Fremont, CA, USA - Blackmagic Design today announced that “Rains Over Babel,” the debut feature film from Spanish Colombian writer/director Gala del Sol, was edited and color graded in DaVinci Resolve Studio. The film recently premiered at the 2025 Sundance Film Festival in the NEXT category which spotlights innovative, bold and forward thinking films.

In the film, a city’s Grim Reaper, La Flaca, presides over Babel, a legendary dive bar that doubles as purgatory. Inside, a group of misfits converges, gambling years of their lives with La Flaca, daring to outwit Death herself. Described as a tropical Colombian steampunk fever dream, the fantastical world and vibrant characters in “Rains Over Babel” were brought to life in post by Editors Gala del Sol and Hadley Hillel, along with Assistant Editors Jose Varón and Felipe Aguilar, and Colorist Elliott Powell.

“Hadley and I began by editing each scene separately in DaVinci Resolve Studio, starting with individual timelines for every scene. Later, we combined these into sequences to refine timing, rhythm, and structure. We used speed ramps to finetune the rhythm of certain cuts and enhance the energy in action sequences. Resolve’s stabilization tools were fantastic, helping to smooth out some challenging shots,” noted del Sol.

“My favorite, and the most challenging sequence, was the climactic fight. It involved a montage of two fights happening in different times and locations, with the cuts matching movement. DaVinci Resolve allowed us to easily experiment with rhythm and flow until we achieved a seamless, kinetic montage,” del Sol added. “Outside of the edit page, we used Fusion for keying out green screens, working with titles, and creating the final animated sequence. The cut out animations for the credits were also done entirely within Resolve.”

According to del Sol, the goal during grading was to create a retro futuristic, tropical punk aesthetic, with Powell working his magic to bring this vision to life using a DaVinci Resolve Mini Panel. Using DP Sten Olsen’s show LUT as a starting point, Powell created subtleties by adding color density, texture, light grain, halation and glow.

“The very first scene of the movie was one that developed the most,” Powell explained. “I cooled it down a fair bit to make the blue walls pop, and the scene’s wide shots, showcasing all different lamps and windows, really made the textural elements that I added shine.”

Powell also relied heavily on DaVinci Resolve Studio’s ColorTrace tool, which allowed him to quickly copy grades from one timeline to another based on the source timecode of each clip.

“With Gala editing in Colombia while I was in NYC, she used Resolve’s media management to get everything down to less than a terabyte using trimmed files, and then she sent me a hard drive and a DRT, which made the conform minimal. I reconformed from bins to the new trimmed clips, and then it was smooth sailing,” Powell said. “If there were some changes, she sent a new DRT and some more trimmed files, and I used the same process and then ColorTraced the color from the old DRT to the new one.”

Del Sol added: “Given that Hadley and I were working long distance between Colombia and Los Angeles, while Elliott was in New York, being able to seamlessly exchange DaVinci timelines saved us an incredible amount of time and ensured accuracy.”

“I love working with DaVinci because it simplifies the workflow between editing, coloring, and finalizing. In past projects, transferring between different software for color grading introduced challenges like dropped frames, misaligned shots, or lost adjustments, including zooms, speed changes, and stabilization. For ‘Rains Over Babel,’ DaVinci Resolve eliminated those issues entirely,” noted del Sol.

“I started using DaVinci Resolve in college, and I took a class taught by Tashi Trieu, an acclaimed colorist whose work includes ‘Avatar,’ ‘Stranger Things,’ and ‘Star Trek,’” she continued. “Although Elliott helped me with a lot of my class projects back then, I quickly fell in love with Resolve’s intuitive workflow and how everything I needed was integrated into one software.”

Del Sol concluded: “I loved collaborating once again with my college friends, Hadley and Elliott, on this project. They’ve been integral to every short film I’ve worked on since sophomore year, and it was incredible to have their talent, patience, and sharp creative instincts by my side for my first feature. Their unwavering support made all the difference.”