Conversion ***SLOW***, doesn´t recognize fps

[thomas erichsen]

hey, I just started to sync audio to my finally imported 5 hours of footage, shot on red one. it took me 80!!! hours to convert it via redcine on a decent xp pro computer running avid like a charm. only to find now that the audio won´t sync. no way. the fps redcine gave me on transcoding is 24, and i thought there should be some metadata saving fps, so i figured 24 would be correct. now i had the producer call the camera assistant, telling me the footage was shot on 25 fps? where´s the point of metadata then? yes i could have asked in advance.

could redcine please be a little faster? like, umm, maybe more than .3 fps? i would accept an even draftier look. this is a no-budget project and i haven´t got the money to buy me a renderfarm, i am simply the editor. now where´s the upside of a cheap camera if the workflow sucks majorly? thinking of p2...
i recently worked with arri D21: shoot, load, edit. like that. we shot 3 h footage on hdcam sr, and edited 3 days. all in all, shooting and editing simultaneously, production time 4-5 days. with red, shoot 5 hours, transcode 80 hours, import 12 hours, start editing. huh?


:head_explode::head_explode::head_explode:

 

[Ed Watkins]

hey, I just started to sync audio to my finally imported 5 hours of footage, shot on red one. it took me 80!!!... etc.....:

I feel bad that you had a poor experience with RED footage, but:

The RED one is a 4K camera, that means transcoding on a standard desktop computer will take time.The format has a lot of advantages over traditional HD, no least the resolution, re-framing, and color correcting latitude. It sounds like you haven't researched your RED work flow, and are surprised when you have issues. This really bugs me.

There are plenty of work flows that don't require you to 'online' all of your rough footage. Adobe and Final Cut can both work with 'offline' proxies or lower resolution debayers. As for Avid, I can't speak for the ease of that workflow.

Also, REDCINE has a bunch of settings all of which affect the render time, there are options for draft, standard, and high quality de-bayering. Depending on how you set up your render your time could vary hugely.

I have never once on-lined all my dailies to edit, I either create lower resolution offlines or use the proxy files.

Simply import the footage, or proxies, to FCP or Premier. Cut the sound synced offline. Then online your timeline through Adobe Premier, or Crimson/REDCINE, or Monkey Extract, or ClipFinder... it is quick and easy.

That way you only transcode what you need (plus handles).

 

[Zakaree Sandberg]

unfortunately RED is not a prosumer camera.. and must have power behind it on the computer end to make things work right

 

[hunterrichards]

Zakaree- way to go with the elitist comments. The D21 isn't a prosumer camera at all- yet I could cut with HDcamSR on my imac.

For now, Things are great with Red if you have a Scratch set-up- other than that, its a lot of rendertime for long projects.

Post with Red will get much better after the new Red hardware card comes out for realtime transcoding.

 

[Cail Young]

it took me 80!!! hours to convert it via redcine on a decent xp pro computer running avid like a charm.

http://www.avid.com/red/

There's a PDF there describing in great detail RED workflows for Avid.

MetaFuze or Redrushes would have saved you a lot of time and hassle.

The 24fps issue indicates you aren't using the latest REDCINE.

 

[Zakaree Sandberg]

Zakaree- way to go with the elitist comments. The D21 isn't a prosumer camera at all- yet I could cut with HDcamSR on my imac.

For now, Things are great with Red if you have a Scratch set-up- other than that, its a lot of rendertime for long projects.

Post with Red will get much better after the new Red hardware card comes out for realtime transcoding.

haha I know I sounded like a total ass.. im sorry:/
I actually had a similar problem with a macbook pro..
One computer took FOREEEVVEEERRR to do my rendering in redcine
another (macbook pro) did it in an hour...

so one computer said 80 hours or something ridiculous..
and another said 50 min..

maybe settings were off?

Im looking into a badass PC system now.

