"Colour Can Subtly Convey Emotions, Set the Tone, and Enhance the Narrative"
Ross Baker is senior colourist and head of grading at Molinare in London. He has worked on high-end dramas, comedies, documentaries and factuals. As head of grading, he is also responsible for ensuring his team has the right tools and infrastructure to deliver top-tier results.
Ross’s credits include Sexy Beast (2024), SAS: Rogue Heroes (2022 and 2024), Motherland (2016-2022), The World According to Jeff Goldblum (2019-2021), David Attenborough’s Great Barrier Reef (2015-2016), War of the Worlds (2022) and BBC1/Starz The Missing (2014).
Ross has been nominated for five RTS Programme Awards and has made Televisual’s ‘Top 20 Colourists’ list every year since 2006.
Q> Tell us about your journey to becoming a successful colourist and head of grading at Molinare?
Ross> I always had a passion for photography and was an early user of Photoshop, but I never imagined I could build a career in colour.
After leaving school, I got a job as an apprentice car mechanic, but it didn't take me long to realise it was not a career that would fulfil me.
I went on to secure a job at Metro Lab, starting as a positive assembler in fundamentally a runner position. After six months, I discovered the telecine department, which I found fascinating. I was working days and nights for four years alongside colourists, eager to get hands-on with the tools. From there, I moved to Pepper, where I took a step back to work as an assistant for some of London’s best colourists. This period was key, as it allowed me to start again and truly develop my craft.
After my time at Pepper, I joined Vince Narduzzo at St. Anne's and later followed him to his own company, Narduzzo Too. From here, I got the chance to start a grading department at Halo and build a team from the ground up. I spent 13 years there and worked on a wide range of material, honing my skills in colour grading and understanding the ever-changing needs and requirements of the industry.
Then, during the covid lockdown, I was approached by Glen Gathard, chief creative officer at Molinare. Molinare is a company I always wanted to work for and in meeting the creative team, I knew it was a place I could elevate my skills. And that’s how I ended up where I am now – head of grading at Molinare.
Q> What does your role involve?
Ross> I’ve always had a very collaborative approach to grading, believing that by working well as a team, you can achieve much more. I also like to be part of the decision-making process and to have valued input into the company’s development. When I started discussions with Molinare, Nigel Bennett quickly saw this potential in me.
My primary focus is on grading a wide range of genres, which I truly love. However, I am also responsible for ensuring that my team is working on projects that they enjoy, and that we have the right tools and infrastructure in place to deliver top-tier results.
I am also very passionate about training the next generation of colourists. I spend time encouraging our colour support team to get hands-on experience with the grading panel and set them various challenges to help them grow.
I love running and supporting the team, but my primary focus must always remain in the grading suite. I have full support from the managerial team in this, and we have developed efficient communication channels to ensure everything runs smoothly.
Q> What are the benefits and challenges of working on a variety of content?
Ross> I enjoy working on a wide range of content, and I believe this diverse experience has equipped me with a versatile skill set that I can apply across different projects. Whether it's in a high-pressured environment or a more relaxed one, each experience offers a unique learning opportunity that helps to elevate the quality of my work.
One of the biggest challenges we face is the time allocated to each show. We need to be mindful of what can be achieved within the given budgets and timelines. Balancing the artistic vision with practical constraints is a constant challenge, but it also pushes us to be ultra creative and efficient.
Q> How do you think colour shapes the way an audience perceives an image?
Ross> I can't express enough how important colour is in film and TV. I believe that colour significantly influences how an audience perceives a story or scene. Much of this impact operates on a subconscious level.
Colour can subtly convey emotions, set the tone, and enhance the narrative. For example, warm colours can evoke feelings of comfort or tension, while cool colours can create a sense of calm or detachment. Even something as simple as a time-of-day mismatch in colour grading can be jarring and take the viewer out of the story.
Q> How has the role of a colourist changed over the years? How do you think it’ll continue to evolve?
Ross> I've been in the industry since the late '90s, starting with rushes (dailies) on telecine machines at Metrocolor. Back then, we only had basic six-vector and primary grades, primarily balancing for creating looks. Now, I feel that colourists have become integral members of the larger creative team, responsible for conveying the story through colours, building emotions, and crafting worlds around the narrative.
As our tools have developed, so have client requests and expectations. In the past, clients would ask if we could fix something or add an effect. Now, it's less of a request – we are seen as finishing artists, tasked with refining and enhancing the visual storytelling.
Moving forward, I believe the role of the colourist will continue to evolve with technological advancements, allowing us to push the boundaries of creativity even further.
Q> How would you describe your style of grading?
