We’ve seen many grading apps and plugins made to take our footage that extra step towards the film look many of us are so keen to achieve: To make our films look cinematic, organic and nice. But none of them is quite as easy to use and gives you as spot on beautiful results as FilmConvert.

Does it work? Yes it does. I’ve been using FilmConvert for the past several weeks now and I’m very pleased with everything it has done. On any other software doing a quick film grade takes time and I have to smear up my footage with numerous looks, most of them being way to exaggerated. FilmConvert applies just the subtle changes needed to get digital footage where film would be.

The people from FilmConvert measured the exact differences from certain cameras to certain analogue film stocks. The software detects which camera your footage was shot with and alters it accordingly. The result is always right and each of the included 8 (light version) or 19 (pro version) stocks looks very nice. There’s also an exposure and colour temperature tab to do primary corrections and a 3-way colour correction and levels tab to do some rough grading.

FilmConvert has become an essential asset for colour correction workflow. From now on every digital material will go through FilmConvert in one way or another.
Q&A. Like any app in development there are also some limitations which I would like to point out here:
(Answers provided by Nigel Stanford from FilmConvert.)
- Not all cameras included yet.
–> As of now FilmConvert detects RED and Canon 5D mark II footage. Any other material will be detected as “digital camera” and thus not provide as accurate results. Nigel and his team are currently shooting and testing new cameras for implementation. They have already shot Arri Alexa, Sony EX, 5D mark III “and several others”. Sony FS700 is on the todo list, Blackmagic Cinema Camera is “on order”…
- Only Quicktime files.
–> Currently the Standalone application can only detect quicktime files, Sony MTS files are not detected. The plugin version of the application will detect any format the host application.
- C300 will probably only be in PRO version, C100 in light version
- No second monitor support.
–> In the standalone version of the application you are currently not able to use your second or external display as a reference/display monitor. It’s a picture in picture layout. You’ll need a 27″ monitor to see your full HD.
- XML import only in pro version.
–> After I’ve edited my sequence in good old quirky Final Cut Pro 7 I export as XML and can import this list in FilmConvert. The application imports the necessary raw files, I can grade them and at the end it exports a duplicate of the footage where only the used portions are being rendered, the rest stays black. I can then reconnect to the graded footage in Final Cut, works nicely, but the light version of the application does not support XML import…

The light version of the application is $99.
If you enter cinema5d on checkout you will get 10% off, so then it will be $89 I guess.

The pro version of the application is $249.
Makes it about $224 with the cinema5d code.

Code is valid until Nov 15th.

I wish I had some footage to show, but all my current projects are not for the public (yet) or footage owned by someone else.
Here are some more videos from vimeo: