- New Stream Deck Plus – A Video Editors Evaluate
- Setting Up a Stream Deck Plus for Video Modifying and Color Grading
- Obtain Free Stream Deck Plus Profiles
What’s it like to make use of the brand new Elgato Stream Deck Plus + for video enhancing and color grading?
Get set for a deep dive into answering this query as we take a look at utilizing the brand new Stream Deck+ in DaVinci Resolve, Adobe Premiere Professional, Closing Reduce Professional and Avid Media Composer.
The brand new Stream Deck + from Elgato is the most recent of their line up of shortcut and macro enabled controllers, initially constructed for streamers however which have grow to be extremely well-liked as video enhancing and color grading peripherals.
The Stream Deck Plus retains 8 of the tactile LCD keys from the earlier variations however provides two new components: 4 x infinite dials and an LCD show strip that additionally acts as a contact delicate management too.
Of all of the controllers I’ve seen (and reviewed) through the years, the Stream Decks appear to have grow to be essentially the most ubiquitous and everlasting additions to many an enhancing and color grading suite. Different controllers appear to have had their second, then fallen into disuse after which, finally, tucked away in a draw, whereas the Stream Deck’s versatility and utility appears to have given them actual endurance.
Will that be the case for the Stream Deck +?
And in case you already personal a Stream Deck is it definitely worth the improve?
Because of Elgato for each sponsoring this text and offering me with the Stream Deck Plus.
This text bought fairly lengthy, so I wouldn’t need you to overlook this video wherein I display the trimming performance utilizing the Stream Deck + in Avid Media Composer, Adobe Premiere Professional, Apple Closing Reduce Professional and DaVinci Resolve, together with a couple of comparable shortcuts.
Obtain these ‘starter’ profiles without cost right here.
Stream Deck + First Impressions
Out there on Amazon World Shops
What’s within the field – Stream Deck +
The Stream Deck + comes properly packaged in a sturdy cardboard field together with a removable USB-C to USB-A braided cable.
The Stream Deck Plus is wider and taller than the unique Stream Deck, with a in-built stand that may be eliminated by taking out a few screws in case you’re into constructing your personal customized cradles.
It additionally options barely greater buttons than the unique Stream Deck, for “improved glanceability”, in keeping with Elgato. Which I’m at the moment undecided about.
There’s one thing good in regards to the compact nature of the unique association, however the elevated spacing and measurement of the Stream Deck + buttons does makes it simpler to hit the appropriate key with out wanting over an excessive amount of.
The dials are measurement to suit between a thumb and finger with out feeling too fiddly. They’ve a clicky sound and really feel, which does assist with making particular changes as you’ll be able to each hear and really feel what you’re doing.
In some methods I want the dials had a easy motion because it feels a bit extra ‘premium’ and pleasurable to make use of, resembling on the Tangent Component Kb, however the suggestions from the clicks might be extra helpful on reflection.
General the Stream Deck Plus appears to be like nice, the contact strip and dials have a pleasant really feel to them and total the entire system appears to be like and feels nicely crafted. If you wish to see some properly lit macro shut ups of the whole lot, try randomfrankp’s video overview right here.
An Upgraded Cable
One enchancment of the Stream Deck Mark 1 not less than, is the removable cable. This can be a higher design resolution, in comparison with the everlasting cable on the unique Stream Deck, for a few causes. Firstly, it makes it replaceable if it ought to break and secondly it makes it customisable – must you want to run an extended, or a lot shorter cable.
The one within the field is about 1.5m lengthy (60″), which is nice in case your laptop is tucked away someplace out of sight or under your desk, though if not, the lengthy cable results in quite a lot of cable cluttering the desk in a arrange like mine. (As you’ll be able to see from my photos!) I’ll should discover a good brief cable to switch it with.
The braided cable that ships with the Stream Deck + feels good and durable although, so it ought to final in case you’re commonly transporting it round or utilizing it within the tough and tumble of a manufacturing surroundings, say on a DIT cart.
System Necessities
You could be working Home windows 10 (64 bit) or Mac OS 10.15 or greater.
Organising the Elgato Stream Deck +
On this article I’m going to concentrate on utilizing the dials and contact strip as these are the brand new options on the Stream Deck Plus.
