DaVinci Resolve 10 Beta Update

Huzzah! DaVinci Resolve 10 beta is now publically available, after much anticipation building due to various private beta testers remarking on Twitter just how great the V10 update really is. In fact Grant Petty CEO of Blackmagic Design said it is the biggest update to the software in the past 30 years!

So what’s so great about it? Well there really is too much to mention; Live Grading on set, online and audio capabilities built in, editorial functionality, title creation, DCP creation, dozens of new grading features…. You really have to check out the huge feature comparison list on the BMD site to understand the scale of the update.

DaVinci Resolve 10 Freebies

While you’re downloading the update (for free!) from the Blackmagic Design site you really should take some time to watch colorist Alexis Van Hurkman’s introduction to the new features in V10 which spans over an hour of video content. Also check out the stories from other professional colorist’s dotted around the site from colorists like Tim Masik from Company 3.

You’ll also want to download the updated manual for the version 10 beta (also written by Alexis) and it is probably one of the best manuals written on colour grading, let alone the software. So if you’re new to the whole art you should definitely rummage through it for plenty of straight forward instruction.

Although if you are looking for an detailed education on colour grading then Alexis’ 552 page Color Correction Handbook is an excellent read.

Update: Alexis has posted a list of some of the newer features that aren’t listed in the manual or might be easily overlooked. Alexis explains how to use features like copy and pasting grades in the color page, duplicating timelines, speedchanges, render to AVI and many more. Well worth a read.

Beta Users Perspectives on Resolve 10

A few of the private beta testers and early adopters have already posted their reviews of the new software. Dan Moran, a colorist at the London office of Smoke and Mirrors, has written up this detailed account of using the new software on an attended grading session, over on the Mixing Light blog.

My favorite new feature -and the first one I noticed – are the new power windows. The whole power window architecture has been redesigned:

• Unlimited windows per node
• Draw freehand using the new power curve window – which feels incredibly natural.
• The new gradient power window is very handy and fast.

Dan’s account is a great read because its not just an overview of the new features, but a practical demonstration of how useful they prove to be in a real world environment.

Update: Colorist Rob Bessette, who has previously delivered an excellent two hour lecture on grading in Resolve 9, shares his insights on the top 5 creative features in the new version of Resolve. One of the features Rob is most excited about is the new OpenFX integration which opens Resolve up to a giant market place of creative add-ons.

I’m really interested to sift through and learn as many of these tools as I can and figure out the best places to utilize them.  This is where I’m going to spend the bulk of my time.  A whole new world is opened here and now all of a sudden I can offer finishing tools that were never an option in the past.  Lens flares anyone?

UPDATE: SpliceNPost also shares his top 10 features in the new Resolve 10 beta in a handy 20 minute video. Thanks to AOTG for the link.

Cinematographer Frank Glencairn also offers his thoughts on v10 as a user who is accustomed to working in an Adobe Premiere workflow. It’s interesting to note how much the time remapping tools have improved in v10.

Now I can do Time Remapping in Resolve and it is as easy as in Premiere, but with much better results, because of pretty sophisticated optical flow algorithms.  First it didn’t work well at all, and I was really disappointed. But then I found out, that there is another panel where you can choose the quality and all was good (mind that we beta testers didn’t have a manual).

A complete list of what’s new in DaVinci Resolve 10:

Resolve Live 
• Grade Live incoming SDI video and save grading snapshots with metadata and stills

New Editing Enhancements for Project Finishing
• Multi track video and audio editing
• Extensive clip trimming support
• High quality optical flow image processing
• Static, lower third, scroll and crawl titles
• Compound clips
• Three point and four point fit-to-fill editing
• Transform, crop and opacity video effects
• Multiple Take selection
• Expanded XML and AAF roundtrip support
• Built-in generators for bars and test patterns
• Audio level controls with track mixing
• Matchframe linking for source and timeline viewers
• Stereoscopic 3D editing
• Media Pool list view now includes a filmstrip view

New Color Correction Enhancements
• Support for an unlimited number of industry standard OpenFX plug-ins per clip
• Unlimited Power Windows per node
• New Gradient Power Window
• Power Window presets to combine multiple windows
• PowerCurve Window freehand drawing and processing enhancements
• Copy and Paste of Tracking Data between Power Windows
• Power Window rotation available on the 4th trackball on the BMD control panel
• Motion Effects palette – In full version of DaVinci Resolve
• Chrominance control for Spatial noise reduction – In full version of DaVinci Resolve
• Temporal noise reduction – In full version of DaVinci Resolve
• Motion blur – In full version of DaVinci Resolve
• Enhanced blur with 10x range increase
• Contrast and pivot controls in 3-Way color and Primary palettes
• Split screen viewer display with SDI output
• CinemaDNG and ARRI Raw decoder options for half and quarter resolution
• Debayer and image scaling quality modes for systems with low GPU power
• Keyframe Timeline metadata now saved with Gallery Stills
• Drag and drop stills between Gallery pages
• Grab missing stills for all clips
• PowerGrades will now be append to the node editor with double click
• Enhanced Lightbox display with colour correction controls and SDI output
• Node based PTZR controls
• Corrector Node RGB/YUV selector for channel isolation
• Splitter and Combiners Nodes for single channel effects
• Optimized latency while grading complex node graphs
• Render Cache metadata is now saved with the project
• Global grade bypass for quick before/after grade review
• Auto Stabilization improvements to track shots with camera pans
• Additional External Matte Freeze and current clip settings
• Burn-in options for individual and global formatting and whether to display item labels
• User selectable LUT selection for GUI Viewer and Scopes
• Printer Light Hotkey grading
• Additional timeline filters to sort the colour and deliver timelines
• Keyboard shortcut to full screen viewer mode
• Media and Edit page viewer now includes a zoom to fit selector
• The switching clip selection now also in the node editor options menu
• Projects can now be arranged and saved within project folders for easy organisation
• Projects and project folders can be cut and pasted between project folders
• 3rd party panel improvements

Media Support Enhancements
• AVI clip decoding
• JPEG 2000 decoding
• Viewer display with side-by-side audio waveform or VU display options
• Auto Sync of Dailies audio and video using matching time code
• Edit clip metadata concurrently with audio and video sync
• User definable preset list of metadata to be displayed on screen
• Log ACES support
• Sony Slog2 IDT for ACES
• Canon C500 IDT for ACES
• Additional Media Pool fields for clip metadata includes shot, scene, take, angle, circled and camera roll #

Deliver Enhancements
• Audio tracks are now displayed in the timeline with video clips
• Audio VU meters with dBu and VU range selection
• Additional render option to JPEG 2000 for DCP generation
• Additional render resolution templates
• Render settings now include optional render job version name
• Integration with easyDCP using license purchased from EasyDCP (Available for Mac and Windows)

General Enhancements
• OpenCL support for multiple AMD GPUs on Windows
• Menu bar support on Linux
• Linux CentOS 6.3 support
• General performance and stability improvements