Color Grade different from Export?

[Armando Ferreira]

So I've been noticing that whenever I upload my videos to YouTube they look much different than how I color graded it on my timeline.  At first I thought it was maybe YouTube doing something funny.  But then I saw the final export on my computer and it was also different. 

So I decided to do a test and load up the same video on CC 2018 and also CC 2019 and Yup I was right!  2019 on the timeline has ore contrast and more saturation.  Is there a setting that's causing this?  Very frustrating to say the least and until I can fix it I have to go back to 2018.  In general 2019 seems like a bug fest, lots of stuff not working and also feels slower.

[R Neil Haugen]

What is your system? What color space have you set your monitor for, and have you calibrated it with a puck and software calibration system to Rec 709, sRGB/video standard, gamma 2.4?

If you haven't done the above there's no way you can have any confidence whatever in anything you export. Period.

The newer Macs with P3 monitors give you a massively different color space than the video sRGB standard. And a wide-gamut monitor in a PC is nearly as problematic but as it's a PC, far easier to fix the problem.

QuickTime player is notoriously color Stuupid, paying no attention to color profile flags on the media it plays. Chrome and Safari browsers are nearly as bad.

YouTube does one encode on uploads, and needs to do a second one to a different media to get proper color/gamma settings into the upload and frequently doesn't. You can force the second encode by opening the vid in your channel and select the modify or edit option,  then saving without doing anything.

Or, you can upload using Cineform YUV 10-bit or DNxHD/R instead of H 264 and get longer uploads (bigger files) but proper color/gamma on upload.

VLC and Potplayer will abide by color tags in media headers so they are vastly better than QuickTime.

For some users with wide-gamut monitors the new preferences option "enable display color management" may help PrPro on your machine.

But at any rate ... color management is so screwed up between the OS, the hardware,  the various players and apps, that the user has to learn to be in control.

Neil

[Mo Moolla]

"But at any rate ... color management is so screwed up between the OS, the hardware,  the various players and apps, that the user has to learn to be in control."

+1

[R Neil Haugen]

Yea ... I wish it were otherwise, but it ain't ... and with all the new wide-gamut & high-dynamic-range monitors and TV sets coming into use, with media designed for that ... but most folks still with HD/sRGB ... it's only going to get worse.

Neil