Every colorist needs speed.

Speed gives you more time to do your best work, making sure you deliver something you're proud of on every job while making your clients happy (and always having new footage for your Instagram and your reel that's get-me-hired worthy).

Speed also helps you stay in flow, getting jobs done faster while being a better collaborator, making you look like a color grading genius as you translate your clients’ every wish to the screen with ease.

Speed also lets you finish the same job in half the time, effectively getting paid more for the same work, while having more time for your partner, family, and friends.

Speed means more time to wear your other filmmaking hats: cinematographer, director, writer, producer.

And it gives you more time to work on your own film projects while still having all the income you need.

Other than a colorist's dog, partner, and DaVinci Resolve...

Speed is a colorist's best friend.

That's why I set out to make that had all of the creative control you need to make any look you want, but that also helped you build beautiful looks faster.

This means it needed to not only have the most advanced color science to produce eyeball-pleasing results, but it needed to help you, the colorist, build your looks without the hours of tweaking and testing that can come with look design (and without the years of linear algebra, calculus, and debugging code that comes with trying to build your own tools).

Now, after 12 months and hundreds of testing hours, the plugin exists...

Introducing: Contour.

Like a look design plugin.

Unlike any look design plugin.

Here's how Contour helps you create beautiful looks that won't ever break, faster than any other toolset:

1) Contour uses unique color science that "listens" to what you want, then adapts the way it works in real time based on your creative intent

This ability to "listen" is the most significant feature of Contour, and you'll see it throughout many features of the plugin.

It allows Contour to quickly translate the creative decisions you make with each slider into a look that looks beautiful on every shot — and that won't break.

This ability to listen and build a stunning, unbreakable look based on your creative intent is like having your own color science team on every grade. Just like Hollywood's top colorists.

2) Contour makes sure you spend your time on the right things

Let's say you have 5 minutes to make a look.

If you only got one part of your look done in those 5 minutes, and the one part you got done was your contrast curve, then you'd have spent that 5 minutes well.

And if you were able to get two pieces done, and those two pieces were your contrast and split tone, then you'd have spent your time well.

This is Contour's approach to how it walks you through its modules: making sure you spend your time wisely instead of worrying about the proper order of operations for putting together the different parts of a look.

Contour's modules go in this order: Curve, Split-tone, Saturation, Density, and Hue.

If you spend your time for creating your look by going through these modules in order, you'll always have made the best look you could in the time you have.

3) Contour makes sure you won't break your clients’ images right in front of them during a grade, or have the DP calling you because the show LUT you built him broke on set.

Contour gives you ultimate creative control — but there's one thing it won't let you do: break your image.

This goes back to Contour's "listening" capabilities and being able to adapt.

Since Contour can understand what you're trying to create, it can change its math in real time to give you what you want while also making sure the operations won't break your image.

This saves you 2, 3, 4 hours (or more) of testing, and saves you the pain of looking like an amateur when your look breaks mid-project or on set.

4) Contour's toolkit lets you build everything you want, without any of the drawbacks, so you can push looks farther without ever "showing your hand"

Here's an example: Split-toning is one of your best tools for adding more depth to an image, but it's also one of the easiest ways to make things look weird or make your work as a colorist obvious.

Contour gives you tools to keep this from happening.

It uses advanced saturation masks to cleanly exclude neutral areas, letting you pump more split-toning without giving yourself away by making your blacks crazy blue and the whites of your subject's eyes yellow.

I'll share more about these options in the tools section later.

5) Contour keeps fresh ideas and inspiration at your finger tips

Contour has "profiles", which are editable looks you can load into the plugin. This can be used for inspiration, to learn from, or to give you a head start on your look design.

You can think of them as editable LUTs.

There are two ways to get a profile:

1) You can save your looks after you've created them so you can recall them later

2) You can get profiles from other colorists (I'm giving you six profiles with Contour to use, learn from, or be inspired by)

6) Contour makes it easy to be a master of your tools, making sure you always know how to work towards any look you wan't to create

Don't remember what a slider does? Just hover your mouse over it's name and a tooltip will appear reminding you how it works.

