Documentation
The whole handoff — from dropping a .prproj on the Hub to bringing the graded shots back into Premiere. Condensed from the user manual.
Konformista rebuilds your Premiere Pro edit inside DaVinci Resolve — with transforms, retimes, transitions and audio routing intact — and packages it so it drops straight onto the Resolve timeline. When the grade is finished, it brings the graded shots back into Premiere.
It fixes the two things that usually break a Premiere → Resolve handoff:
Not a transcoder — it doesn't re-encode your masters. Not a grade translator — it reports grade intent, it doesn't recreate a look. Not a replacement for human QC — it makes review faster. Everything runs locally; your project and media never leave your machine.
A few ideas run through the whole app. Once they click, the rest is just screens that do what their labels say.
Rebuilding your edit in another application so it matches frame-for-frame — same cuts, timing and transforms. Konformista conforms your Premiere sequence into Resolve.
Every clip that carries risk arrives flagged by severity, colour-coded so you can triage at a glance. You'll see the same six colours in the analysis, on the clips in Resolve, and in the Review window. See the full catalogue →
Everything Konformista hands off travels in a single file — a .konform package (say it "konform"). Think of it as a sealed box holding the conformed timeline, the conform notes (flags and markers), and — when you choose — the trimmed media the edit uses. At the Resolve end you open it with the free Konformer app (or with Konformista) and the timeline rebuilds online, ready to grade.
You can also export a plain .xml timeline as a backup, but XML is lossy — it can't carry the flags and notes, native Resolve generators, keyframed motion, sub-frame retimes, or embedded nested timelines. Use .konform whenever the Resolve end can open it; fall back to .xml only when it can't.
Packages from early builds carried the .knfm extension — those open exactly the same way, forever.
Konformista can sit on either side. What changes between jobs is simply who runs the conform into Resolve.
The editor hands over the Premiere project and footage. The colourist runs it through Konformista themselves — analyse, then Send to Resolve directly. One app does the whole conform, on the machine next to Resolve. No .konform changes hands.
The editor runs Konformista, builds a .konform package and sends it to the colourist with a link to the free Konformer. The colourist opens it to finish the conform in Resolve, without needing the full app.
When you open Konformista you land on the Project Hub — home base. Every project lives here as a card showing where it is in the handoff.
Across the top is a drop bar that accepts three things, and Konformista figures out which is which: a Premiere project (.prproj) starts a new conform; a .konform opens a package; a grade delivery folder is matched back to bring the grade home.
Each card carries a coloured dot telling you where the project is: grey (not analysed), blue (ready to send), amber (awaiting grade), gold (grade is back), green (graded project written), or red (source not found — right-click to relink).
Click a card to open it. This is where you tell Konformista what to hand off, before you analyse.
A project is the job; a timeline is one thing you conform within it. Each Premiere sequence you bring in becomes its own timeline — analysed, sent and graded independently, all under one project. When a file has several sequences the Add sequences picker lets you choose which become timelines.
List the folders where your footage lives. Konformista searches them and their subfolders to locate every clip.
Optionally supply a flat render of your timeline so the colourist can A/B the conform against your offline. The Media preference dropdown — Auto, Prefer originals, or Prefer proxies — tells Konformista which to conform against when both exist.
Analysis reads your chosen sequence, works out how to rebuild it in Resolve, and flags anything that needs attention. Click Analyse; it scans every clip, transform, retime, transition and audio route against what Resolve can reproduce. Re-run it any time you change the edit or setup.
Results group into categories, each with a count, a severity colour, and an expandable list of affected clips with name, track and timecode. Select a clip for a plain-language explanation.
For each flag you choose: fix it in Premiere and re-analyse, or send as-is and let the flag travel with the package so nothing is forgotten. Analysis only reads your project — it never changes it.
The catalogue, grouped by severity colour. The same guidance appears next to every clip in the app and in the Review window.
Once analysed, the Handoff options unlock. Two ways to hand off:
Add markers, include audio, colour clips by severity, open the Review window after import, and optionally print an issues PDF. Grading-layout options control nested sequences (embedded timelines vs flattened) and whether to collapse tracks for a straight full-frame grade.
If you'll bring the grade back, turn on Premiere Pro roundtrip and pick a delivery codec (ProRes / DNxHR). On the way back only the graded picture is swapped — audio, graphics and other media rebuild from your originals, so keep them on disk.
Turn on Pack trimmed media and the .konform carries only the frames your edit uses, plus handles. On import, Konformer reconstructs normal media next to the package — same names, same timecode, no quality loss.
Konformista is camera-format aware: it trims ProRes, long-GOP H.264/265, MXF, RED (.r3d), Blackmagic (.braw), image sequences (DPX/EXR) and WAV/BWF audio; stills, graphics and anything it can't safely trim ship whole. Handles run from none to 48 frames — 12 is a sensible default.
Leave it off when the colourist is on the same storage and already has the originals, or when you need whole camera files on the far end (to re-edit rather than just grade).
