(rock music) - What's going on guys? This is Qazi. Welcome to another epic video. Today we're gonna be
creating a Sin City effect or a Sin City look. You can check it out, like,
what I got going on over here. So we're gonna build it from ground up. There's tons of little technical things that you need to understand
to achieve this sort of look. Now a look like that you
gotta be very careful. You don't wanna overuse it. But there's definitely
time and place for it. Specifically music videos and commercials. You can also create this look
and then dial back the colors from black and white to, like, just a hint of, like a specific color, and then still push tons of color to that one specific product
that you're focusing on. So there's bunch of different
directions you can take, once you know how to build
this particular look. Now I get questions about the node tree and what different nodes do all the time. I have a one hour long training that covers all of that and then some. Link is down below. It's absolutely free. Do not forget to check it out. And then it's loaded with Q&A at the end. And those questions came
straight from you guys. So tons and tons of value. It's absolutely free. Link is down below. If you're enjoying the
content, you know what to do. Smash that like button. Subscribe to my channel
for more awesomeness. Make sure you're
following me on Instagram. Let's roll the intro. (upbeat music) All right. Let's jump into it. And I must say Sin City, growing up, was one of my favorite movies,
and a movie that inspired me and opened the doors for me to get into the world of color grading. So that's just the honest truth. First thing that I wanna do
is to pop open our image. And, so, let's see what's really going on. Let's check out the Scopes. That's gonna tell us the actual story. So the first thing that we notice when you look at this
image is that it is pushed. I mean, look at this. This is the meet of the image. And then we gotta our highlights. And then this is just basically nothing. Everything is living in here and here. So it's a very, very pushed image. That's the one thing
that we need to realize. And when you think about Sin City, you just think like black
and white with a pop of, like, one color, whether
it's yellow or red. But the funny thing is
that it's not white 100%. Because look at how much red is in there. So it has this like staircase
sort of situation going on. And that's one thing that people don't realize
that Sin City had that. So you can still create a black and white. But throw your own flare on top. That's what we get from this. So let's go over to what
we're working with right now. So this is my image. And
that's my hero frame. I'm gonna be building my
node tree and my grade off of this one frame. This particular shot is
filmed with ALEXA Mini LF, same camera used on 1917 by Roger Deakins. It's mind-blowing. I mean
this camera and what you get, the range you get here
is just outta control. So, I'm gonna go ahead, start
building out my node tree. First node is gonna be
reserved for highlights. The second one, I'm gonna pull it down, and this is gonna be the Arri LUT. We're gonna to do a
technical LUT conversion. So we're gonna to take our LOG image and turn it into REC 709. Then I'm gonna create another node. And this is where the black
and white is gonna happen. And then we're gonna create a layer mixer. And this one is gonna be our yellow. Okay? So before I go any further,
this is not what I meant to do. I'm not sure what happened. And then this is gonna be our yellow. So let's move back to frame 13. And let's just get going. So I'm gonna come in here, go under LUTs, Arri, and then this is the LUT provided by Arri. So you can do a proper conversion, like, look at nothing is blown out. Everything is looking perfect. So now we're basically
at the natural state. This is what it looked like when it was shot through a camera. Okay? So this is the first
step that we're gonna do. And now what I wanna do
is I wanna go in here, and I wanna punch in on this yellow, and I wanna qualify it. So I'm gonna go under my Qualifier, and I'm just gonna go ahead select this. I'm gonna hit Shift A, so we can see what I'm, we're selecting. And let's just make it
a little bit better. So I'm gonna announce it a little bit. I just wanna grab the
yellow. Nothing else. So let's clean it up. And if we look at what we're doing right now, there's still a lot of areas
that are being selected. So that's totally okay. Because you're gonna be
working on a commercial or a music video, anything like that, you're going to be rod owing this area when you
work on this footage. Okay? So this is totally normal. And when you talk about big production movies, they have the luxury to
create their set design and do the prep work to make sure that they
can avoid similar colors as much as possible. So it's a lot easier. But in this case, this is what
we're gonna be doing. Okay? Another thing that I wanna do is I wanna go back into my Key and I wanna denoise it a little bit. I just wanna add a little bit of denoise. And I don't necessarily have to add blur. So we're good on that. Let's go back into our Key, and I'm gonna go ahead and track it. Okay? So we're gonna track it backwards. And we're gonna go back to this point. And we're gonna track it forwards. And everything is looking good. And now I'm just gonna come
out of my highlight mode. And now this is tracked. So what does that mean? Well, that means is that now I can go in this black and white node. I can go under here and just
click on Monochrome. Boom. So we're basically there. All we have to do is just
bring in the contrast, get that Sin City look DNA,
and we're done and done. So, so far, this is where we started. This is where we ended up. And that's what we have and
everything is tracked here. So that's not moving. It's latching on. So we're good on that front. So I'm gonna go ahead create a new node. I'm gonna call this node contrast. And what I wanna do is I wanna
use Contrast and Pivot here. Okay? And I really wanna push
it. Because if we remember the Sin City look, it was
pushed quite a bit. Okay? I'm gonna keep it somewhere around here. Maybe pull it back somewhere around here. And now if we do before-and-after, it is really pushed to white,
so it's looking really good. The blacks are looking really good. I mean we're bringing in
that Sin City personality. So maybe dial it back a little
bit, something like that. I'm gonna park it right here. I'm gonna create a new layer. This layer I'm gonna call sharpen. Okay? And two things are gonna
happen in this layer. I'm gonna go under my Radius, and I'm gonna add a
little bit of sharpening. So I'm gonna just bring
it down to around 47ish, because that's one thing that
you need to understand that, what makes the Sin City look is not just black and white, and not just that pushed contrast look, but it's a lot of, like, gritty feeling comes from
sharpening and a lot of detail, like really rich, detailed image. So always go too far, obviously. And but then, you know, dial it back, like, don't go too crazy. So in this case, I'm gonna go to 46. Then the next thing that I wanna do is I wanna take my Midtone Detail. I wanna crank it to, like, 75ish. Okay? Like, I'm really going to push it. And look what it does to all the texture. Like, look at right
here. What's happening? This is what's creating
that Sin City effect, where it's just really in your face. Everything just kind of
pops out of the screen. So you can go pretty,
pretty far with that. Maybe we can bring it
back to, like, 50ish. If you're just getting too uncomfortable to, like, what it's doing. So keep it somewhere around here. I'm gonna create another layer. And this one I'm gonna call texture pop. It's a technique that you
guys haven't seen me used. And let's go ahead and pop it open. And it's Texture Pop. Just type it in and then
drop in that all effects. And then once you drop
it on, nothing happens. Right? But what I wanna do is I wanna punch in a
little bit in this area, and then take you through
these sliders right here, and you're gonna start to see,
like, what it actually does. I'm gonna go under the Detail tab. And I'm gonna start cranking it. And you can see that it's
making a pretty big difference. So before and now after. And I'm gonna park
it somewhere around here. And if we zoom back out,
and we do on and off, you can see how much of
a difference it's making. Like, look at the detail here. Look at the detail on his
pants, like right here. Look at the details right
here in the highlights. All the way through. Okay? Even on his face, too. Now we can move this
frame a little bit over. And we can hold it right here and see all this detail, like this
grunge that it's adding, the grit that it's adding to the frame. That is very, very important. Okay? So this is the basic use of it. Obviously you can open up
the Tonal Range and then mess around with it on, you know, Shadows, Midtones and
Highlights level. But for now, I'm gonna leave it just like
that. Because we're seeing the letters are popping, the
carbon fiber texture we can start to see. Like,
look at that right here. It's a big difference. Okay? We are really adding
that Sin City character. It's really coming together. I'm gonna go in here. I'm gonna call this node a Sin City node. This is where we're gonna
bring in the Sin City image and start really dialing
in those certain things. Because, if you guys remember correctly, remember how we had
the red, green and then the blue. Not to mention that how much we can see here. This is not what's happening here. It's like the blacks
are just almost crushed. I mean, look at this,
remember that contrast. So we're gonna create all of that. Okay? So we're gonna start off
by creating that contrast. And what I'm gonna do is
I'm gonna take my Lift. And I'm gonna start crushing it. I'm really going to pull it
down to something like this. And right now, you're gonna say, dude, you clipped your
shadows, which I did. So in order to fix that, but
in terms of the contrast, I'm getting really close. So this is before. This is
after. I mean, just look at that. So in terms of the contrast,
it's looking really good. It's just that now I'm
clipping right here, which is not good. So how do we fix that? This is how we're gonna fix it. I'm gonna go under my Low
Soft in my Custom Contrast. I'm gonna grab it. And I'm gonna start pulling it up. And just look what happens at the bottom. Just keep your eyes right here. I'm gonna bring it up just
enough, just right here. Now nothing is clipping. Yet we got that kind of contrast going on. As a matter of fact, I'm
gonna take my Lift and pull it down a little bit more. Keep it somewhere around here. And if I do before-and-after. I'm even gonna take my Low Soft and pull it down a little bit more. And if we do before-and-after, we're making a big difference. Okay? So this is the building
blocks to getting that Sin City look. Now the thing that's
really gonna tie it all in is gonna be the red,
green and blue channels on the high end that we have to control. So I'm gonna go in. And we're just gonna go
into our Printer Lights. So what I'm gonna do is
I'm gonna take my red Gain, and I'm gonna raise it up. And I'm gonna take my blue Gain, and I'm gonna bring
it down a little bit. Okay? So I'm gonna take my green and bring it down just a little bit. I'm gonna take my red
and I'm gonna crank it. And now let's do back and forth. And then one thing that I've got to do is I gotta go into my highlights. We never really see.
