saturation for colorists

SATURATION for Colorists - By Hector Berrebi 

A Deep Dive into the meaning, variations and applications of Chroma 

Saturation, Colorfulness or Chroma - are a main factor in any color manipulation pipeline, one which holds powerful and visually influential possibilities on one side - while easily can be mistaken to be simpler than it truly is

Terms like subtractive saturation, deep saturation & filmic saturation, became very popular in recent years - along with workflows exploring different approaches to Sat by S channel in HSL/HSV models - adding not only possibilities, but also confusion, uncertainty, and misinterpretations. Saturation isn’t restricted to the digital realm and its screens, it is a critical part of real world objects characteristics as well as our visual system and it’s perceptual nature -- the challenge to properly or specifically represent it in our destination delivery arises in almost every project, and various Gamut-Saturation issues in log acquisition especially regarding light emitting colors (colorful LEDs, screens, stage lights etc’) became part of DP’s and Videographers essential checklist.

And yet it remains elusive and trying to properly define it, or understand its workings - isn’t always natural and intuitive to most users 

It’s maybe time to put some order and try to get a better grasp of what it is

The goal of this 2 part Masterclass is to explore the meaning, definitions, differentiations, aspects and applications of saturation - in relation to Film and Video Color correction and grading in Da Vinci Resolve. We will go from theory to practice, compare tools, methods and results - explain how they work and what they do to our footage and see how we can leverage advanced node structures and visual math to construct and manipulate saturation tools and functions within DVR