OW Essentials No.07 – Printlite 3513 LUT

The character of 3513DI, rebuilt for commercial grading

PrintLite 3513 began inside a real commercial grade that called for the recognisable look and feel associated with Fujifilm 3513DI D55. The standard film-print LUT supplied with DaVinci Resolve brought the image into the right general colour world, but its transformation was not clean or flexible enough for the finish the project required.

Traditional film-print LUTs can introduce a strong tonal curve, colour shifts and other characteristics that form part of their identity. In commercial work, those same characteristics can become restrictive. Skin, products, brand colours and neutral surfaces often require precise control, leaving the colorist to correct or work against qualities introduced by the LUT itself.

Instead of first imposing those limitations and then grading them back out, PrintLite 3513 rebuilds the most useful parts of the look in a cleaner form. It retains print-inspired colour cohesion, controlled saturation and satisfying tonal density while preserving more freedom for balancing, matching and creative adjustment.

The result is recognisably filmic and finished, but clean enough for commercials, branded content, narrative work and other projects where the grade still needs to remain controlled.

What you will notice

• Film-print-inspired colour cohesion without an overpowering global cast.
• Controlled saturation that creates colour density rather than a broad digital boost.
• Gently weighted midtones and controlled blacks without unnecessarily crushing the image.
• Warm, cohesive skin rendering without a strong orange bias.
• Cleaner neutral separation across whites, greys and production-design surfaces.
• Softer, less brittle highlight transitions.
• A finished filmic character that still leaves room for normal grading decisions.
• Greater flexibility across products, skin, interiors and mixed real-world colour.

How it was designed

PrintLite 3513 was developed during a commercial project that required the familiar visual character of Fujifilm 3513DI D55, but demanded a cleaner and more controllable result than the standard DaVinci Resolve film-print LUT provided.

Rather than modifying or redistributing the original LUT, the look was rebuilt independently by identifying the qualities that made the reference useful: its colour organisation, compact saturation, tonal density, highlight behaviour and overall sense of cohesion. These qualities were then translated into a cleaner creative transform without retaining corrections that would immediately need to be counteracted during a commercial grade.

This approach avoids a workflow in which the image is first pushed too far by a conventional print transform and then corrected back towards the desired result. PrintLite 3513 starts closer to that intended endpoint, providing film-print character while keeping the underlying grade more adaptable.

Each camera- and log-specific version is designed for direct use with its stated input profile. PrintLite 3513 is an independently developed Offwhitecolor look and does not contain or redistribute the original Fujifilm or DaVinci Resolve LUT.

Best suited for

• Commercials and branded content requiring film character with precise colour control.
• Narrative, documentary and lifestyle footage.
• Product imagery in which brand colours and neutral surfaces need to remain manageable.
• Portraits and close-ups that benefit from cohesive, controlled skin rendering.
• Daylight and interior footage requiring greater tonal density without a heavy vintage finish.
• Projects that need a consistent print-inspired foundation across varied scenes.
• Colorists who enjoy the character of 3513DI D55 but regularly find themselves grading against a conventional film-print LUT.
• Creators who want a finished filmic result without building a separate Cineon print workflow.