It’s that time again for another Useful Tools for Editors. This long, long-running series highlights some useful products, software and hardware that those working in editing and post-production might find useful. The Tennessee Titans are worth mentioning after their commanding victory over Green Bay last week on Thursday Night Football and their my hometown team … so there! You can see how long ago I started working on this post as the Titans went from first to worst in the AFC South … so there.

While not a huge Useful Tools for Editors edition, there are some new things worth mentioning so I’ll go ahead and post this before any more time goes by.

Sideshow FX Loupedeck Color Panel for DaVinci Resolve

If you’ve ever wanted to use your Loupedeck CT to control Resolve’s Color page, then Sideshow FX’s Loupedeck Color Panel for DaVinci Resolve might currently be the only option. It’s available for both Mac and PC. And it’s big and complex. 

For years Sideshow FX has released some very nice and very useful icon packs for Loupedeck and Stream Deck, but they’ve taken their unique niche to a new level by building Resolve Color-page-specific workflows for the Loupedeck CT. This is work noting as Blackmagic really limits the hardware that can drive the Resolve to their own hardware and panels that were around long before BMD’s hardware. And that makes this support complex. More on that in a second. 

This supports both Mac and PC, and the supported controls seem a bit different, according to the Sideshow FX website. 

For Windows PC:

Color Grade in Primary Color, Primary Log and HDR, control secondaries with all of the Qualifier controls, adjust Power Window parameters, control Tracking, fine tune Mattes and Keys, adjust Sizing, manipulate Printer Lights all with your Loupedeck device.

For Mac:

Color Grade in Primary Color, Primary Log and HDR, control secondaries with all of the Qualifier controls, adjust Power Window parameters, control Tracking, bend color with Color Warper, fine tune Mattes and Keys, adjust Sizing, work with Dolby Vision, adjust Magic Mask, manipulate Printer Lights all with your Loupedeck device.

There’s a big caveat for how this operates on the Mac: It requires Keyboard Maestro to work its magic (I did not test this on the PC). That’s because Sideshow FX must utilize mouse cursor control that Keyboard Maestro enables in order to emulate the wheels, dials, curves and things like that which Resolve requires on the color page. 

The biggest hurdle to making this work is three-fold on the Mac. 

1. Sideshow FX’s Loupedeck Color Panel for DaVinci Resolve requires a good bit of setup time as you have to map where your mouse cursor location is on the screen for Keyboard Maestro to be able to get your tool commands from the Loupedect CT and translate those into mouse movements in Resolve. 
2. You can’t change your screen resolution or Resolve window layout as that would move the position where the mouse cursor has been mapped therefore making it unable to adjust the tool.
3. You have to own a copy of the $36 Keyboard Maestro for Mac to make this work but there is a discount for this Mac utility when you purchase the Sideshow FX product. 

The setup time is estimated at around 20 minutes but it took a bit less for me. If you don’t use all of the possible controls, you don’t have to map them, saving even more time. I don’t think this is big deal as good control surface workflows require some setup and dedication to be able to learn and use. Don’t let this put you off. 

Below is an installation video for Mac. I think it’s important to see how Sideshow FX is able to achieve this integration for Mac.

The biggest hurdle for Mac users to overcome is the window layout and screen resolution thing. I feel like I often adjust exactly what part of the interface is what size and whether I’m working on a dual screen layout or single screen layout. Committing to the Sideshow FX’s Loupedeck Color Panel for DaVinci Resolve does require a commitment to leave that screen setup intact but I find this much easier on the Color page. And that’s where you’ll be using this workflow. 

Sideshow FX’s Loupedeck Color Panel for DaVinci Resolve is $45 for both Mac and PC. I think that’s a fair price considering it takes a very useful but somewhat expensive piece of hardware and makes it handy within Resolve’s Color page. Will this replace BMD’s hardware or even my Tangent Ripple? No, but it was never meant to. What it can be is a great supplement to an existing setup for the part-time Resolve editor needing to color and wanting to use a great piece of hardware in a place where it otherwise sits idle. 

And no, this is not the Stream Deck + with dials as that is something different.

Revisor for Adobe Premiere Pro 

If you work in a part of the industry where you’re in constant need to work on individual file revisions to your Premiere edit, then the Revisor extension might be just for you. I love these Premiere extensions that take a very simple idea and turn it into a tool that should be an existing workflow in all NLEs to begin with. 

Imagine a tool within Premiere that can quickly toggle between the v1, v2, v3 etc, versions of a graphic or composite right in the timeline without the need for version stacking or using the various replace edit functions that PPro offers. Understand that, and you understand Revisor. 

As long as you adhere to Revisor’s naming convention, then you might save yourself a lot of time. From the Revisor manual:

File names need to have a version tag to get recognized. Version tags need to have an uppercase V or lowercase v followed by a number.

It’s that simple. Revisor costs $20 but might save you a lot of time. Priceless.

Freque

This is an interesting little service that claims to be somewhat like Frame.io but for music to picture. If you can imagine a review and approval service geared toward scoring and music for picture then you have an idea of what Freque is all about.

Here is what they say about the service: