The job
Use Resolve when the look is the job. Use Vantacut when the first assembly of an event is the job.
Side by side
| Question | DaVinci Resolve | Vantacut |
|---|---|---|
| Colour | A full colour page with node-based grading. | Wheels, curves, LUTs and scopes, plus Auto Balance Colour to even white balance across the cut. |
| Audio | Fairlight, with up to 2,000 tracks for audio post. | Speech understood in 22 Indian languages and English; keep a line and the song ducks under it. |
| Assembly | Edit, sync bin and multicam tools for cutting by hand; Studio adds AI tools such as face recognition and auto colour. | Auto-Edit asks what matters, shows a plan, and cuts a highlight reel to your song on a new timeline. |
| Price | A free version, and Studio as a one-time purchase. | The editor is free with an account. Only Auto-Edit uses credits, charged by the minute. |
| Platforms | Mac, Windows and Linux. | Windows and Linux; macOS is coming. |
Choose DaVinci Resolve if
You grade for a living and the assembly is already done, or you enjoy building the film by hand in a suite you know.
Choose Vantacut if
You need tonight’s highlight from today’s footage, and the grade can come after the first cut.
Which to pick
| If you need | Pick |
|---|---|
| The grade is the job: node-based colour and cameras matched by hand | DaVinci Resolve |
| Audio post across many tracks | DaVinci Resolve |
| An editor on macOS today | DaVinci Resolve |
| The first assembly of a wedding, cut to one song, from today’s footage | Vantacut |
| A Linux workstation | Either: both run on Linux |
A common split: assemble, then grade
Resolve’s strength is the look, and Vantacut’s is the first assembly, so many jobs can use both. Cut the highlight in Vantacut first: Auto-Edit asks what matters, shows a plan and cuts to the song, and Auto Balance Colour evens white balance across the day so the first cut is watchable. Then export the movie and bring it into Resolve. You will be grading one rendered file rather than separate clips, so do any colour work that needs a clip of its own on Vantacut’s colour page first, with its wheels, curves, LUTs and scopes, or plan to grade the film as one piece.
Running both on Linux
Vantacut ships a .deb for Ubuntu 24.04 or later on amd64, and Resolve lists Linux among its platforms, so one Linux machine can hold both. Vantacut reads clips from your drive without copying them and makes light proxies of heavy footage, so the bin does not fill a second disk. Editing and export keep working offline once you have signed in; only Auto-Edit needs a connection. On Windows the same split works, and on a Mac, Resolve runs today while Vantacut’s macOS build is still coming.
Colour on Vantacut’s own page
Vantacut’s colour page has Shadows, Midtones and Highlights wheels, sliders for exposure, contrast, saturation, temperature and tint, curves and LUTs, with a waveform, vectorscope and RGB parade beside the viewer. Auto Balance Colour is the first pass across a day that moved from tungsten rooms to daylight to stage light: it evens white balance across the cut. It is a pass, not a grade. If the client wants a look that needs nodes, that is Resolve’s job, and the export is ready for it.
Your footage stays on your computer
Editing, playback and export run on your computer, and your original footage and songs never leave it. To find moments, Auto-Edit shares low-quality copies of your clips, still frames and the speech, and the app asks once before anything is sent. The editor works worldwide, in English; credit packs are priced in Indian rupees.
Questions
Can I grade a Vantacut export in Resolve?
Yes. Export the movie from Vantacut and bring the file into Resolve.
Is Auto Balance Colour a Resolve replacement?
No. It evens white balance across mixed lighting so the first cut is watchable. A full grade is still a grade.
Do both run on Linux?
Yes. Vantacut ships a .deb for Ubuntu 24.04 or later; Resolve lists Linux among its platforms.
Which is better for wedding colour grading?
Resolve, if the grade is the job: its colour page is built around node-based grading. Vantacut’s colour page and Auto Balance Colour are there so the first cut of the day looks right before you finish it, in Vantacut or in Resolve.
Get the editor
Windows and Linux now; macOS is coming. The editor is free; create your account when it first opens.