Color Grade with Wheels

The color grading wheels in RapidRAW are inspired by film color-grading tools (DaVinci Resolve, Baselight). This recipe walks through a typical "teal & orange" cinema look, but the technique generalizes to any palette.

You'll touch the Color → Color Grading group (Adjustments panel, D).

1. Establish the photo first

Color grading is a finishing step, not a fix. Before opening the wheels:

Set Exposure so the midtones look right.
Use Highlights / Shadows if you need recovery.
Set White Balance so the photo isn't fighting you with an obvious cast.

If the underlying photo is wrong, no grade will save it.

2. Open the wheels

Scroll to Color Grading in the Color panel. The 3-Way tab is selected by default, three wheels: Shadows, Midtones, Highlights.

3. Push shadows toward teal

Click and drag inside the Shadows wheel. For teal, drag toward the lower-left (around 200°). The wheel marker should land in a cool-blue position, but not at the very edge.

Push the Saturation moderately (the distance from the center). 30–50% of the way out is a good starting point.

You'll see the dark areas of your photo take on a subtle teal cast.

4. Push highlights toward orange

In the Highlights wheel, drag toward the upper-right (around 30°). Match the saturation level you used in the shadows.

Bright areas, skin, sun-lit surfaces, pick up a warm orange cast.

5. Leave midtones alone (mostly)

The midtones wheel is the most dangerous one. A small push (e.g. 10% saturation) can be tasteful; a strong push usually muddies the photo because midtones cover the largest tonal range.

For "teal & orange," leave midtones near neutral or push very slightly toward orange.

6. Tune Blending and Balance

These two sliders control how the three zones interact:

Blending (default 50): higher values blur the boundaries between shadow/midtone/highlight, giving a smoother result. Lower values give harder zones, good for stylized looks.
Balance (default 0): negative shifts emphasis toward shadows; positive shifts toward highlights. Use this when one zone is dominating the image (e.g. a mostly-dark photo where the highlight grade isn't showing).

For a clean cinematic look, try Blending 60–70, Balance 0.

7. Adjust Luminance per zone (optional)

Each wheel has a Luminance slider next to it. This is a per-zone exposure control:

Shadows Luminance −10 to −20, deepens the shadow area.
Highlights Luminance +5 to +10, brightens the highlight area.

This isn't traditional color grading, it's tonal, but it pairs naturally with the color shifts you just made.

8. Compare to the original

Press B to toggle before/after. Walk through whether the grade is reading the way you want.

9. (Optional) Save as a preset

Once you're happy, save the grade as a Style preset (see Presets). A preset captures only the tone & color, perfect for applying the same grade to a series of photos.

Other looks to try

Look	Shadows	Highlights	Midtones
Teal & Orange	Teal (~200°), sat 30–50%	Orange (~30°), sat 30–50%	Neutral or slight orange
Bleach Bypass	Slight cyan, sat 15%	Slight yellow-green, sat 15%	Neutral; lower global saturation
Warm Filmic	Brown (~30°), sat 20%	Warm yellow (~50°), sat 30%	Neutral
Cold Cinema	Strong blue (~210°), sat 50%	Slight cyan (~190°), sat 20%	Neutral
Vintage Magenta	Magenta (~330°), sat 30%	Yellow (~60°), sat 20%	Slight magenta

These are starting points; tune to your photo.

When to switch to Global

The Global tab applies a single wheel to the entire image. Use it when:

You want a uniform color cast (e.g. the whole photo subtly warm).
You're stacking on top of a 3-way grade and just want to push everything one direction.

You can use 3-Way + Global together, the Global grade applies after the 3-Way, multiplicatively.