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This documentation makes use of several symbols and typographical conventions in order to differentiate various paragraphs from standard descriptive text. Here is the list of symbols and typographical styles used:

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First step, you have to import the license.dat file. You need to browse the file system where you have stored the licenses. It is easier to find by to setting the correct ".dat" filter in the "File Type" line:

Should the import of the license worked fine, new functions will appear in the starting menu:

The auxiliary License is reflecting your chosen options for your software (IMF Mastering package, etc.). It needs to be imported as well, so select again “Install License” to to install the mist.lic file:

Again browse the file system where you have stored the licenses, and select “.lic” in the file type for retrieving the file.

Now, you have your software correctly activated and the IMF and DCP options enabled.

You can check your license and plugins by pressing F12 (About) or by pressing Ctrl + right click on the viewer, when a project is open.

This structure has been specially designed to be as efficient as possible to support long hours of work.

A module in MIST is displayed on the full screen of the user interface. Each module interface differs from the others.

Each module can be accessed from any other module of the application using either keyboard shortcuts or the Module Radial Menu.

From the TimeLine module, it is possible to access Sub-Modules.

These feature-specific panels or windows are accessible from the bottom menu.

This menu bar gives access to various capabilities of MIST, related to content management or specific features.

The Command Panel gives access to the assets of a project (media, compositions, metadata) as well as some tools for working with those assets.

From there you will also be able to import and manage the media for the project.

The Viewport layout and capabilities are detailed in the chapter VIEWPORT

The TimeLine behavior is detailed in the chapter TIMELINE.

MIST mouse cursor changes appearance if an action with the mouse is possible:

A contextual menu is a menu in a graphical user interface (GUI) that appears upon user interaction, such as a right-click. This menu offer a selected set of choices that are available in the current state, or context, of the application.

The Contextual Menus are accessible from every module of MIST, at the current mouse cursor location.

MIST uses two different contextual Menus: Radial Menu and Drop-down Menus.

Dialogue windows are represented by large rectangles opening over the module you are in.

They are accessible using interface buttons.

Dialogues windows can have several tabs and sometimes sub-tabs where the user can set different parameters.

Warning messages can appear in the different modules of MIST.

These messages interrupt the current work, in order to inform the user about a critical path.

Warning messages always require an action from the user : press [OK] to continue or ESC to cancel.

A lot of keyboard shortcuts are available in MIST.

A recapitulation of the available Keyboards Shortcuts for MIST is available in Appendix Keyboard Shortcuts. Animation</a> panel

Once the new project is created, the application switches to the TimeLine module.

On the left side of the panel the list of all the projects is displayed.

On the right side are indicated the list of all the compositions saved for the selected project.

Projects can be deleted using the Windows file explorer. They can be found under :

C:\Users\$SessionName$\$MarquiseSoftwareName$\users\$SessionName$\projects

For all projects, it is possible to enter additional information or metadata that can be used as reference information to identify a project:

Insert custom information like Production Company, Director’s name, etc.

In the Properties tab, set the default dimensions, frame rate or duration for all new compositions in the project.

Each new Composition of the project will be created with these parameters.

This tab allows you to set the parameters when working with JPEG2000. Depending on the performances of your workstation you can choose to use CPU or GPU power.

In CPU mode, you can also defines the maximum number of CPU threads engaged in the encoding or decoding process.

In this panel, you can select the properties of the signal that you wish to output.

Once the workstation has been properly connected to a display device (i.e. A DCI compliant projector or a SDI reference monitor), you can setup the video output of your project to obtain the appropriate signal on your device.

This tab allows you to configure the communication between your Reference monitor and the application: the ST-2086 metadata selected in the Mastering Display of the COMPOSITION SETTINGS can be automatically sent to the Reference monitor, allowing to configure it accordingly and avoid the operator to use the monitor’s manual menu.

The following monitors can be remote controlled:

Select your preferences for the user interface:

When using a control panel, this is where you can connect and configure it.

The Tangent Devices panels are supported.

Defines autosavings.

This sections defines the default settings for Dolby technologies.

