I am so disappointed with Sony; they created that great software - Vegas but they can not convey the message to the "professional" public to convince them that not all that glitters is Apple. I know it is hard to fight that "Apple mania" but having such a great product they should do more in terms of creative marketing. [not all professional editing is Apple FCP and Apple is not easiest and fastest software to work with].
They (Sony) can't even "convince" Red Giant Magic Bullets to produce 64bit version for Vegas. Just imagine how powerful platform would it be with set of MB filters on 64bit PC.
WHY is that!? Are these guys from Red Giant not interested in Vegas or something else is preventing them in working with/for Sony software. Hey Sony - what have you done so far in that matter.?????

If you're going to be mad at anybody, you really have two choices:

1) Reg Giant - for dropping support (and really never supporting well) of Vegas. Plus with the new OpenFX api, it should be even easier for them to support. Plus it was so slow it caused many people to not want to use it.

2) Your fellow Vegas users. Apparently not enough of them chose to buy MBL meaning Red Giant wasn't making any money off of it. No reason to not drop support if you're not getting any sales.

I just don't see how Sony can be blamed for a third-party dropping support.

Edward,
That's EXACTLY why I blame Sony;
having such a great third party plug-in (MB) and not being active enough to make it as :affordable option" for Vegas is what makes me disappointed.
they could:
1. spend some money to advertise it (yes to advertise third party plug-in which takes their software to different level); although it sound strange in the end it would benefit their software - Vegas
2. subsidize the MB plug-in (negotiate some good pricing/discounts) with Red Giant and sell it at discount through Sony web site as add on plug-in for those more serious users
3. negotiate with red Giant to offer free 30 trial with purchase of Vegas
4. if RG was not interested in all above - move their a... and develop Sony's own set of filters - it is not rocket science for Vegas developers.

but see all above requires to spend some cash [read invest in their product] as well as some pro-active attitude - so far it looks like they just don't care that much.

am amazed at the amount of 'dependence' put upon a plugin!

i used mbl a couple of times - it was way too slow, and, more importantly, i could recognise it's 'looks' in numerous productions.

if you want something similar look at genarts sapphire edge - or better yet. roll your own in vegas itself.

as for expecting ANY company to invest r&d, time, and money in some else's product.....

I've tried a lot of plugins and have never found one that matches the look I get with MBL. They have white diffusion glow controls that add a really nice subtle touch. Just tried the Saphire and it's not the same. Plus MBL has many really nice additional tools.

Marc

I keep wondering why you want a long rendering projects when you can do instantaneous looks with Cineform and Firstlight.

I use firstlight but it is not the same as MBL.

Marc I completely agree with you on this and it's my mission to get MBL back to Vegas, anyone that says MBL is a waste of time clearly has no idea how to use the plug-in to begin with! Even with the long render times it's worth what you get out. If anyone can point out any another plug-in that does spot/gradient exposure adjustments, subtle vignette, proper diffusion and various other high quality effects as well as MBL please do. Vegas is crippled without MBL and it annoys me beyond words that Red Giant has no support for Vegas and they just don't care. Chris I also use First Light - it's no MBLooks. It's not about using presets, I custom grade with gradient exposure on almost every clip in my timeline.

Amen,
Nicholas, my point was that Sony seems not to be interested in (or is underestimating) MBL; it looks like they just don't care and that's a BIG mistake because they could easily compete with FCP adding more and more plugins, functions etc. It looks like thay are "To Big To Care"

Well.. see... Sony DID work out a deal with Red Giant. And a smaller version of Magic Bullets was bundled with the pro version of Vegas several versions back. Now people have the limited version - why are they going to buy the full version? And then was it's SLOW render time making the people who had it NOT want to use it. So who's fault is it???

Edward,
which MBL limited version plugins in Vegas 10 are you referring to?

Edward video is one of the biggest markets at the moment it's literally exploded overnight and cameras are better and cheaper, I think it's pointless for Sony & Red Giant to say sales aren’t good enough to validate development costs, the market is completely different now compared to 3-4 years back. I hate having to use Premiere to get access to MBLooks. Vegas is a shell that needs to be populated by plug-ins and extensions, even Excalibur makes Vegas 10x more powerful that other editing systems. What gets to me is that FCPX is cheaper than Vegas and they will get supported. I'm trying really hard to switch to another platform like Premiere for its plug-in support but once you are use to how easy Vegas makes editing it's really hard to settle for anything else. I have money please give me MBLooks Red Giant! I'm heartbroken.

The bundled version in Vegas 8 was nice, and MB is a great plug in, but it is not efficient for event users. It does take forever to process.

This topic has been brought up over and over, and has been beaten to death by folks disappointed about it. We're sorry for your loss guys, but it might be time to move on.

I loved the look I got from it too, but I got tired of the long rendering time and gave it up long ago.

The bundled version was very slow and did take forever to render. But the paid version of MB Editors with an nVidea card was a different animal not that bad for rendering. I still use it on some projects in 32bit and like the ability to adjust it directly in Vegas without having to go into another interface. The next version called MB Looks was buggy for me, added it's own internal interface which took away the ability to see immediate corrections on the monitor and never worked with 64bit.

I just tested the latest release of MBL in After Effects and all I can say is WOW! I'm buying it just for the adjustable exposure masks. Relighting a scene has never been easier and the rendering is very fast. The amount of tools available is really amazing for the $99 upgrade cost. And the've added monitor output support as well.

I too long for the day when MBL will return to Vegas. I think if it worked like it does in AE people many Vegas users would buy the plugin because there is nothing else like it.

