Highlight Recovery | Mistakes Every Beginner Make | DaVinci Resolve 17 Tutorial

Introduction

This tutorial is designed to guide beginners in recovering highlights in DaVinci Resolve 17 while avoiding common mistakes. Highlight recovery is essential for achieving a balanced and professional look in your videos. By following these steps, you’ll learn how to effectively manage highlights, enhance your color grading skills, and improve your overall editing workflow.

Step 1: Understanding Highlight Recovery

• What is Highlight Recovery?

  • It involves retrieving details from bright areas of an image that may appear washed out.
  • This technique is crucial for maintaining the integrity of your footage and ensuring a professional output.

• Practical Tips:

  • Always begin with a well-exposed source. Underexposed or drastically overexposed footage can complicate highlight recovery.
  • Use scopes (like the waveform) to monitor your highlights and ensure you’re not clipping the data.

Step 2: Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Mistake #1: Overdoing Recovery

  • Beginners often push highlight recovery too far, leading to unnatural looking footage.
  • Solution:
    • Gradually adjust the highlight recovery slider and monitor the changes closely.

• Mistake #2: Ignoring Color Balance

  • Focusing only on highlight recovery without balancing colors can result in a flat image.
  • Solution:
    • After adjusting highlights, check the overall color balance and make necessary adjustments to shadows and midtones.

• Mistake #3: Not Using Curves

  • Beginners may rely solely on sliders and neglect the power of curves.
  • Solution:
    • Use the curves tool to make precise adjustments. This gives you more control over how highlights recover without affecting other areas.

Step 3: Implementing the Pro Way

• Professional Techniques for Highlight Recovery:

  • Instead of simply using the highlight recovery tool, consider:

    • Curves Adjustment:

      • Use the curves panel to selectively lift highlights without impacting shadows.
      • Create a gentle S-curve to enhance contrast and maintain detail.

    • Using Color Wheels:

      • Adjust the lift, gamma, and gain to achieve a balanced look.
      • Focus on the gain for highlights while keeping the lift for shadows.

• Real-World Application:

  • Test these techniques on different types of footage, such as landscapes or portraits, to see how highlight recovery can significantly improve the visual quality.

Conclusion

Highlight recovery is an essential skill in color grading, especially for beginners using DaVinci Resolve 17. By understanding the process, avoiding common mistakes, and implementing professional techniques, you can enhance your video quality significantly. Practice these steps and experiment with different footage to refine your skills. For further improvement, consider taking additional training or watching more advanced tutorials to deepen your understanding of color grading.