However in case you’re completely new to establishing a Stream Deck, positively try my earlier Stream Deck article and overview right here, which can information you thru establishing shortcut mappings and customized macros, managing profiles and contains some free customized profiles to obtain too.
In case you have an current Stream Deck related once you plug within the Stream Deck Plus it would ask you if you wish to copy your current profiles over. Or you are able to do this manually by proper clicking on any profile and selecting ‘Copy to Stream Deck +’.
You may as well copy and paste any current button by deciding on it within the mapper and utilizing CMD+C / CMD+V to stick it wherever you want, even throughout units.
The Contact Strip
The brand new LCD contact strip appears to be like nice and each small textual content and icons are sharply displayed. It acts as each a label for the dials under but in addition a contact delicate set of ‘buttons’ with one above every dial.
You may as well swipe left and proper on your entire show to navigate by means of totally different pages, so there’s no want to make use of up one of many 8 bodily buttons above for navigation. This can be a large profit in comparison with the Stream Deck which wants not less than one or two buttons devoted to transferring by means of profiles and pages.
You possibly can each contact the strip to activate a operate associated to the dial under or contact and maintain for additional performance. For instance, with a dial set to controlling quantity, urgent the contact strip may toggle a mute motion, whereas urgent and holding may reset the worth of the dial.
You may as well customise the background of your entire strip or the person button areas inside it. The background library information are saved in:
- ~/Library/Software Help/com.elgato.StreamDeck/ (Mac)
- %appdatapercentElgatoStreamDeckPluginscom.elgato.StreamDeck (Home windows)
These are 800 x 100 pixels, though you should use a collection of any bigger picture by way of the Stream Deck app.
You even have management over the brightness of your entire show by assigning the Stream Deck Brightness management to a dial. Someplace between 60-80% labored nicely for my daylight edit suite arrange.
However having discrete management over this is able to be a pleasant profit to colourists or editors working in darker environments who may not need to be distracted by the brightness of the show and keys. You possibly can nevertheless additionally management the brightness of the unique Stream Deck by way of assigning two keys to ‘brighter’ or ‘darker’.
The Dials
The 4 dials all function in the identical approach, with an infinite scroll and button push motion.
Every will be assigned three totally different customized hot-key controls:
- Counter Clock Smart – E.g Zoom Out (CMD+–)
- Clock Smart – E.g. Zoom In (CMD+=)
- Push – E.g. Zoom to full timeline (Shift+z)
The place a built-in motion exists, such because the Stream Deck Brightness management or Multimedia operate these include predefined actions which you could’t customise.
The SDK is quickly to be publicly launched to 3rd celebration builders and I’m positive we’ll see much more actions and makes use of circumstances built-in into the dials within the coming months.
Dial Stacks – These are ‘folders’ for dials, and let you stack a number of instructions onto a single dial. You then use the dial’s press operate to flow into by means of the obtainable choices.
Tip – Simply make all of your dial’s dial stacks from the beginning! You’ll virtually actually find yourself wanting so as to add layers of controls and it saves you having to take away something you’ve already mapped to a single management after which re-map it to the brand new dial stack.
Though, you’ll be able to simply do that by urgent CMD+C in your current shortcut, swap the dial to a dial stack after which press CMD+V to stick your preivous mapping into the brand new dial stack.
Right here’s an instance of a Dial Stack for my Premiere Professional trimming features:
- Trim Massive < begin of clip | finish of clip >
- Trim Body by Body < begin of clip | finish of clip >
- Trim to Playhead < begin of clip | finish of clip >
- Ripple Trim to Playhead < begin of clip | finish of clip >
I had toyed with assigning Undo to the button push operate, however I even have an Undo/Redo dial assigned proper now to blast backwards and forwards by means of my undo/redo queue.
The great thing about dial stacks mixed with an updating LCD show lets you create as many controls as you want, stack them into logical folders and never be restricted to solely 4 actions on the 4 bodily dials or having to memorise what you’ve arrange.
The Greatest Icon Packs and Plugins for The Stream Deck+
It’s been some time since I’ve delved into the Stream Deck library itself and issues have positively improved since I final visited whereas establishing my unique Stream Deck.
