How To Manage DaVinci’s Film LUTS | DaVinci Resolve 19 Colour Grading Tutorial

The built in Film Look LUTS in DaVinci Resolve 19 are a very common tool utilised by colourists all over the world - and for good reason.

They help to emulate a filmic style incredibly quickly, and with a variety of 6 options to choose from (3 Kodak LUTS and 3 Fujifilm LUTS) , they fit seamlessly into node tree workflows.

However, oh so often I see people setting these up incorrectly. This might be using them in the wrong order, using incorrect node types or using the wrong CST (Colour Space Transform) settings. One mistake I see done wrong ALL the time is the tone mapping.

Make sure you have the correct tone mapping selected depending on the CST’s you use.

Below, I demonstrate the method I use. This allows you to work in DaVinci Wide Gamut/Intermediate so you have a nice wide colour space, and uses a layer mixer and compound node to allow you to adjust the strength of the film look and come closer to Rec.709 if desired.

Step 1 - Convert Into DaVinci Wide Gamut/DaVinci Intermediate

Input Colour Space > DaVinci Wide Gamut/Intermediate

To turn a node into a Color Space Transform node, go into your Effects panel. Search “Color Space Transform” and drag this onto your node.

DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate (DWG/DI) is a working colour space that grants you the widest possible colour range to choose from. We convert into this at the very start of our pipeline so that everything we edit afterwards is within this space, and we can take the greatest advantage of it.

It’s important to set your tone mapping and gamut mapping to none whenever you convert into DWG/DI. DaVinci Resolve used to do this by default, but no longer does as of Version 19.

Tone mapping and gamut mapping are mathematical calculations used to map your tone curve and your saturation (gamut). The more accurate we are with our calculations, the more accurate our final image will be.

For more information on tone and gamut mapping, see page 234 of the DaVinci Resolve 19 Reference Manual.

CST Settings

Input: Your Camera Settings

Output: DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate

Tone Mapping: None
Gamut Mapping: None

Step 2 - Create Your Look

Correction and creative nodes.

After your first CST, you can now add your creative nodes.

In this example, I’ve just used 4 empty nodes and labelled them for example purposes. However, this can be as small or as large as you like. Feel free to experiment or just place your usual node structure here.

Step 3 - Create a Rec.709 CST Node

DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate > Rec.709 / Gamma 2.2.

The first of two CST nodes we’re going to create is a standard Rec.709 / Gamma 2.2 conversion node.

It’s important you convert your colour space to Rec.709 for later on, as the Film LUT’s we are going to use expect this colour space.

You may want to convert to another Output Gamma depending on your workflow or the device you’re using, but here I use 2.2 as it’s my standard.

CST Settings

Input: DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate

Output: Rec.709 / Gamma 2.2

Tone Mapping: DaVinci.
Gamut Mapping: Saturation Compression.

Step 4 - Create a Cineon Log CST Node

DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate > Rec.709 / Cineon Film Log

The second of two CST nodes we’re going to create is a Rec.709 / Cineon Log conversion node. Drag the output from your final serial node (in this example, it’s the “Grade” node) into your second CST. They should now both be outputted to simultaneously as shown above.

Cineon Log is the Output Gamma the Film LUTs are expecting. Because the LUT’s are going to do the film conversions themselves, we can select None for both out tone mapping and Gamut Mapping.

(We’re going to layer this node on top of our our Gamma 2.2 node to allow us to adjust the LUT strength, but we’ll do this later on).

CST Settings

Input: DaVinci Wide Gamut / Intermediate

Output: Rec.709 / Cineon Log

Tone Mapping: None
Gamut Mapping: None

Step 5 - Add the Rec.709 Film LUT

Apply one of the Kodak or Fujifilm LUTS after your CST’s.

Add a node after your Cineon Log CST and right click. Navigate to the menu in the image below, and select any one of the 6 film LUT’s you want to use.

The D55 options are the warmest, whilst the D65 are the coolest.

Right click on your node and navigate through these menus to apply. Make sure you use the Rec709 LUTS.

Step 6 - Expand the Shadows and Reduce the Highlights

Joined together with a parallel node.

Create two nodes with simulatenous inputs, similar to what we did with the two CST’s earlier on.

Use the first node to bring the highlights down slightly, as these LUT’s can be quite harsh on the higher end of the spectrum.

Use the second node to bring the shadows down slightly, to give you more room to play around with your tone curve (contrast), as the LUT’s bring the black parts of your image a little toto high.

Play around until you get something you like, or use these settings below.

Finally, add a parallel node (Ctrl + P) after these and bring them together. This stops one node from affecting the other and blends them seamlessly.

Highlight Reduction

Find the highlights value in the Primary Color Wheels tab and reduce. I bring mine down by -50.00.

Shadows Decrease

Go into your Log Wheels tab and reduce the shadows. I bring my down by -0.03.

Step 7 - Create a Layer Mixer and Compound Node

Compounding the Film nodes and adding a layer mixer last.

Select the following nodes:

• Cineon Log CST.

• Film LUT.

• Highlights adjustment.

• Shadows adjustment.

• Parallel node.

Right click, and select “create compound node”. You should get a result that looks similar to above. Add a layer mixer node (Ctrl + L) right at the end.

Now, you can adjust the opacity of the compound node to change the strength of the LUT. To access the inside of the compound node, right click and select “Show Compound Node”.

Important: Your compound node should attach BELOW, and your Rec.709 CST should attach ABOVE on the layer mixer node. Confusingly, this is reversed in your output, meaning the Film Look is layered on ABOVE of the Rec.709, so you can lower the opacity to reveal the Rec.709 image BELOW.

Before.

After.

And that’s it.

You now have an accurate film look for all your footage, simply using built in DaVinci Resolve features.

For easier application, save this as a pre-set node tree to apply to your later projects.

Alternatively, you can download the Cinescope Powergrade which uses all of these techniques and more, to emulate an accurate film look regardless of the footage you’re using.

On top of the film look, Cinescope also has grain, film blur, custom halation and more… and works both the Free and Studio versions of DaVinci Resolve.

The Cinescope Powergrade.

Hopefully this tutorial helps you with using the Kodak and FujiFilm Film Look LUT’s in DaVinci Resolve. Thank you for reading, and happy grading! :)