Give your film a glowing, almost film-like look.

[Clarence]

Yeah, if you've seen that movie Sky Captain and the World of Tommorow, it almost looks like a canvas painting, the way it glows. See below:



Anyway, it's pretty easy to do this effect. It seems to make digital video look more like film, actually.

1. Take the raw video clip, and adjust gamma, contrast and brightness controls.

2. Bring down the color level, so that its almost black and white, but not quite.

3. Duplicate the clip.

4. With the duplicated clip, blur it using a gaussian blur or the like.

5. Make the duplicated clip black and white.

6. Overlay the two clips over each other by adjusting the opacity. I suggest making the opacity of the original clip higher.

7. Your film will glooow!

[Gyro]

Really cool! I enjoyed playing around with that, looks fancy!

[Clarence]

Thanks! I think it looks awesome, I'll post a clip in about a 1/2 hour.

[Clarence]

Okay, here's some test footage. It's dark, so the effect didn't work great, but oh well:

Quicktime, Medium

Hey, I have an idea! If you play around with this effect, post a sample on here to see what different people are doing with it.

[rep22]

hey that looks pretty good, i like the way it turned out. did you use premiere to adjust the settings?

[rep22]

oh and how exactly did you change the settings? more of one, less of another, or what?

[SgtPadrino]

Original:


Glow added:


Very nice, this will definitely come in handy.

[BuriedinSweet666]

Hey,alright I'm trying to give some footage of mine this film look,seeing as how I just got Premiere 6.5 for $200 bucks from B+H,it was on sale. I need to know how I adjust the opacity,thanks a lot.

[BrownCowStudios]

SgtPadrino: Looks pretty good, though I'd hate to see what that would do to skin tones. The blacks look a bit too crushed for my tastes.

About adjusting the opacity: Place your footage on the second video track, and click the carrot to the far left. This will drop the view down, and you'll see "rubber bands." Drag the handles (at the beginnging and end of the footage) down to the desired opacity and you're set. Good luck.

[Almondo99]

Looks almost like Minority Report, looks awesome.

[Almondo99]

How do you get that Bluish-Sci-Fi tint? Like in padrinos pics?

[SgtPadrino]

I kind of forgot, but I'm pretty sure that for one of the clips I took the saturation all the way down so it was black and white, and for the other I took the saturation down halfway. I might've done some color correction with Cinelook but I'm not sure.

[maj_barnes]

Looks almost like Minority Report, looks awesome.

Exactly what I thought, very nice.

[timmay]

Thats a great effect! how do you guys upload files on these pages so I can show how mine turned out. cheers

[maj_barnes]

Go to photobucket.com and start up an account.

[MasterMike]

This is pretty much the technique I've been using for flashback / dream sequences. Personally, I wouldn't use it all the way through though.

[timmay]

Ok guys heres how mine went before and after pics after It's a heaps good effect I reckon

[timmay]

why didnt the pics work? sorry

[BrownCowStudios]

Maybe it was just the compression of the picture, but it appeared that the letterbox also had a blur applied. If this was the case, then change the order in which you applied the effects, or change the export order of the effects to make the letterbox last. This goes for all effects, not just the one mentioned here.

[Epsilon]

I think all of you guys are trying to overdo the effect. It is supposed to enhance the image, not kill it! Too much contrast is just as evil.

[aaronv2]

dont tell anyone that they are over doing something... if i said that to tarrentino id get a hatori hanzo to the face... playing around with the look of your footage is one of the most valuable things you can experiment on... the crew on sky captains (watch the special features because its fuxing amazing what they do with what they have.) anyway the colorists on the film spent days on getting the right balance and the movie gets its feel and believability from it... they basically used black and white footage and recolored it like the people who retouch old black and white TV shows do... also if you have seen Sin City yet there is also alot of great shots using color and sometimes just black and white where things are colored as if they exist in a totally different world... it is amazing some of the visuals you can get from playing around with what you already have.

[maj_barnes]

I kinda got the same effect while messing around with my tv while playing The Getaway:

Turn contrast all the way up, turn the brightness down so the picture doesn't look like it's turning white, then turn down the color some, and turn the sharpness down all the way. It looks pretty cool (the reds become the most apparent color).

[aaronv2]

heaps of swearing in that game... and if you lean up against the wall you get all your health back? i hope that works in real life

[maj_barnes]

It does, try it! Did you notice when the Mark Hammand runs, it looks like he has crapped himself?

More cussing than World Cup, World Series and World War II combined.

[reflexive_cinematics]

I dont know if I like the effect...to me it seems that most of the color get's lost. I mean that's ok if that's the exact look your going for, but being 'film like' doesn't necessarily mean that you desaturate the footage.

I just did this to show the method that I use.
I took some footage of some monkeys at the local zoo.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Here are three clips to show the changes:

#1
Original Footage - No color correction



#2
Only levels were set - i.e. black , mid, and white



#3
Levels set and then added the Magic Bullet 'Filmic' plugin



------------------------------------------------------------------------------

As you can see the top picture looks like it came off of a video camera.. but then if you just do a few simple things, like make sure you adjust your levels and use a basic ( but good ) plugin you will get some good results.

But also if you notice I backed up a bit and zoomed in while paying attention to the framing of my shots to give it the appearance of a little shallower depth of field. That helps a LOT as well. ( another thing I did, which you can't see here is I set my camera to a shutter speed of 30 - it helps if you can do this if your camera let's you. )

I'll post the video clips so you can see the difference with motion too.
They are quicktime format - 3 MB a piece. (so you 56k'ers feel free...)
-------------
Remember to RIGHT CLICK and SAVE AS...

ORIGINAL VIDEO

COLOR CORRECTED w/ MAGIC BULLET PLUGIN


This isnt' the only technique, but one I like to use. You can use other plugins with other settings, or other effects like glow or desaturate... it all depends on what your vision is.

Cheers