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It’s amazing how far technology has come in the world of video. Post production software has come so far that just about any shot can be corrected, fixed or enhanced in some way, and look pretty darn good. However, this doesn’t mean post production should be relied on as a “fix-all” solution. The concept of “garbage in equals garbage out” is one that nearly every serious videographer is familiar with. If your original shot is crummy, chances are your final product isn’t going to look much better.

Getting that perfect shot right the first time, out in the field, is always going to be better than trying to fix your mistakes later in post production. Plus, it’s going to save you boatloads of time and frustration. Trust me, you’re better off spending more time getting your camera settings correct, than spending hours upon hours in front of a computer monitor, pulling your hair out and wishing you had paid more attention to those zebra stripes!

Now, generally speaking, getting things perfect the first time is something we all aim for. And usually (if you know what you’re doing, and take your time) it’s really not difficult to get the shot you want.  But with that said, sooner or later it’s going to happen – it happens to every videographer at some point. You set your iris, white balance, adjust your focus and shoot your footage. Things look great in your viewfinder and/or LCD display, but when you dump your footage onto your editing suite and review it, things look nothing like what you expected; particularly, the color looks way off. This is one of those few instances where color correction can really shine.

Let’s take a look at some footage I shot a couple months ago.

As you can see, there is an overall orange/warm tone to the footage, even though the subject was well lit and the camera was properly white balanced. More than likely, this color “offset” was caused by the nature of the set (which consisted of tan/gold painted walls) combined with some spill off from the lights. The viewfinder and color LCD screen on my camera does not pick this up.

To correct this, I’m going to bring this footage into my editing software and use its color correction tools to compensate for the color offset.

Here’s what it looks like:

This is the color correction tool found in Sony Vegas, which is what I use to edit my footage. Most editing programs (such as Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere, Avid, etc) use a similar set of tools. There are three color wheels here, one for low tones, one for mid tones, and one for high tones. Low tones are generally the darker colors such as darks grays and blacks, while high tones are the brighter colors such as whites and bright yellows. Mid tones are pretty much everything in between.

Since the low tones really aren’t the problem here, I’m going to begin by adjusting the mid tones, which will affect the overall tone of the footage along with most of the skin tone of the subject. I’m going to move the adjuster towards the light blue, which is opposite of the light orange. This will help counter the orange-ish hue of the footage and balance it out.

Here’s what the adjustment looks like.

Not bad, but we can do better! The skin tones still need some slight adjusting, primarily around the areas of the forehead where there are a couple minor hotspots created from the lights.

For this, I’m going to adjust the high tones wheel, bringing the adjuster (again) towards the light blue.

This looks pretty good. But the shot does look a little flat.

To enhance this, I’m going to adjust the brightness and contrast.

I’m going to start by turning the brightness down slightly. Then I’ll increase the contrast just a little to separate the subject from the background. This will give the shot a slightly more three-dimensional look and add a nice final touch.

Here’s what we end up with.

Pretty slick, huh?

As you can see, you don’t need to make huge adjustments to create good results. Once again, I wouldn’t recommend relying on color correction to save your butt. It can be very useful when you don’t have much control over the tone of the shot (such as in this case), but even then you should do everything you can to get the shot as perfect as can be before dipping into post production tools. Remember, garbage in equals garbage out (in most cases.) I tend to use color correction as a last resort since it’s never 100% reliable and can be quite time consuming. This particular shot was a rare case, and I’d say on average, I  use color correction as a “fix” maybe one out of every 10-15 shoots. Most of the time I’ll use color correction merely to enhance a shot and/or give it a certain tone or “feel.” Experiment with the tools you have at your disposal. Learn what each one does and what you can and can’t get away with. Knowing the boundaries is going to really be beneficial both on and offsite and will save you a ton of time. Good luck and happy shooting!