Color Correction Event FX Order

Rich Parry wrote on 8/24/2019, 12:32 AM

I believe there is agreement that FX events such as Color Correction and White Balance should come before events such as Levels and Curves to make the video clip meet 16-235 levels. So can anyone explain the following?

The first histogram was generated with Color Correction before Curves FX.
The second histogram was generated with Color Correction after Curves FX.

I could not see a difference in the "Preview" window between these two scenarios. However, there is a big difference between the histograms. With Color Correction after Curves, there are no empty color slots indicating there are no missing colors.

QUESTIONS:

Am I correct that Vegas is creating missing colors when Color Correction FX is placed after Curves?
Am I also correct that Color Correction should become before Curves.

Comments

Marco. wrote on 8/24/2019, 2:43 AM

I learned to always adjust black level, white level and gamma before touching the colors.

See in the vectorscope how much a tone level adjustment like the Curves affect the color (saturation).
And see in the Waveform how little a straight color correction like the color wheels of the Color Corrector FX affect the luma.

You'd do kind of a master leveling applied as Output FX anyway if you need your levels to strictly conform a certain standard.

Rich Parry wrote on 8/24/2019, 4:08 PM

Marco, thanks for response, I'll give your workflow a try. But I still don't understand how Vegas appears to be creating colors were none exist (Question #1). I want to understand what Vegas is doing.

Thanks,

Rich

karma17 wrote on 8/24/2019, 8:05 PM

I'd really like to see a Magix sponsor a master class in color correcting in Vegas 17, really drilling down to the nitty gritty details, order of operations, and best work flows.