I have worked with a few videographers on big shoots, but don’t have much experience myself other than little behind the scenes type of videos shot with an iPhone. One thing I noticed is that the initial footage is always super washed out. Then they color correct it, and bam! Awesome footage.
Why do they shoot it that way? It’s obvious to me that there’s a reason— they’re I professionals, and they know what they’re doing— but I have no idea what that reason is!
In: Technology
There are some great technical answers, but there’s another answer.
Let’s say you want a particular color profile for your film. You set your camera for that profile. You shoot some test footage. You look at it and it looks good. Now, you go and shoot the actual scene, take the footage, and go home.
Now you’re home and editing, and you realize the color profile you chose isn’t what you wanted. You need to fix it. You have to go back, set everything up again, pay all the people you needed on set the first time to come back, and shoot the whole thing all over. Lather, rinse, repeat. There’s a whole extra day’s work.
If you shoot neutral and color correct after, it’s more efficient. Do the color correction. Don’t like it? Re-do it in a minute. Don’t like it? Re-do it again. Heck, take an hour to get it right. It’s one person, working for one hour, at a desk.
Laziness is the mother of invention.
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