DRAGON debayer options - Red Rocket-X hardware versus RCX-P software only

[Neil W. Smith]

Phil kindly gave us permission to take some of his .r3ds from 'It's Only Paint' through Red Rocket-X and compare the results to a software only debayer.

So this i what I did:

1) downloaded the five x 3 second .r3d clips from Phil's Vimeo account

2) put the five clips into RCX-P b.21 and applied RedGamma3 and RedColor3 to all five clips ... no other adjustments made

3) rendered out FULL debayer using RR-X

4) clicked off the Rocket button and rendered out FULL debayer using software only

No other differences between the two renders apart from the watermark to identify which is which.

Check these out and let me know what differences you see .. please don't apply any "artistic improvements" ... just look at the images as they on the best screen/monitor you have and see what you can see:

First version = FULL debayer using Red Rocket-X .... second version = FULL debayer using RC-P software only:

SPOILER - I'll post some of my prelim findings in the post below - don't read them until you've looked at the images first and come to your own conclusions.

Neil

 

[Neil W. Smith]

Preliminary thoughts on RR-X versus software only

Preliminary thoughts on RR-X versus software only

Looking at the images closely on a Sony BVM grading monitor I've come to the following initial conclusions:

1) the image rendering quality of the RR-X card is way better than the old RR card - way better!

2) on wide shots and mediums it's quite hard to see any significant difference in image quality between hardware and software potions - they're both great ... that might change on a large screen with a 4K projector

3) on the close-ups is where you see the real difference and here is where the RR-X card takes the lead .... you see more detail in the fine hair around the model's head and eyes.

So in terms of Overall Image Quality it's a close race but in the fine detail on CUs Red Rocket-X comes out ahead.

But this is where it gets interesting:

3) SPEED of renders! .... both for final renders and for checking out different options at FULL debayer ... no comparison ... if you have the need for speed, Red Rocket-X is the way to go (and I was running the software only renders on a beefy Mac Pro with a TITAN in the expansion chassis).

Here's the numbers:

RR-X FULL debayer of 5 x 3 second clips took 1 minute 52 seconds

RCX-P software only FULL debayer took 7 minutes 7 seconds

The other interesting thing is that the files rendered out by RR-X are all slightly larger than the software only versions ..... so maybe that's were the extra detail is coming from.

Overall, very impressed with what RED have achieved with new Red Rocket-X card .... if you're shooting DRAGON you should have one of this in your system. Even EPIC 5K processing benefits from the quality and speed of the RR-X.

Attached are some pixs taken with my iPhone showing the Stop Watch on my iPad and Phil's clips in RCX-P.

Neil

 

[Matt Ryan]

Hey Neil, the embed codes looks a bit messed up. Only the first video is showing.

 

[Neil W. Smith]

To sharpen or not to sharpen - that is the question ....

To sharpen or not to sharpen - that is the question ....

The other thing that's struck me while grading the .r3ds from Phil and Ketch's shoots is this - do we need to sharpen DRAGON footage in the final pass? ... we'd typically do that on EPIC and RED-MX shows but now I'm not so sure. Really like the look and the "feel' of the skin tones in DRAGON without any sharpening applied. The extra resolution gives such a delicate texture and granularity to the skin that I kinda think that leaving sharpening off is the way to go for certain looks.

When you assess the images above bear in mind that no sharpening has been applied ... if you have a decent monitor look closely at the texture of the two women's faces ... really quite pleasing.

Phil and Ketch, what's your view on the matter?

Neil

 

[Johnny Friday]

Neil, very interesting find and information. NOW, what about renders out of FCPx?
With a RR-x card
Without a RR-x card

.....this would be quite interesting to know if the detail issue that you mentioned will be better in FCPx with a RR-x card or the same if software debayer only....Basically how does using a RR card or RR-x card or NO card and FCPx affect the outputted file?

OR---do you get better exports out of RCX pro with rocket-x VS FCPx with/without card?
where would one benefit from the finer detail with the RR-x card and RCXpro.....---straight transcode, then drop in FCPx?

Thanks for your findings Neil,

 

[joe hedge]

Am I to understand that a 15 second full-res debayer from 6k, at the 17:1 compression Phil used, took 1:52 with a RR-X card?

 

[Phil Holland]

The other thing that's struck me while grading the .r3ds from Phil and Ketch's shoots is this - do we need to sharpen DRAGON footage in the final pass?

Phil and Ketch, what's your view on the matter?

I just made this post regarding sharpening and finishing.

For me personally it really depends on what you want your final image to look like. We're talking "end of the road" processing here really.

If you want razor sharp that's an option, the samples I uploaded above aren't pushed that far though. Personally I think depending on the aesthetic of the motion picture you may want to not sharpen at all. I've come up with several variations on how to sharpen 6K between different workflows. They all produce a slightly different look and texture to the image.

