Color Wheels in DaVinci Resolve

Bome Products
1

Hellow Bome Community!

I'm curious how others have managed to control DaVinci Resolve's functions Color page.

I got Bome MIDI Translator Pro ("BMT Pro") to control DaVinci Resolve with Native Instrument Maschine Studio. I've read all 8 topics and threads in the forum that popped up under the search for "DaVinci Resolve." In addition, I've read the manual and watched the demo YouTube tutorials.

Controlling DaVinci Resolve via the hotkeys is simple enough. However, the Color page in DaVinci Resolve lacks many hotkeys to support color grading; for example, the Color Wheels section.

Here are some strategies I am exploring:

  1. To accommodate variable window dimensions, I first tried using the inject event. BMT Pro's "Windows: inject event" only draws a green rectangle around the whole screen, but isn't able to isolate individual buttons or input areas. The note clearly stated that the injected event doesn't work with all Windows programs. In additional to DaVinci Resolve, Notepad, Paint, and Visual Studio Code, all showed the green rectangle around the whole application window instead of the button I was trying to focus on. I couldn't find a program that allowed me to isolate a button. Perhaps I'm missing something.
  2. Failing option #1, I am going to test the option that may not be as reliable with window sizes changing and resizing of different areas in DaVinci Resolve.
    1. Create a translator using Incoming Control Change message to cause an Outgoing Mouse Left Button Down Click for the Set Mouse Position captured at where the dial under Lift color wheel is.
    2. Create two more translators to accept Incoming Control Change message from a twisty knob switch to cause an Outgoing Mouse Wheel to increase a positive value if the knob was turned right, or decrease if turned left.
    3. To move the middle dot in the Lift color wheel, I could set up additional translators to map a button and two more twisty knobs to move that middle dot to different quadrants of the Lift color wheel.
      1. The button would move the mouse pointer to the middle of that dot via a translator control change mouse button down.
      2. Each knob would be handled by their own translators to move the mouse pointer left/right or up/down depending on the turn of the knobs.
      3. Pressing the button in the previous #1 step would be handled by another translator to cause the mouse button up.

I would appreciate learning how you are handling the Color page.

2

Indeed some applications do not expose the many controls within their application. So for those, injected events are not very useful.

Yes, if you have a consistent screen location for your color wheel or any other control, it is possible to position the mouse, click, drag, and whatever with a MIDI knob or button. It is a bit of a trial and error but it has been known to work.

I personally do not use Davinci Resolve but I know other users here do so maybe they will chime in with some good examples. I think I did an example for someone using Capture One, so if you search on that, perhaps you can find the example and borrow ideas from it.

Steve Caldwell
Bome Q and A Moderator and
Independent Bome Consultant/Specialist
bome@sniz.biz

 

3

Thank you, Steve. I’ll do a search for Capture One and look at the demo.

4

Try this one:

https://www.bome.com/support/kb/encoder-to-mouse-positiondown-clickmove-l-rup-click

5

I’ll check that out. I appreciate the link.

6

Hi,

I just bought MT, and I was a little disappointed that I could not just roll into a program and change its dials with a MIDI knob to scrollwheel - even though natively, it supports free scrollwheels everywhere in it.

I tried all the injection variables I could, but nothing would move.

I was just about to give up (but keep it, since it beautifully replaces midi-ox), and something happened.

As I was focused in Firefox, I moved over to the application and without focusing on it, I moved my MIDI knob, and presto. My next thought was, do I need to focus on another window to do this? Turns out, I can click on the desktop to focus on it, and then I can go into my program without focusing and all the knobs work. It's probably a program language difference that lets this happen. This only worked because the program supports scrollwheel from the get-go - a different program was negative.

Perhaps in Resolve, you could click on the desktop, and then hover over some knobs and try that? I don't know if Resolve has scrollwheel capability built-in.

My 2 cents, maybe someone will find this useful from the search engines.

7

Hi Thomas,

Were you able to get something working regarding a MIDI controller to control color wheels on Davinci Resolve?

Steve Caldwell
Bome Q and A Moderator and
Independent Bome Consultant/Specialist
bome@sniz.biz

8

Hi Steve, thank you for checking in! You rock in providing support! What is working so far is the assigned knobs can turn the corresponding color wheel to a certain extend. Then I ran into the issue of when the knob would reach 0 or 127 for the MIDI CC value, it wouldn’t adjust anymore. I posted about that issue here:
https://www.bome.com/support/kb/mouse-wheel-scroll-and-midi-cc-value-0-and-127
You helped with providing two potential solutions I’m currently looking into. I’ll update.

9

Awesome. I actually had alterier motives. Another user interested in Davinci Resolve with X-touch MINI. Found your thread so it would help and saw that it hadn’t been completed yet. Would probably help if you posted your solution when you are done.

Thanks!

Steve Caldwell
Bome Q and A Moderator and
Independent Bome Consultant/Specialist
bome@sniz.biz

10

I know this is an old thread, but I am stumped on getting my encoders to even control anything on the color page, how were you able to map to those parameters?

11

Hi and welcome to the Bome community!

Try downloading this project file for a start and see where that gets you.

It would be helpful if you view the MIDI log so we can see the incoming MIDI message of the controller you are turning.

You may also want to check out this post.

Steve Caldwell
Bome Customer Care

Also available for paid consulting services: bome@sniz.biz
12

Hi,

I just did some playing around with Davinci Resolve and color wheels on my MIDI Fighter Twister. Using the new ‘Application Focus’ and ‘Perform’ capabilities, I’m having more success in manipulating color wheels and the scroll wheels under them.

Hi have my push set a follows

Pushall momentary
Top Row 0x30 0x31 0x32 0x33
2nd Row 0x34 0x35 0x36 0x37
3rd Row 0x38 0x39 0x3A 0x3B
4th Row 0x3C 0x3D 0x3D 0x3F

My top row selects color wheels
My second row selects scroll wheels under color wheels
My third row does nothing
Forth Row
First push = Select Edit Page
2nd Push = Select Color Page
3rd Push = Toggle Click (Push one for click down and again for click up)

Encoders
Top Left - Mouse Up/Down - B0 30 qq
Top Second - Mouse Left/Right - B0 31 qq
Top 3rd - Scroll Wheel - B0 32 qq

I use relative encoders for above where qq=0x3f for left turn and 0x41 for right turn.

So if I select the color page and push the top left encoder it jumps to my Lift color wheel (but doesn’t click down).

I can then click down with bottom row 3rd encoder push. At which point I can move encoders 1 and 2 to adjust. Push bottom 3rd encoder again and it sends a click up. A click up occurs automatically if you select a different color wheel or scroll wheel.

You may need to adjust the coordinates based on your screen resolution. I have my screen set for 1920x1080 and have Resolve a full screen. Coordinates are controlled in the rules of translators 1.3 and 1.4.

I’m running Resolve on my secondary display monitor.
I’m on Windows 10 so if you run it on Mac, you will need to change the application focus translators to match the Mac executables and will certainly need to re-assign screen coordinates for the color and scroll wheels.

I stopped short of a full solution but for anyone trying to do this, it might help. The same strategy may also help with Premiere Pro but I haven’t messed with that lately.

This project really shows the power of the new ‘Resolve’ capabilities of MT Pro 1.9.1 (which is required).

I find Resolve is very handy in separating different controllers from performing similar defined functions. For instance, you could create a different controller definitions to call the same Perform Actions thereby leveraging your work you put into the perform translators for multiple controller types.

Resolve-MFT.bmtp (6.0 KB)

Steve Caldwell
Bome Customer Care

Also available for paid consulting services: bome@sniz.biz