Browsing Category Free Stuff

Instagram filters for video

Posted on February 11, 2012 by Brent Pierce

Everyone loves the Instagram app for the iPhone. It’s a cool way to create vintage/retro photos with a tap of the finger. Seriously, people go nuts over these type of filters. A while back, Daniel Box, created Photoshop actions of these filters. They’re awesome. Just a click of the mouse, and you’ve “Instagrammed” your photo in Photoshop.

I wanted a way to use these in applications like After Effects or Final Cut Pro. An easy way to achieve a simple color change is by using Look-Up-Tables (LUTs). I’m not gonna dive too deep into what exactly a LUT is, but basically, it communicates color changes from different applications. Aharon Rabinowitz posted a tutorial video about using Red Giant Software’s LUT Buddy, a free application by RGS to create and apply LUTs. It’s pretty helpful in introducing someone to what a LUT is, and how they work.

I took Daniel Box’s Instagram Photoshop actions, and made them into LUTs and presets to use with video. They work wonderfully. Keep in mind. LUTs are a bit limited in their functionality; they cannot apply things that use masks or generators, such as vignettes, diffusion, blurs, etc. But they are still awesome.

Here is how to use these LUTs.

Download and install LUT Buddy from Red Giant Software. It’s free.
Download and unzip my Instagram LUTs. Huge credit to Daniel Box.
Apply the effect “LUT Buddy” to your footage, click Options, then Import LUT, then choose which effect you would like.
If you are using After Effects, copy the provided “Instagram” presets folder into your application presets folder. (Applications/Adobe After Effects/Presets)

Free Magic Bullet Looks presets

Posted on July 3, 2011 by Brent Pierce

Please note: You need Red Giant Software’s “Magic Bullet Looks” to use these presets.

Introducing “Awesome Looks” by Brent Pierce. This is my own Magic Bullet preset pack that I created, which I am providing to every filmmaker for FREE. In the past, I sold these presets for a small fee, but I now give them all to you, for free. (PS. Philip Bloom downloaded them a while back)

What is “Awesome Looks?”

32 customized presets to use inside Magic Bullet Looks
Various styles, including vintage, retro, wedding, B&W’s, and more
Completely customizable: once a preset is applied, settings can be tweaked to your needs
Absolutely FREE: much cheaper than a standard guru preset pack from Red Giant Software

With “Awesome Looks,” you have the power to create a unique emotion and style in your film with a simple click of the mouse. Once you apply a preset, you’ll notice that there are a few effects in the line that are not enabled. These disabled effects can be enabled to add a different desired look.

Most of the presets are perfect for a standardly exposed shot, but not every preset works with every shot. If a preset looks a bit too harsh, you can easily pull down an effect and get it to look like you want. Some of the presets in “Awesome Looks” are a bit extreme and just for fun. But who knows, maybe someone needs to make an actor look like a hippie zombie.

Below are a couple quick video samples with all 32 presets.

This video was graded entirely with these presets.

So there you go, as you can see, “Awesome Looks” presets are great for whatever stylized shot you may desire. There is a text file inside the download that will instruct you on how to install these presets. Also, if you want to get even more stylized, check out these free film burns.
NOTE: I have heard some issues with these presets not working in Magic Bullet Quick Looks. They should work fine with Photolooks though.

To download, follow the “retweet” link below, or if you’re not a Tweeter, you can sign up for the Cineblur mailing list.

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Enjoy!

Free Film Burns

Posted on March 10, 2010 by Brent Pierce

With the never-ending quest for HD video to have the look and feel of film, users have gone to great lengths to make viewers feel as if they are experiencing scenes from a Buster Keaton film. One fairly common technique is the addition of “film burns” over footage. The film burn, or film flash, look typically comes from the misfeed of film through the camera gate behind the lens of a film camera, creating an accidental stylization look of red and yellowish hues on the negative and the print.
Digital video clips of film burns can be purchased from artbeats.com for a small fortune, or if you do enough digging, you can find a few good/free clips scattered throughout the world wide web. Various blogs, forums, videos, Google searches, and a little creativity have lead me to a few.

You can download the filmburns by following me on Twitter, via the link below. If you don’t have Twitter, fear not, you can sign up for the Cineblur mailing list to receive the film burns.

H.264 (19MB) Use this for most applications.

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ProRes (108MB) Use this for Final Cut Pro.

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To use the film burns:

Place the film burn clip on a layer above the edited footage.
Change the transfer mode of the film burn, (screen, add, hard light, overlay, etc.)
Then adjust opacity of the film burn layer accordingly or leave it at 100%.
If your transfer mode does not key out the black, (hard light, darken, multiply) use a color key filter, and select black, and adjust the tolerance until you get what you want.
I personally favor the “add” transfer mode the most.
If the pixelation becomes an issue, mostly on the SD clips, use a blur to soften the edges until you do not see the large, digital “squares.”

You can also do some pretty creative things, like speeding up or slowing down the underlying clip to create a more believable effect. Also, try adding a “film flash” transition under the burn clip, to give a sweet effect. The “Too Much Too Soon” effects package is great, and contains an awesome film flash transition. And it’s free! I highly suggest any FCP editor to download it. Read More →