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11-01-2010, 08:09 PM
I'm new to video editing, and as a teacher I can get Smoke for Mac free, or CS5 Master collection for $90. I do not own a mac pro yet, but I am just as happy to build a PC and overclock.
Which is the best path to follow down ...
1. Smoke for mac, plus buy a mac pro.
2. Premiere Pro CS5 (included in Master Collection), and buid a pc and oc.
?
11-01-2010, 11:59 PM
They are very different applications. If you don't know either of them and sometimes work with other formats than R3D, I'd go CS5, it's more flexible.
Plus, CS5 is available for Mac and PC, so why don't you try both? There's a one month demo for CS5, albeit limited in codec choices.
11-02-2010, 12:18 AM
Oakley's Video dept. is almost all transfered to Smoke on Mac now. It is a large bandwith change, larger pipes for R3D, and a steep learning curve from FCP. In their enviroment, multi user, and deadline driven, CS5 did not seem practical. But it it is a multi-user scenario. Very intensive SAN attentention. Going pretty well from what I hear.
Last edited by Brian Ferguson; 11-02-2010 at 12:19 AM. Reason: punctuation
11-02-2010, 02:10 AM
We use both, Smoke on Mac and CS5 (Windows and OSX).
This is my take:
Adobe created with the freshly released CS5 package a great tool kit that is very versatile and surprisingly stable. To accomplish complicate tasks such as vfx you have to switch the applications from Premier Pro to Aftereffects. Premier Pro swallows R3Ds and plays them back in 1/4 to 1/2 depending on your systems CPU power. Shooting 4KHD debayered half delivers very good 1080p. For many projects this may be good enough leading to the fact that Premier Pro CS5 can deliver Red based project with no transcoding involved. This is huge.
We are running CS5 primarily on a HP z800 with a 5800fx SDI which is Cuda enabled and allows many RT effects within Premier Pro. Premier Pro's effects are varying very much in terms of quality and usability. You immediately feel that Premier Pro is aimed for a broad customer base. But with the implementation of TC audio sync, EDL, AAF and XML support you can also clearly see that Adobe is looking at the classic Avid user.
If you buy CineForm you have a very good codec on Windows which is on par or better than ProRes or DNxHD. This way you are sure that your projects are done technically on a very high level.
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Smoke on Mac on the other hand is a very different beast. It's an NLE of course but much more a finishing application for the high-end market. It's tool set is very rich, containing a layer and node based 3D compositior (Action), paint tool, text tool, 2 colour correction tools, motion estimation based time warper and last but not least an excellent keyer (Modular Keyer) which is node based. Even Smoke's sound tools are better than that what you find in other NLEs. For the most tasks you don't have to leave Smoke.
Smoke also has very powerful conforming tools, loves LUTs and whatnot and has no gamma and colour shifts due to the fact that it internally is DPX based which leads to the need of fast and huge Raids.
Smoke's learning curve is steep and the handling cannot be compared to any other NLE. I'm pretty familiar with FCP, Avid, Premier Pro and applications such as Shake and found Smoke to be the most demanding piece of software I ever met. But then it's also the most powerful.
Smoke eats disk space by the shovel load. I did a 15 minute green screen based project with many Action set ups and ended up when archiving by 4.5 TB - without the soft imported R3Ds. Go figure!
Like Premier Pro Smoke on Mac likes R3Ds. You can work with 1/4 resolution in RT, maybe 1/2 does work but my MacPro with its 5600fx is from 2008 and out dated. You can edit with 1/4 in Smoke and then do a fresh import with a full transcode into Smoke's stone (hard import) and conform the timeline.
To leverage Smoke's potential you need expensive Hardware such as a big and fast Raid, a Wacom A3 board, a very good 24" Screen such as an Eizo Color Edge or a HP Dreamcolor, AJA Kona3 for SDI monitoring and a Nvidia 4800fx plus the MacPro. Altogether you can easily reach 25k on hardware only.
