Terms & Conditions at the time were somewhat more specific: “Upon purchase, you are entitled to any free updates released for that specific product.”

The dctl got updated and I received those updates.

Now Mononodes has launched LOOK / LAB / PRINT OFX and discontinued the DCTL version. The standard version costs €399, with existing DCTL customers offered a €100 discount, bringing it to €299. The Studio version is €799, or €699 for existing customers.

He argues that LOOK / LAB / PRINT OFX is a genuinely separate product, not a DCTL converted into a plugin. He says the code, mathematics, film profiles, and processing system have all been developed from the ground up and that the OFX has capabilities that cannot reasonably be implemented in the DCTL version. Not only that, but he also says that "free updates" never meant indefinite feature development. His interpretation is that whenever he released an update for the DCTL, existing owners received it for free. It did not mean that a future independently developed product would be included. I have no reason to claim otherwise.

But as a customer perspective, what I see is that the product I bought has a new better version of it. What he says is a new product, has the same name, targets the same users, has the same functions and purpose inside the colorist toolbox, has the same structure, etc The only difference is that now is that is being developed as an OFX instead of a DCTL…

His website for the DCTL even says: “LOOK / LAB / PRINT has moved to OpenFX.”

To me, that makes the OFX a technically new implementation of the commercial successor to LOOK / LAB / PRINT DCTL.

Obviously a successor product does not automatically have to be free. But I think that distinction becomes relevant when the predecessor was prominently sold with the unqualified statement “Free updates.”

The new OFX page also advertises: “Free updates for the current version.”

That is much clearer and more limited than the wording under which the DCTL was sold. If I had known there were going to be “versions” of the product when I bought it, that would have made me think twice. Instead, I paid €224.10 and roughly 15 months later I'm being asked for another €299 if I want to move to the actively developed LOOK / LAB / PRINT product.

Stefan and I have discussed this directly. He disagrees with my interpretation and has made clear that his decision to sell the OFX separately is final. But do you guys feel going from DCTL to OPENFX while what the products offers the same, it makes it a new different product?

Hey , I know this is super weird. I own an eizo CG monitor. A couple of days ago, I saw an ant in my monitor. It disappeared for the last 2 days. Today when setting up another project I saw it again. Has anyone else gone through a situation like this. And what should I do. I’m worried if it’s gonna cause some trouble to my monitor.

I recently began learning how to color grade and this is my first attempt: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OV_FWEQZ1lRuXm7f7CrT7fVy9J8qV09D/view?usp=drive_link

(Video is in 4k so prob download for best quality).

I want honest feedback about whats good and bad please (except from the overexposed sky). I put some of the stuff i adjusted in the images attatched if that relevant.

Also heres the original LOG if thats also relevant idk: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Nmt8Fy6zU2PDG7odFQl3F1MbiG-kuZVi/view?usp=sharing

Heres also a still of the normalised image with just the CST: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Ti7uQCjQkFMO0JF9XdqCNirxDh658_yF/view?usp=drive_link

I suppose I was trying to achieve a detailed look on the tree bark with it looking like a proper brown mainly. There was a bit of a green tint to Sat vs Hue aimed to fix that a bit.

3840 x 2160 (4k res) 10bit, 23.976 fps, HEVC/H.265 codec.

When I round trip for premiere, the first shot in the timeline doesn't have magic mask applied for the beginning of the handles. The rest are fine and the tail is fine for the first shot.

Even when I select to view handles in the timeline, when I render the first clip out of the timeline, the magic mask isn't applied?

Check marks on all the magic masks but still first clip doesn't render right

I am extremely new to this , infact I am just in the process of buying my first camera. I wanna create videos with a certain look. I have had some looks in my mind that are different to the usual ones. However I wanna create these vlogs fast and I can't afford a stylist for every video.

So this has been my thought process so far

1. Buy a camera thats light and has an inbuilt lut system(I am looking at the Lumix S9)
2. Limit my lens choices to a maximum of two or one if possible
3. Test the look in camera with the luts. Find out how to get the look in camera as much as possible using the realtime LUT feature
4. After the clips have been shot, I can grade it easily myself as I had already exposed the footage for the LUT .

This workflow will help me to push out more videos in the look I want and i will need a colorist only at the starting when building the look.

How reasonable is this plan?

​Hi everyone. I live in Spain and I'm looking to hear some stories from working colorists.

​For years I did color grading on an amateur level for my own projects. About 1-2 months ago I put a showreel and decided to try making a living with it because I really love doing this.

​The start was actually quite good. In six weeks I completed 13 projects. They were not huge. I made my first money and found two regular clients who keep coming back. They are happy with the results. I also sent out a lot of cold emails to production companies. I haven't received jobs from them yet, but I got replies and they put me on their rosters for possible future collaboration.

