How to hand a culled wedding project to Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro

A cull only helps if it survives the trip into your editor. Sorting four hundred clips into heroes and rejects does nothing if the editor opens them as one flat pile. This guide covers exactly what Basecut sends to Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro, what DaVinci Resolve gets for comparison, and the one thing that does not arrive applied in Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro: the color grade.

Checked against Basecut 4.0.8 on 2026-10-10.

The short answer

Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro both receive your cull as an organized project: clips sorted into bins or collections, ratings, markers, and select timelines. Neither receives an applied color grade. The grade arrives as one .cube file per clip, and you attach it yourself in a few clicks. DaVinci Resolve is the one editor where Basecut can apply a baseline grade for you, and only on Studio or on Free before version 21.1.

What each editor receives

	Premiere Pro	Final Cut Pro	DaVinci Resolve (Studio, or Free before 21.1)
How it arrives	One click. The first time, Basecut adds a small Premiere extension (it appears under Window, Extensions, Basecut) and imports into your open project, or makes a project if none is open. If that route is not available it saves an XML file and shows the import steps.	One click. Final Cut Pro opens and asks which library to import into. Final Cut Pro runs on Mac only.	One click. Basecut builds the project through Resolve's Python scripting.
Clip grouping	A Basecut bin with sub-bins by shot type, then by rating (for example Handheld, then 4 Star). You can organize by shot type, rating or both.	Events named 01_Heroes, 02_Keepers, 03_Maybe, 04_Skip and 99_Junk. Inside each, keyword collections for Shot type and Rating.	Bins and clip colors, plus keywords, a description and camera info on each clip.
Ratings	Star rating as a label color: 5 Rose, 4 Mango, 3 Yellow, 2 Iris, 1 Tan.	Four and five stars become Favorite, one and two stars become Reject, three stars or unrated get no mark.	Star rating field on each clip.
Markers	A marker at the start of each clip with the AI's short description of the shot, plus a marker for each moment Basecut found.	Markers on clips Basecut analyzed in sections (clips longer than 90 seconds): one per section and one per moment. Shorter clips carry none.	Markers at the start of long-clip sections and at each moment.
Timelines	One sequence per verdict: 01_Heroes, 02_Keepers, 03_Maybe, 04_Skip and 99_Junk.	A Basecut Selects project with the heroes and keepers laid end to end.	Two timelines: a chronological stringout of the selects, and one grouped by scene.
Color	Nothing applied. One full-grade .cube per clip in handoff/luts, to apply as an Input LUT.	Nothing applied. The same .cube files, for the Custom LUT effect. The color values (an ASC CDL) and a short color note ride as clip metadata for reference only.	A baseline grade applied to each clip.

Resolve Free 21.1 or newer is covered further down. It gets a timeline file and the .cube files, not an applied grade.

None of these copy or change your media. The projects point at your original files, so if you move the footage afterwards, relink it in the editor.

Step by step: cull, then hand off

1. Finish the cull first
A handoff is only as good as the cull behind it. Check the Junk bin, fix any ratings you disagree with, and confirm that the key moments have coverage. In Basecut your own star rating wins over the AI's, and the handoff uses your rating for the label colors in Premiere Pro and the Favorite and Reject marks in Final Cut Pro. How to cull wedding footage with AI covers that stage.
2. Choose what to send
Send the whole run, or tick just the clips you want on the run page. Picks apply to Send to Resolve, Open in Premiere and Open in Final Cut. Every other export in the menu uses the whole run.
3. Choose how clips are organized
Basecut's Organise clips by setting has three options: shot type, rating or both. Both is the default. Shot type is the outer group (drone, gimbal, tripod, handheld, vehicle or other) and the star rating is the inner one.
4. Open in Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro
Use Open in Premiere Pro or Open in Final Cut Pro in the run's export menu. Basecut first bakes a grade for every clip, then builds the handoff. In Premiere Pro, the first send adds the Basecut extension and the clips arrive in a Basecut bin. In Final Cut Pro, pick a library when it asks, or click New to make a fresh one.
5. Check what arrived
In Premiere Pro, look for the Basecut bin and its sub-bins, the label colors, the markers, and the sequences named 01_Heroes through 99_Junk. In Final Cut Pro, look for the events 01_Heroes through 99_Junk, the Shot type and Rating keyword collections inside them, the Favorite and Reject marks, and the Basecut Selects project. If clips show as offline, the files have moved. In Premiere Pro, right-click and choose Link Media to point it at them.
6. Attach the color
No import file can attach a LUT to a clip, so the Basecut grade arrives as files instead: one .cube per clip in the handoff/luts folder next to the handoff file, named after the clip. Each cube is the whole Basecut grade for that clip, meaning the log to Rec.709 conversion, white balance and exposure, the match to your other cameras, and the creative look if you chose one. In Premiere Pro, select the clip, open Lumetri Color, Basic Correction, Input LUT, Browse, and pick its .cube. In Final Cut Pro, add the Custom LUT effect to the clip and choose its .cube. Do not stack a second camera conversion or an automatic log conversion on the same clip, or you convert twice.
7. If you send again, expect Premiere to reuse its clips
When the same footage goes into the same Premiere Pro project twice, Premiere keeps the clips it already has. Basecut moves the clips it can into the new layout and leaves any clips you filed in your own bins where they are. For a clean layout, send into a new project.

