Layer Mixer instead of Parallel node

Layer Mixer instead of Parallel node

layer-mixer

When using Davinci Resolve most of the time you use Serial nodes and in some instances you use Parallel nodes. In some cases Parallel doesn’t do the job, instead you can use Layer Mixer.

If you want to have a B/W image and want to keep 2 colors you can do the following.

PARALLEL

– Do a primary grade to get the correct contrast (node 1)
– Add a Serial node and remove all the saturation (set to 0) to make it B/W (node 2)
– Select node 2 and add a Parallel node (node 4 + PARALLEL node)
– Create a key for green (node 4)
– Reintroduce the saturation (set to 100) (node 4)
– Select node 4 and add a Parallel node (node 5)
– Create a key for red (node 5)
– Reintroduce the saturation (set to 100) (node 5)

parallel

This works fine, but you can’t saturate the color more then you saturated it in node 1. What if you would like to saturate the green more then the red. One way would be to add more saturation in node 1 and then not reintroduce the full saturation in node 5. Another way is to use Layer Mixer node.

LAYER MIXER

– Do a primary grade to get the correct contrast (node1)
– Add a Serial node and remove all the saturation (set to 0) to make it B/W (node 2)
– Click right mouse button in node area and “Add Node>CORRECTOR” (node 3)

addNode-Cor

– Click right mouse button in node area and “Add Node>LAYER MIXER” (LAYER MIXER)

addNode-Lmix

– delete link from layer 2 to OUTPUT
– connect output node 2 to input LAYER MIXER

addInput

– connect output LAYER MIXER to OUTPUT
– Click right mouse button on LAYER MIXER node and “Add One Input”
– Connect output node 3 to input 2 LAYER MIXER
– Create a key for green (node 3)

layer-node3

When using Layer Mixer there is no need to reintroduce the color, it’s there right away. This gives you the possibility to use the Saturation slider to add more saturation.

green-normal

– Saturate the color (something above 50) (node 3)

green-saturated

– Click right mouse button in node area and “Add Node>CORRECTOR” (node 5)
– Click right mouse button on LAYER MIXER node and “Add One Input”
– Connect output node 5 to input 3 LAYER MIXER
– Create a key for red (node 5)

layer-mixer-final

Since the Layer Mixer node uses priority for blending images, where the top node has least priority, you need to connect the correctors in the right order. Try to change the order of the corrector nodes and see what happens.

© Nikolai Waldman

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