Want to go deeper and review the manual instead? Just click the help button at the bottom of the plugin.

7) Contour comes with in-depth look design education

With any annual or perpetual license, you'll get my new 2-day look dev course for free as a bonus.

Inside that course you'll further the master of your toolset and be granted insider knowledge for building any type of look your clients ask for.

Recent work by colorists using Contour

Here's how Contour's toolset works

Contour's toolset exists in 5 modules, and each one contains two more of Contour's speedy secrets:

First, the modules let you shape specific parts of your image without having unwanted effects on other parts of the look you've already built. This saves you from losing precious time going back and forth balancing each adjustment you make.

Two, these modules have professional color science and look design principles built into the way they work and interact, saving you time by letting you focus on the creativity and letting Contour handle the technical details to make it all work.

Module 1: Curve

Contour's curve module creates beautiful contrast quickly by combining 7 essential control points for shaping your curve, and lets you craft every part of it independently without ever getting unwanted interactions between them.

For example, this means that unlike in Resolve and other tools, once you shape the shoulder of your curve, it won't be affected when you go to shape the toe, putting you in a time-consuming balancing act just to get something you like.

The curve module's design lets you create your curve in a fine-tuned way while Contour again "listens" to what you want to make and brings it all together for you.

And it does this using curve functions I've spent the last 2.5 years developing to make a contrast curve that is smooth and beautiful.

Contour's contrast module can create beautiful looks in every scenario.

You can create thicker yet controlled contrast like in the 1917 inspired look in the example above...

Or create more extreme looks, like a popular Bleach Bypass.

Module 2: Split-tone

Contour continues the game of speed and creative control in its split-tone module.

First, nail your split-tone faster using the on-screen color swatches, helping you pinpoint the colors you want to push into your images.

Then, it gives you specialized "Subtractive" sliders to adjust how your split affects your tonal contrast too.

In their default state, the "Subtractive" sliders preserve the contrast decisions you made in the curve module, again letting you shape each piece of your look without having unwanted affects on creative decisions you already made.

Or, you can use them as further controls to deepen the contrast of your image, or to fine-tune the top and bottom ends of your overall curve.

Also, we can't talk about split-toning without addressing the problems it used to come with.

Because even though split-toning is one of the best ways for a colorist to create depth in their images, it comes with a lot of drawbacks that can make things look weird and basically hang a sign on top of each image saying, "A colorist was here."

With split-toning...

Known neutrals can feel tinted (like bedsheets getting "reddish", or having yellow walls).

Bright colors will shift and look unnatural, like blue skies turning "dusty" due to a warm push.

Colors that are similar to the hues in the split-tone will start "piggybacking", like skin getting over saturated or too red.

And skin will transition from warm to cool over a very narrow range of exposure.

But Contour addresses these issues by giving you tools that neatly tuck away the unwanted effects of split-toning, letting you push your split-tone farther and increasing your ability to create depth in your images.

A saturation mask lets you flag off neutrals so white walls look white and the bright highlights on your subject's face look natural.

Another slider lets you preserve colors near middle gray, keeping your subject looking natural while still pushing colors into the highlights and shadows.

And two more control points let you have your split-tone while preserving your blacks and bright highlights, a real treasure if you're the type that hates blue blacks.

The extra controls and specialized masking in Contour let you get the depth, color separation, and more filmic aesthetics without the split totally taking over the image. In fact, the split strength slider is cranked about three times harder than you might push on most looks in this example (which also means you have a lot of room to adjust it if you think this example is still too strong).

And all of this is done in just moments, letting you get onto the grade faster, or giving you more time to dial in other parts of your look.

Module 3: Saturation

To make this module a reality, I dug and found 8 different color models to test, and had them compete against each other while I developed a new approach for handling color in an image.

