Apple Final Cut Pro 7 - Manual (Page 1331)

Regardless of race, the hues of human flesh tones, when recorded to videotape and
measured on a vectorscope, fall along a fairly narrow range (although the saturation and
brightness vary).
To adjust color on source tapes using flesh tones
1 Cue your tape to a section that has a well-lit facial closeup.
2 Check to see if there’s a spike on the Vectorscope near the Flesh Tone line.
3 Adjust this spike so that it falls approximately along the Flesh Tone line. While doing so,
check the image quality of your clip on a broadcast monitor to make sure that your
adjustment is accurate.
The Flesh Tone line is only meant to be an approximation; it’s more important that the
shot look correct than that it fit this line exactly.
The Flesh Tone line is
here on the Vectorscope.
Using Color Bars for Video Calibration
When using analog devices, make sure they are calibrated for accurate brightness and
color so there’s no distortion when you capture and color correct your video.
About Color Bars
Color bars are electronically generated video signals that meet very strict specifications.
Because the luma and chroma levels are standardized, you can use color bars passing
through different components of a video system to see how each device is affecting the
signal. For example, if you record color bars that have a 100 percent white level in a
camcorder and then play the videotape back on a VTR, and if the white level output from
the VTR is only 90 percent, you know that you need to increase the luma level output of
the VTR.
NTSC and PAL each have specific color bar standards, and even within NTSC and PAL
there are several standards. When you evaluate color bars on a video scope, it is important
to know which color bar standard you are measuring, or you may make improper
adjustments. “SMPTE bars” is a commonly used standard.
1331 Chapter 78 Measuring and Setting Video Levels