TORNADO is a transcoding server that can be linked to MIST in order to offload the rendering from MIST PC system.

In the case TORNADO is installed on the same PC system than MIST, this tab shows the local host TORNADO is using.

Read more on TORNADO : https://marquise-tech.cloud/portal/en/kb/articles/tornado-user-guide

You can create folders to organize the project media according to your needs.

Alternatively you can use the icon "add folder":

The operator can display the media assets using different views :

Click on the View icons on the upper right of the Command Panel to change the views:

Drag & Drop from Windows' file system allows you to easily import flat files, packages (DCP, IMF, iTunes, etc..), image sequences, camera magazines, compositions, sidecars files, etc. as well as entire directories.

Once the media are properly referenced, they are displayed in the Media tab.

The Import panel is an internal browser that has the capability of understanding complex media files and packages.

This is also the function you will use to import specific metadata files like EDLs, Dolby Vision .mdf or QC reports in XML.

Alternatively, when the clip is selected, you can press the mouse’s right button. Choose Delete from the drop-down menu.

When a package contains SideCar files, they are displayed in the list Sidecar Assets.

OPLs present in an IMF package are listed under the Processing Graphs list.

Read more on Compositions

To easily navigate in any area of the image, use the pan navigation:

To zoom in a specific part of the image:

It is possible to capture a snapshot of the content displayed in the viewport.

Settings for the snapshots are located in the Media section of the Project.

It is possible to define automatically the naming convention for your snapshots as well as the directory to save them, or to opt for a manual saving.

You can also add the LUT defined for the GUI or the SDI output.

To use the Dual Viewport option, it is easier to start with an open project.

The right Viewport is for the Composition, and the left Viewport is used by the source media.

The navigation management tools in the Viewport remain the same as for Single Viewport on the selected Viewport. Refer to chapter Viewport Manipulations .

It is possible to synchronize the timeline of the source with the one of the composition to do frame matching.

Automatically, the second timeline will place and lock the playhead position at the same image number. You can also playback both timelines at the same time.

The commands for the Transport controls are the following:

Some controls for the timeline are directly accessible from the GUI (in addition to keyboard shortcuts).

The user interface displays playback information. It is also possible to change the playback speed on the fly.

See Playback information

Depending on the length of the composition, you may need to navigate through the composition back and forth, or change the display scale to reveal more or less of it.

The TimeLine can be configured to serve your needs depending on the projects you are working on. Possible configurations include:

Composition duration is displayed in light grey over the timescale:

By default, the composition is set on 24h.

The duration of the composition can be adjusted by a simple move (left mouse click and drag) of the small handles at each end of the line.

The Composition can also be manually adjusted by typing values for the beginning and the end of the composition:

The composition is automatically updated with the new duration.

In order to quickly fit the composition, you can also use the Timeline Hot Box:

A project can contain an unlimited number of compositions, each of them with a different output format, frame rate or image resolution.

Compositions are reflecting the content of a Timeline. You can save them and reload them.

Markers are represented in the TimeLine by colored triangles and positioned in the Marker’s track:

You can navigate from Markers to Markers with a double click on a time code in the Markers list: the playhead automatically jumps to the chosen frame in the TimeLine.

SMPTE markers labels are supported. To add some, select the desired Marker in the list and click on Default on the Type column.

This action display the Markers drop down menu.

You can also add custom comments.

Select the desired Marker in the list and click on Default on the Comments column and add your custom text:

You can navigate from Locators to Locators with a double click on a time code in the Locators list: the playhead automatically jumps to the chosen frame in the TimeLine.

Once created, duration as well as the IN and OUT points of reels cannot be changed. In order to do it, a new reel has to be done. To create all the desired reels, repeat the process as many times as necessary. The reels are listed in order of timecode and not by their order of creation.

The Auto Reel function is a very useful tool creating automatically the reels.

Right-click on the TimeLine background to access the COMPOSITION OPERATIONS drop-down menu and choose Auto Reels:

A window appears in order to choose the desired method and settings:

All of these method can be applied by choosing different range such as:

Composition, Actual Total or Marked In/Out.

