FestivalLuts Academy

Start where you are stuck

Grouped by the order the work happens in, not by camera brand.

1 · Expose

Get this wrong and nothing downstream recovers it. One number per log format, computed from the transform library this site runs on.

ExposureWhere middle grey lands in S-Log341.1% of code value, and what that single number settles about metering on an FX3, FX5 or FX6.18% grey at 41.06% · 7.74 stops over8 min readExposureCanon C-Log3: middle grey at 33.1%The lowest grey placement of the eight, which changes where a correctly exposed face sits on the scope.18% grey at 33.10% · 6.50 stops over11 min readExposureRED Log3G10: middle grey at 33.3%Ten stops of headroom above middle grey, second only to Blackmagic Film Gen5, and a grey target nowhere near a Sony's.18% grey at 33.33% · 10.00 stops over9 min readExposureApple Log: highest grey, least headroom48.8% grey and the shortest run to clipping on the list. Meter an iPhone like a Sony and you are a stop out.18% grey at 48.83% · 6.06 stops over8 min readExposureHow to expose S-Log3 on the Sony FX5For when the monitor in a dark tent says the shot is fine and the file disagrees. Middle grey at 41% IRE, skin in the 55–62% band, Zebra 1 at 94%.6 min read

2 · Convert

Log to Rec.709: what the conversion actually does, what it costs, and the one problem it cannot fix.

ConversionLog to Rec.709: conversion LUT or CST?What a conversion actually does, why a creative look applied to log footage goes wrong, and the node order that keeps the two jobs separate.9 min readLUT formatWhat LUT lattice size actually costsWhether a 65-point LUT beats a 17-point one, measured rather than asserted: a look survives the coarse lattice, a log conversion does not, and the worst errors barely improve at any size.10 min readStage lightingWhy stage lighting clips out of gamutA red wash that will not come back when you pull exposure is not over-exposed, it is outside the colour space. Which control fixes that, and which one everybody reaches for instead.6 min read

3 · Apply the look, and publish your own

Where the LUT goes in each application, and what makes one worth downloading.

Applying the lookInstalling .cube LUTs in Resolve, Premiere and Final CutWhere LUTs live per application, the difference between a Camera LUT slot and a node LUT, and what goes wrong when one gets applied twice.9 min readPublishingUploading to FestivalLuts, and what makes a LUT worth downloadingEvery check your .cube has to pass, why each one exists, and the export settings that decide whether your LUT survives contact with someone else's footage.6 min read

Sony FX3 and FX5

The two bodies this site documents in detail, and where they actually differ.

CamerasSony FX3 and FX5 for live eventsWhat the two bodies share at the colour level, so you stop hunting for a per-body LUT that need not exist.3 min readCamerasFX3 vs FX5 for low-light event coverageWhich body goes on the A-cam, and what the published base-ISO difference does not settle.6 min readRAW workflowGrading FX5 X-OCN RAW in DaVinci ResolveRAW changes what node 1 is: the Camera RAW tab, the one place Highlight Recovery actually exists. Read it before you copy a RAW tip onto XAVC, where that control is not there.6 min read

In the catalogue

The product pages the guides refer back to.

ConversionSony S-Log3What a conversion is doing to your file, step by step: decode curve, gamut matrix, highlight shoulder, display curve.3 min readCatalogueConcert LUTs and stage lightingWhy a red wash smears and faces go plastic, and why pulling exposure down does not fix it: the problem is out-of-gamut saturation, and there is a specific transform control for it.ConversionLog → Rec.709 conversionsSix technical conversions. Pick by the log format you recorded, never by the camera's marketing name.

Why that order

1. Correct the exposure — on the log footage, before anything else. The Offset wheel is additive, and an additive shift in log space is a multiplication in linear: a stop change. That is why colourists balance on log with it. Do the same after the conversion and Offset becomes a pedestal lift that washes the blacks out.
2. Convert — one transform, log to Rec.709. A Color Space Transform compresses everything above diffuse white into Rec.709's much smaller range. It does not hard-clip — Resolve works in 32-bit float and the transform tone-maps — but once compressed, pulling exposure down afterwards drags the whole block down together. Muddy greys, not recovered detail.
3. Apply the look — last, on top of Rec.709. A creative LUT expects display-referred input. Given log, it applies its curve to the wrong numbers.

The commonest reason a LUT "doesn't work" is that order reversed: a creative look dropped straight onto log. Nothing further down the timeline recovers it.

For photographers

The catalogue is two halves. Everything above is video: .cube LUTs for Resolve, Premiere and Final Cut. The other half is Lightroom and Camera Raw presets — .xmp develop settings for stills, which are not LUTs and do not go in a LUT slot.

Each preset page reads the file and lists what it actually sets, panel by panel, in the names Lightroom uses: exposure, contrast, the tone sliders, the colour mixer bands it touches, and whether it sets a white balance or hands that back to the camera. That is the file's own contents, not a description of it.