One of the most outstanding features is the 3D Color Space monitor. For first timers, this might not be the most useful, but as you become familiar with vectorscopes and waveform monitors, the 3D Color Space view gives you both these perspectives in one view. New users in Apple Color may find more useful video monitoring with the vectorscope, waveform monitor and histogram. Unfortunately, those of you used to using a FireWire port to monitor video externally will find Apple Color does not support this method of monitoring. We realize that going out to FireWire would reduce the color space and be less effective; however, having some form of output is better than nothing for most enthusiast editors.

Apple Color has plenty of room for new colorists to grow into and refine their skills. With eight levels of Secondary color, you could add a lot of fine-tuning to your image. Add the functionality of making your own masks and key framing, and the options seem limitless. We were relieved to see how easy the custom shape tool works, allowing the colorist to save and load custom shapes. Custom grades work in the same way, where the colorist can save settings from each leg of the process and apply them to other clips.

Upon completion of our project, we rendered our Apple Color adjustments in ProRes and exported the project back to Final Cut Pro.

The opportunity for mainstream enthusiasts to have powerful control over the color correction and timing is alluring and may lead some users into a big post-production time-eating trap. But, if your main concern is to make your productions look as good as possible, then it's obviously a worthwhile investment for you - as long as you take the time to understand the theory of what you are doing. With any professional tool, the ability for you to make a masterpiece is equal to the possibility of making a disgraceful mess. So, use discretion and bone up on your color theory first.

OS: Mac OS 10.439 or later
Processor: 1.25GHz or faster PowerPC G4, PowerPC G5, Intel Core Duo, or Intel Xeon processor
Graphics Card: Standard graphics card in any Mac Pro, 17-inch MacBook Pro, 24-inch iMac with Intel Core Duo, or 2.5GHz or faster Power Mac G5 Quad, ATI Mobility Radeon X1600, ATI Radeon X1600, NVIDIA GeForce 7800 GT/7600 GT/7300 GT/6600, Quadro FX 4500
Display: 1680x1050 pixels resolution or higher
Additional Hardware: 3-button mouse for full functionality
Memory: At least 1GB RAM, 2GB RAM recommended with compressed HD, 4GB recommended with uncompressed HD

• Auto adjust
• 3D color space view
• 8 levels of secondary color

• None

Apple Color is a terrific tool for the advanced editor and the control freak enthusiast. The rest of us might want to stick to our same-old techniques for achieving color correction and effects, to save ourselves from self-destruction.

Mark Montgomery is Videomaker's Technical Editor.

Apple Inc.
1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014
www.apple.com

$1,299 (part of Final Cut Studio 2)