You possibly can nonetheless create particular person icons with Stream Deck’s on-line key creator, which works fairly nicely, however they now have an in depth library of each free and paid icon packs in a myriad of various kinds and big selection of of functions.
To get to the Stream Deck Retailer, open the Configure Stream Deck app after which click on on the little vibrant mini-stream-deck-with-the-blue-plus icon, subsequent to the Settings cog. It’s within the prime proper nook.
From right here you’ll be able to obtain collections of official and third-party plugins, icon packs, music cues and sound results.
The explanation to obtain the icon packs is to avoid wasting your self the difficulty of making your personal bespoke ones and the plugins add direct performance into a wide range of totally different apps, for instance OBS display seize
The Greatest Stream Deck Plus Free Icon Packs and Plugins
Listed below are a number of the free icon packs and plugins I’ve downloaded and loved utilizing:
Plugins – Add programmed performance, resembling the power so as to add Finder Tags in Mac OS or have a learn out of your present CPU utilization as a share.
Why it’s value paying for Profiles – The free icon packs from SideShowFX characteristic round 70 particular person icons that you should use when constructing your personal Profiles from scratch, however once you purchase an icon pack and profile arrange from SideshowFX’s website, you get tons of of pre-programmed keys and icons already arrange and able to go.
For instance, their DaVinci Resolve Pack incorporates 1500 icons for 960+ pre-programmed keys throughout 9 distinctive profiles, every holding a number of pages. They’ve particular packs for every of the Stream Decks (15, 32 and Plus) and different units as nicely.
Save your self hours of effort and time all for $34.99!
The Greatest Stream Deck Plus Paid Icon Packs
I’m a giant fan of SideshowFX’s paid packs as a result of I’ve spent approach an excessive amount of time attempting to construct my very own Profiles, with some success, however in case you simply need to get essentially the most out of your system and save a ton of time organising a logical format, creating understandable icons and mapping all the keys (that’s quite a lot of work!) then simply pay the small price.
SideshowFX’s documentation, buyer assist and YouTube tutorials are all wonderful and I do know from private expertise that Todd and the group are enthusiastic about making inventive professionals lives simpler and extra environment friendly. They actually care so much about what they provide!
Their pack’s usually use default keyboard shortcuts, plus a ton of additional mappings, or their very own customized settings, so it is advisable use their keyboard shortcut mapping within the set up course of, which is simply one thing to contemplate in case you’re already working a deep bespoke arrange.
When it comes to paid Plugins, I’ve not seen any but on the Stream Deck Retailer, as the whole lot that’s at the moment listed is free to put in and use.
How does the Stream Deck + Evaluate to…
Stream Deck + Vs Authentic Stream Deck
Now that I personal each an unique Stream Deck and the new Stream Deck Plus, how do they evaluate?
As I discussed earlier than, I’m torn between appreciating the compact measurement of the unique and valuing the brand new options of the Plus. I really feel like I’m going to utilize each anyway, as my muscle reminiscence is already pretty ingrained with the Stream Deck.
For the needs of this text I had began by copying my current profiles over to the Plus however I’ll slowly re-set the Plus to a special toolset and use them each for various issues, throughout the identical app.
The dials on the Stream Deck Plus do open up extra helpful actions that may be much less satisfying to function easily with buttons on the Stream Deck and I’m hopeful that by means of the SDK and Elgato’s personal developments they’ll work to ship tighter integrations with my most used inventive functions.
However that is likely to be a ready recreation value taking part in, in case you’d relatively see what they ship in actuality relatively than in hope, earlier than you format any chilly onerous money.
For those who may solely select one, which might I like to recommend?
Most likely the Plus for the flexibility, though in case you’re utilizing it to reinforce an current management floor, say a Blackmagic or Tangent grading panel, then the 15 buttons of the Stream Deck is likely to be extra worthwhile.
Do you have to improve?
For those who don’t have any Stream Decks simply but, then the Plus is a superb place to start out. Not solely will you could have 8 shortcut buttons however you’ll even have 4 dials to work with, which simply provides an entire totally different dimension of tactile management.
