Canon's log is three formats with similar names, and picking the wrong conversion is the commonest reason footage comes out looking worse after the LUT than it did before.
Which one did you shoot?
| Profile | Bodies, broadly | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| C-Log | Older Cinema EOS, some DSLRs | The original, least range |
| C-Log2 | Higher-end Cinema EOS | Most range, flattest |
| C-Log3 | R5, R6, C70 and most recent | The practical default |
C-Log3 is what most people reading this shot, because it is the one on the recent mirrorless bodies. It was designed as a middle ground — more range than the original, easier to grade than C-Log2.
Check in the camera menu rather than guessing. The three look similar on the card and convert differently.
Why it looks wrong off the card
The same reason every log format does: it is not a look, it is a container. Log stores a wide brightness range in a flat, low-contrast, desaturated image so that highlight and shadow detail survive to the grade.
Viewed directly it is washed out and slightly green. That is the format working, not a fault — what is a LUT covers why a conversion is needed to get back to something viewable.
The right conversion
Canon publishes official conversion LUTs for each profile on their support site, and they are the correct starting point. Use the one that matches:
- Your profile — C-Log, C-Log2 or C-Log3, as above.
- Your colour gamut — usually Cinema Gamut or BT.2020 on these bodies.
- Your target — Rec.709 for anything that is not going to an HDR deliverable.
A conversion LUT and a creative LUT are different files doing different jobs. Convert first, add a look second. Stacking a creative LUT straight onto log gives the muddy, oddly-contrasted result people usually blame on the camera.
One clip
In any editor: apply the conversion LUT, then adjust exposure. That order — not the reverse — because the conversion expects log input and adjusting first moves it away from what the LUT is built for.
The tool-specific versions are the same idea: Premiere, DaVinci Resolve, Final Cut Pro.
A whole card
Here is where it stops being a five-minute job. Forty clips means forty times: import, apply, check, adjust, move on. The conversion itself is identical every time — it is the same transform for the same camera — so the repetition buys nothing.
Editors handle this with adjustment layers, which works when every clip was exposed the same way and needs unpicking when they were not. Which is most shoots: the light changed, you rode the exposure, and three clips need less than the rest.
How BatchTone handles it
Drop the folder in, pick the C-Log version, and every clip takes the conversion. A frame is pulled from each and previewed with it applied, so the judgement happens on your own footage rather than on faith.
- The clips that need less get a strength slider; the rest stay where they are.
- Audio is copied across untouched rather than re-encoded.
- Encoding uses the Mac's own hardware encoder, so a card is not an overnight job.
- Originals are never written to.
- 10-bit HEVC from the R5 and R6 is read directly.
The same shape of problem on other cameras, the same tool: S-Log3 to Rec.709 for Sony and D-Log to Rec.709 for DJI. There is a seven-day trial, which is the honest way to check it reads what your body writes.
Common questions
Which C-Log does my camera shoot? Check the menu. R5, R6 and C70 are C-Log3; higher-end Cinema EOS bodies offer C-Log2; older bodies are C-Log. The names are close and the conversions are not interchangeable.
Where do I get the official Canon LUTs? Canon's own support site publishes them per profile and gamut, free. They are the correct starting point before any creative LUT.
Why does my Canon log footage look green? That is normal for log before conversion. If it is still green afterwards, the conversion does not match the profile or gamut you actually shot.
Can I apply a creative LUT directly to C-Log? You can and it will look wrong. Convert to Rec.709 first, then put the look on top of that.
Does converting damage the footage? Not if you export once from the original. Repeated export and re-import compresses it each time, which is a bigger risk than the conversion itself.