In my mind since there is so much flexibility in the "final draw" it's really going to be something that needs to be worked out on a case by case basis depending on the filmmakers, post folks, and project.

Might even be something to work out on a shot by shot basis if we're talking something like a wide shot on a field of flowers and then cutting to an extreme close up on a face.

Just depends.

 

[Eric Haase]

Am I to understand that a 15 second full-res debayer from 6k, at the 17:1 compression Phil used, took 1:52 with a RR-X card?

Yeah this is what I am really surprised at if this is true. I;'m REALLY hoping there was some kind of other bottleneck. How do we go from near realtime transcoding of MX material with the old rocket to 2.5x realtime with RR-X which is supposed to be 3-5 times faster? I know it's 6K so a lot more information but I thought the new rocket would make up for it and at least put us back to realtime.

 

[Neil W. Smith]

I just made this post regarding sharpening and finishing.

For me personally it really depends on what you want your final image to look like. We're talking "end of the road" processing here really.

If you want razor sharp that's an option, the samples I uploaded above aren't pushed that far though. Personally I think depending on the aesthetic of the motion picture you may want to not sharpen at all. I've come up with several variations on how to sharpen 6K between different workflows. They all produce a slightly different look and texture to the image.

In my mind since there is so much flexibility in the "final draw" it's really going to be something that needs to be worked out on a case by case basis depending on the filmmakers, post folks, and project.

Might even be something to work out on a shot by shot basis if we're talking something like a wide shot on a field of flowers and then cutting to an extreme close up on a face.

Just depends.

Great reply, Phil ... sorry I didn't see the posting on your thread but it looks like you were were already thinking about the same question ... and agree, the choice now with DRAGON is very much in the hands of the Director or DP to make at the last second when they go for final renders ... the point being that whereas with Red-MX and the old Rocket card you'd invariably go for sharpening you can now check things out quickly with RR-X and see what works best for the story line and the "look" you're going for - on a shot by shot basis.

The other interesting thing that RR-X allows is the ability to work at FULL debayer quickly and efficiently ... so if you want to see exactly what's in the shot, click on FULL and play back from the Timeline or render out the clip you want to look at closely.

I think the new mantra of LumaForge will be "waiting is not an option" ... let us provide you with the systems that allow you to work at the speed of creativity!

Cheers,
Neil

 

[Matt Ryan]

Video's are still not showing up....

What was your export settings because I get better than realtime on 5K MX footage now with RR? How come it's slower with RR-x? Is it in an external enclosure?

 

[Ketch Rossi]

The other thing that's struck me while grading the .r3ds from Phil and Ketch's shoots is this - do we need to sharpen DRAGON footage in the final pass? ... we'd typically do that on EPIC and RED-MX shows but now I'm not so sure. Really like the look and the "feel' of the skin tones in DRAGON without any sharpening applied. The extra resolution gives such a delicate texture and granularity to the skin that I kinda think that leaving sharpening off is the way to go for certain looks.

When you assess the images above bear in mind that no sharpening has been applied ... if you have a decent monitor look closely at the texture of the two women's faces ... really quite pleasing.

Phil and Ketch, what's your view on the matter?

Neil

Interesting tests indeed Neil.


As far as Sharpening for me has always came in two flavors, "Pre" sharpening and "POST" sharpening, meaning that I usually apply a small amount of global sharpening before I begin working on the images, and then one last pass of sharpening right before I go to render out what ever format needed, and this last "POST" sharpening amount depends entirely by what this images are to be used for, and also this last one is usually not applied globally, at list not on Human subjects, and especially not on Female subjects.

There are very specific reasons for the need to sharpen images, and most of this is do to the type of "Compression" algorithms used by various sites, which each use their own, deepening on bandwidth and load of the image they are wiling to carry.

There is also sharpening needed when you go to print, as you must keep in mind the material you will print your images to, Rag, Canvas, Glossy, Glass, Metal etc.

However form my Photography days to the Red Epic MX, I have transitioned smoothly in to a different workflow, were I spend more time choosing the right image, then working on it in Photoshop.

This is do to various reasons, which since this is a question about sharpness and I'll not get in those, but I will say that now with Dragon, I see even less need to work on the images i Photoshop, and what ever I apply is done so in minimum amounts, which results in more natural skin and overall look.

This is of course me talking about Frame Pulling for a Still image workflow.

If I have to voice my opinion for actual Motion Image processing, then I'll say that the list you do the best with Dragon, as we have seen with "The RED dress" images, were we simply left RCX-Pro with absolute zeroed out RedLogFilm files.

