How To Get Ready For Dragon Post Workflow

[Niko Pueringer]

I highly recommend against a mac-based setup. PCs offer much more power and software options.

You'll likely want to go with an Adobe workflow, utilizing some beefy GPUs to debayer and render everything in realtime. Set up a RAID 0 SSD configuration on your main system for your media cache, and run your project off a server of RAIDed drives, using at least a gigabit connection.

 

[Blair S. Paulsen]

OP mentioned using the new MacPro when it ships in the fall, which, IMO, changes the equation vs what's available now.

Yes, even after the MacPro hits the streets it will still be possible to build out a bomber PC that's faster. That said, I fully expect the new MacPro to be a serious powerhouse fully capable of being the heart of a 4K post system. The open question at this point is going to be the RedRocket-X performance delta when hosted by a Thunderbolt expansion chassis vs direct mounting in a PC tower.

Cheers - #19

 

[Peter Majtan]

Niko, I guess your head must be in the cloud... ;o)

About RED ROCKETS - what people don't realize is that these cards have different requirements based on the tasks involved.
Here are the most common uses and their TB saturation:

1. Transcoding
- this is the one of the key two tasks (along with grading) that has the potential to utilize full horse power of the cards...
- the limiting factor in most setups (i.e. as DIT on the location) is the HDD's into which you are transcoding to...
- the trend is in any case moving steadily away from the transcoding, which was preferred at the early stages of RED workflow evolution. Theses days most workflows try to keep the data RAW till the grading output...
- affected the most by the TB limits - however this only applies to those with storage sustaining 10Gbps write speeds for TB1 and 20Gbps write speeds for TB2 - which lets face it are only very few amongst us...

2. Grading
- this is the other task that can utilize the full power of the cards...
- just as with transcoding - limiting factor in most cases is the actual storage, so unless you have volumes sustaining 10/20 Gbps (TB1/TB2) - RED ROCKET limitation is your last concern...
- unlike the transcoding (with 100% power draw from RR cards) - grading also involves many other tasks that are handled by the GPUs. This is secondary limiting factor before you can fully utilize RR cards...
- second-most affected by TB - however you must have storage and GPU matched to exceed the TB throughput of the RR feed...

3. Monitoring / Preview
- many use the RR cards to play out (for preview or monitoring) the RAW data onto a display device connected directly to the RR cards...
- the only data throughput required is sending the RAW footage to the RR card - which even at the highest quality 6K Dragon level will not saturate even a USB3 bandwidth - let alone TB1 or TB2
- not at all affected by TB limits

4. Editing
- this is really up to the individual workflow, but I am yet to see any editor actually requiring full 4K/UHD high quality debayer for editing purposes
- having said that - even if the editors insisted on such a quality - this is basically a monitoring situation. So if the main hi-res display is connected to the RR, there is no limit issues with TB1. nor TB2
- if however the preview monitor is connected via cards like BMD / AJA - then the RR needs to send full RGB buffer to them - but here again: why would an editor need full 4K high-quality debayer?!?
- ironically it is the editors who required the RAW data to be transcoded in the first place into a low res proxies for ease of editing, so editors will be fine working with 1/2 or even 1/4 res quick debayer, which the RRs will easily sustain over both TB1 and TB2...
- can be limited by TB1/TB2, but only if the editor insists on watching 4K full debayer on a device connected via 3-rd party cards (not RR's), so in another words - not an issue...

So what is the conclusion?

Worry first about the No.1 bottleneck in our workflows - your main media storage device. I would dare to guess that less then 3% of the people involved in the RED postproduction actually have storage capable saturating TB1 and TB2 - and these folks usually have a purpose build turnkey system towers with two or more RR's built directly in. These are the folks that will not be interested in the new Mac Pro...
For the 97% (the rest of us) the issues surrounding RED ROCKET limitations over TB1 or TB2 are largely academic, until we can have large capacity RAID-protected storage sustaining 20+ Gbps throughput...

Just my two yen...

