Matching Shadows, Midtones & Highlights?

[user_deleted]

Hi Everyone,

This is my first post so not entirely sure about what I'm doing, but here goes -

I'm new to Shake and in the middle of trying to create a few shots possibly for a showreel somewhere down the line BUT I'm having a few problems with colour correction which I know is VERY VERY important!

I'm not absolutely sure about how to match my FG shadow (black) and FG highlight (white) values to those of the BG to make the elements fit in together?

I've heard about certain processes called 'Density Matching' and 'Greyscale Colour Balancing' but I was wondering if anyone out there in the Shake Universe might be able to shed more light on the subject? I don't know how effective the Colour Match Node is going to be and I'm running out of ideas!

Can either of the Compress or Expand Nodes be used to help? The Shake Manual doesn't help much with these!

ANY HELP OR ADVICE WOULD BE REALLY APPRECIATED! THANKS!

Andrew.

[user_deleted]

there are several things you can do that help to match colors..

the highlight and shadows are usually easiest:
learning how to read the histogramm is always useful
examining the red green and blue channels seperately in the composite is a good method too (maybe thats what the call Greyscale Colour Balancing)
the expand node is excellent for that.
midtones are a bit more difficult..

the color match node is kinda useful for some things, but it takes a while to learn how to use it. there is an excellent example in the tutorial i think. stay away from the big ColorCorrect node in the start.

basically color correcting is just something that you have to do a lot untill you get an eye for it..
++ chris

[user_deleted]

Hey Chris!

Sorry for the late reply - bit disorganised! Just wanted to say thanks for your advice - I'll be checking out the Histogramm!

Thanks again.