30 Second Color Correction Tricks in Final Cut Pro

30 Second Color Correction Tricks in Final Cut Proby Charles Angelis, Final Cut Cafe

Tips & TricksMore available at artbeats.com

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Using Artbeats stock footage is an excellent way to enhance the storytelling value of your production. A common myth exists that says stock footage gives your production a cookie-cutter look. The important thing to understand is that any footage (shot by you or by others) can give your production a cookie-cutter look unless the shots have been color corrected. In this tutorial I will show you how to breathe life into your stock footage in Final Cut Pro using techniques that take only 30 seconds. In this tutorial, I will use only two filters, the Color Corrector 3-Way and Bright-ness and Contrast filters found in Final Cut Pro.

Applying color correction is largely a personal affair. You are trying to match one shot with another while creating a unique look. In this example, I found the original to have too strong of a blue cast. I also felt our characters blended in with the water too much.

Figure 1: Artbeats clip A013-C174. Top image is before, bottom image is after the color correction was applied.

I began by increasing the white values in the Color Corrector 3-Way filter. This brought emphasis to our characters by increasing the lu-minance of the white shirt. It also increased the shine on the boat, helping to separate our characters and the boat from the background. Next I decreased the black levels to give the shot a richer feeling. This is commonly referred to as crushing the blacks. Detail is taken out of the dark-er, shadowy parts of the frame and the end result is a shot that appears to have more depth to it. Increas-ing the mid tones came next. This brought back more detail after having decreased the blacks and added tex-ture to the water. Lastly, I decreased the saturation so the dominant color in the frame, blue, would have less strength in the overall look.


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Figure 2: Clip AGG-FH117-51 is from AQUA Geo Graphic, part of the Artbeats FootageHub, left image is before, image to right is after color cor-rection.

In this shot, I wanted to bring out more detail in the manta ray and have it appear to pop out of the frame, bringing the viewer’s atten-tion right to the manta ray. This time I started by decreasing the blacks first. I only lowered the black value a little so as not to remove all detail from the sea creature. Then I increased the mid tones to help separate the manta ray from the burst of light in the background. After that I shifted the hue towards blue to give the water a more tra-ditional ocean look. Increasing the saturation was a natural next step, making sure not to take it too far. I was going for realism here. To help the manta ray stand out from the background, I used the Brightness and Contrast filter to increase the contrast by a value of 5.

The end result is a shot that has more clarity. The foreground and background also separate well. This is essential in directing your viewer’s attention to certain areas of your frame.


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My goal this time was to create a more intense or edgy shot. The origi-nal gave me the feeling of fall and I wanted to give it a bright and warm summer feeling to it. I started by increasing the mid tones to brighten the image, especially the sky and the sand. I then decreased the blacks for a more edgy look and to increase the detail in the water. Bumping up the saturation just a little gave my sky that nice summer blue without going over the top. Increasing the satura-tion also improved the coloration of the boat, which helps your viewer’s line of sight travel from the boat to the man walking on the beach. I still found the image to be too cold for summer. I shifted the hue towards the yellow/green side of the spec-trum. The yellow added the warmth I was looking for and the green en-hanced the nature colors.

I then used the Brightness and Con-trast filter to increase the contrast by a value of 10. This further defined the edges of the trees and the distant hillside in the background.

Figure 3: Artbeats Clip ASC134; left image is before, image to right is after color correction.


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Figure 4: Clip MD-FH101-38 is from Glory Film Co., part of the Artbeats FootageHub, left image is before, image to right is after color correction.

This shot speaks heat to me. I wanted to maintain that while improving on the haziness apparent in the shot. I increased the mids to brighten up the sand and the camel. To balance this out and to add richness to the shadows, I decreased the blacks quite a bit. Making drastic adjustment in color correction usually involves a give and take relationship. The more I decreased the blacks, the more I increased the mids to achieve the balanced look I was going for. Take a close look at the camel’s neck and decoration. You will notice an in-creased level of definition and rich-ness in color. The image appears to have higher contrast, but we only used one filter to achieve this look.

At this point the sand was a little too bright for me. I wanted it to be bright, but I did not want the high-lights to be blown. I decreased the whites just a little. Take another close look at the sand. You’ll notice that by increasing the mid tones as much as I did, it got rid of the unnatural orange hue in the sand. The end re-sult is an image that places the viewer’s frame of mind in a hot summer desert location.


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I took a different direction for this shot, to illustrate how quickly you can change the mood of your frame. I wanted to establish a sense of ur-gency as your viewer looks down the path of sheep running towards them. I started by increasing the whites to give the sheep a harder light, which makes them look like they are moving faster. Then I increased the mids to bring up the brightness of the lawn, fencing and background. I decreased the blacks to decrease some of the shadow detail in the sheep and to increase the perception of depth.

I used a careful balancing act when adjusting these three values. After initial adjustments, I would move the sliders for each value, one after the other, to achieve a slightly rug-ged, bleached look. The final touch came from shifting the hue towards blue. This brought a sense of cold-ness to the frame. Where there is cold, there is fear. This adjustment in hue was a little more than minor. It was enough to skew the overall feeling this frame evoked.

Look at the before still and then look at the after. Do the sheep appear to be running faster towards you in the after than they appear in the before?

Figure 5: Clip NZV-FH101-19 is from NZ Video Productions, part of the Artbeats FootageHub, left image is before, image to right is after color cor-rection.


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To close this tutorial, I thought I would touch base with our roots, black and white. This time I wanted to give it an old sepia look. But instead of applying the Sepia filter in Final Cut Pro, I chose to use the same filter we have been concen-trating on in this tutorial, the Color Corrector 3-Way filter. This method is often quicker than applying color correction and then adding a second filter to achieve the sepia look.

The original shot looks a bit soft, so I chose to liven it up a little by decreasing the blacks. I then in-creased the mids dramatically to bring out the sky, the dirt ground and their dresses. I decreased the

Figure 6: Artbeats clip AR105; left image is before, image to right is after color correction.

whites to ensure I could still see some detail in their pleated skirts. Lastly, I shifted the hue towards the yellow/orange spectrum. This combination brought a realistic sepia look to the shot. Often, people try to add sepia tone to their shots and end up making them look too artificial. A careful blend of hues can give you the realistic look of faded film dyes.

Charles Angelis, an Apple Certified Trainer, is a video post-production specialist and video production teacher. He heads the Digital Me-dia Career-Tech Pathway at the New San Juan High School in Citrus Heights, CA (an Apple Authorized Training Center for Education) and works as a freelance video editor with over a decade of experience editing national television series, documentaries and corporate video.

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30 Second Color Correction Tricks in Final Cut Pro