Silent Atlas
How this look was derived, and why every control does what it does. The settings themselves are in the pack.
Target aesthetic
A cinematic documentary teal-and-warm travel-film grade, derived from studying Merlin Krumme's The Silent Atlas (2026), a short film shot in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco. The look is characterised by: - Warm amber/terracotta midtones and highlights (earth, walls, skin) - Cool teal shadows (building shade, overcast sky, mist) - Deep, rich blacks with retained shadow detail - Soft, non-clipping highlights (misty/cloudy mountain scenes) - Muted overall saturation: filmic, not digital-vivid - Slightly soft/halated rendering (physical Glimmerglass filter in the reference)
This is the "teal-and-orange" cinematic split expressed through Moroccan earth tones rather than Hollywood neon.
Why Classic Negative (not Eterna or Classic Chrome)
| Candidate | Pros | Cons | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|
| Classic Negative | Native teal-cyan shadow cast; hard tonality adds contrast depth to flat/overcast light; colour separation shifts hues toward exactly the amber-teal axis we need | Can be crunchy; strong character | ✅ Selected — the teal shadow character is the core of this grade |
| Classic Chrome | More muted and editorial; great for Kodak emulations | Shadow contrast is grey-blue, not teal-cyan; would need more WB pushing | ❌ Close second, but missing the teal shadow key |
| Eterna | Low-contrast cine base; designed for cinema | Too flat and desaturated for this level of contrast; needs heavy contrast boosting | ❌ Too much departure needed |
White Balance strategy: — / — (corrected from —: see verification below)
The reference film has a clear warm lean on sunlit surfaces and skin, against cool teal backgrounds. Classic Negative already has a cool shadow tone; the warm WB shift (— from Daylight) pushes: - Skin → golden/peach warmth - Earth/terracotta walls → rich amber
While Classic Neg's shadow character stays teal, creating the colour split.
The blue shift is deliberately gentler than the red push (—, not —): the second frame-verification pass showed the reference's skies and mist land consistently teal-cyan, a — shift would strip too much blue and push the atmosphere toward khaki/yellow-grey, whereas — leaves enough blue for Classic Negative's native cyan lean to do the teal work.
Frame verification: second independent pass (2026-07-16)
The original derivation (2026-07-15, other machine) studied frames at ~60s/105s/150s/195s via browser capture. A second, independent pass re-fetched 4 actual video frames (YouTube's auto-generated stills: ~25% mist landscape, ~50% portrait, ~75% clear-sky, plus the full-res hero frame) and checked every design decision:
| Observation across all 4 frames | Recipe element | Verdict |
|---|---|---|
| Skin consistently warm golden-peach; earth/coats warm amber-tan | — WB | ✅ confirmed |
| Skies/mist/atmosphere consistently teal-cyan, never warm or royal-blue | Blue WB shift | ⚠️ corrected — → — (— would yellow the atmosphere) |
| Deep, held shadows (silhouettes keep shape; jackets near-black) | Shadow —, — | ✅ confirmed |
| Soft, non-clipping highlights with visible bloom at bright edges | Highlight —+ Glimmerglass note + Sharpness — | ✅ confirmed |
| Muted overall saturation (teal-warm split carries the colour interest) | Color —video / —stills | ✅ within range; drop stills to —if results read richer than the reference |
| Fine grain texture visible in the mist (hero frame) | Stills Grain —/— | ✅ confirmed — grain is genuinely part of the reference look |
One caveat kept in mind during this pass: YouTube's auto-frames are heavily compressed, which mutes absolute saturation, so hue relationships (teal vs warm) were treated as reliable evidence, absolute saturation only loosely.
— + Highlight —+ Shadow —
- — (not 400): the reference has real contrast. Deep blacks, present shadows. — would flatten this too much. — gives 1 stop of highlight headroom for the misty/cloudy skies without sacrificing the punchy shadow character.
- Highlight —: gentle roll-—, the reference preserves cloud/sky detail without flat-looking highlights.
- Shadow —: deepens blacks, giving the moody cinematic depth. Classic Neg's teal cast intensifies in deep shadows, which is the desired effect.
Color —(compensating for absent CCE/CCFXB)
In stills, Color Chrome Effect and FX Blue add richness and depth to reds/blues. In video, these are unavailable. Color —(up from the usual —in cinema recipes) compensates, bringing the warm earth tones to life and ensuring the amber/terracotta isn't too muted.
Sharpness —and the Glimmerglass question
The reference film uses a Tiffen Glimmerglass diffusion filter, a physical optical element that creates halation (highlight bloom/glow) and reduces micro-contrast. This can't be replicated in-camera. Sharpness —is the closest in-camera approximation: slightly soft, filmic edges without going blurry. The real Glimmerglass look requires the physical filter.
Video-first design, stills companion added
The recipe was designed from scratch for movie mode (the reference is a film), with settings chosen knowing that Grain, CCE, CCFXB, and Clarity are unavailable there. A stills companion was added 2026-07-16: same WB split, tone curve, and softness, but with Color pulled back to —(Color Chrome Effect — now carries the warm-tone depth), CCFXB Weak adding teal shadow depth, and —/— grain for a subtle cine texture, i.e. the stills build uses the richer toolset to express the same grade, rather than the video build's saturation-compensation approach.
Relationship to the 2383 Print recipe
This is conceptually a sibling of the Kodak 2383 Print recipe. Same Classic Negative base, same teal-orange concept. The differences:
| 2383 Print (video) | Silent Atlas | |
|---|---|---|
| WB Red | +2 | +3 (warmer amber) |
| WB Blue | −2 | −2 (same — corrected from −3 after frame verification; both looks need blue preserved for teal skies) |
| Highlight | 0 | −1 (softer roll-off for misty conditions) |
| Sharpness | 0 | −1 (filmic softness for Glimmerglass feel) |
| Color | +3 | +3 (same) |
| DR | — | — (same) |
| Intent | Theatrical print projection | Documentary travel-film |
Source
- Merlin Krumme, The Silent Atlas, YouTube, Mar 2026.
- Shot on Sony FX30 with Sigma 18-35 f/1.8 + Sony 11mm f/1.8, Tiffen Glimmerglass filter.
- Post-graded with custom LUTs (available at tinted.sellfy.store).
- Location: Atlas Mountains, Morocco (Imlil, mountain villages).
Last updated: 2026-07-16. Originally derived 2026-07-15 in a session on the second machine (frame-by-frame study of the reference video at ~60s/105s/150s/195s); ported into this repo copy 2026-07-16, when the stills companion was added.
Get Silent Atlas
Every value, the movie-mode translation, and the datasheet evidence behind the grade.