Color Grading: What Is It & How Does It Work?

Whether you’re watching a movie, commercial, or TV show, you likely notice how colors effectively set the tone of each scene; that’s the power of color grading. While topics like green screens and computer-generated images (CGI) tend to get all the love, this is an equally important element when producing engaging content. 

What is color grading, and how does it work? Here’s everything you need to know. 


What Is Color Grading?

Color grading is the process of creating a color tone for your content, such as a cooler, bluish hue or a warmer, reddish one. During color grading, you can enhance or alter the color, saturation, and contrast of footage to create a specific vibe. Whether you’re aiming for a nostalgic feel or a dark, suspenseful atmosphere, color grading lets you fine-tune the visual experience to evoke the exact response you want from your audience. 

Color Grading vs. Color Correction

Before we dig in deeper, it’s important to understand the difference between color grading and color correction. You’ll make color corrections early on in the editing process to adjust any inaccuracies in color and exposure. For example, if you shoot footage in low light, certain colors may look dull or yellowish. Color correction allows you to fix the hues and make content appear natural. 

After you’ve corrected all of the colors in your content, you can make stylistic choices to enhance the visual narrative, which is color grading. You can adjust colors and hues to give your content a specific mood and look. 

Benefits of Color Grading

Incorporating color grading into your post-production process does the following for your production:

1. Enhances the Mood and Emotion of the Scene

Color has a powerful emotional effect, and this process allows you to harness that power to influence the audience’s emotional response. A feeling of tension calls for darker and desaturated colors, while a warm and romantic scene might benefit most from a golden hue that makes everything look more inviting. 

2. Creates a Cinematic and Professional Look

Raw footage often looks flat, especially when filmed with high-end cameras that capture a wide dynamic range. Color grading transforms flat shots into vibrant visuals that look polished and professional. 

3. Establishes Visual Consistency Throughout the Project

In any project, visual consistency is crucial. Color grading ensures each shot maintains a similar tone, creating a seamless viewing experience. Scenes may look disjointed if you use this process incorrectly (or not at all), especially if you filmed them under different lighting conditions or at various times of day. With consistent color throughout your entire video, you’ll have smooth and natural transitions.

4. Helps Direct the Viewer’s Attention

Color grading can subtly direct the viewer’s eye to the most important elements in each frame. You can highlight certain details while downplaying less important aspects of the content. It’s a technique that is particularly useful in storytelling, where directing attention to specific characters, objects, or actions is essential for conveying your narrative. 

5. Transforms Ordinary Footage Into a Distinct Visual Style

One of the most exciting aspects of color grading is its ability to define a unique style. You want your content to be instantly recognizable, and this process plays a key role in that. Use it to express your distinct style and create a visual signature that viewers can recognize. 

How Does Color Grading Work?

Color grading is typically handled in post-production through the use of specialized software. These tools allow you to manipulate various color elements, including brightness, contrast, hue, and saturation. 

You’ll start by importing high-quality footage into your software, performing basic color correction, and then applying your grading adjustments. Most programs also allow you to use Look-Up Tables (LUTs) or presets, which are pre-configured settings that apply specific color schemes to the footage. LUTs can save you ample time while also helping you maintain consistency. 

Key Elements of Color Grading

The primary elements you’ll need to address during color grading include the following:

  • Contrast and Brightness: Control the depth and dimension in the footage 
  • Saturation: Adjusts the intensity of colors 
  • Hue: Allows shifts in color tones and changes the overall temperature of the scene 
  • Shadows and Highlights: Help enhance detail by balancing darker and lighter areas 

If you are new to this post-production process, take time to experiment with these different elements. Make minor adjustments until you achieve the desired look. 

Best Practices for Effective Color Grading

Here are some tips to help you make the most of your next video project: 

Maintain Consistent Visual Style Across Scenes

Your content should look cohesive and polished from the first frame to the last. Establish a color palette that compliments the story’s mood and apply it consistently across all scenes. 

Use LUTs and Presets To Enhance Creativity

LUTs and presets are fantastic tools that can save time and help you quickly achieve a specific look. Experiment with presets and use them as a creative starting point to tweak further to fit your unique style. 

Balance Colors for Natural Skin Tones

You’ll need to maintain realistic skin tones, especially in close-up shots. Be careful not to distort skin tones too much when color grading, as that can make the footage feel unnatural. A good rule of thumb is to focus on skin tones first and adjust other colors around them. 

Fine-Tune Contrast and Highlights for Depth

Creating depth in footage involves carefully balancing contrast and highlights, which helps give your visuals a more cinematic feel. You can use contrast to add dimension and make certain elements pop on-screen. 

Ensure Color Grading Complements the Story’s Mood

Always keep the story’s tone and emotion in mind when color grading. Cooler tones work well for suspenseful scenes, for instance, while warmer tones suit scenes with joyful moments. Remember that every single element of the video helps tell your overall story.

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Color Grading

While color grading can transform your footage, even a few minor mistakes can undermine its impact. For example, oversaturation can make the footage look unrealistic and distract from its most important elements. 

Inconsistent grading is another common mistake that can create a disjointed viewing experience, as is misaligning the colors with the story’s tone. Effective grading requires a delicate balance, so avoiding extremes in any direction is essential. 

What Color Grading Cannot Do

Color grading isn’t a magical fix-all. It’s not going to repair poorly lit or blurry footage, nor will it fully compensate for extreme under- or overexposure. And like any other post-production tool, it can’t create quality from scratch. It’s most effective when used in combination with high-quality footage shot with proper lighting and exposure. If you start with high-quality footage, color grading can improve your content. 

Producing High-Quality Videos at Scale

Mastering the art of color grading requires practice and a knack for perfecting the color tone of video content. If you need a little help applying concepts like color grading to produce high-quality videos at scale, QuickFrame has you covered.

QuickFrame is a dynamic video production solution that eliminates the inefficiencies of traditional video content creation. We connect brands like yours to a global community of video makers with incredible video skills, including color grading, VFX compositing, and more. No matter your video needs, QuickFrame’s video production platform can connect you with the right video makers for your projects! 

Color Grading: Final Thoughts 

Color grading is vital in video production, turning raw footage into something expressive and visually captivating. Whether you’re producing a feature film, commercial, or YouTube video, color grading is essential for delivering a professional look that resonates with your audience. 

By understanding the principles and best practices of color grading, you can create videos that look cinematic and tell a compelling story. Elevate the quality of your next video marketing campaign by leveraging color grading. 

Do More with Video

Learn how we can help you produce more quality videos affordably and at scale.