There are two separate things you are probably dealing with.
First, getting correct color management settings in Premiere Pro.
This one is pretty easy and is solvable ... the second one, not so much.
You need complete set of color management settings for your output needs. These are all now located in the Lumetri panel's Settings tab. The tab NAMED Settings.
For most normal workflows, which will end with an SDR/Rec.709 export process, you should:
- have Display Color Management on;
- have auto detect log on;
- have auto tonemapping on;
- set the Sequence CM color space to Rec.709;
- use only Rec.709 export presets, those presets that do not have either HLG or PQ in the preset name.
Follow the above steps, all of them, and you should be fine.
The second problem, which is the color management difficulties between viewing the image inside Premiere Pro, and outside Premiere in video players on Macs without Reference modes.
This one is a pick-your-poison thanks to Apple. Sorry, but that's just Life.
The long established specifications, the standards, for Rec.709/SDR video playback have included the display transform function of Bt.1886 ever since flat panel screens replaced CRTs, the old TV tube displays.
All broadcast, streaming, and other professional workflows use the specified display transform of Bt.1886, including essentially applying a screen gamma of 2.4 to the signal.
But Apple, being Unique, decided to apply the camera transform (!) ... of essentially gamma 1.96, within their ColorSync color management utility ... to Rec.709/SDR video playback. This makes the shadows lighter.
Apparently, they also did a poor job of remapping hues ... colors ... between the sRGB space of Rec.709 video, and the native P3 space of their Retina monitors. So there's also a color discrepancy in their transform. They blew both the tonal and color transforms.
So they present a wrong image for both tonal values and hues compared to a correctly set Rec.709 screen display system.
You probably haven't noticed this. No one ever notices that their screen is say too dark or a bit green or something, as they get used to it and our brains auto-adjust. Which is why colorists spend more on their calibration gear than the rest of us do on the entire computer system.
But Macs with Reference modes, set to HDTV, do use the correct display transform, and nail both gamma and color!
So only the Macs without Reference modes get the lighter, less colorful image.
QuickTime player, Chrome and Safari browsers, all allow ColorSync to 'manage' the displayed image. They will get a lighter, less saturated image than all other types of screens, from TVs, to broadcast compliant computer systems, Android devices, and Macs with Reference modes.
But VLC and Potplayer do not allow ColorSync to mangle the image, so they present a nearly correct Rec.709/SDR view of the image on Macs without Reference modes.
So you have choices, none perfect.
1) If you only care about what you see on your system:
Then set the Viewing Gamma in the Settings tab to 1.96/QuickTime. The image within Premiere on the Program Monitor and outside in QuickTime Player will be pretty consistent.
Note, this only changes the displayed value, it does not make an encoding difference. ONLY a difference in displaying the image. But if you 'grade' with a shadow-lightening screen, you will set the image differently than if doing so with darker shadows on the screen.
And ... all other non-Mac systems, and Macs with Reference modes, will see your material much darker, and perhaps over-saturated.
2) If you want a 'correct' image across the majority of screens, and are grading in a moderately bright to bright "office lighting" type environment:
Then set the Viewing gamma to gamma 2.2/Web ... because it isn't where your media is headed, but your viewing environment while grading!!!!! ... that should determine the monitor gamma setting while grading. According to professional standards for grading environments.
3) If you are grading in a pretty dark room as colorists do and want your media to look good across most systems:
Then use the Viewing gamma of 2.4/broadcast, because again, it is your viewing environment while grading that should be the determinant between gamma 2.2 and 2.4.
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