 

[thomas erichsen]

i did not have much choice in the matter concerning the workflow. actually i was asked if i wanted to edit that short film, and they already were so into shooting on red i would not talk them out of it. i did research the workflow. of course i read avid.com/red/ as i would not have known how to start otherwise

still, redcine is the only tool reasonable. redrushes does not run on pc. metafuze makes you transcode each single clip separately, no batch as of now. at 300+ shots, no way.

premiere: ahem, i bought media composer and plan to stick with it cause i like it, why should i need to go somewhere else? still i know it is partly avids fault that the workflow sucks. sad thing.

redrushes: i tried on a 8core mac pro, it was a little faster than my machine like maybe 4 fps but the quicktimes came out full of artifacts and green blocks, every codec i tried. maybe the quicktime version wasn´t the right one, but i didn´t wan´t to change that since it wasn´t my mac and i didn´t wan´t to bother the owner too much.

fcp: i have a pc, and i´m not into fcp, although i worked with it for some months. i thought once i learned how to do things quicker fcp would be fine for me, only i found it impossible to work it without constantly using the mouse, and in the end i gave up because i realised there wasn´t going to be a speedup in workflow, click clickety click. compared to avid, i was like 30 % as fast, so no fcp for me.

anyway, i have the latest redcine, and i don´t see why draft mode is still so slow. the quality is still too high for me then...

was this 24/25 my fault or should redcine have recognized the clips correctly? what confuses me here ist that metafuze also showed the clips as 24, though it was possible to change it to 25. is it possible to shoot 25 but having metadata say 24?

generally what i am experiencing is this: ah wow, great camera, so cheap´n´easy, lets go for it. only - the real cost is going to come up in post. probably nobody told the producers about this transcoding thing on renting the cam anyway, they need not care as i am the one dealing with it now

i know i sound like a big whiner who can´t go with the flow. only i also had to pay for my gear and am unlikely to get me lots of new macs, renderfarms, fcp and/or premiere as i feel my avid is just fine. till now. it gets to me that this transcoding thing can´t be faster or even avoided.

Simply import the footage, or proxies, to FCP or Premier.

why is there still no red quicktime codec for windows?

on osx all this seems much easier, is that so? anyone using avid on mac? is it possible to make an ale first and batch import the proxie qts?

whine whine whine...

:beer:

cheers!

thomas

 

[thomas erichsen]

For now, Things are great with Red if you have a Scratch set-up- other than that, its a lot of rendertime for long projects.

what´s that scratch setup? anything i might go for? please elaborate ...

 

[Cail Young]

metafuze makes you transcode each single clip separately, no batch as of now. at 300+ shots, no way.

It makes you set a transcode for each clip but it will batch them in the end.

It's odd that the other tools saw 24fps as well - there was a bug in REDCINE for a long time that showed (and processed!) all footage as 24fps regardless of the reality - however given metafuze said the same thing... may be worth triple checking with the camera dept over what happened. Theoretically one could run the camera at 25 over 24, however you would not be recording sound on camera.

 

[thomas erichsen]

It makes you set a transcode for each clip but it will batch them in the end.

yes but that requires a ***lot*** of time to set up, or did i miss something? you have to do that for each clip separately, right?

Theoretically one could run the camera at 25 over 24, however you would not be recording sound on camera.

they did not record sound oncamera as it is said to create dropouts imagewise - i have to sync everything. another mystery to me, this...

well, on my second turn to convert i´m already down to *only* 36 hours from now... i will wait...

 

[Cail Young]

yes but that requires a ***lot*** of time to set up, or did i miss something? you have to do that for each clip separately, right?

No, you're correct. Hopefully this is something Avid corrects soon.

they did not record sound oncamera as it is said to create dropouts imagewise

This I have never heard of. Ever. It does currently potentially affect playback in camera but the images recorded should not be affected at all by sound.

Also, make sure in REDCINE that your view resolution matches your decode resolution, and that the histogram is OFF before you render.

 

[thomas erichsen]

No, you're correct. Hopefully this is something Avid corrects soon.

hope so too, very much so...

Also, make sure in REDCINE that your view resolution matches your decode resolution, and that the histogram is OFF before you render.

oh, does this affect speed or quality? unknowingly i did neither... nonetheless i´m down to 24 hours rendering left

 

[Cail Young]

Yes, having your view decode match the render decode and disabling the histogram should speed things up a bit. How much depends on your system, but the histo definitely adds a lot of process time.

 

[Igor Ridanovic]

could redcine please be a little faster? like, umm, maybe more than .3 fps?

The output size and especially quality settings have much to do with processing speed. OLPF will slow down things a lot. Also, Redcine uses GPU if it can and to do it properly the quality setting should match the quality level setting at the output.

If you're going to HD with this you don't need "premium" debayering.

Avid Metafuze 1.3 should be coming out soon, they showed it at NAB. Based on my estimates it will be a little faster than Redcine but not much. Debayering 4k takes a while.