I think that we'll continue to see people talking about too much resolution more then ever here, and ail want to use filters and so on, but I instead will go on saying that the more resolution and detail the better, yet again it is also about final destination and material at hand, I see some Film purists wanting a not so sharp look, were they'll add some Grain or filmic effects, the use of various filters, both in Production and in Post, were Docu-filmmakers will absolutely rejoice at the Dragon's resolution, and so will Photographers turned to the Epic like my self, were the more you have the better, and not only for Print, of course there is SO very much more then just that, but we are talking about resolution and sharpness here so this is what I have to say about that in particular.

 

[Phil Holland]

Video's are still not showing up....

Forgot I was a moderator there for a second! Neil I cleaned up your embedded video code.

 

[Neil W. Smith]

embedding Vimeo clips?

embedding Vimeo clips?

Forgot I was a moderator there for a second! Neil I cleaned up your embedded video code.

Thanks mate ... I've got another pair of your clips to insert from Vimeo... keep an eye on them.

What was I doing wrong?

Neil

 

[Phil Holland]

Thanks mate ... I've got another pair of your clips to insert from Vimeo... keep an eye on them.

What was I doing wrong?

Anytime. You don't use the "embed code" from Vimeo when posting a video. Just copy the URL from the browser and click the "Insert Video" button when making a post.

 

[Neil W. Smith]

Anytime. You don't use the "embed code" from Vimeo when posting a video. Just copy the URL from the browser and click the "Insert Video" button when making a post.

This is why they pay you the big bucks, Phil

Will go back and fix.

Already done I see - thanks ... one other question re Vimeo .... on several occasions of trying to upload the rendered 'PAINT' clips up to Vimeo I've gotten the message saying something like 'Ooops - this is not a video file please try again' .... just happened now when I tried to upload both balcony shots ... last time I tried both were rejected now only one of them .... any idea what that's about? ... I was hoping to be able to upload five at a time but it's never worked out.

BTW, you're more than welcome to come over to The Lot and have a play with the RR-X card ... if you still have all your .r3ds from the PAINT shoot bring them over as well

Neil

 

[Tyson Benard]

Am I the only one that can't fullscreen any embedded vimeo videos on reduser? They all play just fine, but I can never get them to go fullscreen, so I can't see any differences.

 

[Axel Mertes]

Phil kindly gave us permission to take some of his .r3ds from 'It's Only Paint' through Red Rocket-X and compare the results to a software only debayer.

So this i what I did:

1) downloaded the five x 3 second .r3d clips from Phil's Vimeo account

2) put the five clips into RCX-P b.21 and applied RedGamma3 and RedColor3 to all five clips ... no other adjustments made

3) rendered out FULL debayer using RR-X

4) clicked off the Rocket button and rendered out FULL debayer using software only

No other differences between the two renders apart from the watermark to identify which is which.

Check these out and let me know what differences you see .. please don't apply any "artistic improvements" ... just look at the images as they on the best screen/monitor you have and see what you can see:

First version = FULL debayer using Red Rocket-X .... second version = FULL debayer using RC-P software only:

[snip the videos]


SPOILER - I'll post some of my prelim findings in the post below - don't read them until you've looked at the images first and come to your own conclusions.

Neil

Neil,

can you share a TIFF 16 bit uncompressed file (1 frame is enough, perhaps 1 frame from each clip) from both the REDROCKET-X and the software deBayered results in full 6K resolution, so two files per clip?
This would allow better to understand the quality of both deBayer approaches.

Thank in advance,

Axel

 

[Neil W. Smith]

6K playback in Vimeo?

6K playback in Vimeo?

Neil,

can you share a TIFF 16 bit uncompressed file (1 frame is enough, perhaps 1 frame from each clip) from both the REDROCKET-X and the software deBayered results in full 6K resolution, so two files per clip?
This would allow better to understand the quality of both deBayer approaches.

Thank in advance,

Axel

Good idea, Axel ... I'll do that in the morning when I get to the Lab .... I did render out 6K ProRes4444 QuickTimes from the DRAGON .r3ds but I think Vimeo is only allowing HD playback.

Phil, is there any way to change playback resolution in Vimeo like there is 4K YouTube?

Neil

 

[Phil Holland]

Sadly. Vimeo doesn't support 4K yet. You just get what they consider SD and HD are. UHD should happen before the year is our for Pro members.

 

[Les Dittert]

Or to save transfer times, crop in on some details and post TIFs of that. A 1K image would be fine.
I am also interested in the MX sensor debayer, and if it looks different.
Q: Who will post the first MX vs Dragon image compare of the same scene with same lens ? Me thinks Phil. Phil was allowed to post Dragon R3D's , thanks for the almost immediate followup !

Neil,

can you share a TIFF 16 bit uncompressed file (1 frame is enough, perhaps 1 frame from each clip) from both the REDROCKET-X and the software deBayered results in full 6K resolution, so two files per clip?
This would allow better to understand the quality of both deBayer approaches.

Thank in advance,

Axel