Hawaiki AutoMatch - Manual

• Overview
• System Requirements
• Basic Operation
• Match Brightness
• Match 2
• Advanced Section
• Auto Levels
• FineTune
• Legalize
• Onscreen Buttons
• Presets

• Overview - Hawaiki AutoMatch is an incredibly powerful and easy-to-use grading plug-in that allows to create an automatic match between two different shots.


• AutoMatch is perfect for matching shots from two or more different makes of camera. But of course it's also ideal for just matching two shots in the same scene from the same camera, making it a useful tool in any grading situation. Yet another use might be when you’re keying and you want to match the colours of the foreground to the background. In each case, AutoMatch creates a quick and easy match without the need for complex manual adjustment, but there’s plenty of control over the fine tuning if you want it.


• New in AutoMatch 1.0.3 - support for M1 (Apple silicon) Macs.

macOS: macOS 10.14.6 Mojave, macOS 10.15 Catalina, macOS 11 Big Sur, macOS 12 Monterey

FxFactory: 7.2.5 +

Apps: Final Cut Pro 10.4 +,  Motion 5.4 +,  Premiere Pro 12 +,  After Effects 15 +

M1 (Apple silicon) Macs: require Final Cut Pro 10.5.3 +

• Select Hawaiki AutoMatch from your Effects Browser/Library and apply to your chosen clip(s) or use the Title (overlay) version (FCP only) for global grading of multiple clips.


• AutoMatch Basic Operation - The automatic matching in AutoMatch works by sampling two colors - one in the image which you wish to match to - the Reference, and the other in the clip to which AutoMatch is applied (the clip you wish to correct) - the Destination.


• Click on the Reference swatch, to bring up the Mac Color picker and move the playhead to the shot you wish to match to and pick a color. Note that in hosts other than FCP you can pick directly using the eyedropper for each color swatch without having to invoke the Mac Color picker.
  
  Next move back to the clip that needs correcting and pick a similar color, or if it’s from the same scene, preferably the same object.
  
  Click "Enable" to see the results.
  
  The Amount slider allows you to quickly dial the correction up or down.
  
  
• Match Brightness - AutoMatch works well with a range of hue and saturation levels and from very dark to very light colors but by default it also matches the brightness of the Reference scene - for example if you pick a bright color as a Reference and a dark color in the Destination shot then AutoMatch will brighten the entire scene.

This is often desirable and really depends on the material and your intent but the Match Brightness slider allows for an easy override that maintains the brightness of your clip while still correcting the color. To maintain the brightness of the destination clip, move the Match Brightness slider towards zero. Move the slider between zero and 1 to brighten or darken your clip by the desired amount. You can even push past the Reference scene brightness level by taking the slider beyond 1.


• Very often you will need no more than these very simple controls to achieve outstanding results making AutoMatch both incredibly simple and very powerful to use. But there's a huge amount more control if you need it.


• Match 2 - Sometimes matching one color will throw other colors off and AutoMatch allows you to correct for this by providing a second set of picks.
  
  Enable the "Match 2" checkbox to bring up the second match.
  
  Two more swatches will appear below the current swatches labelled Ref 2 and Dest 2 as well as a Match Blend slider. This slider defaults to a value of 1, which represents 100% of the first match you made. When the slider is at 2 the correction is being made using 100% of the second match. A value of 1.5 gives a 50/50 mix of the two.
  
  It normally pays to disable the effect by unchecking Enable, and using the Match 2 swatches to pick again, although sometimes picking on top of the original correction can provide some nice fine-tuning.
  
  Even if you don't blend Match 2 with Match 1 it is quite a useful option for trying out a couple of matches and switching between them.

• Advanced Section - Checking the Advanced checkbox brings up a set of controls that allow you to really customise your match and get the exact look you're after.


• The High slider increases/decreases the correction in the highlights of your clip.


• The Mid slider increases/decreases the correction in the midtones of your clip.


• The Low slider increases/decreases the correction in the lows or shadows of your clip.

By default the Low correction is at zero as it is not normally required. However, in shot where you have a large block of color that is dark it can be useful to increase this amount. The Low correction is designed so it will correct a cast in the lows while minimizing the change to your clip's black point.


• The Max Boost/Reduce slider automatically increases or decreases the correction in the channel with the maximum difference. This can be a handy way to selectively adjust the dominant cast without effecting the other channels.


• The RGB Mix controls adjust the Match Color correction for each color channel. They're a great way to finesse the match.

Note - Within the Fine-tune section there are RGB Bias controls that adjust the RGB balance for all modules in the effect. The RGB Mix is limited to the Match Color module.


• Image Processing - Choose between the default Standard processing and an Enhanced Gamma mode that can be a good option for some shots where you want to boost the gamma but minimise the shift in the white point.

• Auto Levels - In addition to Matching Color, AutoMatch also includes an Auto Levels Module, that allows you to set the level of the Highs, Mids and Lows in your clip.


• Default Mode - in the default mode the luminance of the selections you make with the high, mid and low pickers are matched to absolute values for White, Middle Gray or Black respectively, making for a very easy way to balance out your clip for an optimum spread of values.
  
  So clicking on an area that you want to be white will bring those values up to maximum white. Selecting an area that you want to be black will bring those values down to minimum black. Use the Middle Gray swatch to set the values that you want to lie exactly halfway between black and white.

• Reference Mode - If you prefer you can choose to match the White, Middle Gray or Black to the Reference clip values instead.
  
  Change the High, Mid or Low Mode to access this operation.
  
  Another swatch will appear to enable you to use a reference clip, as with Match Color.


• The High, Mid and Low sliders allow you to adjust the amount of the correction in each tonal range.

• Fine-Tune - In addition to the automatic color matching in AutoMatch, there is an entire suite of manual grading tools to help you really refine your shot and get the very best out of it.


• Enable the Fine-Tune checkbox to reveal the Fine-Tune controls


• You'll find control over Global, High, Mid and Low saturation.
  
  In the Saturation section you’ll find a Saturation S-Curve option complete with pivot slider that gives you some unique creative control.





• Below this are standard controls for High, Mid and Low for Luminance and the Red, Green and Blue channels.


• The Bias control allows you to adjust the correction amount applied to each channel for the entire effect.




• Legalize - enable the legalize checkbox to clamp the signal to broadcast levels. It is best practice not to enable this until you have finalised your shot to avoid unnecessary clipping of the values.

• Onscreen Buttons - available only in FCP and Motion 5, a set of four onscreen buttons (in the area below your image in the Viewer) allow you to toggle and/or view the state of various parameters - sometimes easier and quicker than using the Inspector.
  
  Presets - the presets button is a dropdown menu that calls up the presets Open and Save dialogue box or allows you to choose one of your already-saved presets (see Presets below).

• Presets - In each of the host applications you will find at the bottom of the effect controls the option to Open, Save and Choose a preset that you have already saved.
  
  In FCP and Motion you can use the onscreen Presets button to access this option.
  
  This allows you to save the current state of all the parameters of the plug-in to a folder of your choosing and re-open it for use either in the same project or another project, or any other project in any of the other supported applications.