Konformer is the free companion for completing a conform in Resolve. Load a .konform by double-clicking it, dragging it onto the window, or CHOOSE .KONFORM. Pick where it lands (new project or add to the open one), choose what to include, and click Import — it extracts, reconstructs any trimmed media, builds the timeline and imports it.
On Resolve Studio, Konformer imports directly — one click. On Resolve Free (no scripting) it prepares a self-contained package and guides you through File ‣ Import ‣ Timeline. The media is reconstructed first, so it relinks cleanly.
Opened from the always-on-top Tools palette that floats over Resolve, or as standalone apps.
Your checklist during the grade — every flagged clip grouped by issue, with severity filter pills and a progress bar. Click a row to move the Resolve playhead to that clip (Studio), tick REVIEWED as you clear each, and Export CSV for sign-off.
Every media clip with online / offline / mismatch filters. Select offline clips, click Relink Selected, choose a folder, and Apply the confident matches. Batch colours, flags, markers, replace/add-take, and build a VFX pull — all from one action bar.
Kontroller is also home to the Markers, VFX Pull, Timer and Billing tabs, and the pop-out Marker Nav Bar and Timer Bar that float over Resolve. See time & billing →
Kontroller is still being built out during the beta.
A VFX pull gathers the shots you need for a vendor — the source clips under a set of marked ranges, padded with handles, ready to work on. On Kontroller's VFX Pull tab: mark ranges (or seed them from editorial flags), check the clips in the pull, set handles and a vendor profile, and Deliver plates — Konformista trims straight from the originals where it can and renders through Resolve only where it must.
Export a CSV shot list a vendor's tracking system (ShotGrid, ftrack, Nuke Studio) reads directly, with optional per-shot CDL/LUT values travelling beside each plate. The pull writes a small provenance record with the plates, so weeks later each returned comp can be matched to its shot.
When the vendor delivers, the Returns sub-tab matches each returned file to the shot it came from — even after a recut — and places it on a new track above the original. Clean matches arrive pre-ticked; doubtful ones wait for you. An optional Finish Pass writes retimes, sub-frame alignment and animated reframes Resolve can't set live, as a new versioned timeline. Studio only — the VFX tabs drive Resolve directly.
Once the colourist has graded and rendered the shots, Konformista writes a new Premiere project pointing at the graded masters — your exact edit, effects intact, on the colour-corrected picture.
Requires Premiere Pro roundtrip to have been on when the package was built. Only the colour-graded picture is swapped; keep your original audio and graphics on disk.
Kontroller tracks how long you spend on each project, so a conform or grade bills accurately without a separate stopwatch. It records per-project time, tells work from idle, and can start and stop itself as you move around Resolve. Part of the Studio suite and the standalone Kontroller app; a licence without Kontroller doesn't show the timer.
A timer chip sits on the Project Hub and Kontroller — Start when idle; a gold dot, project name, live clock and Stop when running. When Resolve fills the screen, pop out the floating Timer Bar — a frameless strip that stays on top of everything, with a live budget burn under the clock.
The timer auto-pauses after a few minutes of no activity and resumes on its own — with a longer grace on the Colour page (panel grading sends no keystrokes), and it never pauses through a render. Turn on Track automatically and it starts and stops as you open timelines in Resolve. Billable time is time at the desk, minus idle.
Every session lands in the project's time ledger on the Timer tab — with a work/idle breakdown and an activity split (Prep, Conform/Edit, Colour, Fusion, Audio, Render), each editable and individually billable. Day, Week and Months views zoom from a single session to a year of revenue.
Tracked hours become money on Kontroller's Billing tab.
Set an hourly or day rate in your currency, with rounding that matches how a client reads a bill. Override it per project or per activity (colour at one rate, conform at another). Give a project a budget in hours or money and a burn bar fills gold → amber → red as you work — on the Hub, the ledger, and the floating Timer Bar.
Pick a client and/or project, then export: a send-ready branded PDF (with tax, discount and a scan-to-pay QR), or a Generic CSV, Xero and QuickBooks Online import — plus a detailed time sheet for the record. Invoices roll billable sessions into one line per reel, with room for extra lines (a licence, a rush fee).
Exporting an invoice stamps every session it covers, so the next one bills only what's new. Each invoice is recorded with its state — open, overdue or paid — and an outstanding total, so who-owes-what is one glance. Invoicing needs no Resolve connection.
Beta builds aren't code-signed yet. On macOS, right-click the app and choose Open the first time; on Windows, click More info ‣ Run anyway. Restart Resolve after installing so the Tools palette appears.
Live clip navigation needs Resolve Studio running with scripting available. Open Resolve, then click the red status label to retry. On Free the windows still show the flags and lists.
Restart DaVinci Resolve — the palette appears whenever Resolve is running. If collapsed, look for the slim K / tools tab against a screen edge.
No. Most flags are "handled — glance at the result" notes. Only red (Error) items must be fixed before you send. Use the colours to triage.
Use .konform whenever the other end can run Konformer — it carries far more of your edit. Use .xml only as a fallback when they can't.
No, and no. Everything runs locally, and Konformista only ever writes new files — your originals are left untouched.