Apple Final Cut Express HD - Manual (Page 844)

844 Part IX Effects
9 Click anywhere in the Balance control and drag to move the balance control indicator
relative to its previous position.
Since you already used the Auto-balance control to add more reds to compensate for
the blues that you didn’t want, this will be your starting point as you work to achieve
the particular effect you want for this scene. For example, you could drag the balance
control indicator farther into the direction of magenta in order to make the image look
a bit warmer and more inviting while preserving the corrected color balance.
Because you’re not worrying about matching this image to any other shots right now,
you can select whatever look you want. Whether you go warmer, cooler, or even into
other more surreal balances of color is purely a creative choice at this point. If you’re
going for a realistic look, it’s important to restrain yourself and stick to making subtle
changes.
Once you’ve achieved the color balance you want, it’s time to adjust the saturation of
your clip to complete the look you want.
10 Drag the Sat slider to increase or decrease the saturation.
Be careful when you do this. A common mistake beginners make is to automatically
oversaturate shots to make them look “better.” While a highly saturated look is sometimes
appropriate, less saturation may actually improve the look of your footage. This is
especially true if you have a camcorder with artificially vivid color. In this case, it may be
appropriate to desaturate the image somewhat to keep it from looking too “hot.”
Note: As always, be careful to make adjustments to saturation only while looking at a
properly calibrated broadcast monitor. It can be very tempting to oversaturate the
colors of your clip based on the way video looks on a computer display.
Hue Matching Controls in the Color Corrector
The Hue Matching controls provide a way to adjust the color balance of the current
clip, based on a specific hue, to match a similar hue in another clip. A common
example of when you might use the Hue Matching controls is to match the flesh tones
of an actor in two different shots that have different lighting.
The Hue Matching controls do not affect the contrast of your image. Adjusting the Whites,
Blacks, and Mids levels controls to maximize the contrast in your image is still going to be
the first step in your color correction process, even when using Hue Matching.
Note: The Hue Matching controls are intended to match similar colors to one another.
They cannot be used to match completely opposite colors.