The Contact Strip additionally makes navigation extra intuitive and extra environment friendly as you’re not utilizing up keys to maneuver by means of your Profile pages and is basically interesting to take a look at!
Provided that the Stream Deck Plus is barely $50 greater than the Stream Deck (£/$149 vs £/$199) there’s not an enormous quantity to sway you by some means on worth.
However I really feel like me attempting to recommendation you whether or not or not it’s value upgrading is a futile endeavour. For those who already personal a Stream Deck and are an enthusiastic person, you’ve in all probability already thought of including a second (or have already got!) and are salivating on the thought of including one more system, this time with dials to your arrange.
So do as you want!
Stream Deck Plus + Vs Loupedeck CT
Provided that I’ve owned a Loupedeck CT for a very long time, you’d have thought I might be capable of provide extra perception into which one is best, however in all honesty whereas I initially set the Loupedeck CT up with some customized controls and began to discover what it may possibly do, it has largely sat on my desk unused, compared to my Stream Deck.
In some way jabbing on the tactile and sturdy LCD keys of the Stream Deck, particularly in Adobe Premiere Professional – the place I spent most of my working day – simply bought programmed into my muscle reminiscence in a approach that I didn’t get to with the Loupedeck.
That mentioned the Loupedeck CT is a superbly crafted system and in some methods gives greater than the Stream Deck Plus does. For instance, it has 6 dials as a substitute of 4, has the bigger and easy turning shuttle wheel within the centre, whereas it additionally has contact delicate LCD buttons in addition to the bodily button arrays.
Via its API integrations it may possibly additionally management some inventive software program extra immediately, resembling sliders and color grading controls in Adobe Premiere, which is one thing Elgato may construct into the Stream Deck, however till now they’ve not likely gone down this street.
You also needs to actually put the Loupedeck CT on a stand to make it simpler to make use of. And compared to the Stream Deck configuration software program, Loupedeck’s wasn’t as straightforward to make use of after I first set mine up.
That mentioned, the Loupedeck CT is twice the value of the Stream Deck Plus!
At £499 vs £199 I’m undecided you’re getting double the worth from the Loupedeck CT, until the API integrations make all of the distinction for you. Each are actually properly made and both will be capable of pace up your workflow when customised to your particular wants and massaged into your muscle reminiscence.
Placement Issues
Funnily sufficient, now that I’m penning this and all three units, as a left-handed Wacom person, I ponder if placing the Stream Decks to my proper and the Loupedeck CT in entrance of me, additionally made a slight unconscious distinction to how a lot I used them?
In that, it’s a lot simpler for me to maneuver my right-hand from the keyboard barely over to the appropriate and hit the Stream Deck than up and to the left to hit the Loupedeck CT. Possibly positioning in your desk issues greater than I gave earlier thought to it!
SideshowFX DaVinci Resolve Professional Pack for the Stream Deck +
Todd from SideshowFX was form sufficient to ship me their DaVinci Resolve Stream Deck + pack to assist me up and working with the system for this overview.
It’s an enormous pack illustrated by 1500 icons and containing 9 totally different profiles that join collectively to present you a complete 272 programmed keys and 47 rotary dial controls.
At solely $34.99 it’s an absolute steal. No matter your hourly price is that is absolutely an enormous saving in comparison with doing all this work your self!
Every thing is laid out logically and systematically making it straightforward to get going immediately with the management set – the educational curve may be very mild and Sideshow’s accompanying documentation might be one of the best I’ve seen from a ‘third-party’ developer!
The 9 profiles within the pack embody:
- Primary dwelling web page
- Media Administration – 4 pages
- Multicam – 3 pages
- Printer Lights – 3 pages
- Pace Editor – 3 pages (Emulating Pace Editor)
- Modifying – 6 pages
- Grading – 7 pages (inc 8 preset node timber)
- Fairlight – 3 pages
- Fusion – 6 pages
It’s value swiping by means of all the pages to see what controls are mapped to the dials as generally the identical set of controls are mapped to the dials for the primary few pages after which change for the final web page.
It’s important to do a small quantity of profile ‘plumbing’ to attach the profiles collectively right into a single navigable set, however that is very straightforward to do, takes about 2 minutes and once more the documentation walks you thru it clearly.