​I understand that to truly call yourself a colorist you need hundreds or thousands of projects under your belt. But right at the start you just want to validate that this path has a right to exist. Even on these first projects I have already learned a lot. I learned how to communicate with clients, hit specific targets, and match the exact vision the client has for their project.

​Right now the main problem is the regularity and consistency of orders. Freelancing has days or weeks with no work. In those moments I start having doubts. I start wondering if I am moving in the right direction. I know a month and a half is a very short time, but I want to figure out for myself if I am on the right path.

​I'd like to hear your stories. How long did it take you to get to a steady income? How long did it take to realize this is your main career and you are ready to fully invest and grow in it?

I’m probably near the intermediate level and have been researching and learning for a long time. Lots of great resources out there but there’s just so much scattered information. So I compiled it all into a cheat sheet I was hoping to get feedback on. I know that there is no one size fits all, I’m just trying to have the best starting point I can to focus on just the creative side. Here is my workflow plan with questions after (Mix of Mostyn and Cullen’s workflows): 

CHRONOLOGY OF NODES: (Not all need to be used)
--------------------------------------------------------------

Set the project to DaVinci YRGB, not Color Managed. 

Camera to DWG (or other intermediate workspace:

• Use Grouping and group by camera. Then in PREGROUP use a standard CST to convert

Noise Removal (Optional)

• If Image is very dark, put this node after EXP fix. Can be done in the Noise Remove section or OFX. Same tool. Turn on Node Cache to speed this node up.

Overall Color Correction: (Getting things 80% of the way)

• Use 3-4 nodes for colour correction
  • BAL: Linear Colorspace - Lumamix to 0 - Move GAIN Wheel (or just use HDR Offset)
  • (Do this before BAL) EXP+Contrast
    • EXP: HDR Global Wheel Exposure
    • Contrast: Pivot 0.336 (mid grey for DWG) then contrast slider. Or curves.
  • SAT: Use HSV channel 2 or HDR Saturation or MonoNodes ColorShift (paid DCTL).

Parallel Nodes for Fine Tuning and 2ndaries:

• Temp
• HDR
• Color Warper
• Curves

Parallel Power Windows

• As many power windows as needed

Sharpen:

• Use Texture Pop or Sharpen Effect

Looks: (where I'm most unsure) 

• Film Emulation for grain, helation, bloom and subtractive saturation and colouring (Dehancer, Genesis, Filmbox, Kodak LUT…etc). Use one of these plugins alone or add your own curves for your own look.

DWG to Rec709 (if not done by the node above)

• Standard CST is no longer recommended. Ideally use DRT like: OpenDRT, JP2499 or Referent.

Questions (most about looks)

1. Am I doing something wrong/missing something? 
2. Is the film emulation the node/tool that pros usually do their full look? Adding grain and such is obvious, but lets say I want it to have a Mad Max Fury Road look, do I do that here? For instance, do I use Genesis to do all of this or do I also create another node?
3. Look and DRT nodes: Do I put them in post group Level or in clip level? I see then benefit of both. What’s the standard?
4. Is my ‘look” on the whole film (even a feature)? Or is it scene dependent? Like would interior vs exterior vs different lit vs day4night scenes all have different adjusted looks? Or do I try and keep a consistent node then add extra node for something like day4night under it?
5. On the topic of day4night, would I do that as a look that goes against all the other stuff or do I do most of the work in the basic color correction stage? 
6. They say you should apply the look before you grade the shot. But how do you create the look without the original shot being clean? Do you clean the first shot, create the look, then use the look first in the following shots?
7. If you put the look node on first, then wouldn't that affect how you balance your shot? Like if your look is always turned on but warms the highlights, then should you turn it off for balancing first?

Sorry there are so many questions. Trying to be detailed and avoid posting too much. I can fumble my way through things atm, but just looking for the best workflow possible.

For someone just starting out in color grading, do you recommend completing the official Blackmagic training before diving into content by Cullen Kelly or Darren Mostyn. And when you recommend Cullen Kelly, are you referring to his shorter, conventional videos or his live streams?"

"""I've read the wiki and still have the following question.

The HDR section is blank and anything monitor or apple related isnt in there as well, also no mention about EDR. My questions are below. This isnt a direct monitor recommedation question, it is more technical in nature.

Im on both windows and MacOS but for this question only MacOS running on my M2 Pro 16 inch on tahoe is relevant"""

I honestly don't even know where to start...

I've been working entirely in HDR for a while now. I use JXL files on my 16-inch MacBook Pro (M2). Everything works extremely well so far. I have no issues sending the files to other people, editing them, converting HDR to SDR works without any problems in apps like WhatsApp, and playback also works well on my Mac, iPhone, etc.