We're clipping on top now. So I'm gonna go in here. Shift H, so I can see what I'm selecting. And I'm gonna go ahead and
just select my highlights. Maybe something like
that. I'm gonna come out. I'm gonna take my Gamma.
I'm gonna pull it down. I'm gonna take my Gain,
and I'm gonna pull it down just a little bit, something like that. And now if I go before and after. What do we need to do? We
need to pull our blue down. I'm gonna go into my Sin City node. I'm gonna take my blue Gain,
and I'm gonna bring it down. Okay? So now where we are? I'm gonna bring it down even more. I'm gonna take my green and bring it down. I'm gonna take my blue
and keep bringing it down. And now one thing that I wanna do
is I want to go in this mode and pop it next to each other and see how close we actually are. So if I turn the Sin City node on and off, you can see the difference
that we're making. Okay? Another thing that we can
do is that kind of thing. So we can see how close
we're actually getting. I think we're getting pretty close. We still need to add way more red. I feel like- But you know, I gotta see
this white to that white. That's what's really going on. So one thing that I'm gonna do is I'm gonna go back into
my highlights right here, and I'm gonna pull them
down, something like that. So that right there is
really putting us there, where we need to be. I'm gonna go back to my node number nine. I'm gonna take my red, and I'm gonna pop it a little bit more. I'm gonna take my blue and
make a dingy, a little more. And then take my red up a little more. So somewhere around here. Now, if I look at this to this, we can see we are right there. This to this, we're there. If I do before, I mean, just look at that, to like when I do after,
we're exactly there. So now one more thing that
we can do and should do is just adding a little bit
more pop into our yellow. Okay? So that would be the last step. I'm gonna just take it and
crank it to, like, 80ish and maybe bring it down to,
like, 75ish. That's fine. But if I just do before and after now, or if I just kill it all
the way, the saturation, and then bring it back, it
makes a massive difference. And this is where we're gonna lock it in. Before we do our look breakdown, let's just check one more thing, which is how is this Key holding up? So if I bring it down here, we obviously see that
it breaks quite a bit. So let's go ahead and fix that. So I'm gonna go back in here. And I'm gonna go back into my Key. I'm gonna punch in so
we can get pretty close. And what we really need to do is just open it up a little bit. So if I just open it up like
that, something like that, and hold it somewhere
around here, move it around. So this is good. And
then go under Saturation and just pull that back a little bit. And what else? This pretty much just does it. Okay? So let's take it up and watch
the whole thing like that. And see how well it holds up. And in here, what are we missing? Let's do a Luminance and open
it up a little bit there. And now if I just do- Okay. All right. It holds
up all the way. I'm gonna come back out. I'm gonna punch out. And if we just do all the way through. Like now, it is really, really
locking in, how it should. It looks great. It looks great. Now we got to stay true to our yellow. And I think it's more of a
gold than this kind of yellow. So one thing that I can do is I can just go and
sink my Hue a little bit. And I can bring it back to that gold. This kind of thing instead
of, like, where it was before. So I can just bring that back a little bit, not too
much, something like that. Even, like, I would keep it around 40, somewhere around here. Now that is pretty true
to our actual logo, what it should look like. And we're gonna just park it right here. So once again, guys, let's go back and look
at our image right here. So this is what we wanted to match. This is what we created. And just look at it. If I just go all the way back to where we started, to like where we ended up. Okay? And then if we go to our
node number nine and kill it, like, the Sin City node made
all the difference. Okay? I mean this in itself
is a pretty cool look. But it doesn't have a personality.
It's lacking personality. And then as soon as I
add the Sin City look, I mean, come on, just look at that. So let's go ahead and get rid of this. Let's kill all of our nodes
and start from the top. So this time I went with
the technical LUT, Arri LUT. So that's a proper conversion from LOG to REC 709. Then we went ahead and selected
our yellow, tracked it. Added the black and white effect,
which is in our RGB Mixer. And then did tons of contrast to just bring in that Sin City character, sharpening to dirty up
our image a little bit. And then I showed you a
brand-new technique, Texture Pop. And that really helped bring in that DNA from movies like Sin City and just make everything really gritty. And finally, we added the Sin City node that just made all the
difference in the world. And then the highlight one was extremely important. Because
just look at this area right here, look at this right there, look at that right there. And not to mention, how
close it brought us. Because without it, like,
look at this to that. And if I were to get rid of this node, like, there's a big difference.
And then after that, it just brought everything together. Let's check out the
final look, info screen. (rock music) So hopefully that was fun.
And like I mentioned, I mean it's not something you're
gonna be using all the time. But definitely good to know how to do it, if the job requires to create
something similar to this. Guys, if you're enjoying the content, make sure to smash that like button. Subscribe to my channel for
more on some awesomeness. And do not forget to watch the
one hour long free training. Literally, I'm telling you, it's gonna transform your
color grading careers. It's gonna take you from not
knowing anything about Resolve to blowing the F up. So check that out. And on that note, I'll see
you guys in the next video. (rock music)