Ross> Adaptive. Every show has its unique requirements and styles, and having a fixed look can hinder creativity. I like to approach each grade with a sandbox mentality, exploring the ‘what ifs’ and ‘maybes’. I dislike the idea of acting like an Instagram filter, swiping through LUTs until one fits a show. Instead, I believe in tailoring the grade to enhance the story and vision of each project.
Q> What’s your career highlight to date?
Ross> It's always fun when people ask about career highlights because it's hard to pinpoint just one project. Everyone expects you to talk about the biggest shows, but working on a low-budget short film and bringing something unique to it for the client is just as rewarding. Having clients appreciate my work and input is a weekly highlight.
Having said that, if I had to pick something, it would be sitting with Sir David Attenborough in the grading suite as we worked on colour together. His excitement and energy is incredible.
Q> How long have you been grading on Baselight?
Ross> I've been grading on Baselight since I joined Molinare three and a half years ago. It was a switch I had been wanting to make for a long time.
What I love most about Baselight is the deep colour management and how the tools react. There is a smooth and refined touch when pushing the tools. I also appreciate how powerful Baselight is when working on effects with detailed work.
Q> What are your thoughts on Baselight 6.0?
Ross> I have been using Baselight 6.0 for a while and was fortunate enough to be part of the beta testing team. This gave me early access to the new tools and the opportunity to provide feedback.
I'm loving many of the new features. I find the new Curve Grade much smoother, more refined, and less destructive. This, combined with X Grade and the modulation edit function, makes for a very powerful combo.
Q> Can you tell us about your work on Sexy Beast?
Ross> I worked on Sexy Beast for Paramount+ alongside DoPs Birgit Dierken, Ralph Kaechele, and Mattias Nyberg, and series producers James Levison and Matt Barber. The brief was to create distinct worlds for the characters while maintaining a uniform style.
For the day exteriors, we aimed for a mundane, uninspiring look for Dom's life, using soft contrast and muted tones. Birgit wanted the day interiors to have a slight contrast, making them warmer to reflect the idea that British homes add colour to an otherwise dull outside world.
As we delved into the night life and the criminal world, we increased the contrast and richness of the colours. We wanted the scenes with significant red elements to have deep, foreboding burgundy textures, symbolising power and wealth.
A key scene in the story is the casino, which we treated with a smoky, grimy texture but with vivid colours, balancing contrast and colour density.
Q> What were the key challenges on this project?
Ross> One big challenge was episode four, which was set in Spain. They had such poor weather on the shoot so we had to work hard to contrast it heavily with Dom's experience in England. The goal was to make Spain look stunning and sun-kissed during the day and a jewelled-like starry night sky that would make Dom feel bewitched by his surroundings.
Production considered bringing in a VFX team to enhance the skies and inject some sun into the scenes, but first they asked me to mock up a few ideas to discuss with the VFX team. After a few tests they were very pleased with what I achieved with the compositing tool in Baselight – taking skies from other parts of the series or stock elements.
I combined this with other Baselight tools – using ‘Boost’ tools to enhance contrast and saturation as starting points in my primary layer, before adding a slight warm hazy effect and then my balance layer followed. I applied the hazy layer by setting the blending option to screen with some diffusion and adjusted the opacity to control the volume of the effect. I also used a combination of the DKey tool with shapes to add shadows – helping to sell the strong sunny vibes.
Q> Tell us more about the latest series of Inside No. 9?
Ross> Grading Inside No. 9 is always exciting because it provides the perfect opportunity to showcase a wide range of skills and develop multiple looks within the same series.
The show is a testament to filmmaking with outstanding results despite lower budgets. It's one of those projects where you can throw out various ideas and see what works. The final series presented challenges, such as turning ARRI ALEXA camera footage into ring doorbell style or recreating 1970’s film stock. I will miss this series and the creativity it involved!
Q> What advice would you give to aspiring colourists?
Ross> This is a big topic and I could give advice all day long.
In short, find a genre you would like to work in, secure a job at a company, and work your way up to grade assistant. Build relationships with the colourists and learn from them. Explore all the tools and practice whenever you can. Be cautious of following video tutorials on YouTube, as some can be misleading. Remember, it's not a quick path to becoming proficient. Clients are trusting you with months or even years of their work, and you have a finite time to deliver – keep this in mind when they make difficult requests.
Q> What are you working on now/next?
Ross> I'm currently working on the second series of SAS: Rogue Heroes for Kudos and the BBC and working as supervising colourist to Jake Davis on a feature documentary by director Dan Gordon (BAFTA winner for Hillsborough).
Plus several feature films, and a few other feature documentaries for streamers, which unfortunately cannot be named.
These projects will definitely keep the creative juices flowing!
