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Scratch vs Pablo

gbalaji

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To Scratch Team,

I was told by a Post house that Scratch is limited for DI.

"Scratch is not accurate in Red dynamic Color Range. The Color precision, control and UI of Scratch's color Matrix is extremely limiting for high quality feature. Ability to qualify color lift, gamma and gain in image is very poor Scratch can't even display image in full resolution at a full debayer quality. You can only review your work in lower debayered qualities, not full. "


Expecting clarifications from Assimilate on this issue. I don't need the price comparison and expecting only the quality output of the image.
 
Yes, it can display the full 4k! Just like Redcine can. I'll let Lucas fill in the rest of the rebuttal, but both Scratch and Pablo are great products - there's no need to bas one or the other.

Graeme
 
To Scratch Team,

I was told by a Post house that Scratch is limited for DI.

"Scratch is not accurate in Red dynamic Color Range. The Color precision, control and UI of Scratch's color Matrix is extremely limiting for high quality feature. Ability to qualify color lift, gamma and gain in image is very poor Scratch can't even display image in full resolution at a full debayer quality. You can only review your work in lower debayered qualities, not full. "


Expecting clarifications from Assimilate on this issue. I don't need the price comparison and expecting only the quality output of the image.

I don't even know where to begin, except that I believe it is all very wrong.

All I think I really need to say to justify this...

"Che" was graded, and the final output was done on SCRATCH.

"Journey to the Center of the Earth" was graded in Stereo on SCRATCH.

I could go on, but those are two good recent examples. But, there are many features that have been graded on SCRATCH and released to a wide audience.

Soderbergh and his team did not seem to find it limiting, nor did Erik Brevig and the Journey team.

Best,

Lucas
------
ASSIMILATE, inc.
LA, CA, USA
 
I saw "Journey to The Center Of the Earth" It looked all-pro to me.

G.Balaji just try out the two different systems and you be the judge. I will say that the guy you spoke of loses my respect when he tries to elevate his product by slamming someone else's.

Jay
 
To Scratch Team,

I was told by a Post house that Scratch is limited for DI.

"Scratch is not accurate in Red dynamic Color Range. The Color precision, control and UI of Scratch's color Matrix is extremely limiting for high quality feature. Ability to qualify color lift, gamma and gain in image is very poor Scratch can't even display image in full resolution at a full debayer quality. You can only review your work in lower debayered qualities, not full. "

Sounds to me like the post house in question has and uses a Pablo, and wanted to convince you of its superiority by using terminology and specific references that you are not likely to understand, at least not from experience. There is no magic to a color corrector, all color correction systems use mathematical transforms, most of them use very similar ones. If they really want to sell you on Pablo, they should be talking about the things that DO differentiate it from a system like Scratch, such as a multilayer time line, integrated effects capabilities, much more comprehensive editing abilities, faster/better tracking, real time 4K playout/delivery, ability to take in AAF's, superior control panel availability, and some other things. Anything else is window dressing and colorist-friendly features, which shouldn't mean much to you unless you're the one operating it.
 
umm... not actually my concern but it seems like a really poor argument. Here we have been doing our CC and Finish with SCRATCH with all sorts of formats and projects and it always worked fine (full highres realtime, etc) i just dont see the point of a comment like that. ive never used a Pablo but hey... different softwares, different capabilities.
gbalaji, from my experience SCRATCH works great. I recomend you to try it and see it for yourself.
 
I agree with Mike - they are probably a Pablo based post facility and want to convince you that spending money at their facility is the best decision.

While Pablo is a fantastic system, so is Scratch, and the arguments you've listed that the post facility told you don't point out Pablo's differences/advantages, since in terms of color grading there is no significant difference.

Scratch's color tools are world class, it processes internally in floating point precision. I use it every day, just about, and would put it up against any other system out there in terms of its grading output.

regards,

John T.
 
Soderbergh and his team did not seem to find it limiting, nor did Erik Brevig and the Journey team.

LA, CA, USA

the guy from technicolor had a slightly different point of view in amsterdam, anyway this was 6 months ago....means generations away in red time.

scratch is still a great tool
 
Never used either. But I can say that I've only read Lucas speaking respectfully about the competition.

