Techni: Two controls, two strip and three strip, both with value sliders. What the heck is Techni? Well, without a full film institute history lesson, it’s the original Technicolor® method of faking color in the ’30s with multiple gray scale film by adding dye to it - kind of that old Wizard of Oz look before they “restored” the color. The color is slightly off and somehow, oddly saturated - and oddly charming.
Color Temperature: Two controls. Warm/cool and Amount, both controlled by value sliders. For specifically changing warm to cool looks, it’s simply easier to use than some of the other options out there.
The layers, individually, are nothing super special. Cumulatively, it’s a pretty tidy package. Not having to rebuild these effect relationships provides the very nice option for predictably controlled and incredibly nuanced color treatments in your imagery.
Performance
Some of the plug-ins available for FCP can add significant render times to your final output. DVShade isn’t one of those. Its implementation seems to be fairly kind to the clock, so using this plug-in on a rush project shouldn’t give you pause.
Now, how you use it merits a couple of notes. Something that always surprises me when speaking with other FCP users is what seems to be a lack of awareness that you can change the order of effects in the “stack” that is the list in the Effects Tab. How do you change the order? By simply clicking and dragging the effect either up or down. I mention this because there are some some occasional oddities while using this plug that are fixable but do require a reordering of the filter stack. Interestingly, DVShade has a freebie on their site you can download that replicates the reflection alá Apple iTunes disc art look. (You know, the reflection that fades into black under the image; yea, that one.) If the free Reflection plug-in is placed first and then DVShade is placed second (Reflection is on the top of the stack and DVShade is directly underneath it) The effects of DVShade will not perform as expected. However, moving DVShade to the top of the list remedied the issue.
Once I found this out, I began investigating how well it played with other filters from FX Factory and idustrial revolution and others. The results are kind of a mixed bag. Sometimes things work well and sometimes they don’t. Sometimes changing the stack order helps and sometimes it doesn’t. I haven’t tried DVShade with my full complement of plug-ins to make a comprehensive list of what works or not. Now, I don’t spend my time in tech manuals for these plugs so I can’t begin to tell you why they misbehave - I just know that they do. This is by no means a deal breaker for DVShade, because you can also get other plug-ins to behave badly when used in combination with each other. But it is worth mentioning. As Clint Eastwood once opined, “A man’s got to know his limitations.”
[Editor's Note: Apparently this is actually a bug in Final Cut Pro that can effect any plugins and can be seen any time a geometrical change is made to the image before the plugin is applied (this includes using the Motion tab). The creators of DVShade have tried to get Apple to correct this bug, but so far Apple has not done so. DVShade Pro will be released in the near future and is based on FXPlug technology instead of FXScript, which should eliminate this problem in the Pro version. - JH]
Value
Whether this is valuable in your studio or not really depends on the kind of work you do or expect to do. DVShade's claim-to-fame is definitely creating moods with color quickly and painlessly. It also makes it very easy to create some nice vintage film colorations quickly directly within FCP. This saves me time both in FCP itself and in Shake, where I would sometimes duck in to perform some of the less common tasks found in this plugin package.
Final Comments
You can’t help but look at some of the presets and think of angst ridden music videos. Amusingly, I’ve been finding that is now becoming an acceptable look within vignettes for corporate clients as well. DVShade will save you time and brain cells from too much clicking and dragging to create exactly those types of looks.
I wouldn’t consider DVShade a special effects filter, the way some are for (which can completely change even the geometry of your sequences). It’s simply a focused color modification tool. Unless my client base quickly changes, I won’t be making music videos any time soon. But I have found it to be useful in surprising circumstances already. It’s very capable and fast at what it does. And seriously, if you use it even once on an assignment or on a film, it will have paid for itself. I don’t know what you’ll choose, but it’s staying in my toolbox for sure.
