Directing Color

Ollie Kenchington

Directing Color

Ollie Kenchington
4.55
1h 25m
8 modules (view curriculum)

$349
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  • Total Time:

    1h 25m

Description

In Directing Color, filmmaker, editor and colorist Ollie Kenchington explores how visual language cues, color theory and even color grading techniques can be used throughout the filmmaking process to not just create a “look” but to enhance storytelling. He challenges directors, cinematographers and filmmakers to think of color first rather than the more common approach of leaving color considerations until post-production.


Subtitles available: English

Modules

09m

In the first module of the course, Ollie introduces us to the concept of “Directing Color” as he begins to produce a commercial for a boutique catering company. He takes us through the process of how he developed a color palette for their brand which will be woven into the production design for the commercial, and explains how the relationships between colors can create compositional balance in your images.


Subtitles available: English

02m

Here, Ollie gives us a quick primer on how the Human Visual System affects our perception of color and why that means certain colors recede and others advance in our perception.


Subtitles available: English

09m

In this lesson, Ollie takes us through the process of building custom LUTs on set for monitoring. He shows how simple steps before rolling the camera can ensure everyone on set is connected with the image and able to see how the film’s look is developing in every frame.


Subtitles available: English

18m

With everything now set to record, Ollie focuses on how simple colour and contrast management in production can maximise the quality of your digital negative. From using probes to ensure camera monitors are calibrated, to using charts to ensure white balance and contrast are consistent across all cameras; Ollie shows us his top tips for in-camera color management.


Subtitles available: English

18m

With production wrapped on the commercial, Ollie brings us into the grading suite to discuss how contrast can be introduced in post-production to add depth. Ollie also shows us examples from ‘The Crown’ to reinforce this.


Subtitles available: English

09m

As we continue looking at post-production, Ollie shows how hue and saturation can be used to direct the viewer's eye in the frame. Using examples from ‘Blade Runner 2049’, Ollie demonstrates how this technique can be used most effectively in your films.


Subtitles available: English

14m

In the final lesson of the course Ollie delves into the most exciting part of color grading - conveying mood and eliciting emotion with color. He shows us how this is used so effectively in ‘Whiplash’, where color becomes a signifier to the emotional journey of the film’s protagonist.


Subtitles available: English

01m

This bonus module allows you to see the finished product of the "Ox & Origin" commercial from the course.


Subtitles available: English

About the Educator

Ollie Kenchington

Filmmaker, Editor, Colorist

7 Courses

Ollie's company, Korro Films, produces commercials, short films, documentaries and branded content for major international clients, with Ollie carrying out senior editor and colourist duties on every project. Ollie is an assured practitioner across all areas of filmmaking, giving him a deep understanding of the creative process which allows his agency to flourish in this competitive industry. Additionally he is an accomplished educator, and founder of Korro Academy.