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We use both applications because they work nicely together and have their individual strengths. For TVCs and cinema commercials Smoke is the preferred tool, for documentaries Premier Pro does a great job. But now that I'm quite familiar with Smoke I'm finishing a 40 min doc film with Smoke.
My advise for the beginner would be to start off with CS5 and later, when the demand is there, invest into Smoke on Mac.
Hans
11-02-2010, 04:02 AM
Thankyou for a range of very comprehensive answers.
I think I'll start with CS5, build the pc, buy two good monitors, and spend the rest on the camera.
Thankyou.
11-02-2010, 02:30 PM
You are a Teacher I highly suggest you get both smoke on the Mac and CS5. I'm serious. If and when you master Smoke, every other NLE/vfx conform tool will be easy to use. It is extremely difficult to learn, but if you can get it for free, take full advantage. You will not regret it.Originally Posted by adam r
obviously you will need a Mac pro. Having CS5 and Smoke on your mac will be the best investment you ever made.
11-02-2010, 03:39 PM
We use both applications because they work nicely together and have their individual strengths. For TVCs and cinema commercials Smoke is the preferred tool, for documentaries Premier Pro does a great job. But now that I'm quite familiar with Smoke I'm finishing a 40 min doc film with Smoke.
My advise for the beginner would be to start off with CS5 and later, when the demand is there, invest into Smoke on Mac.
Hans
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Hans von Sonntag
www.hubbertvonsonntag.com
Hans, thanks for your information on Smoke. Do you color grade with Smoke or do it elsewhere, dpx and finish in smoke? Lim
11-02-2010, 04:20 PM
Smoke is much better for client attended finishing sessions.. not having to jump back and forth between applications is great, and of course, Smoke just impresses people with it's unfamiliar UI. :p
If you're simply teaching people the basics of editorial/finishing.. CS5 is great.
But I think you'll find knowing and owning Smoke (especially if you can get it for free) to be worth while!
11-03-2010, 01:35 AM
I've been part-time teaching in a university and know that it's not this easy to get a fully working license of ANY filmmaking software, let alone a "medium iron" like Smoke on the Mac which is, when you buy it, a valuable investment and not an 1k NLE. This said, if there is a legal possibility to safe money, why not?
I thinks it's a bit exaggerated to say that Smoke is "extremely difficult to learn". It's different to other NLEs, has a broad toolset to wade through and a old fashioned UNICX GUI with tons of buttons. But it also comes with a comprehensive manual, plus there are very good tutorials on the AREA (http://www.the-area.com/blogs) that will help you get along with your projects.
Not neccesarily. You're implying that Smoke on the Mac is the best NLE which it surely is not. It's an NLE on steroids in a way but its workflow is time consuming when it comes to organizing footage, you cannot drag'n drop from the desktop, you have to split the libraries in handy parts otherwise the appliciation can become sticky, trained talent is rare and when available then expensive and so on.
Also, as said above, it produces TBs and TBs of DPX when rendering VXF and this costs a lot of space, which again costs quite an amount of money.
For many tasks I would prefer CS5, FCP or AVID MC.
Hans
11-03-2010, 01:59 AM
Lim, Smoke is not a grading application, IMHO. But it depends how you define a grading application. For me a grading application can manipulate in RT primary colours and secondaries, be it power windows or keys plus some interesting plugins. Smoke has with its Colour Corrector and Colour Warper two powerful tools that use different algorithms but they are more aimed towards problems in compositing such as white balancing and colour matching than creative look creation.
But, of course, you can accomplish a lot in this regard, much more than in any other NLE. It's just not RT and you may need to build a multi layer timeline for vignettes, power windows, etc...
Actually, AFAIK, AVID's Mc Colour is now supported for Smoke on the Mac, go figure. Perhaps with additional tools it will become in the not too distant future also a grading application...?
I grade my projects in SpeedGrade and, depending on the project's size and delivery target, either use DPX and ProRes files for conform in Smoke.
Hans
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