I have found Denoiser a bit temperamental in FCP 7 when dealing with long clips. I made the mistake of applying Denoiser to a 30-minute point-the-camera-talking-head clip (I know—it’s what the client wanted and I aim to please) and FCP was simply unable to render it. It worked fine on small clips, and that long clip was able to render in AE CS5. (It took 10 hours, but it rendered.) The results were stunning: noise removal with very minimal softening of image. Lesson here is to apply Denoiser to shorter clips. The better lesson, however, is to convince your client that a 30-minute shot of a talking head is deadly.
Grinder 1.5 is my transcoding app of choice for DSLR footage. Granted, some of this workload has been obviated by FCP X and its ability to ingest DSLR files. But there remains a use for Grinder wherever direct reading of DSLR and other H.264/AVC files is inconvenient or impossible.
The two new components of MB Suite are Cosmo v1 and Looks v2. Cosmo is one of several “digital makeup” apps in the marketplace, but it stands apart from its competitors by the great amount of control it offers.
Magic Bullet Looks 2 is the centerpiece of the suite. Its power mask parameter allows keyframeable masks so you can apply a look to a specific portion of the image. Note the presence of scopes as well as extensive categories of looks. Apply a basic look and tweak the image by clicking on a category at the bottom of the screen and adjusting its controls. When you’re satisfied, click Finished to return to the host application. In this case, I created a very grainy, high-contrast look—which I would never use for anything other than illustrative purposes!
The principle in Magic Bullet Looks differs from the preset notion of Sapphire Edge. In Magic Bullet Looks 2, you are creating your own look with extensive tools not only to preview but also to monitor technical parameters of the shot with scopes.
Then add Magic Bullet Mojo to the stack. Mojo extends the functionality of looks with the ability to tint, warm, cool, add punch or bleach bypass an image.
The combination of Colorista II, Looks 2 and Mojo provides a complete color grading solution within your NLE. It is for this reason alone that I would recommend purchasing the entire package, even if you are not using the other plug-ins, since together the cost of these three exceeds the $799 package price.
Once again, Red Giant hits one out of the park. The bundle represents excellent value. Colorista II is my favorite color grading plug-in. Mojo adds, well, that little bit of Mojo to your shot. Looks 2 is more intricate and allows for the creation of your own looks with fine control. For best results, I prefer running these plug-ins within After Effects.