Reviews

5
A must watch
Aruho Manzi
5
Great introduction to color in Film.
Christoph Janetzko
5
The course information is of great use even for a working professional.
Tihomir Lazarov
5
Great piece! Thank You.
Łukasz Kucharski
5
Thank you Ollie and MZed for another great course. I have learned so much!
Sarah MacClary
5
Greatly put together, filled with useful information and enjoyed watching all of these episodes. Course information was concise and well explained. Highly recommended.
Oggi Tomic
5
Great use of time and well worth it lessons
Princess Shechinah Jed Javier
5
I love the enthusiasm towards colors. Thr reinforcement of the existing realization: for most of us, color is everywhere and all the time - full of meaning. An inspiring master class!
Ben Kunstleben
5
This "short" course already gave me a way better understanding of color usage in movies and what to look for in my own projects. I can totally recommend it! Looking forward to seeing the next ones.
Michael Wolff
5
So many golden nuggets of information packed into a short amount of time. Picked up so many tips and tricks that I can use throughout production from pre to post. Don't be put off by the beginner class, there's something for everyone in this course.
Timothy Tan
5
Awesome.
P Menangnichet
5
This is a beautifully shot course that introduces a lot of great concepts. I particularly enjoyed the real world examples provided of selecting a color palette and incorporating that palette into the shoot. It was also great to see him do simple yet powerful changes in Resolve.
Joseph Henry
5
Loved it. The presentation and detail is really amazing. Ollie is a great educator. Thank you.
Manoj Jayadevan
5
Coloring is a an important step to learn in today's moviemaking. This course is a great introduction to learn the basics.
Terrell Epps
5
Some great info and important insights to consider before and during a shoot.
Ross Dwyer
5
Excellent deconstruction of how to direct & construct colour from pre-production to post. Loved it and will definitely be implementing some of the tips and tricks straight away. Great stuff!
Benjamin Burnett
5
Excellent
Nenad Barbul
5
Very Interesting and information packed! Look forward to more from Ollie!
Andrew Maynard
5
A succinct course that added to both my technical and creative appreciation for on-set and pre-production choices of color.
Sean Edevane
5
Great, great course! Especially the chapter on color management is invaluable. I bought the color chart and started using it as Ollie teaches. Consistent colors across cameras is now a simple process. The color chart is my most important investment - after the camera ;-) Eagerly waiting for more stuff from Ollie!
Mark Hediger
5
Excellent work! Different levels of technical information delivered in understandable "language". Great use vivid descriptions... Look forward to watching the next series.
James De Mello
5
Really good and short class, The teacher gives some meaningful insight on pre and post production color workflow
Fabio Paul Bedoya Huerta
5
nice course
Stefan Danojlic
5
Really useful. Thanks a lot!
Alexander Sakharov
5
Love it. Learned a great deal about colour grading.
Mark Bachar
5
Good
Greg M
5
Well worth the time. The subtleties that often go unnoticed by video creators are uncovered and will make you take notice of how other DoPs, cinematographers and Directors use colour to direct the viewer. Love Ollie’s calm manner and intelligent approach. Even appreciate the way Ollie will correct an errant key stroke to make sure his new node version has the ‘caps’ on the correct letter in a title. That’s attention to detail.
Jason Grills
5
Helped add some knowledge about using colour for character and themes, preparing colour palettes and drawing the attention to what you want people to focus on.
Paul Bishop
5
Fantastic. Delivered with warmth ;)
Nathan Musson
5
Ollie is very clear in his teachings and presents solid facts to back up his processes.
Mitch Noakes
5
Very good. He is a great teacher.
Joel Rivera
5
Ollie knows what he's talking about, so listen to him. This course opened my eyes to the color process being a part of production as much as post-production. Glad to put this info to use. Thanks Ollie!
Morgon Dickerson
5
Very interesting course! Looking forward to the next ones.
Baiba Sprance
5
This is truly an inspirational course for me. I wanted to learn how to get better colour consistency when shooting weddings, as I always found grading them to be fiddly. This course has taught me a HUGE amount and I am so very grateful that I found it. More please!
Benjamin Bruton-Cox
5
This course really gives me a better knowledge of working with colors in pre-production and production. Much appreciated!
Young Lee
5
Good. Like explaining with examples. Thank you.
Raj Jadhav
5
Great! Was very thoughtful in approach and practical in application.
Christopher Eustace
5
A great blend of color theory and technical science designed to teach filmmakers to be intentional when making color choices on set and in post.
James Crocco
5
Excellent course for folks like me that are starting in the industry. Ollie helps bringing to the table details about the importance of color in a particular project and also talks about its impact to a business brand. Ollie isn’t only a passionate filmmaker but an excellent teacher as well. I recommend it.
Adalberto Almeida
5
Absolutely mind blowing... The best hour I have spent in a long time, and the amount of knowledge and insight has transformed my way of seeing light, color and storytelling.
Aurelien Tanguep
5
Great introduction... inspiring and not too complicated, but without being simplistic. I am not a colour grading person but this is a great way for me to begin to understand the craft. Now I understand better.
Peter Turner
5
One may look at the brief running time of the course and think it's not worth it - but it's so packed with information, more than what many others try to teach in twice the amount of time. You jump right in, and it's non-stop information, presented clearly and professionally.
Daniel Brown
5
One of my favourites on MZed, Oillie does a brilliant job of demonstrating how much colour has an impact.
Daniel Grindrod
5
Excellent slice on the power of colour, how to see it, use it, and create meaning with it! Thanks
Kire Godal
5
Very good and indeep introduction to color management (because it is not only about color correction or color grading).
Julien Gouz
5
Great intro in the world of relighting in post, grading and the fundamentals. Good examples.
Felix Gorbach
5
Nails it!
Spiro Angelatos
5
THERE NEEDS TO BE MORE OF THIS! And fast! Seriously... particularly the workflow-parts and with looking over his shoulder need to be expanded. The whole analysis and deconstruction bit (while interesting and useful) can also be seen elsewhere.
Rasim Prosic
5
Very informative.
Billy Lim
5
Brilliant introduction to the use of colour as a tool in one's film making quiver. Loved it.
Marshall Cant
5
Just, thank you!
Alain El Sakhawi
5
It's a brief course, but well packed with grade A content, and one of the best introductions to the world of narrating with color. An eye opener!
Camilo Marulanda
5
Terrific. Mind boggling depth of understanding color. Greatly looking forward to the next installments. Thank you.