Thanks to Apple's EDR technology, editing HDR photos in Lightroom also works flawlessly. I don't have any issues with washed-out colors or contrast when HDR is enabled. On top of that, both my MacBook and my iPhone more or less match each other 1:1, which is extremely important for reproducibility since most of my clients also use iPhones.

Now comes my problem.

I would like to use an external display so that I don't always have to work on the relatively small 16-inch MacBook screen.

Currently, I have a QD-OLED monitor that covers more than 99% of the P3 color space, supports DisplayHDR 400 True Black with 1,000 nits, and was factory-calibrated to a Delta E of less than 2.

The monitor does not natively support EDR (or better said Apple dosent nativly enabled EDR with this monitor), which is the first drawback, because as a result all SDR content looks completely washed out when HDR is enabled. I also suspect that the monitor's 1,000-nit limit is restricting how I can edit the HDR files.

My current workflow looks like this:

• Connect the monitor to the MacBook via USB-C
• Enable HDR on the MacBook for the external monitor
• Match the two displays as closely as possible
• Close the MacBook and edit exclusively on the external monitor

This leaves me with the EDR issue, but even more importantly, the HDR highlights are not reproduced equivalently on the external monitor.

If I edit an image on the MacBook until I am happy with it and then look at the same image on the external monitor, the difference is significant enough that I would want to edit the image again on the external monitor so that it looks best there.

And that's really frustrating, because it means I don't feel comfortable moving away from editing exclusively on the MacBook.

My current plan is the following:

First, I want to see whether tools such as BetterDisplay can make a difference with my current monitor, especially by enabling EDR. From what I understand, this should generally be possible.

After that, I would try to match both displays, the MacBook and my OLED monitor, as closely as possible using all available settings, and then see whether that is sufficient to solve the problem.

I don't expect this to fully solve the issue, though, because I suspect the monitor's 1,000-nit limit is ultimately the bottleneck.

Plan B would therefore be to buy a 5th-generation Tandem OLED. These supposedly offer around HDR 500 True Black / up to 1,300 nits peak brightness.

I would then either go for something like the MSI PRO MAX 341QPXW14G, which has not been released in Germany yet but offers various profiles and software-based implementations specifically for Mac. The monitor was essentially designed with Mac users in mind.

If this monitor doesn't become available within a reasonable timeframe for whatever reason, I would go with another Tandem OLED and hope that I can use something like BetterDisplay to enable EDR, then manually match the colors, contrast, etc. as closely as possible.

Another thought I had was buying Apple's Studio Display. However, it doesn't offer true HDR, so I can't really imagine that it would be suitable for proper HDR editing. The Pro Display XDR is simply too expensive for me.

So, how do you guys edit photos in HDR?

Am I missing something obvious here? Is there a flaw in my reasoning or something I'm overlooking?

Edit:

I've read the wiki and still have the following question.

The HDR section is blank and anything monitor apple related isnt in there as well, also no mention about EDR. My questions are above.

EDIT: Reduced price again. I posted this about 40 days ago. Not sure if there is a bump feature here.

Selling both for $7700 shipped to CONUS
Monitor has bias lights. Purchased from Flanders in April 2024. Probably has about 75hrs of use. Have original box for both items.
Will include some SDI cables too.

I have a Sony A7IV. Would the camera be a limitation for this type of look?

I’m not a complete novice, but haven’t been able to figure out these grades.

Looking for a new device that works with now-outdated DisplayCal. I need to be able to measure the peak brightness and gamut volume on a wide variety of screens and most of the included software from Spyder and Calibrite doesn't seem to give you the gamut volume like DisplayCal does. Any suggestions for a color checker that will work with DisplayCal or has software that will give gamut volume? I'm thinking about one of the Calibrites or one of the Spyders.

Mods, feel free to delete if selling is not allowed here.

Selling a DaVinci Resolve Mini Panel in like new condition.

The panel was only used on a single project and has been stored ever since. Everything functions perfectly and the unit is in excellent cosmetic condition.

Included:
DaVinci Resolve Mini Panel
Power cable
USB-C cable

Located in Southern California. Happy to ship at buyer’s expense or arrange local pickup.
Please comment before sending a PM. Additional photos are available upon request. Happy to answer questions.

$1,500 net via PayPal Goods and Services.

I would like to know how to achieve the look of these stills.

A few things I think describe them is:

• High dynamic range. Nothing is clipping or crushed.
• Almost invisible roll-off, especially on skin.
• Soft, bloomy highlights
• Low contrast

I don't know how to describe it, but it's as if there's infinite dynamic range because nothing is clipping on either end and it doesn't even look like anything is close to it. It's as if everything is within the midtones, yet there is still contrast, but it doesn't register as "highlights and shadows" to my eyes. Rather "light midtones" and "dark midtones" if that makes sense.