In order to delete a reel, click on the desired reel and click - to validate the deletion of the selected reel.

Double-click on the IN or OUT timecode, allow to move quickly from one to another reel.

One of the major differences between a colorist and an editor is the fact that they have different requirements regarding the display of the shots and how to navigate from one to the other. While the editor will be mostly using the timeline to navigate in the composition, a colorist is more likely to prefer another method. The reason for this is quite simple : when color grading a show, the focus is on the shots as individual pieces of content and their placement in the chronology of the show or the possible transitions between them is not relevant.

A classic editing timeline is far from sufficient to serve the purpose. Instead another navigation tool is preferred. This navigation tool is the Event Viewer (sometimes called the shot viewer).

The Event Viewer also displays the clips available on the timeline in a chronological manner; however, it represents each clip with a preview of one of the frames of the clip. Each preview is displayed next to each other and their dimension is always the same. As a matter of fact, the Event Viewer does not visually represent the length of a clip (or shot). Again this information is of little interest during the color correction process. The diagram below shows you the difference between the timeline and the Event Viewer representations :

Besides the visual difference, there is also the fact that an Event Viewer allows only a limited number of editing operations. These editing operations are the common ones used by a colorist or an assistant and once again they only serve the purpose of permitting operations needed in this context.

It is also worth noting that the name (i.e. Event Viewer) refers to the objects it displays as “events” and not clips or shots or anything else. From the colorists point of view the timeline is an assemblage of pieces of material that have been spliced together in a chronological manner.

Each of these objects are called “events” because they are actually events occurring at a certain time during the playback of the final show. Once an event is over, it is immediately followed by another event (which can be another piece of material, a transition, or simply a black screen).

A colorist will work on each of these events and make sure that they are all consistent from the color point of view and correspond to the intentions of the director of photography.

In addition to the navigation shortcuts offered by the Event Viewer, there is another important reason to use it. The Event Viewer also gives you access to multiple grading versions per event.

In this chapter, you will learn the following things:

The Event Viewer is a key element during a grading session. As a matter of fact, colorists use it much more than the regular timeline. Therefore it must be accessible at any time by using all the connected input devices, i.e. the mouse or the stylus, the keyboard and of course the control surface.

The Event Viewer always displays the events on the currently active layer only. In a multi-layer composition, you must activate the layer you want to work on first. The Event Viewer is immediately updated with the events (clips or holes) existing on the active layer.

The events are arranged chronologically from the left to the right. The leftmost event is the first event on the timeline, while the rightmost is the last event on the timeline.

The current event (the one that you are working on) is always centered in the display. Towards the left you will find the preceding events (or past events), while to the right you will have the upcoming events (or future events).

The diagram below shows multiple events on the currently selected layers and their organization from left to right:

As previously explained, the current event (the one that you are working on) is always centered. To distinguish it from the other surrounding events, it has a light-blue blinking border.

Besides the indication of which event is currently worked on, there are other indications that the current event carries and that are worth looking at. The close-up screenshot below shows the current event centered and exposes some extra information :

The current event also has a display of the current frame number as well as the total number of frames. This indication is updated as you navigate through the event.

Moreover, each event has a “dirty” flag that is displayed on the top-left corner of the thumbnail. This flag indicates that the event has been modified and the modifications have not been confirmed or saved. So, if you don’t save your composition by yourself, the auto-save could do it and then make the flag disappear.

One of the top purposes of the Event Viewer is to provide a fast visually-oriented navigation through the shots available in the currently active layer. Rather than locating a segment in a timeline, the Event Viewer allows you to visually locate the event you want to go to by looking at is thumbnail.

The navigation is performed by either using the mouse and stylus, or the same navigation keyboard shortcuts as in the timeline or eventually by using the transport controls of your control surface. In this section, only the specific Event Viewer navigation methods will be explained.

During the grading process it could happen that a missing shot needs to be inserted in the timeline. This can happen for various reasons, some being the fact that a VFX shot was missing or you simply need to insert some titles for the purpose of mastering. Whatever the reason, the best way to edit the timeline is still by using the editing tools in the actual timeline or editing mode.