Construct Preset Node Bushes
One of many cool issues in regards to the pack are the 8 preset node timber, which you’ll watch construct out in entrance of your eyes – this 18 node construction
As a fast apart, revered characteristic movie colorist Walter Volpatto shares his rationale for working with a hard and fast node tree construction on this well-liked tutorial.
While you look at this within the Configure Stream Deck app you’ll see it’s constructed by means of 102 separate actions, which ought to provide you with loads of inspiration as to how you can construct your personal node tree presets.
Printer Lights
The printer gentle web page delivers an accessible approach of partaking with this historic approach of grading. For some context there’s a useful article over on LowePost.com which explains how and why to grade with Printer Lights in DaVinci Resolve.
One of many causes for its reputation is that printer factors transfer the sign in its entirety and alter your entire tonal vary within the picture. This fashion, we keep true to the best way the unique picture was shot, and the consequence will be very clear and cinematic.
With the ability to work with the dials to regulate the totally different Printer Gentle controls in particular increments and with a number of dials in tandem, is a very nice option to management your picture and the profile arrange within the pack makes this very fast to do.
A Quibble and a Quirk
My solely quibble with the arrange for the Stream Deck Plus is that there are not any textual content labels on the icons for the dials, the place because the button’s are all labelled for readability, this implies you’re left to decipher the dial’s probably operate from the icon itself, which isn’t at all times profitable.
However once you dig into the mapping, the title’s are there however the ‘present title’ choices have been turned off for the dials, presumably attributable to a present limitation with the mapping software program which doesn’t recognise areas firstly of a title label or have a option to centre the textual content in order that it doesn’t overlay on the icons Sideshow have included on the highest left of every button and subsequently look messy.
For those who add a full cease after which some areas you will get the titles to be displayed within the centre, look OK and make it a lot simpler to make use of!
Closing Thought – At simply $34.99 for all of this, the Profile packs from Sideshow for DaVinci Resolve, or some other app, are an absolute discount.
Coming Quickly from SideshowFX – Use your Stream Deck + as a Grading Panel…
The group at SideshowFX are engaged on a option to make the Stream Deck + work in a approach that mimics the best way the Blackmagic Design panels do, by controlling the values of the parameters and never simply activating shortcuts and macros in the best way that the Profile pack does.
Thrilling stuff!
Utilizing the Stream Deck + with video enhancing software program
Within the video above I’ve tried to present you a fast sense of what it appears to be like like to make use of all of those starter profiles that I created in Avid Media Composer, Closing Reduce Professional X and Adobe Premiere Professional. I overlooked DaVinci Resolve as a result of you’ll be able to simply see from SideshowFX’s in depth stroll by means of the whole lot the Stream Deck Plus can do in that regard.
Avid was the least responsive of all of the apps on my system* and I’m undecided why that will be. Generally it might work completely and others there could be a big delay after which a bunch of actions would catch up.
Different shortcuts that it might make sense so as to add to the dials are nudging, slipping, rising and reducing clip quantity, adjusting keyframe positions and so forth. The checklist is just about countless!
With a few of these dial actions you may need to swap the clockwise vs counter-clockwise mappings relying on whether or not in your thoughts turning a dial to the left means you trim the left, or maintain the left facet of the clip.
Additionally each app does issues in a different way, so relatively than replicate all the similar controls throughout each app, I’ve additionally chosen a couple of shortcuts the place the default mapping requires a multi-key faucet dance to make it work.
*MC 21.6 on OSX Monterey 12.6.1
A very powerful factor to grasp is that establishing your personal Stream Deck plus to suit your most well-liked workflow takes a little bit little bit of trial and error, in addition to adjusting issues to your personal private shortcut mappings.
And as you construct your personal over time, it’s value noting these moments once you’re doing the identical repetitive activity again and again (are you able to construct a macro) otherwise you’re having to hit a multi-key mixture to activate a shortcut – can a finger stab a Stream Deck key faster and with much less disruption to your move?
