Our goal at AbelCine is to help our clients navigate these new waters, and I hope this article helps as well.Īndy Shipsides is a N.Y.-based Camera Technology Specialist and Manager of AbelCine’s Training Department. These types of conversations are happening in production every day now, and I only see them happening more in the future. I then explained that a Scene File was very different, and is something specific to a camera, created in a camera and baked into the video recording. RED cameras can do a similar thing, with the look built into the metadata of each clip. This LUT can be loaded to create dailies or into a color-grading application for finishing. The LUT is created with the ARRI LUT Generator, which creates LUTs in many different formats. The Look File will travel with the metadata of every clip shot on the ALEXA and can be extracted to make a LUT. That output even could be recorded if the job didn’t want to deal with video in the flat Log C mode.
The ALEXA Studio camera can load a Look File, generated by the ARRI Look Generator or other software, and its output is adjusted accordingly. So the difference between a LUT and a Look is subtle, but because the files are camera-specific, there’s a difference.Īs long as my explanation was here, I gave the “CliffNotes” version to attendees at our event. ARRI also allows you to convert their Look Files into actual LUTs for post, which can be done through their online LUT Generator ( The Sony F65 camera will be able to do the same thing in the future with ASC CDL files working as the Look. This type of adjustment then travels through metadata of the recorded clips and can be applied very easily through the right post tools. Basically, the Look works like a LUT, but is built just for a specific camera and doesn’t require any external hardware. The cameras then can apply the adjustments to their outputs for monitoring. With these tools, a Look can be generated and loaded into the camera. RED’s files are made through their RedCine-X software, and ARRI has a Look Generator. The difference between a Look and a LUT is that these Look Files only can be used in-camera. Both cameras have the ability to load in special files, which I call Looks, that essentially function as LUTs. ARRI also has a Log C shooting mode, which is a very flat, wide-gamut video output. RED and ARRI both enable recording in a RAW format, with no baked-in color adjustment. To learn more about this process and about LUTs in general, check out Light Illusion’s website, WHAT’S A LOOK?
Software like cineSpace from THX and Light Illusion LightSpace CMS can be used to combine Calibration LUTs and Viewing LUTs, which can be a tricky process.
A piece of hardware, like the Cine-tal Davio, Blackmagic Design HDLink Pro or Pandora Pluto, is used to process the incoming image and apply the LUT to the output. Now, how is it applied? Usually, a piece of hardware, often called a LUT Box, is used in between the camera and a monitor. Most color-grading software applications can load an ASC CDL file, and many on-set tools can work with these files, so the ASC CDL offers the clearest solution for working with LUTs on set and in post. This is a 3D LUT with a relatively simple format. So they came up with a standard they call an ASC Color Decision List (CDL).
The American Society of Cinematographers (ASC) saw that there was a huge variety of LUT formats out there, which created a lot of problems between on-set tools and postproduction. A Viewing LUT is usually a 3D LUT because it gives the most possible adjustment.
These LUTs are then sent to postproduction to create dailies and to give the colorist a starting point for the final grade. A Digital Imagining Technician on set often will create a Viewing LUT for the DP to look at. 709 image, while others also will include some aesthetic choices. They may be as simple as converting a flat S-Log or Log C feed into a normal-looking Rec.
They’re designed to make a camera’s output look good during shooting. A Viewing LUT is what people are most often talking about when describing LUTs.