Using Color Grade to Correct Exposure and Color In Premiere Pro

If you are looking to make your videos more professional and go to the next level of video editing, then this is the blog post for you! This blog will help you with using color grade to correct exposure and color in Premiere Pro! We know that it can be intimidating with all the different color correction tutorials and LUTs that are out there. Muddy-looking videos and shots that don’t match one another, skin tones that don’t look quite right, and that feeling of not knowing where to stop or when the grade looks right. The good news is that you don’t need a new camera, better grip, better lenses or cinematography training to make your videos look more professional. The thing that can elevate your videos to a professional level is what you do in the video edit using color grade. Adobe Premiere has made great strides not only advancing its editorial platform but also improving its color tools. Even if you’re just a beginner, this post can help you feel confident in Premiere Pro CC!

Premiere Pro provides you with professional-quality color grading and color correction tools that let you grade your footage directly on your editing timeline.

Within the Lumetri color workspace in Premiere Pro, you will find the color tools that allow you to adjust the color, contrast, and light in your sequences. Premiere Pro provides the ability to edit your clips and also color grade them without having to launch a separate program.

Both beginners as well as experienced color graders are able to use the Color workspace because of its friendly user interface. You can apply simple color corrections as well as complex Lumetri looks using intuitive sliders and controls.

Set up a Color workspace

Premiere Pro provides a preset Color workspace that makes your task of color grading quicker and more efficient.

Select Window > Workspace > Color, or choose Color from the workspace switcher. The Color workspace opens a Lumetri Color panel to the right, and a Lumetri Scopes panel to the left of the Program Monitor.

The Lumetri Color board offers ground-breaking and simple to-utilize color tools, like curves, color wheels, and sliders, organized in various sections. Each section of the Lumetri Color panel centers around a particular assignment of the color process.

The Lumetri Scopes panel shows various examinations of luma and chroma as waveforms dependent on your changes, letting you assess as you grade your clasps.

General Color Correction workflow

1. 1. Ensure that you have set up the Color workspace.
2. 2. Place the playhead on the required clip in your sequence. At the point when the Lumetri Color panel is open, Premiere Pro automatically chooses the Selection Follows Playhead option from the Sequence menu. The auto-selection of the clip guarantees that any color adjustments you make are applied to the selected clip.
3. 3. Begin making color adjustments utilizing the Basic Correction section. The controls in the Basic Correction segment guide you through applying a LUT (Lookup Table), and making other specialized corrections to exposure and light through simple to-utilize controls.
4. 4. Utilize the Creative section to apply Looks. You would then be able to make further alterations utilizing the Adjustments sliders.
5. 5. Utilize the Curves section to further refine the look utilizing RGB Curves and the Hue Saturation Curve.
6. 6. Change shadows, midtones, and highlights utilizing the color wheels for more exact color adjustments.
7. 7. To make individual shots recorded under various lighting conditions seem as though they have a place in a similar scene, and not out of place when cutting from one shot then onto the next, utilize the Color Match section.
8. 8. After making the color adjustments, add a great vignette to make your video stick out.

Apply basic color correction

Utilizing controls in the Basic Correction area, you can address video that is too dark or too light, and change both the hue(color or chroma) and luminance (exposure and contrast) in your clip.

To modify a control, drag the slider until you achieve the ideal result. Or, you can set a specific value in the box next to the sliders. To select the box and type another value, click the current value.

Input LUT

You can utilize a LUT (Look Up Table) as a starting point for reviewing your video, and afterward utilize the other color controls for additional grading.

Premiere Pro gives a few preset LUTs that you can apply to your videos, or you can choose a custom LUT that you saved.

White Balance

The white balance in a video mirrors the lighting conditions under which the video was shot. Changing the white balance can viably improve the ambient color of your video.

Alter the white balance in your clip by changing the Temperature and Tint properties. You can utilize the eye-dropper to click a region in the recording that is white or neutral in color. The white balance automatically gets adjusted. However, you can also utilize the slider controls to adjust the temperature and tint values until you accomplish the ideal color balance.

Temperature: Calibrates the white balance utilizing a color temperature scale. Move the slider to the left to make the video appear cooler, and to the right for warmer colors.

Tint: Adjusts the white balance to make up for a green or maroon tint. To add a green tint to the video, move the slider to the left (negative values), and to add magenta, move it to the right (positive values).

Tone: Modify the apparent size of the video cut utilizing the diverse tone controls.

Exposure: Sets the brightness of the video clip. Move the Exposure slider to the right to increase tonal values and expands highlights. Move the slider to the left to decrease tonal values and expands shadows. Adjust the slider until the video looks good with the desired brightness.

Contrast: Increases or decreases contrast. Adjusting the contrast mainly affects the midtones of color in your video. When you increase contrast, the middle-to-dark areas become darker. Similarly, decreasing the contrast makes the middle-to-light areas lighter.

Highlights: Adjusts bright areas. Drag the slider to the left to darken highlights. Drag to the right to brighten highlights while minimizing clipping.

Shadows: Adjusts dark areas. Drag the slider to the left to darken shadows while minimizing clipping. Drag to the right to brighten shadows and recover shadow details.

Whites: Adjusts white clipping. Drag the slider to the left to reduce clipping in highlights. Drag to the right to increase highlight clipping.

Blacks: Adjusts black clipping. Drag the slider to the left to increase black clipping, making more shadows pure black. Drag to the right to reduce shadow clipping.

Reset: Reverts all Tone controls to the original settings.

Auto: To set the overall tonal scale, click Auto. When you select Auto, Premiere Pro sets the sliders to maximize the tonal scale and minimize highlight and shadow clipping.

Saturation: Adjusts the saturation of all colors in the video equally. Drag the slider to the left to decrease the overall saturation. Drag to the right to increase the overall saturation.

Looks and LUTs

LUT is an abbreviation for Look Up Table. It measures color value and outputs a corresponding value. You can utilize LUTs to control saturation and contrast, or totally change the color of a clip. LUTs are normally used to make and save color grades that can be applied to give your clips a remarkable style.

Premiere Pro arranges LUTs in two classes:

• Input LUT: An Input LUT deciphers footage. It is applied on flat log footage to improve and color-correct footage. You can utilize it as a beginning stage for grading clips.
• Looks: A Look is a LUT intended to change the appearance and color style of the footage. Apply looks to make your video resemble an expertly shot film.

How to add LUTs

To add a LUT, do the following:

• Select a clip in the Timeline panel.
• Do one of the accompanying:
  1. 1. In the Lumetri panel, open the Basic Correction tab.
  2. 2. In the Effects Control panel, open the Basic Correction tab from the Lumetri section.
• In the Basic Correction tab, select the Input LUT dropdown menu. You can add existing LUTs from Premiere Pro. To add a new LUT, click Browse…
• The File Explorer on your system opens. Select your preferred LUT.

The LUT is applied to the clip. You would then be able to alter the white balance and tone of the clip.

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