Why does my footage look better in Final Cut Pro's viewer than outside??
 

So my project in final cut pro looks a lot better color-wise when played in the viewer than it looks played in a .mov file played through quicktime.

Are there any secret export settings or gamma corrections that I should know of to make my footage look OUTSIDE of FCP the same way it looks INSIDE?

Kyle,

The link Shaun has given you is now only about half the correct information, since that post I made was pre-Snow Leopard and there are not-so-obvious changes that have taken place since.

Assuming you're on a Snow Leopard machine: Quicktime "X" does not have this "compatibility" option with FCP as it is the "consumer" version of Quicktime, designed only for playback and extremely limited cut/edit/export options. The compatibility mode is still only found in the "other" version, Quicktime 7, which is an optional install in the SL install routine. If you want to see this compatibility mode then you need to use QT 7 as your de-facto movie player.

BUT - this compatibility mode is only specific to what your content will look like on a DVD or going out to broadcast. If your final movie is going to the web or for mobile devices then you need to "uncheck" this compatibility mode in QT 7, because then you'll see exactly what others will see when they look at your final sequence on their computer/mobile phone screens.

Trust me, there's nothing wrong with your workflow or settings in FCP that's causing this behavior; it's a long-standing bug that has huge implications even on PC's but for some reason Apple has chosen to ignore this issue. I would not expect it to be fixed even in the next iteration of FCS.

Unfortunately - and for no good reason that *anyone* in the pro video community can suss out - Apple has created a very confusing and totally unnecessary duality with Quicktime versions. Just know that for Snow Leopard QT 7 is your friend, QT "X" is useless to you as an editor.

Thanks Robert. I linked from memory (and a quick DVi Google search) and didn't realize the QT X debacle wasn't covered.