Why the color does not arrive applied

Basecut found no import file that can attach a LUT to a clip as it comes into either editor. Its tests with Final Cut Pro 12.3 also found no element in the FCPXML format that applies color values on import, so Basecut sends the values as clip metadata and the grade itself as .cube files beside the project.

The practical result is one extra step per clip you want graded: pick the clip, attach its .cube. If your footage is Sony, Canon or iPhone, the editor guides cover what the editor does on its own with log footage: S-Log3 in Premiere Pro, S-Log3 in Final Cut Pro, Apple Log in Premiere Pro, Apple Log in Final Cut Pro and Canon C-Log3 in Premiere Pro.

Resolve, for comparison

Resolve Studio, or Free before 21.1: Basecut builds the project through Resolve's Python scripting. You get bins, clip colors, star ratings, keywords, descriptions and camera info, markers, two timelines, and a baseline grade applied to every clip.
Resolve Free 21.1 or newer: Blackmagic moved Python scripting to Studio in 21.1, so Basecut (4.0.8 and later) sends a timeline file plus the .cube files instead. You import the timeline and apply the cubes yourself, the same way as in Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro.
For the Resolve side of culling, see Culling footage in DaVinci Resolve.

Other editors

Basecut also exports ALE and FCPXML files for other editors. ALE is the format Avid Media Composer reads.

Common snags

Clips show offline. The files moved after the cull. In Premiere Pro, right-click and choose Link Media. In Final Cut Pro, relink the files to their new location.
Final Cut Pro shows no markers on a short clip. Final Cut markers only exist on clips Basecut analyzed in sections, which means clips longer than 90 seconds.
The grade looks doubled in the editor. The .cube already holds the camera conversion, so remove any conversion LUT or automatic log handling from that clip.
The layout did not change after a second send. Premiere Pro reuses clips it already has. Send into a new project for a clean layout.
You are on Windows. Final Cut Pro runs on Mac only, so on Windows send to Premiere Pro or DaVinci Resolve.

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Questions people ask

Does Basecut apply its color grade in Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro?

No. In both editors the project arrives organized but ungraded. The grade comes as one .cube file per clip, which you attach yourself: the Input LUT slot in Lumetri Color in Premiere Pro, or the Custom LUT effect in Final Cut Pro. In Final Cut Pro the color values also ride along as clip metadata for reference, but Final Cut does not apply them. Only DaVinci Resolve (Studio, or Free before 21.1) gets a baseline grade applied for you.

What do Basecut's star ratings become in Premiere Pro?

Label colors. Five stars is Rose, four is Mango, three is Yellow, two is Iris and one is Tan. Each level gets its own color, so the five levels stay distinguishable at a glance.

What do ratings become in Final Cut Pro?

Four and five stars become Favorite, one and two stars become Reject, and three stars or unrated clips get no mark. The star level is also available as a Rating keyword collection, so nothing is lost. The file format Basecut sends to Final Cut Pro only carries Favorite and Reject ratings.

Are my original files copied or changed?

No. Both projects point at your original files and Basecut never modifies them. If you move the footage afterwards, relink it in the editor.

Do I need DaVinci Resolve Studio?

Not for Premiere Pro or Final Cut Pro. For Resolve, Studio or Resolve Free before 21.1 lets Basecut build the project through Resolve's scripting. Resolve Free 21.1 or newer gets a timeline file plus the .cube files instead, because Blackmagic moved Python scripting to Studio in 21.1.

Can I send only some of the clips?

Yes. Tick the clips you want on the run page, and Send to Resolve, Open in Premiere and Open in Final Cut send only those. The other exports in the menu use the whole run.

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