LUTs and Lightroom presets

A LUT is a table that maps each colour to a new colour. Chobial treats a LUT as one stage of a film. The camera shoots RAW by default, and the film, LUT included, is how that RAW is developed. So you see the LUT live in the viewfinder, and you can still change it later.

Import a .cube and build a film on it

1. Save the .cube file to the Files app.
2. Open Films. Tap Controls › Film › Manage Films, or go to Settings.
3. Tap + › Import Film, LUT or Preset… and pick the file. Chobial makes a new film built on the LUT.
4. Open the film. In the LUT section, set Strength from 0 to 100%. Many creative LUTs are too strong at 100%, and 60–80% often looks best.
5. Add the rest of the film on top. Adjust Tone (contrast, highlights, highlight rolloff, fade, curves) and Color (saturation, the 8-band colour mixer, split toning). Add grain, halation or a vignette under Effects.
6. Tap the checkmark to save.

Chobial imports only 3D .cube LUTs. It doesn't take .3dl, .png HALD images or 1D LUTs.

Import a Lightroom preset as a film

A Lightroom preset is a saved set of Lightroom's sliders. Chobial reads presets as .xmp, .lrtemplate or .dng files.

1. Get the preset file. In Lightroom mobile, open a photo with the preset on it and use Share › Export as › Preset.
2. In Films, tap + › Import Film, LUT or Preset… and pick the file. You can pick several presets at once. You can also open a preset file from Files, Mail or Messages, and it comes into Chobial.
3. Each preset becomes a film of your own. Open it to change it, like any film you made.

A film has no place for some of what a preset can set. When a preset has any of these, Chobial names them when it imports it. Those parts are left out:

• Colour: the profile, white balance in Kelvin, calibration, the black & white mix, point color, and midtone and global color grading.
• Detail: texture, dehaze, sharpening and noise reduction.
• Parts and shape of the photo: masks, removed spots, lens blur, transform and the crop.
• Old presets: settings from Lightroom's 2010 process.

Shoot through the film

1. Load the film on the camera. The viewfinder shows it live.
2. To see the picture without the film, go to Controls › Film and touch and hold the film's name.
3. Shoot.
4. Later, open any photo, choose the Film tool, and change Strength or pick another film. The photo develops again from the RAW.

The RAW vs HEIF post explains why that matters, and it has the measured file sizes.

Which LUTs work on photos

A LUT expects its input in one certain form. When the input comes in another form, the result is wrong. There are two main kinds:

• Creative LUTs expect a normal, finished picture, like Rec.709 video or an sRGB photo. They add warmer highlights, teal shadows or a filmic curve. These work on photos.
• Log conversion LUTs expect flat, grey log footage, such as Apple Log, Sony S-Log3 or Fujifilm F-Log. Their job is to add back a lot of contrast and colour.

A photo already has contrast and colour, so a log LUT adds them a second time. A name like "Apple Log to Rec.709" or "SLog3 to 709" means a conversion LUT. If a LUT looks heavy and crushed at 20% strength, it's almost certainly a log LUT. Fujifilm's official film simulation LUTs are log LUTs too, made for F-Log footage.

Recipe: Soft Print

This recipe calms down a strong teal-orange creative LUT for stills. Import the LUT, open the new film, and start from these settings.

Share a LUT film

A film built on an imported LUT is too big for a QR film code. Use ••• › Share Film instead, and send it As a File through Messages, Mail or AirDrop. The LUT travels inside the .chobial file, so the other person doesn't need the .cube. If the LUT is someone else's paid product, check its licence before you share it.

Export a film as a .cube

1. Open Films and tap + › New Film. Choose a film under Start From. You can't export a built-in film directly, but a new film started from one has the same look.
2. Build the look in Tone and Color. Those are the two stages that go into the LUT.
3. Tap the checkmark at the top right to save.
4. In Films, tap ••• on the film and choose Export Color LUT (.cube).
5. Send the file to your Mac with AirDrop, or save it to Files.

The export is a 33-point cube of the film's colour stage. It holds tone, curves, the colour mixer, split toning, the channel mixer and any LUT you imported into the film. Grain, halation, bloom and vignette stay behind, because they depend on nearby pixels or where a pixel sits. Add them in your editor. The digital grain post explains what good grain needs.

Use the .cube in DaVinci Resolve

1. Go to Project Settings › Color Management › Lookup Tables › Open LUT Folder. Copy the .cube in, then click Update Lists.
2. On the Color page, add a serial node after your correction nodes.
3. Right-click the node and choose LUTs, then your LUT.
4. If the look is too strong, turn it down with the node's Key Output Gain.

For log footage, add a node before this one with a Color Space Transform or the camera maker's conversion LUT. Chobial works in Display P3, so strong colours can shift a little on a Rec.709 timeline. Check the look on a real clip.

Export a film as a Lightroom preset

A film made of sliders can also go to Lightroom as a preset. In Films, tap ••• on the film and choose Export Lightroom Preset (.xmp). In Lightroom, bring the .xmp in with File › Import Profiles & Presets.

Lightroom has no place for some parts of a Chobial film. Those are halation, bloom, tone color, the channel mixer, the black & white filter and the base tone boost. If your film uses any of them, Chobial names what stays behind. On iPhone and iPad, it asks before it shares, and Share Preset sends the preset anyway. On Android, it tells you after. The .cube takes the whole colour look, so use it when those parts matter.

Films built on one of Chobial's films, or on a LUT, don't have this menu item. Their look isn't a set of sliders, so a preset would lose it. Export them as a .cube instead.

Use the .cube in Lightroom

Lightroom doesn't load .cube files directly. You put the LUT inside a profile with Camera Raw first.

1. Open any photo in Camera Raw, from Photoshop or Bridge.
2. Open the Presets panel. Hold Option (Alt on Windows) and click the Create Preset icon. The dialog opens as Create Profile.
3. Under Color Lookup Table, open the Table menu, choose Load ".cube" File and pick your LUT.
4. Name the profile, choose a group, and click OK.
5. In Lightroom (the cloud-based app), bring the .xmp in with File › Import Profiles & Presets. It then syncs to Lightroom on your phone.

Free or Pro

Shooting, developing and making films are free, LUT and preset films included. Photos in a film built on your own LUT or preset also save for free. The one exception is a LUT that copies one of Chobial's Pro films, and the app checks for that. Exporting a film as a .cube LUT or a Lightroom preset needs Pro. For other film looks, see the films.