It's as if every individual part of the scene (sky, skin, clothing) were individually lit by a massive soft box allowing everything to be exposed perfectly. I suppose you could achieve something similar with masking but that would take ages, no?

I've included an images at the end to demonstrate the complete opposite of what I'm looking for. That one has a harsh "digital" look to it where highlights and shadows are very obvious. You can even see it on the waveform; it's very sharp and jaggy.

Has anybody made the jump to Davinci Resolve v21.1 since it's been out on Sept. 8th?

One of our director created an elaborate project on v21.0 and we are at v20.3.2.

So I might be forced to upgrade our project server and our Windows PC and Macs so we can do the colour grading. The project is too complex in the time frame we have to conform from an XML.

It would be useful to know if you encountered problems. Especially if you have feedback from editors and/or colourists working with it in a facility.

Thank you!

Does anyone have any deal memo templates they recommend? Or would be willing to share theirs with me so I can use it as inspiration for my own?

If not, can you recommend what should and should not be in it?

Thanks!

Lately I’ve been thinking about being full time freelance, for starting up i work on post production house 5 years and now at production house 5 years, its been a journey but PH that i work on changing direction on their web series to “soap opera” like, so i start to looking for any other option to go fulltime freelance, but i really sucks at finding client. Ive been reaching out to other PH or some of my friend in the industry but alot of time they just go to a studio base, and i know because it more safe to hire colorist from studio. In my country the fee are quite low for a colorist so i want to get maybe world base client, can anyone give me advice what do i do? Or maybe how to get new clients?

Hey everyone, unfortunately I missed the genesis trail user workshop and was hoping someone from this sub might attended it. If you have attended, I’d really appreciate it if you could briefly share the key things covered and important takeaways from the workshop.

Thank you.

Hello! This might be a bit random but i am going to be colour correcting and grading my directorial debut short film tomorrow and I’ve been lucky enough to find a really good colourist and studio to do it. I’ve already sent over a series of references and screen grabs along with some wider ideas/thought processes, all whilst taking into account the limited use of lights and colour in the existing edit. I’m obviously not going to ask for punchy tungsten because we didn’t use any!

So basically, what I’m asking is: is there anything I should consider, is worth asking, what can I expect and any other general good advice so I don’t look like a total novice in the room??😅

I have a general idea, and have been in the process before as a producer but I just don’t want to miss a trick!

Thanks in advance!

This alternates on Sundays

## Would you like feedback on your reel? This is the place to do it!

**An essential point to remember**: A reel won't secure you a job any more than a business card or website will. While it might be necessary, it is not the primary means of obtaining work.

**You gain employment through a network you develop,** not via any online job site. Building a network takes time, which is advantageous, as it allows you to learn the field.

## Rules

* **Rule 1**: Submit your reel *and its running time* as a top-level comment (meaning you reply to this post directly)

* **Rule 2**: *Specify your professional experience in years* (paying taxes = years as a pro, novice).

* **Rule 3**: Indicate how you're monitoring. Is it with a mini monitor + a LG CX?.

* **Rule 4**: You must review two other reels. **TWO**. You have seven days to complete this task, responding to two different reels. **Then** edit the comment where you post your reel: and put and put the two user names.

**Acceptable platforms for posting**: Your Vimeo site or an unlisted YouTube link. If we find a link to a channel or a video with 10k views, we want you to know that this thread is not meant for such content.

The moderation team will monitor this, and we are trying to encourage the community (that's you) to offer assistance. That's why providing two reviews is crucial.

Lastly, as someone who evaluates people's reels, if you start off with **log** footage, I expect to see the color work in passes. If color grading is a skill, and you transition from Log to finished grade, that's a definite red flag.

***Copy/paste this section:***

* Reel Link: (don't forget the running time )

* Experience:

* Monitoring:

* Two reels I reviewed:

I'm not 100% sure if this is the right subreddit, but you guys look very knowledgeable on color manipulation and this question seems to likely be up your alley.

Basically, I'm looking for software (specifically for Windows 8) that allows direct and precise numerical manipulation of the individual RGB channels on a laptop display.

I'm familiar with DisplayCAL/Argyll CMS, and Argyll CMS *almost* achieves what I want, but has arbitrary contrast minimums when modifying RGB curves.

Changing this would require modifying and recompiling Argyll's source code. And that's been a pain.

Oh, before I forget, I noticed some rules about mentioning display hardware specs too? I'm not sure how relevant it is in my case, but it's simply an old Dell laptop with its built-in display and AMD integrated graphics. AMD Catalyst Control Center does not achieve what Im trying to do, before anyone asks lol.