Nevertheless, for some simple operations it is also quite handy to insert shots by placing them between other shots via some quick methods. The event viewer offers the possibility to insert shots before or after a shot, by dropping one or more clips attached to your pointing device.

To insert before or after a shot through the Event Viewer, some conditions need to be met :

Also you have first to decide if you want to insert or replace by clicking on the button on the top left corner of the timeline to toggle from one to another (or you can press the hotkey INSERT). The one showed will be the one used :

Just as important as being able to insert shots on the fly, without any conforming or editing operations, it often happens that shots simply need to be replaced. There are many ways to replace shots on the timeline and every method has its pros and cons. While the timeline and more editing-oriented and the conforming operations are more adapted to building or adapting full compositions to media changes, they still are somehow complex operations.

A simple method is provided by the Event Viewer, facilitating shot replacement without the need to understand editing or conforming.

To replace one or more shots through the Event Viewer, some conditions need to be met:

During the grading process shots must be selected and deselected to perform various operations on them as a group. Shots can be selected any many places with the exact same effect on them, however the event viewer also allows some basic selection operation for the sake of convenience. Below are listed the selection operations that can be performed directly in the Event Viewer.

There is several modes for playback available:

The “Play once” mode is set by default.

To play a specific region of the composition, mark the desired range with IN and/or OUT points:

The timeline’s interface displays some playback information such as:

Once you have dropped your media in the Media tab of the Command Panel (see Media Tab, you can start adding the clips on the Timeline.

There are several ways to add clips to a composition and they all depend on the context. Some methods will be more appropriate than others in some particular cases.

Alternatively you can use the TimeLine Hot Box to quickly manipulate the clips:

You can remove an entire clip or a range of frames from the composition using several methods :

In order to quickly navigate with clips, you can use the Timeline Hot Box:

By razor at mark In or Out or by range :

To use the drag & drop method, first select the desired insert mode (INSERT / REPLACE).

You can use the Dual Viewport for inserting a clip or parts of a clip using the 3-point editing method.

Refer to Dual Viewport for more information.

The import of standalone subtitle file is similar to a video or a audio assets.

You can import the subtitle file directly from the OS browser by selecting it and dragging it into the Command Panel's Media bin.

The way to import subtitles and captions image profile is identical to text profile.

However, make sure the image files and the subtitle XML file are in the same root folder, permitting to automatically locate the image files to which the XML subtitle file refers.

To place your subtitles and captions in the timeline create a subtitle track by clicking S+ at the top left of the timeline and place your media like any other asset type or paste it directly to the playhead location.

In case you have selected multiple subtitle tracks, they will be stacked on the top of each other.

It is possible to configure the composition size according to the properties of a subtitle file such as IMSC1. To do this, the file must have the attribute tts: extent defining the resolution of the image in its settings.

Most of the time, this attribute is used in the subtitle files using the image profile and the pixel unit. This is to inform the optimal resolution of the use of the subtitle, so as not to deteriorate its quality which the would make it unusable:

The composition fits the dimensions of the subtitle file.

In the case of using a subtitle in text profile, the subtitle will use the same resolution as the current composition. The text being vectorial, there is no loss of quality.

The subtitle file can contain one or more blocks of text, each block itself being able to contain several lines of text. Each block has several properties, including the font face type, size and of course the start and end time during the presentation.

As soon as the subtitle has been placed in the timeline, subtitles are displayed into the Viewport. If not, verify that the associated font has been loaded:

If a font is present in the subtitle, it will automatically appear under the tab FONT.

If the font has been not loaded, no font will be listed and no subtitle will be displayed into the Viewport. Note that a subtitle file can have multiple referenced fonts into the list.

In order for a font associated with a subtitle to be automatically loaded, the font file must be in the same root folder as the subtitle text file. Otherwise, the Arial font is loaded by default.

Several active subtitles track can be displayed simultaneously.

Active tracks have their name highlighted in cyan.