Pointing out differeneces? Sure, but ALWAYS with class and respect. THAT HAS TO COUNT FOR SOMETHING. It SURELY speaks well of Assimilate.
 
Never used either. But I can say that I've only read Lucas speaking respectfully about the competition.

Pointing out differeneces? Sure, but ALWAYS with class and respect. THAT HAS TO COUNT FOR SOMETHING. It SURELY speaks well of Assimilate.

true...lucas never bashed other companys, why should he....his product is good
 
Does anyone know if Apple's Color also uses floating point calculations for precise color correction? Can it compare to both Pablo and Scratch in terms of color manipulation abilities (without taking into consideration features)?
 
Even if Color did better CC, most people would still prefer one of those options, just because of stability and reliability.

But yes, Color can do internal processing in float. I still find it can "lose" information between rooms, though.

Thanks for the answer. I find it interesting that you say Color can loose information between rooms. I didn't know this.
 
So does Pablo have better colour precision than Scratch? that was the main thing there seem to have been suggesting.

Heard it was these guys

http://www.plastercitypost.com

SCRATCH does everything in 32-bit float, so if that's what you mean by "precision," then I think 32-bit float is enough. ;)

I doubt it was Plaster City putting down SCRATCH, since they own a Pablo... and several SCRATCH systems.

Lucas
------
ASSIMILATE, inc.
LA, CA, USA
 
Both is good

Both is good

For what its worth we have both....each has its place.

Bang for buck SCRATCH is very hard to beat...it is fast efficient and technically very good. We have only had ours for a short time but have been impressed with its capabilties.

Pablo is an exceptional box also. It is a very refined product which deals with anything we can throw at it with ease. Being an ex Q guy I have always liked the way it works and the fact that it deals with multiple formats in a very efficient fashion.

We generally use Pablo for the "hero" grades because of the more complete toolset, but it would be a struggle to find a more cost effective One light or Best Light system than SCRATCH.

Michael
 
So does Pablo have better colour precision than Scratch? that was the main thing there seem to have been suggesting.

Heard it was these guys

http://www.plastercitypost.com

SCRATCH does everything in 32-bit float, so if that's what you mean by "precision," then I think 32-bit float is enough. ;)

I doubt it was Plaster City putting down SCRATCH, since they own a Pablo... and several SCRATCH systems.

Lucas
------
ASSIMILATE, inc.
LA, CA, USA


To be fair I also "heard" something similar. It was not a slam of Scratch but that Pablo offered a more "precise" color grading space. I would expect that with the cost differences that there would be some differences.

I know this is going to be a can of worms though. I would love to hear specifics as to what this person/persons believes Scratch needs to bring it up to the same level. Not things like Luki is cool, or "they probably have a chip on their shoulder". Real color grading specifics.

Unfortunately politics may keep some parties quiet...

Edited to be as impartial as one can possibly be and not get into trouble!
 
I don't think you should assume that the higher priced products give better output quality. Case in point: the Da Vinci 2K costs more than Scratch and can't do spline-based windows (or motion tracking)... yet there are workflow reasons why its price is justified (but then again, it depends on the workflow that is ideal to what the facility is doing). And then on the flipside, the Da Vinci products can do a lot of layers of defocus (e.g. to defocus/blur the crap out of your keys to deal with noise)... while some other DI systems struggle to do 1/2 layers of that (EDIT: I'm not sure how Scratch fares in this area).

2- You've probably seen great looking movies from (practically) all of the products out there... there's lots of Hollywood feature films graded on the 2k, Resolve, Pogle, Lustre, iQ, etc. etc. etc.
 
To be fair I also "heard" something similar. It was not a slam of Scratch but that Pablo offered a more "precise" color grading space. I would expect that with the cost differences that there would be some differences.

I know this is going to be a can of worms though. I would love to hear specifics as to what this person/persons believes Scratch needs to bring it up to the same level. Not things like Luki is cool, or "they probably have a chip on their shoulder". Real color grading specifics.

Unfortunately politics may keep some parties quiet...

Edited to be as impartial as one can possibly be and not get into trouble!

I have zero issues with discussing products and pros/cons. I just want to know what the heck a "precise" color space is.

:)

Lucas
 
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