Gary Voorhees
5
My favorite Mzed class to date! Ollie delivered high quality beautiful video while packing it full of wisdom in a very short amount of time. He has a certain passion that is tangible, an enthusiasm that is rich, and was able to capture my full attention the entire class. I am left wanting more, and I am very much looking forward to his next course!
James Redlich
5
The course is perfect! Can’t wait to dive deep in color in the next part.
Ivan Abramov
5
Great presentation of an organic truth - color matters.
Jon Zanone
5
"Directing Color" course brings another point of view much more interesting and open-minded about color theory than other lessons I've taken before, and also great basic techniques that a filmmaker can start applying today. Ollie is a very good teacher, I am looking forward to see the next series of color while taking his DaVinci course (which I deeply recommend).
Claudia Marone
5
Ollie brings an excellent balance between technical depth and clarity in his explanations, which makes learning easy. I highly recommend all of Ollie's courses and am looking forward to his future MZed work.
Christopher Skarratt
5
Wonderful introduction to a very deep and powerful dimension of visual art. Ollie comes across as a patient, skilled, and competent teacher with a firm grasp of the technical aspects of cinematography and color correction while presenting it in easily digestible lessons. I highly recommend it for anyone starting out in photography, cinematography, color correction, or any other visually-related field.
Thomas Sireci
5
Must-see. Period.
Manuel Van der Perre
5
Enjoyed this course. Rather than on the how, it focused on the why. Technical side was taught, but it was heavy on theory.
Eliot Honda
4.5
This course started off slow but stick with it. I can't wait to see more of the color grading series he talks about near the end. Very good examples of use of color and getting to neutral in Resolve.
jeff ross
4.5
Great course. Need part 2. Awesome.
Dr. Mike Moriearty DC (ret.)
4.5
A must for video producers and filmmakers. I can really see, how employing this more methodical approach to colour is going to improve my work.
Adam Brennan
4.5
Insightful introduction to meaningful application of colour in video. I enjoyed it!
Vladimir Bondarenko
4.5
Got some understanding of color! Great!
en zhi
4.5
Great course. It's full of advice and examples. In fact it's amazing how it seems obvious after watching the course that color grading is part of storytelling. It should be at the origin of each visual project. And you know what ? I used to do it as a photographer and it's like I've forgotten it as a filmmaker! Well, I'll change my workflow from now on. Thanks!
Simon Questerbert
4.5
Lots of valuable information packed into a quick course! It's hard to justify not sitting down for a little bit to get such a great introduction in how to level up your color in your own productions.
Carlos Serna
4
Great course, left me wanting more
Paul McNulty
4
Some great aspects covered here on colour from pre-production through to post. I would have liked to see more depth in the post and specific controls on what is done through Davinci (it's difficult to see because he's using a control panel instead of seeing a cursor alter controls... luckily for myself I knew enough to pause and work out what he did). Otherwise an inspiring lesson.
Marco Marco
4
Ollie has an infectious shyness about his presentations which is quite different to most and draws you in. Some of his insights on the work that he is doing in this series are very revealing, and useful to any film maker, director, DP or colorist - and his analysis of The Crown is extremely strong. However, I would have liked to seen significantly more depth in the precise techniques that he is using to achieve these, and a deeper analysis on the work of others that he shows. A strong 8/10 as an introduction to the application of color, but from Ollie I'd hoped for more than an introduction.
chris layhe
4
Good course. Enjoyed particularly the three deconstructing modules. Great way of explaining how to create depth with color. Some tweaks done in Davinci Resolve by Ollie were done fast and because he uses a color board device, it was impossible to see what variables he was tweaking on Davinci.
Alejandro Welsh
4
Great course by Ollie but I am hoping for more technical aspect of color grading. Would like to learn more on recreating color pallets from movies and breaking it down through step by step tutorial. Another documentary style course.
James Davis
4
This is an excellent course for beginners and an introduction to color in the pre-production and production phases. It's more like he opens a door for you to explore, and throws you a few examples. I understand this is only a little over an hour's worth of video so no complaints. However, I can't help but think about, if I chose to purchase this course by itself, I'll be disappointed. I think it will be more reasonable if there have been a few more breakdowns of color usage in the cinematic industry.
Michael Fan
4
Wanted to watch the next module
CHEE KEONG EU
4
I really enjoyed the delivery and insights the instructor had with the use of color to tell a story and the importants of thinking of color from the very begining of production.
James Donaldson
3.5
Good introduction to color grading.
Pauline Devesa
3
Good intro, but I thought it would be more specific on post-production grading
Onstudio Team
3
Nice guy and very well explained, but very elemental information delivered, in my point of view. If the course is aimed to beginners, why not explain the color wheel? what colors are compatibles, what colors don't match well, how to work with opposites in the color wheel, with complementaries... and so on.
toño lopez
2
I'm giving two stars to this course because it sells much more than it gives. The promo video says "It's essentially color grading in real life". The only good example of that was mentioning the use of the harmonic and complimentary colors. There is not much here about how to actually use and combine the colors in the set to create different meanings. It is mostly technical stuff like WB, monitor calibrating, Luts, and even some masking in color grading which I don't even think should be in this course because it has nothing to do with "Directing Color" in production. Even though I'm sure Ollie is a professional and he clearly knows what he is doing, I feel like the course itself wastes a lot of time in beautiful into shots and nice music for every module and lacks richer content. I did learn something but I was expecting to learn much more.
Jesus Rubalcava
2
Practical pre-production tips (such as white-balancing) were helpful and nicely presented but the discussion of deconstructing color were not so much of substance. More of like general uninspiring talk. Expectations were high but unfortunately not met. Giving so much room for irrelevant subjects such as contrasty scenes of Crown film was not thoughtful for viewers. Color talk in the latter part of the course was really not highly educational.
Jarkko Kaura
2
All the course of mzed is keep talking and talking, no slide to list the important point where it is.
Honyeung Lau

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