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Day 14: 25 Insights in 25 Days New Year Marathon
Premiere Pro Detective: How Your Scaling Settings Are Killing DaVinci Resolve โRoundtripsโ
Part 1: Why The โFrame Sizeโ Options Matter More Than You Think
DaVinci Resolve has become a very popular finishing tool in Premiere Pro CC workflows. Especially after Adobe killed SpeedGrade CC in 2016 and removed the โSend to SpeedGradeโ menu command from Premiere. This left DaVinci Resolve as the go-to dedicated digital video color grading app for Adobe users. There are two methods for sending a timeline to DaVinci Resolve: Either render out a single self-contained movie for Resolve to โcut upโ and color grade or send an XML and let Resolve recreate your timeline. If you use the latter method then thereโs a good chance youโve found your resizes donโt always survive. For some inexplicable reason, sometimes your Pan & Scans work. Sometimes they donโt. This 3-part series explores the main culprit: The โFrame Sizeโ options in Premiere Pro and a mismatch in Resolveโs โInput Sizingโ project settings.
In roundtrip workflows with DaVinci Resolve, using โScale to Frame Sizeโ can be a huge mistake
If you think thereโs a chance you are sending your timeline (via FCP XML export) to DaVinci Resolve then you need to learn why โScale to Frame Sizeโ can be a nightmare. Thereโs a non-obvious reason for this, owing to a peculiarity of Premiere Proโs X/Y coordinate system and its Anchor Point. This peculiarity makes it difficult for DaVinci Resolve to perfectly recreate your resizes after youโve enabled โScale to Frame Sizingโ.
In Part 1 of this series, you learn the problem with โScale to Frame Sizeโ
The โScale toโ feature is designed to let underpowered CPUs take very large source frames (say, UHD frame sizes) and fit them into a 1080 HD (or any other sized) timeline without taxing the computer. Enabling โScale toโ takes any oversized frame, throws away all the extra pixels, and treats the footage like it is recorded at the frame size of the timeline. Since your computer doesnโt have to process the excess pixels, it speeds up the responsiveness of under-powered computers.
And since โScale to Frame Sizeโ is so useful, thereโs a default that let you enable โScale to Frame Sizeโ on footage imported into your Project bins.
Unfortunately, with mixed Frame Size timelines, โScale to Frame Sizeโ causes all sorts of problems in DaVinci Resolve
And if you enable โScale to Frame Sizeโ in your preferences, youโre setting yourself up for a world of hurt in DaVinci Resolve since every shot you import has this setting applied. And to add even more problems, Premiere Pro doesnโt have an alternative default method for forcing oversized images to properly scale to the timeline frame size using the far more reliable โSet To Frame Sizeโ option.
Premiereโs โSet to Frame Sizeโ works terrifically with DaVinci Resolve
Wellโฆ almost terrifically. If you use โSet to Frame Sizeโ in Premiere and export into Resolve then there is a project setting you need to change.
The complexity of this workflow is why Iโm breaking this Insight into multiple parts
- Part 1: We learn the nuances between โScale to Frame Sizeโ and โSet to Frame Sizeโ. These nuances go beyond the surface differences normally explained between these two features.
- Part 2: We bounce between DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Pro looking at how these different settings get interpreted.
- Part 3: We devise a solid โrule of thumbโ that you can easily replicate on all your jobs going forward. Youโll ensure you never waste time, energy or money matching your resizes. We also do a quick reconform of the โIn the Shadow of Giantsโ timeline and see how this little โrule of thumbโ completely changes the nature of that Conform process.
Shout out to Mixing Light member Jon Howard!
The inspiration for this series came from a comment of Mixing Light member Jon Howard on Part 4 of the Conforming Giants series. He mentioned that some of the problems I was having were due to the โScale to Frame Sizeโ option. It turned out, my problem was from a lack of understanding of how Premiere Pro CC handles resizes. His comment set me on a full day exploring proper settings for both DaVinci Resolve and Premiere Proโฆ and now all of us have him to thank for this detailed breakdown.
As always, use the Comments to share your experiences, insights or ask a question.
You never know when the smallest comment blows up into a 3-part series ๐
Enjoy!
-pi