Marc

Funny thing is they've got an Advanced Red Giant plug-in package bundled with Avid Studio and that includes MBL......... for a total cost of, including Avid Studio........... $169.99.


Mind you that the latest computers should be better in handling MBL's processing .

I'd really like to see a comparison/competition on a clip a MB user corrects versus same look and attempt by those working in Vegas and/or Cineforms Lightworks. Anyone game for a test which would include explanation of what was done ?

I would say MB user does the look they way it is wanted, then non-user attempts to match.

Great idea Chris I've actually been thinking we need some examples to showcase what can be done. Grading is somewhat of a personal taste/art so it won't be an entirely scientific test however a good write up about each grade to motivate what & why something is done will help, accompanied by an ungraded & graded full hd jpeg. I'll try to pull out a few older projects when I get some free time and post them here.

Ok, upload a still twice,
One with a MB look of your choice, and the same pic in its virgin state.
Ill have a crack with First Light to match.
Bear in mind that Vignette or Tilt shift etc will require some other tools from Vegas as well.
Can it be done?
Dont know. Always fun to have a go though.
:)

Good, I would like to try it too. I think this is a challenge about whether MB is a unique thing, or can the same thing be accomplished with other tools available in Vegas.

Interestingly, there is a Webinar just noticed for the 28th of July from Vegas re color correction. Probably not right on point here to the goals of making something look like an MB look, but could have some bearing.

Doing a comparison of different methods to achieve the same look would be VERY interesting.

But, seriously... everyone who want MBL supported on Vegas (both 32 & 64 bit) need to contact Red Giant and tell them! If there's enough market there, they might reconsider. Also remind them the new OpenFX api should make the process easier and works in Vegas Pro 10 and the new Vegas Movie Studio 11!

further to this topic,
‪Apple Color Vs. Magic Bullet Film Looks - Film Look Experiment‬‏ - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0jBY9cWosQ&feature=related)
I think I prefer the Color ones more,
but,
I dont think there is a "look" here I wouldnt be happy to say "I did this".

Bring on the testing :)

and if you really want to be humbled,
‪Anatomy of a Grade - Ep 03 - Underexposure Correction with RED RAW‬‏ - YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdT2iW50bG4)

The more I learn, the more I realize how much I want to know.

MB Looks is a great tool, it is overused in most cases, but I'd love to have it, it's just too bad that guys from Red Giant decided to drop Vegas support, I guess there is a lot of politics involved,

Okay, since no one has posted anything yet, does someone want to try to grade the image below using Magic Bullet, so that others can try to match it with Vegas stuff.

Heres a few,
make requests if you want.
Tried to do some subtle ones, if you want the extreme ones done let me know.

I made an attempt on PPro this week, and it just kills me on how simple stuff done in Vegas is THAT difficult in PPRO! If not for the loads of plugins available to PPRO I would not even want to go near!

I used to depend on MB Looks but it was so slow that i was forced to learn how to grade manually. Fortunately for me i managed to master sufficient skills for my requirements. I can now work on 64bit as well.

Its a pity Red Giant decided to dump Vegas but I'm glad to see folks like Twixtor coming to Vegas now. Its a great move that Vegas is now offering ofx. Hang in there, the glorious days may come very soon!

I did all five of these with close matches using Vegas to grab frames. I actually just took the photo and rendered to a 5 second Cineform .avi. I then took the clip in Cineforms First Light. I looked searched through the various preset .luts and was able to come up with a very close match on all of these. I woulld select the .lut. go to Vegas grab a frame, select another .lut, and grab, etc. Took all of about 15 minutes.

The still above is a good shot to begin with but has anyone seen the latest features of Magic Bullet Looks? It goes far beyond color grading. You can actually relight a scene with spot and grad exposures very easily. While you could do something similar in Vegas it would take multiple masks on many duplicate clips to accomplish what you can do very easily in MBL. There are many other specialty tools in MBL as well. It's like a video repair / custom look toolbox. Works in AE very well and very fast even in 32bit float. Hope to see it return to Vegas some day because nothing compares in my opinion. Also has eternal monitor out now and works great with Intensity.

You can view some demo videos here: Red Giant - RGTV - Getting Started Videos (http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/videos/getting-started/magic-bullet-looks/) (The what's new video shows some pretty cool new tools)

Marc

I too would like to see Sony add something like MBL in their FX choices.

Since Red Giant won't offer support Sony CS should add the presets. I bet rendering would be much faster if it was a Vegas FX vs MBL.

I got my MBL Quick Looks for $50 to use with Vegas 10 and I don't have any complaints. I know a 5 minute video will take almost 2 hours to render but that's the price you have to pay.

With all thats available in Vegas, you can make your on Filmic presets. Eugenia did this here:

Eugenia's Rants and Thoughts Blog Archive Sony Vegas color grading presets (http://eugenia.queru.com/2008/10/03/sony-vegas-color-grading-presets/)

So I know this thread is old but thought I would share the good news!!! Today Vegas 11 was announced with full GPU acceleration and with that Red Giant will be supporting Vegas again very soon!!! Just spoke with them and confirmed this as Sony even makes note of Red Giant plug in support in the Vegas 11 anouncement... this may lead to many more Red Giant plug ins working with Vegas now as well. Anyways good news so far.....now lets hope Vegas 11 is ready for launch next month.

Thanks for the update Jason, this is amazing news!

Really happy to see Red Giant supporting Vegas once again. MB Looks is a great program and I love the new external monitor support. Hopefully Vegas users will grow now that the 64 bit issue is solved. Like any business they need enough user support to make it worthwhile.

I'd go with something like this (Original on Left, Vegas corrected on Right):