Closing Reduce Professional
- Add Colour Board Impact and Swap to Colour Inspector
- Body Maintain
- Break Aside Clip Objects
- World Results Toggle On/Off
- Present Massive Waveforms
- Insert hole
- Compound Clip
- 2 x Pace
- Dial Stack 1: JKL | < Subsequent Edit > | < Body > |
- Dial Stack 2: Zoom In/Out – Faucet LCD: Zoom To Match | Clip Peak
- Dial Stack 3: Trim 10 frames | Trim Body | Trim to Playhead
- Dial Stack 4: Undo/Redo
Add these to the default FCP Shortcuts as they’re unmapped
- World results toggle on /off = SHIFT+CMD+E
- Add Colour Board Impact = CTRL+SHIFT+C
Adobe Premiere Professional
- New Sequence from Clip
- Shut Hole
- Open Favorite Results Folder
- Export Nonetheless
- Audio Achieve
- Body Maintain
- Nest
- 2 x Pace
- Dial Stack 1: JKL | < Subsequent Edit > | < Body > |
- Dial Stack 2: Zoom In/Out – Faucet LCD: Zoom To Match | Audio Peak
- Dial Stack 3: Trim 10 frames | Trim Body | Trim to Playhead | Ripple Trim to PH (Faucet LCD to Toggle Trim Mode)
- Dial Stack 4: Undo/Redo
Avid Media Composer
- Group Clips
- Final Energetic Bin Container
- Full Display screen Playback
- Add Video Observe
- Copy to Supply Monitor
- Prolong (to both In or Out level)
- Collapse Tracks
- Add Audio Observe
- Dial Stack 1: JKL | < Subsequent Edit > | < Body > |
- Dial Stack 2: Zoom In/Out – Faucet LCD: To Match | Observe Peak (choose monitor first)
- Dial Stack 3: Trim 10 frames | Trim Body | Ripple Trim to PH
- Dial Stack 4: Undo/Redo
You could arrange prime and tail enhancing to be able to trim to playhead. I’ve set it up on the Shift+[ ] keys.
You’ll additionally have to map Collapse to a shortcut too. I selected SHIFT+C
I set Prolong to SHIFT+X
Closing Ideas on Stream Deck +
Hopefully in case you’ve learn this far, you’ve learn the entire article, which had a few of my ‘overview’ ideas sprinkled all through.
But when not listed here are some concluding and summarising ideas on the Stream Deck Plus.
I really like my unique Stream Deck and it’s use has stood the check of time through the years. It’s easy, efficient and helpful. I’ve little question the Stream Deck Plus would be the similar.
At $/£199 it’s half the value of the Loupedeck and solely $50 greater than the 15 key Stream Deck, so it feels ‘inexpensive’ – all issues thought of.
The addition of the rotary dials provides quite a lot of performance, particularly as direct controls and intelligent integrations are (hopefully) developed over the approaching months, and likewise simply by means of the sensible use of keyboard shortcuts.
Whether or not the Stream Deck + is your first Stream Deck or your fourth, it’s a value whereas addition to your edit or color grading suite due to the addition of the dials which are perfect for controlling faders, color grading controls, keyframe positions and extra, in a approach {that a} mouse/Wacom pill isn’t essentially as fitted to.
The flexibility to regulate a number of dials without delay can also be an enchancment over keyboard shortcuts or utilizing a pointer, and once more may be very helpful for anybody working with a number of faders or color grading controls, as apparent examples.
Easy design selections just like the removable cable are a noticeable enchancment each from a long life stand level and from the viewpoint of cable administration – one thing from my images you can see I have to work on!
All in all, I’m a fan and I believe you may be too.
I simply hope Elgato double down on software program integrations and enhancements within the months forward to actually make this system sing.
Order yours on Amazon World Shops
Obtain Free Stream Deck + Profiles
If you wish to you’ll be able to obtain the Stream Deck + profiles that I created for:
- Adobe Premiere Professional
- Avid Media Composer
- Apple Closing Reduce Professional
- Apple music
- Chrome browser
On this zipped bundle without cost.
They’re solely fundamental profiles created to check out the system and create the video on this put up, however perhaps they’ll assist get you began!
If you have already got a Stream Deck you’ll be able to obtain my customized profiles for that right here and browse extra about them on this in depth put up too.
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