If needed you can hide the track by clicking on the check mark to deactivate it and on the X to display it again:

It is possible to quickly navigate from one subtitle line to another one in the composition.

Of course this is based on the timecode of the subtitle track, not on the composition’s one. If your subtitle track is not starting on the first frame of your composition, the timecode will be different.

Due to the inherent structure of the subtitle file, MIST imports subtitle files as a single block with all your text into it. Like any other type of media, it is possible to apply basics editing functions.

When you cut a subtitle file placed in the timeline, the REC In and REC Out will be displayed in yellow in the spotlist. The spotlist is located in the TEXT tab of the SUBTITLES panel.

This indicates the offset value between each line of text subtitles with the timecode of the cut as starting point. Regardless of the placement of the subtitle cut in the timeline, the indicated offset will always be based on the timecode registered in the subtitle file.

MIST allows a large modification of many subtitle and caption parameters through inline commands. The possibilities of modifying these parameters depend mainly on the format of the subtitle in use.

If you want to do some basics text editing correction, do as follow:

For DCI subtitles format, it is possible to change the text position by moving respectively the X,Y and Z sliders from left to right to change the values. From the drop-down menu, select the desired text alignment.

Subtitle management for stereoscopy is similar to subtitle management for other content. The main difference is to care of the Z axis when editing subtitle position in the TOOLS tab. There is no need to duplicate tracks to generate 3D for subtitles.

To manage the Z axis, do as follow:

For further information, please report to the stereoscopy chapter.

MIST allows you to export your subtitle track to another subtitle format as single file:

Note that for some file format, the font can be added to the subtitle file (e.g. CineCanvas).

MIST allows to manage the color space and the luminance gain independently from the video track.

Read the MTCMS chapter for further informations.

MIST allows subtitles and captions to be included in an IMF package. Please refer to the IMF chapter for more information.

MIST allows subtitles to be included and encrypted in an DCP package. Please refer to the DCP chapter for more information.

When exporting a content using the Master Delivery panel, excepting for iTunes packages, the active subtitle track will be automatically rendered. Subtitles must be visible to be burned in. Other subtitle tracks are ignored.

When inside the RENDER module, you can have as much as "Subtitle" nodes than needed. It is useful in case of multilingual content (e.g. when having two or three languages need to be displayed like in Switzerland).

The Render module renders all visible tracks in the timeline. If you want to burn-in only one subtitle track, you have to deactivate the others.

To add a subtitle node to an output, do as follow:

in MIST, the Immersive Audio files are not managed as regular audio tracks.

When importing an immersive audio track into the Command Panel, MIST recognizes the metadata and display a different image icon for the file:

The immersive audio files must be placed on an Auxiliary data track on the timeline.

and drop the file on this track.

MIST is supporting Dolby Atmos technology and allows the render and the playback of the Atmos files.

MIST allows to export Atmos content in a variety of files and packages:

MIST allows the wrapping of DTS-X audio tracks in a DCP. See Creating a DCP with DTS-X.

When selecting the ACES CMS, MIST will inspect the media metadata to automatically set the right IDT.

However you may want to modify per clip the IDT. MIST has a non exhaustive list of IDTs including the ones defined for cameras and a list of main inverse ODTs.

From the GRADE PANEL in the Source tab, choose the IDT corresponding to the properties of each of your clips.

When you are in NATIVE mode, the most important setting you really need to pay attention to, is the Range.

A histogram is a graphical representation of the tonal distribution in a digital image.
It plots the number of pixels for each tonal value. By looking at the histogram for a specific image one is able to judge the entire tonal distribution at a glance.

Options

The vectorscope is used to visualize chrominance, which is encoded into the video signal as a subcarrier of specific frequency: it plots the Cb and Cr channels against each other, for the purpose of measuring and testing television signals.

Options

This diagram allows you to see how the signal is displayed within the color space chosen.

You can use Shift+G to display the CIE diagram.

Legend

Options

The Waveform is used to measure and display the level of the brightness, or luminance, of the part of the image being drawn onto a screen at the same point in time.

