Bare Minimum

[Ryan De Franco]

For the last two years I've worked in Red Cine at 1/8 resolution, viewing and applying a simple grade before turning it over to the editor. Plenty of on-set experience with the Red One, very little post experience whatsoever.

I'm considering finally making the move into the Red system. Now that I'll have to take care of my own R3Ds, what would you recommend as a bare minimum setup for 4K? I know there's someone on here using an 2009 iMac, and plenty of folks getting by on their laptops. Let's say I don't mind watching at 1/8 resolution or overnight exports, but let's say that 1/8 playback is 100% stutter free.

And how much difference would 3K make?

Thanks in advance, your thoughts are much appreciated.

 

[Subhadip Sen]

You might want to invest $1000-$2000 on a mainstream computer, especially if you are planning to invest several thousands of dollars on a camera (even if you are renting, it all accumulates). The upcoming Core i7 3930K combined with a GTX 570 will do full res real-time for 3K, maybe multiple streams (on Premiere Pro CS5.5 on Windows 7) and probably even 4K. RedCine is slower, but the least you will get is 1/2 res. Such a system should set you back about $1500 or so. An even cheaper PC based around AMD FX-8150 or Core i7 2600 (which you can buy today) will get you 1/2 res real time for 4K and full res for 3K (I have only tested RED One footage though). To answer your question, for 1/8 res the Core i5 iMac '09 will be more than enough. However, the Core 2 Duos will be touch and go.

 

[Ryan De Franco]

Thanks for the advice--beautiful images in that reel by the way.

Anyone have experience using a MacBook Pro for on set processing? We always use a kitted out 12-core tower, I'm wondering how painful the laptop experience would be...

 

[Subhadip Sen]

Thanks for the advice--beautiful images in that reel by the way.

Anyone have experience using a MacBook Pro for on set processing? We always use a kitted out 12-core tower, I'm wondering how painful the laptop experience would be...

The Early-2011 Macbook Pro 15/17 are quite powerful. You should be seeing 1/4 res real time for 4K footage.

 

[Alexander Ibrahim]

The bare essentials?

For what task?

If all you want to do is review your footage on a 2K/1080p display, any Thunderbolt equipped iMac or MacBook Pro will do the job.

1/4 res 4k should be plenty for that task.

If you actually want to work with that material though, my advice is to invest in a Red Rocket.

Different tasks require different systems though ... and a "hero box" that can manage all the tasks must be a superset.

So, if you are going to do color correction, then Resolve with plenty of fast Nvidia GPU, a Rocket and a Decklink 3D or Decklink 4K card is what you want. (Or Scratch I suppose ... but I have no config experience on that)

For editorial, Premiere Pro CS5.5 with fast Nvidia GPU is the key.

For compositing, lots of CPU power. Any current GPU compatible with your composite software will be fine.

For 3D modeling and animation, you need fast CPU's for rendering and any reasonable GPU with lots of RAM for interactive display while modeling.

Generally I recommend a MacBook Pro 17" 2011 model for on set work, and either a Mac Pro or an HP Z series workstation with a "beefy" configuration for studio.

I greatly prefer OS X, and official support, so I tend to get Macintosh computers from Apple. (As opposed to "Hackintosh" computers.)

 

[Daniel Macleod]

If your not set on using Mac OSX I would definitely suggest the TLX or DLX by Falcon Northwest their stock TLX, is about as powerful as a fully kitted out 17 inch MacBook and only cost as much as the stock Macbook Pro 15 inch. And if you really want to go full out, the 17 inch DLX is a post production monster, for $3600 you get a full desk top 6 core running at 3.46ghz !!!!!!!, 12 gigs of ram, and Nvidia GTX 460M. (ohh yah and they paint it in automotive paint what ever color you want for free.)