Free · runs in your browser
Bring back the reds and yellows the water took away. Start from a reef-tuned look, set the white balance on sand or a slate, and compare with the original as you go.
For underwater video color correction, open your dive or snorkel clip above: this page applies Reef Red Restore, a look built to push back against the blue-green cast and return warmth to coral, fish and skin. For a more precise fix, open Pro tools (P), choose Pick white (W) and click on pale sand, a white slate or a light-coloured fin; Temperature and Tint are set so that spot turns neutral.
Water filters colour out of light as it travels, red first, so the deeper and further away the subject, the less red the camera recorded. Correction can rebalance what is there and strengthen the faint red that remains, but it can’t create colour that never reached the lens, which is why deep footage shot by daylight alone only comes back so far. The white balance page explains colour casts in general, and colour correction covers the rest of the picture.
Choose Select video. Reef Red Restore is applied on this page; drag Intensity to decide how much of it you want.
Open Pro tools (P) on the Basic tab, choose Pick white (W) and click on sand, a slate, a tank or a pale fin. Try a few spots and keep the one that looks most natural.
On the HSL tab, lower the Saturation of Aqua or Blue a little to calm the water, and lift Red or Orange for coral and skin. Auto colour (A) is another good starting point if the look feels too strong.
Turn on Before and after (B). In the Parade, a neutral area should show red, green and blue at similar heights; if red still sits far below, add warmth with Temperature.
Select Export video, then Download video. Use Copy grade first if other clips from the same dive need the same treatment.
Water absorbs long wavelengths much more strongly than short ones. In clear ocean water, red light is largely gone within the first five metres or so, orange fades by around ten, and yellow by around twenty, leaving the blues and greens that give dive footage its familiar cast. These are rough figures that vary with water clarity, sun angle and time of day, but the order never changes: red always goes first.
What matters is the total path the light travels, not only your depth. Sunlight goes down to the subject and then across to the camera, so a fish two metres from the lens at eight metres deep has lost more red than one right in front of you at the same depth. In lakes and temperate seas, plankton and dissolved matter tint the water green rather than blue, which is why Tint matters as much as Temperature there.
A red filter (for blue water) or a magenta one (for green water) puts warmth back before the light hits the sensor. That gives the camera a more balanced signal to record, so the red channel is less noisy than one boosted afterwards. Filters are generally used with natural light at moderate depths, they cost some light, and they should come off when you use video lights, which would otherwise turn close subjects red.
Correcting afterwards works with whatever was recorded, and it is the only option for footage you already have. The best results usually come from both: a filter at the time, then a light touch here with Pick white and Intensity to finish. If your camera records in a log profile, convert it first. GoPro Log isn’t in the Footage menu, so import GoPro’s official LUT with Import LUT on the LUT tab and set Apply LUT to Before the grade; the LUT page explains how.
Water absorbs red light within a few metres, then orange and yellow further down, leaving mostly blue and green. Green water also carries plankton and sediment, which tint it further. The camera records what reaches it, so the cast is in the file.
Open the MP4 on this page, let Reef Red Restore do the first pass, then use Pick white on sand or a slate. If you filmed in GoPro’s log profile, import GoPro’s own LUT with Import LUT, set Apply LUT to Before the grade, and correct after that.
Both work best together. A filter puts real red light into the recording, which gives cleaner colour than boosting it later. Correction afterwards fine-tunes the balance and is the only choice for clips you have already shot. Remove the filter when using video lights.
Down to the depths most recreational divers film, yes. Below roughly 15 to 20 metres with daylight only, so little red is recorded that restoring it adds visible noise. Video lights are the real answer there; correction then only needs to balance what they lit.
The red channel was very weak, and strengthening it strengthens its noise and compression blocks too. Lower Intensity or move Temperature back a little; a slightly cooler result usually looks better than a grainy, fully warmed one.
Yes. Grade one, choose Copy grade, open the next clip and choose Paste grade. Because colour loss changes with depth and distance, redo Pick white on any clip filmed at a noticeably different depth.
No. Correction and export happen in your browser on your own device, which also means there is no file size upload to wait for.