Options

This tools is very similar to the camera zebra mode for controlling the exposure.

The Zebra mode displays in blue the pixels below the boundaries, and in red those above:

The Luminance meter is used to measure the photometric brightness of an HDR image. It measures the amount of light that strikes a surface in the picture.

The VU-Meter displays a representation of the signal level per audio channel.

You can display Peak Meters information, Sample Peak and True Peak.

The Loudness meter measures the human perceived loudness of an audio content.

Here the Loudness Meter is based on the EBU R128 Loudness recommandation.

In this meter, the positions of the full range loudspeakers are marked on a graticule and the amplitude distribution of the sound-field is used to modulate a visual representation, also called "jellyfish display".

The phase relationships that exist between channels of a multi-channel audio system represent critical information to a quality-control engineer.

This meter allows a real-time 3D visualization of the immersive audio objects positions in the room.

As soon as the progress bar has finished, you can read the results of the analysis via the PSNR scope. To access it, press Shift+P.

If you want to export the PSNR report as a PDF file or an XML file, click EXPORT on the timeline.

Once the report is loaded, the errors are displayed on the timeline on the Locators' track:

The first step before you start the grading process is to access the Grade Panel. This can be done either by pressing the corresponding keyboard shortcut kbd:F9] or by clicking on GRADE at the bottom right of the Timeline module.

MIST supports the Elements Control Surfaces from Tangent Devices.

The grade panel comes in several categories:

Each of these categories divides themselves into several tabs of settings specific to their functions.

However for each of these tabs, you will always have access to the recurring functions, arranged to the right of the Grade panel:

Source tab is an essential step in determining the color settings of the clip before starting any color-grading procedure. Especially in the case of RAW files. For more information, please read the chapter Source Settings.

Each clip can be configured individually or together to save time.

However if you want to reset your settings, you have to be in the desired panel before clicking on the RESET button on the right side of the panel (e.g. if you reset pan & scan, it will not affect the YRGB):

Pan and scan is a term used in cinematography to describe geometric adjustments applied on the picture, mostly horizontal and vertical positioning within the frame used for projection/display. Besides frame repositioning, Pan & Scan processes can include zooming in and out of the image and other more sophisticated operations like distortions, etc.

In MIST, the Pan & Scan panel occupies the first position in the color grading pipeline, right after the SOURCE panel.

The YRGB tool is the first set of color correction parameters that is used in almost all situations. As a matter of fact, the major corrections always start using this tool and the rest of the toolset is used for refinements.

The YRGB tool gets his name from the three letters Y, R, G and B, where R, G and B stand for red, green and blue. The Y letter stands for luminance.

This color correction panel offers three main color wheels that will act on three major parts of color distribution in an image. These parts are essentially the black point, the white point and the distribution of shades between these two points.

Depending on your content and your preferences, you can choose which kind of wheels you want to use with the scroll menu in the bottom left corner:

The color balance is the second tool in the color correction chain and is one of the most used as well. This color correction tool is positioned as second because it is used closely in conjunction with the YRGB tool.

While the YRGB corrections process all the image pixels in the same way, the color balance tool processes them depending on their luminance. In other words, the balance tool will treat differently dark pixels from light pixels from average luminance pixels.

The tool offers separate correction for three luminance-based regions, the SHADOWS, MIDTONES and HIGHLIGHTS. These three luminance regions are present in almost any image and clearly identify dark areas, very luminous areas and the average luminous areas.

In the color balance tool, each of these regions has its own set of selectable parameters that can be adjusted to obtain the desired result. The screenshot below shows the dedicated controls for these three regions:

The color balance controls also include for each of the tonal ranges, a saturation control :

The ability to correct independently the shadows, midtones and highlights in an image as well as adjusting the saturation of these regions is extremely important. The YRGB color correction tool described previously may easily introduce color casts in one of these three regions. This is a typical effect during the white balancing process for example.

In order to correct any exaggeration introduced by the YRGB tool, the color balance tool can be used. Among the issues that the YRGB tool can create, one of them is the oversaturation of shadows or highlights. By providing independent saturation control on each of the three tonal ranges, such a problem can be easily corrected.

