FCPX Moonlight Effect, FCPX Moonlight Effect

I am trying to get a moonlight effect in FCPX. I am using stills and have a long dissolve between the image in the daytime and the image in the night time. For the image in the night time I have used the Color Corection/Night effect but it doesn't look like moonlight - and nor does the moonlight effect. It is a picture of the ocean and I want to make it look as if there is a reflection of the moonlight on it to give it a warm glow. Any ideas how to do this? (I am not great at using Motion yet).

Final Cut Pro X

Posted on Jan 5, 2013 5:30 PM

21 replies

Jan 7, 2013 10:37 AM in response to serenity99

Works here with stills as well as video clips:

http://f-video.s3.amazonaws.com/still-light.mp4

That's a still ...

-paul.

serenity99 Author

Level 1

9 points

Jan 7, 2013 10:53 AM in response to Paul Figgiani

I wonder if it is because I am using a version earlier thatn 10.0.6

Jan 7, 2013 11:25 AM in response to serenity99

serenity99 wrote:

… How did you desaturate the shadows? Did you just use the color correction tools as shown below?

click on the pic to get the full-size screen-shot of my settings

hope you don't mind, I didn't switch to an English Interface, …

the pics should be self-explanatory:

this was done in less than 60sec 😉

• as you can see, the day4night effect is applied

• color correction#1 :

global to blue, shadows desaturated, and over all darker (perhaps a lil' too dark, the reflections should sparkle white)

• color correction#2 :

mask, resized & placed (not fully correct: the shot isn't straightened, needs some rotation), inside mask over all aparture is lowered to make sky almost black (I like & keep the blueish tint, the d4n effect gives)

the moon is just my corny humour .... my 12y old son actually looking over my shoulder, teasing me "… and where're Bella and Edward … ?" .... MY son!! 😁

serenity99 Author

Level 1

9 points

Jan 14, 2013 7:24 PM in response to Karsten Schlüter

Karsten, your directions helped me enormously and I was able to achieve my goal 😀 I have saved your directions so I have the "recipe" for future use.

Many thanks to you!!! You are GREAT on this forum 😀

dastoelk

Level 3

706 points

Jan 14, 2013 7:42 PM in response to Karsten Schlüter

For a self-described "hobbyist" your a very good colorist, Mr.Schluter!

Jan 14, 2013 11:06 PM in response to dastoelk

dastoelk wrote:

For a self-described "hobbyist" your a very good colorist, Mr.Schluter!

😊 thanks for the flowers, Dave!

… I AM a hobbyist - in terms, I never had a professional education, nor do I earn money with these skills. And my fundamental skill is, I'm good in 'analysis' (never watch a whodoneit with me!). In this case: how does a night sky look like? basicly 'dark', not blue. And German saying "at night, all cats are grey".-

Unfortunately I'm a very lazy person (no need for perfection), and one of my very weak spots is I'm no good in memorizing long lists of things (e.g. vocabulary of foreign languages). I had a look inside the Official Apple Books (to get a 'trainer' certificate) - NEVER! 😁

I stay with my lil' hobby projects ... and like to share.

give a smile - get a smile!

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FCPX Moonlight Effect, FCPX Moonlight Effect