Some models were unable to create a pleasing operation, some interpreted colors in an unwanted way in bright areas.

But one was just right.

That model was combined with this new approach of modifying saturation, and creates stunning results in seconds.

But this isn't the only thing that makes this module unique.

Contour's saturation module gives you 3 separate sliders for controlling the low, medium, and high saturation parts of the image.

These sections interact in a unique way, giving you the ability to reshape the saturation in your images unlike any other tool you've used.

These controls also allow you to condense and pump the color while retaining detail where other saturation tools would turn things flat and neon.

Then, to sweeten your image further, the Saturation module is where we first see Contour's "Versus Sliders", which allow you to cleanly and selectively affect different colors in your images in different amounts using patent-pending color science.

These sliders give you an extra way to create depth and separation in your images beautifully — and in seconds.

Saturation, especially in a look, isn't only about making things more colorful, but also bringing a harmony of color through compressing saturation and determining the relationship between highly saturated and lower saturated colors.

In this first before & after, notice how the image feels more colorful, but that most of that colorfulness comes from the areas further away from in the scene increasing in saturation as a result of compressing the range of saturations together (and not because color everywhere got cranked.)

And here's the flipside to what we saw above. We see the same image again but this time we compress the saturations differently, giving balance to the saturation range but doing so while reducing colorfulness.

The image's colors are still balanced and pleasing, and if you hadn't seen a more colorful image next to it, you might not even think of it as desaturated.

This final image above already has a ton of color, but it's a little all over the place. As you move the slider, pay close attention to how the saturation in the image not only sweetens in certain areas, like the skin of both people in the frame and the cyan shirt, but how the overall saturation felt throughout comes into more harmony.

(And this is all done with broad adjustments — the skin and shirt are not being targeted directly, which means no breakage and this saturation curve you've built will travel across all of your images.)

I specifically picked this image above because of the subtlety and precision needed to get this type of saturation response across an image (and an entire project) with so many varying colors and intensities. It's a example of that final 5% that makes a great look an unforgettable look — and an unforgettable look that still doesn't pull any attention away from the story.

And even with all of the precision and subtlety, you can create this in Contour in just moments.

Module 4: Density

The Density module showcases a combination of the advantages built into Contour.

It has the ability to selectively affect different hues vs others, like in the Saturation module (a favorite feature of Elvis colorist Kali Bateman).

This helps you create more separation for a juicier image, but it also helps you:

• Create density that is truer to film (density appeared in red, blue, and green colors more than cyan, magenta, and yellow)
• And avoid problems with digital imaging pipelines, giving you more realistic and more pleasing colors

You also get controls that help you remove problems commonly seen with digital density tools, like brown yellows or unnaturally darkened skin, while still being able to push the density, and your look, farther.

All of this happens quickly with just a couple of sliders, making it easy for you to stay focused on what you're creating while Contour handles the technical stuff.

Check out how much density we're able to push into the reds (teapot, firetruck, cereal bowl) without the usual problems of digital density. Yellows are yellow (that orange juice looks tasty!) and skin is left untouched. Again, this isn't accomplished by using a more narrow adjustment, it's actually quite broad, which means your entire project will get this density in the reds and your skin will be left untouched. Another example of Contour's advanced masking.

Module 5: Hue

The final module, Hue, does four things to get you the look you want faster:

First, this is where Contour's ability to "listen" and adapt comes back, as it prioritizes the different hues based on how you're building your look and using the module.

Second, because of its ability to adapt, it adjusts its math under the hood so you can push all you want and still have something that works on all of your images without breaking.

Third, it lets you target the effects of your hue rotations based on saturation, letting you do things like manipulate reds without affecting skin tones, saving you from hours of flipping back and forth on different images to dial this type of adjustment in.

And the fourth part of the Hue module needs some background...

See, there's two problems when it comes to hue selection and what the colorist wants to see.