Like for any others tab, you can bypass them individually by clicking on the bypass button on the right side panel. It allows you to activate or deactivate certain steps of the color pipeline.

The Mixer tool allows to send a proportion of one colour channel to another one, in order to drive pixels of a different colour. This is done by taking values from one channel and add them to or subtract them from another.

There are a lot applications for the mixer tool but one could be to obtain a good balance in case where there’s hardly any colour information there to amplify.

Because chances are good that one of the other colour channels has data which you can use by feeding it into another colour channel’s output. This allows you to increase a low-level channel signal without the consequence to increase noise by adding gain.

The Curves tool allows you to change the gamma as a curve. You can select the desired color channel to modify independently or choose to change all channels at the same time by choosing Master.

Each of them have both input and output components as well as intermediate values points corresponding to a dedicated luminance level. By moving these intermediates points on the graphic, you are changing the gamma.

Unlike other calibration functions that change gamma as a number value, the curves are a more intuitive way to work.

The Vectors tool allows you to select a certain pixel category defined according to established settings, in order to apply saturation, hue or luminance correction on it.

Each color regions is independant and bypassed by default. Click on the BYPASS button to make it active. To select a range of pixels to modify:

The AUX tab allows you to apply one or more plug-ins per clip.

For more information on plug-in features and settings, please refer to manufacturer’s documentation.

The Key tool (or matte key) allows you to select a certain pixel category defined according to established settings then apply color corrections on it.

The setting is bypassed by default. Click on the BYPASS button to make it active. To select a range of pixels to modify:

You can use one key selection per secondary. To switch to another secondary, click on S1 or S2 etc.

Once your selection is made, you can move to the COLOR and EFFECTS tabs or you can move to the SHAPES one in order to define an action area for this selection.

It is possible to create several shapes by secondary. Also, a selection using a Key can be done right upstream.

The color corrections applied here refer to the settings explained previously in the chapter YRGB and BALANCE. Please refer to it for more information.

In the same way as the other tabs referring to the secondary ones, each setting is related to a specific secondary. It is possible to have up to six secondary. Each new secondary coming to apply above the previous one. To switch between secondaries, click on the dedicated one ( e.g S3 or S2 etc).

The grade library is a dedicated module that you use to store, recall and manage presets of color grading parameters. The module is accessible from within the TimeLine module only as it is the only place where you need it.

From the Timeline module, press the F8 key to reveal the grade library. The screen elements will get hidden and the grade library contents will get revealed as shown on the screenshot below:

The Grade Library is organized in three main regions. Each of these regions has a specific purpose and will be used when required during the grading session. The screenshot below shows how these parts are spread across the screen area:

The parts have been numbered from one to three to emphasize their importance during a classic grading session. The following table explains their purpose:

Presets are always stored in the grade library from the current shot you are working on. So in order to store a grade as a preset in the grade library you must first navigate from the Timeline module, to the actual shot you want the color correction parameters to be stored. The current shot is always visible in the Event Viewer (E) as it is displayed in the center.

The simplest method to store a grade is to click on the STORE button available in the GRADE panel, on the right side of the screen.

In order to store a preset using the keyboard, you must press M.

Once a preset has been stored in the grade library, it can naturally be recalled when needed. Just like for the storage procedure, you must go to the Timeline module then set the playhead position on the shot that you want to apply the preset.

To recall a preset you must use the RECALL button that is displayed next to the STORE button or you can press B.

Once the RECALL button pressed, the parameters stored will be reloaded and they will replace the current values used in the various grading tools for the current shot.

In order to ensure the quality and consistency of color grading, color correction on shots must often be compared with each other.

To facilitate all these operations, MIST has a built-in frame comparator with various visual configurations. The comparator is always working with the current frame in your composition and a dedicated frame store, called the StillStore.

The StillStore is essentially a dedicated memory to store a reference frame. That reference frame can be a snapshot of one of the frames of your composition, a reference frame reloaded from the Grade Library or possibly a still frame you have loaded in the Library on purpose.

To display or hide the Storyboard Panel open the TimeLine Module (timeline) and press F7 key. Certain controller panels also have a softkey mapped for direct access from the TimeLine Module.

The entire upper portion of the Storyboard Panel is used to display the Clip Event Thumbnails.

Each new video clip placed in the timeline from the Library or created as a result of an editing process (i.e.: Automatic Scene Detection, Razor, Extract, Cutting, Pasting, Lifting a segment that creates a new segment, etc.) will also automatically create a new clip event thumbnail in the Storyboard Panel.

Each Clip Event displays a thumbnail of its reference frame. By default this reference frame is the first frame of the clip at the moment it was created. However it is automatically updated when a processing correction is committed to the clip in the Grade Module by confirming that process with the Confirm Grade function or with the DO button on your dedicated control panel). Each clip also displays information concerning the clip itself in the corners of the thumbnail.

You may zoom the size of the clips displayed in the Storyboard Panel larger or smaller by holding the Ctrl key then pressing - or +.

In order to be able to see clips in the Storyboard Panel that exceed the size of the screen hold, you may scroll vertically with the mouse wheel.

It is worth noting that these clip events are, in essence, the same clip event that are displayed horizontally in the Event Viewer from the Timeline Module.

When the playback cursor is located over a grouped clip event in the Timeline module, that event is selected in the Event Viewer.

A white triangle is displayed within it and a blue highlight box is displayed around it. All other visible clip events that belong to the same group as the selected clip are highlighted with an orange box around them. This shows which clips will be processed along with the selected clip.

Although you may temporarily select multiple clips to be processed together directly from within the Event Viewer (by holding Ctrl and clicking on clips) the best way to avoid repetitive processes (like applying a single color correction to large series of dallies) is to first group all the clips you wish to process together in the Storyboard and then return to the Event Viewer to apply your corrections to them all.

Thus, these will be applied to the entire group of the selected clip.

You may also wish to exclude one or more clips from a group temporarily without having to remove them from the Storyboard groups by using Ctrl + click on the grouped clips in the Event Viewer that you wish to exclude.

In the bottom left corner of the Storyboard Panel is a miniature viewport display of the current play cursor position of the timeline.

The mini viewport is present as a reminder of what the overall aspect of the current clip is so that you may use the Grade Preset copy shortcut function successfully within the Storyboard Panel. The Grade Preset copy shortcut is explained below in the next section.

In the bottom right corner of the Storyboard Panel are the Group and Select buttons.

The Group buttons are numbered from 01 to 32 and allow you to assign as many ungrouped clips to a single group number as desired.

In order to add clips those are present in the timeline to a Storyboard group :

In order to ungroup all clips in a single group:

“High dynamic range is specified and designed for capturing, processing, and reproducing scene imagery, with increased shadow and highlight detail beyond current SDR video and cinema systems capabilities.” (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers® (SMPTE® Study Group Report High-Dynamic-Range (HDR) Imaging Ecosystem)).

HDR offers the ability to capture, process, distribute, and display large contrast ranges, resulting in more realistic images. The images are not just brighter with contrasts artificially dilated.

The brilliances of the objects are more faithful and the details in the high and the low lights are better represented.

HDR makes it possible to have images with more depth and better saturated highlights. Differences in brightness between indoor and outdoor scenes make more sense.

High Dynamic Range moving images capture is a reality since the first high-end digital cameras. RAW images have naturally a very high dynamic range, with an average of 14 stops for the ARRI Alexa and the SONY F65. Those camera manufacturers already offer wide gamut capture, 6K or 8K resolution at up to 120 frames per second. The bottleneck for HDR was the post-production workflows, not ready because not yet standardized, and no capable display devices were available.

Now that some pioneers have lead the way, like Dolby, and that standardization committees and industry alliances have made great works to specify what HDR is, deliveries in HDR have become a reality, pushed by the consumer market opportunities.

A variety of SMPTE standards specifies the different types of HDR.

Below you will have an overview of the vocabulary frequently used with the HDR technology used as well in MIST :