:sifone: Peter

 

[Maz Mawlawi]

Niko, I guess your head must be in the cloud... ;o)

About RED ROCKETS - what people don't realize is that these cards have different requirements based on the tasks involved.
Here are the most common uses and their TB saturation:

.
- the trend is in any case moving steadily away from the transcoding, which was preferred at the early stages of RED workflow evolution. Theses days most workflows try to keep the data RAW till the grading output...
- affected the most by the TB limits - however this only applies to those with storage sustaining 10Gbps write speeds for TB1 and 20Gbps write speeds for TB2 - which lets face it are only very few amongst us...


:sifone: Peter

I wish this was true....but every national commercial shot I have been on in the U.S required the DIT to transcode all R3d files on set and they end up using the Prores files for their edit and final output and never touch the raw files. So unfortunately Transcoding is still a very necessary and expected service for those big clients.
Having said that we mainly used PC hackintoshes on set as they are much faster and cheaper than current Macpro offerings. (We keep a "real" Macpro as a backup with us just in case)

 

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Here's how I'm getting ready:

Kick back, relax...

Watch a bit of TV..

Go play with my current EPIC-MX cameras, computers, etc..

Deal with the Dragon when it arrives.


Oh, I have a couple Rocket-X cards coming too. Not even sure which systems I'll put them in. You know, new Xeon chips should start shipping shortly after Dragon. I'm not going to stress over any of this just yet. Trying to make assumptions over the little tidbits we've seen so far and relate it to computer hardware that is in the process of being obsoleted, seems silly to me. OTOH, look what Mark Toia was able to crank out with just a couple days with Dragon and he doesn't have anything special in terms of massive computer hardware. In other words, nothing to worry about here.

 

[Phil Holland]

Here's how I'm getting ready:

Kick back, relax...

Watch a bit of TV..

Go play with my current EPIC-MX cameras, computers, etc..

Deal with the Dragon when it arrives.


Oh, I have a couple Rocket-X cards coming too. Not even sure which systems I'll put them in. You know, new Xeon chips should start shipping shortly after Dragon. I'm not going to stress over any of this just yet. Trying to make assumptions over the little tidbits we've seen so far and relate it to computer hardware that is in the process of being obsoleted, seems silly to me. OTOH, look what Mark Toia was able to crank out with just a couple days with Dragon and he doesn't have anything special in terms of massive computer hardware. In other words, nothing to worry about here.

Yep. Same mindset now, and that's after researching a whole bunch of options. I've found a calm known that Dragon and a bunch new CPU stuff is on the horizon. Only thing that was pretty much a must buy was a new GPU for my edit and color system here at home. Went with the Titan mostly because of Resolve 10 coming.

 

[Peter Majtan]

I wish this was true....but every national commercial shot I have been on in the U.S required the DIT to transcode all R3d files on set and they end up using the Prores files for their edit and final output and never touch the raw files. So unfortunately Transcoding is still a very necessary and expected service for those big clients.
Having said that we mainly used PC hackintoshes on set as they are much faster and cheaper than current Macpro offerings. (We keep a "real" Macpro as a backup with us just in case)

Maz - I did say the trend is moving away from transcoding. Yes, indeed, transcoding will be required for some time. The point here is however - how does the TB1/TB2 limits transcoding. And unless you have a storage that saturates the two standards - the answer is "not at all" - and you will see the same performance from an RR over TB...

:sifone: Peter

 

[Noah Yuan-Vogel]

1. Transcoding
- this is the one of the key two tasks (along with grading) that has the potential to utilize full horse power of the cards...
- the limiting factor in most setups (i.e. as DIT on the location) is the HDD's into which you are transcoding to...
- the trend is in any case moving steadily away from the transcoding, which was preferred at the early stages of RED workflow evolution. Theses days most workflows try to keep the data RAW till the grading output...
- affected the most by the TB limits - however this only applies to those with storage sustaining 10Gbps write speeds for TB1 and 20Gbps write speeds for TB2 - which lets face it are only very few amongst us...

Are you assuming a workflow transcoding to uncompressed RGB? Seems like with processing 6K RAW and transcoding it to compressed formats like Prores that take most of the strain off of the storage devices, the bottleneck would quickly become the RR card or the bus it's running on.