First, each color pipeline handles hues differently, so if Contour used the same approach in DaVinci Wide Gamut as it does in ACES or LogC3, it would feel like it grabbed different colors in each pipeline.

Second, "green" in color-science-land isn't necessarily "green" like the greens you want to rotate, like the green leaves on a tree.

So I spent 50 hours developing a new system to solve both of these.

First, the system needed to be able to select colors based on how us colorists perceive them versus what’s technically pure green inside of a color space. This way, when you rotate green, you see the hues rotate the way you expected.

Second, it needed to give the same response in each color pipeline so that your green slider rotated the green hues you were wanting to rotate no matter what color space you were working in.

This way of building the hue module gives you the colors you want much faster and much more cleanly than trying to make narrow adjustments.

This hue rotation was not made by making a more narrow hue adjustment. Instead, Contour uses it's own approach to getting targeted adjustments in a way that's still broad, allowing you to make even massive red shifts like this without affecting skin that will work on every shot in your project. This saves you a ton of time by avoiding countless shot-level adjustments.

And Contour still does more...

Get New Ideas, Learn New Techniques, and Speed Up Your Workflow with Contour Profiles

Contour's profile system is a way to store looks created in Contour in an editable format.

This lets you give yourself a head-start on a job by starting with a look you've already developed, then dialing it in to work perfectly with the specific footage you’re grading.

It also means you can provide incredible work via a custom look even for projects that can't afford much look dev (so you get more work for your reel instead of asking not to be credited).

It's also a powerful way to learn and find inspiration because Contour Profiles are shareable.

Plus, I'm giving you 6 profiles as a bonus when you buy Contour.

Here’s some other ways to use Contour's profiles:

DP comes back and wants you to re-color a job the way they want for their reel? Pull up the look and make the changes they want while easily keeping what they like.

Spent time building your own looks to use on jobs? Save them as a profile so you can start by finding the one that's the best fit, then make it a perfect fit. Clients will love your ability to give their footage exactly what it needs.

And let's remember our clients’ favorite note: "I like this look, but can we change [this one specific thing]." When your looks are built and stored in an editable format, the answer is always an easy yes, and it takes almost no time to do it.

And speaking of bonuses, Contour comes with three.

Because there's one other thing that gives a colorist speed: Mastery over your tools and the art of look design.

Bonus #1:
Contour & Look Design Mastery Training

Start creating pro-level looks on command when you learn how to...

• Get common aesthetics you or your client may want, like bleached highlights and filmic hue rotations, so you can precisely build any look you imagine
• Use Contour like a pro, going into detail about how each module and control works, so you always know where to start with any look you want – and I’ll show you examples of how the modules interact so you can get even more stunning results
• Pick and select the right DRT for your project
• Create a variety of common looks, from warm or cool looks (a fun exercise when you don't have temp or offset to use) to bleach bypass, to creating looks that are heavily film-inspired while excluding the traits of film you or your client don't want (these "film-like" looks are huge these days)

And the course wraps up with me creating looks called out by an audience in real time, so you can see what I think about when building a look and how I use Contour for different looks while being able to learn approaches for looks you'd like to create.

You receive access to this course immediately alongside Contour with an annual or perpetual license.

Bonus #2:

Folder full of look design practice footage

52 clips from 5 different real projects to practice and build with, so you're never short on material for building your own looks or to deliver something beautiful for a client.

Bonus #3:

Six Contour look profiles to use as a starting point for your next grade

Contour profiles are looks created in Contour and then saved to its editable format. It's a better way than exporting LUTs to store and share looks.

This editable format also makes them a great way to speed up your workflow.

And because profiles load with the exact settings used to make the look, it's a great way to learn how to achieve different looks from other colorists.

To get you started, I'm sharing 6 profiles for you to use or learn and get inspired by, including looks inspired by 1917, Arrival, Asteroid City, and David Fincher.

Create any look you need, beautifully and quickly.
With Contour.

Limited time launch special:

Get a perpetual license for 48% off!