Shake and OSX 10.5.x ...

[David Nardini]

Had to upgrade from 10.4 to 10.5 ... and as expected Shake rendering has taken a nose dive :sad:
As the app is no longer supported by Apple, can you folk let me know any workarounds ? I cannot be the only one in this boat !!!

Reluctant to start looking elsewhere (AE, Nuke, etc) ... the only other solution is to get a dedicated box and stay on 10.4 ... for just Shake.

Thanks ...

 

[David Nardini]

10.5.x and Shake

10.5.x and Shake

All I have found is the following : http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1101
(not tested yet).

Any other real world work around you are happy to share ?

 

[Mel Matsuoka]

Yes, upgrading to Leopard was like an unprovoked second kick in the nuts for me, as a Shake user. The first kick, of course being the breaking of 10-bit rendering when Final Cut Studio 2 is installed (even on Tiger).

It's unfortunate that the only way to get decent performance under 10.5.x is to cripple Shake's CPU threads, but short of setting up a dual-boot Tiger/Leopard system, there's no real way around it.

For this reason, I'm slowly (and rather painfully) migrating to Nuke...I highly doubt that Apple is going to release a successor to Shake, so as much as I love the app, I'd be stupid not to get up to speed on alternative options.

 

[Nick Shaw]

I know how you both feel. It's the reason I'm still running Tiger on my main edit system.

I have however recently found one plus on the Shake front. I don't know which QuickTime update it happened with, but Shake now reads ProRes and DNxHD files as 10-bit where it previously only saw 8. Also in a supreme irony it is now able to write 10-bit DNxHD files properly, when Apple's own 10 bit codecs still come out as coloured noise! At least I suppose that means that the 10-bit problem can be fixed without a Shake update (which I'm sure none of us expect) but rather with a QuickTime/codec update.

If anybody on this forum has the ear of anybody at Apple, maybe they could suggest they look into exactly what the Avid codecs do differently, with a view to making ProRes and Apple uncompressed work with Shake.
__________________
Nick Shaw
editor/compsitor/Red workflow consultant
London, UK

 

[David Nardini]

Shake & OSX 10.5.x

Shake & OSX 10.5.x

... I don't know which QuickTime update it happened with ...

Can you let us know what QT version your are running ?

I need to test this, BUT for 8 core systems (running 10.5.x) the suggestion is to start Shake with [sys.maxThread=4] ... for the GUI, and for rendering use separate (say 4) command line renders with [-cpus 0] ... by all accounts zero is the fastest setting !!! :w00t:

10bit ProRes HQ output will remain elusive :angry01:

 

[Gunleik Groven]

you can render 10 bit dpx...

 

[JanneJansson]

I also major problems with OSX 10.5. I solved all problems by, just installing 10.4 again.

 

[Tobias Roediger]

Problem is all new machines will only run 10.5 so going back to Tiger on a new purchase isn't an option.

 

[Nick Shaw]

Can you let us know what QT version your are running ?

Running QuickTime 7.5.5 under 10.4.11, but reading of ProRes as 10-bit started before that last QuickTime update.

you can render 10 bit dpx...

Indeed, that is what I am currently doing, and using GlueTools to bring the DPXs into FCP. But if a 4:2:2 ProRes finish is all I need for a particular project, then the extra time and drive space required to go via DPX is a nuisance.

 

[Charles Angus]

I render 16 bit TIFFs out of Shake and batch convert to AJA 10bit 444 in AE. It's stupid, but it works fine...

 

[David Nardini]

Ok, on 8 core Mac : rendering (10.5.x) from the command line seems zippy enough ... I guess I'll just have to get used to it ;-) it's actually much simpler than I had expected, gives me 4 spare threads / jobs running in background while I work in the GUI (which I've now set to run on 4 threads using the simple startup/ui script).

Phiew ... Shake lives on :biggrin:

Now, I think I'll skip using QT (other than a first cut via the proxies) and just stick with DPX's. RubberMonkey + GlueTools may do the trick until Apple get their finger out and support R3D natively (for both FCS2 and Color) ... fingers crossed :matrix: [at the expense of storage space which is manageable for small projects anyway] need to get on a test those now ... fun fun fun :usd:

 

[Jason Badham]

Phiew ... Shake lives on :biggrin:

News from the guinea-pig grapevine is saying that the new FCS 3 is supposed to have the Shake upgrade built-in (called Phenomenon). Hopefully that is true, and hopefully it won't break any old Shake project files...

 

[Chosei Funahara]

I upgraded OS10.5.5, it works better.

 

[Antoine Baumann]

It's unfortunate that the only way to get decent performance under 10.5.x is to cripple Shake's CPU threads, but short of setting up a dual-boot Tiger/Leopard system, there's no real way around it.

For this reason, I'm slowly (and rather painfully) migrating to Nuke...I highly doubt that Apple is going to release a successor to Shake, so as much as I love the app, I'd be stupid not to get up to speed on alternative options.

Haven't play much with Nuke, but if your facility can switch OS, then have a look to Toxic 2008 (or soon 2009). IMHO it is the best desktop compositing package at the moment, and one should really go for the 64bit linux version.

ciao,
antoine "running shake under linux and switching to Toxic" baumann

 

[Christian Berg]

News from the guinea-pig grapevine is saying that the new FCS 3 is supposed to have the Shake upgrade built-in (called Phenomenon). Hopefully that is true, and hopefully it won't break any old Shake project files...

Do you have a link to where this was written? Would like to read it...
Thanks!

 

[David Nardini]

OS X 10.5.5 better ?

OS X 10.5.5 better ?

I upgraded OS10.5.5, it works better.

Could expand on this statement ? HOW exactly is it better ? Details please

EDIT : WOW ... 10.5.5 make a BIG difference ... much faster renedering from the GUI (still keeping max threads to 4 under the globals on an 8-way machine)