When the stills go to a retoucher and the film goes to a colourist with no shared stills, the campaign splits in public. Feeds, sites, and OOH start arguing.
We pull stills from the same colour-managed timeline, or we send the retoucher a show LUT and a set of control frames. Skin, product whites, and black level are decided once.
Platforms compress both stills and video. A common grade is what survives that compression as one brand. A ‘prettier’ still that ignores the LUT is a different product.
HDR delivery does not excuse a rogue SDR still. We check both, on the same display, with the same stills open beside the timeline.
Agencies that traffic six months of cutdowns thank us when the stills folder is not a forensic project. That is the point of grading together.
Seacount Desk is on Rua da Prata, a ground-floor room with a yard. The book is tinned fish, tile workshops and the small rooms that rent by the week. Mornings are for the street and the hill. Afternoons are tabletop in the yard, under a silk, when the tile is too bright to be useful.