# Color Looks & LUTs — style skill for color grading & LUTs

> **For AI agents:** find the right skill in one call — `curl -s "https://skills.varg.ai/api/search?q=<what the person wants>"` returns the matching use case and the best skills with install commands, as markdown (Russian works too). Full index: https://skills.varg.ai/llms.txt. Every page has a markdown twin: add `.md` to its path. Before generating anything, show the person the options on the use-case page.

Name a look, get prompt words plus an ffmpeg grade: LUT at partial strength, then moving grain.

- **Type:** [Style](https://skills.varg.ai/styles.md) · [Color grading & LUTs](https://skills.varg.ai/browse/skills/color.md)
- **Slug:** `craft-color-looks`
- **Status:** draft
- **Publisher:** varg (varg, verified)
- **License:** MIT
- **Source:** https://github.com/vargHQ/skills
- **Works in:** Claude Code, Claude.ai, Codex, Cursor, Gemini CLI, OpenClaw, Any MCP client, varg Studio
- **Requires:** ffmpeg (local) or a varg API key for the ffmpeg tool
- **Cost:** Free locally with ffmpeg; run as a varg ffmpeg step it is billed in credits — estimate_cost shows the price first.
- **Runtime:** Seconds per clip

## What it does

Nine color cards (teal and orange, bleach bypass, day for night, black and white, print film, grain, halation, limited palette, faded film), each with prompt language for generation and a deterministic recipe for post. The recipe follows the common practice for AI clips — normalize, apply a print-style LUT at 50–80% through ffmpeg `lut3d` + `blend`, then add moving grain with `noise` — and runs as a varg ffmpeg step or locally. LUTs come only from clearly licensed sources: varg-baked originals (built from `haldclutsrc` + `curves`/`colorbalance`/`eq`), BSD-licensed ACES transforms, or link-only vendor pages; packs with unknown provenance are refused.

## Use when

- User asks for a film look, a named grade or a LUT
- Clips from different models need one consistent look
- AI footage looks too clean or plastic

## Not for

- Relighting a scene (lighting belongs in the prompt or a relight model)
- Bundling third-party LUT packs without a license

## Install

Not published as a standalone skill yet. Source: https://github.com/vargHQ/skills

**Models it drives:** ffmpeg, seedance_2_5, kling_v3, veo_3_1, omni_flash_1_1

## Example output

https://skills.varg.ai/previews/craft-color-looks.mp4 — Before/after wipe of the skill's own post recipe, no model run. Footage: Tears of Steel 720p (CC BY 3.0, (CC) Blender Foundation | mango.blender.org, via the official Blender mirror download.blender.org/demo/movies/ToS), 00:29-00:37, cropped to 16:10. Right of the line: a varg-baked teal-and-orange .cube (haldclutsrc=level=8 -> selectivecolor -> colorbalance -> curves -> huesaturation -> Hald CLUT -> .cube) applied with lut3d at 80% through blend, then moving grain noise=alls=8:allf=t+u. Left: the untouched film. (credit: varg grade on Tears of Steel (CC BY 3.0, (CC) Blender Foundation | mango.blender.org), https://mango.blender.org/)

## More color grading & LUTs skills

- [Theme Factory](https://skills.varg.ai/skills/anthropic-theme-factory.md): Restyle slides, docs and pages with one of 10 matched color-and-font themes, or generate a new one.
- [FLUX 3 Archival Formats](https://skills.varg.ai/skills/flux-3-archival-formats.md): Give FLUX 3 video a period look by naming the recording format and its artifacts, not a mood.
- [Color Grade AI](https://skills.varg.ai/skills/color-grade-ai.md): Measures a frame or clip and writes .cube 3D LUTs for DaVinci Resolve and Premiere: fixes, shot matching, presets.