ColorSlice: Deconstructing DaVinci Resolve’s New Secondary Tool

Learning To Control The ColorSlice Tool Plus Workflow Tips

In DaVinci Resolve 19, Blackmagic introduced a new secondary hue and saturation tool called ColorSlice. This tool adds native subtraction saturation and density controls that are normally only found in third-party DCTL plugins.

In this Insight, we’ll explore how the new tool works and discuss what this means for the currently available tools.

ColorSlice and Subtractive Saturation

Blackmagic Design witnessed the popularity of subtractive tools like Steve Yedlin, ASC’s Tetra, PixelTools Hue Shift, and Mononodes Color Shift and decided to add a similar tool to Resolve.

ColorSlice fits (and sits in the software) between the Hue/Sat vs. Curves and the Color Warper in your grading toolset. It doesn’t replace these tools but is a creative addition to them.

Digital video uses additive RGB colors, but subtractive color saturation emulates a film-like CMY color matrix. Subtractive saturation allows you to add greater depth of color (saturation) to your image without simultaneously making it (unnaturally) bright.