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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Helium IPP2 Highlight Test - Huge improvement

Glen David Miller said:
I'm sorry to butt in here - but - having worked for 20 plus years in the film industry across projects like Star Trek, Titanic, and the beginnings of Avatar, there are things being said over and over again without ever reaching the ultimate answers. So, in old school terms....

1) If you wanted to see the same display on camera that the RED TEAM has given you in software, your camera would probably have cost $10,000.oo to $20,000.00 more than it did - just to pay for the processing power needed to display that little extra information. The camera would have required either more CPU power, or a more refined display - or both. It would have cost more and most of us wouldn't have been able to own the camera. On the other hand, the OTHER BIG Companies would have matched the display to the footage for you - cutting both off at the lower point in both the camera AND software. And never told you that they could push the software later in the computer. But RED is different. They are telling you, we can give you that extra power - there are extra stops if you will - that a special algorithm can pull more out of the RAW data in software on your PC or Mac, thereby outperforming the camera - giving you even more that should be possible! PERIOD. END OF STORY. That should be seen as Freaking Fantastic!! Software development is hard - damn hard - and with time, discoveries are made. In a year, they might figure out a way for the CPU in the camera body to catch-up, or they might not. Again, the other companies would never have let you look behind the curtain. You would have had less and never known about the extended range.

2) THE SDK is what powers all that RED DATA in all of those other grading apps. It's code. it must be refined. RED refines the SDK code utilizing RCX. When it works, they send it out so the other companies can write the format into their software. Until the SDK is finished, it does no good to send that code out. Refinement takes time. For better or worse, we are shooting near the cutting edge. It's part of the deal. We should all have to agree that we understand this by signing a contract before we buy into the system. Today, we all want more and more and more, and complain when "it" isn't coming out fast enough, and then complain when it doesn't work because the company was open enough to share THE BETA with you. Well, you can't. It shows you don't respect the enormous set of tasks at play. As everything is refined, training will be released, everyone will learn, and soon we will all be jumping up and down because we are using one of the greatest imaging tools ever created as simply as drinking a glass of water.

3) On Board Prores and the other non-raw formats are shortcuts; a convenience for editors; not a finishing format. RAW footage is shot to be graded later for the highest quality format. If Prores could do, or was meant to do, what RAW can, then why would RED take so much time to develop RAW? They wouldn't. It's like knowing the difference between the Inverse Squared fall-off on a 650 vs a 2K vs a 10K. They all put out light, but they all light very differently. Again, with time, Prorez might be able to match Raw out of the camera - but it would have cost you $10 or 20$ thousand more for your camera to have the extra processing power to record, grade, transcode, and rewrite the data. As it is, you now have the ability for the client to edit their footage almost instantly while they refine the RAW image and render out stellar images to use later - like professionals do. If clients want to work with an iPhone pipeline, inform them their footage looks like it looks - which brings me to the talk of exposure -

4) What happened to the goalposts on camera? I don't recall they walked away. If you don't clip your goalposts, then you aren't going to clip your footage. If you are, add some fill light into the shadows to bring them up into the range of your highlights to your camera can do its best job. Physics hasn't changed.


I'm still waiting to receive the call that I can even upgrade. So, listening to everyone complain is a little upsetting - because I would trade my "on-pause" situation with those of you who have been shooting for months with the new sensor/camera in about two seconds. And I would sit and grin that I have a imaging tool/ camera sitting on my lap that is better than most professional filmmakers in the history of the world had ever had access to during their entire careers. And I would probably be sending the RED software team donuts and pies every week!!

-Glen

PS - Looks like David and I started writing at the same time. :D
Click to expand...

Thanks for your insights. I appreciate it.
Maybe I was sounding unknowledgable but let me tell you this. I have been shooting with Red since 2012 and have always loved the flexibility of Red RAW R3d files. However, with ProRes incorporated into Dsmc2 things are slightly different. In the past 2.5 years I have done a lot of aerials for US TV Networks. Maybe it is show dependent but postproduction clearly stated that they didn't want to deal with Red Raw. I tried to convince them many times, without luck. So I was either stuck with Black Magic or GH4 via external recorder shooting for ProRes in camera delivery because there is no time for transcoding.
Now with Weapon and Helium, they finally agreed and are willing to pay extra to use Red because I can deliver ProRes in camera. How cool. But now hearing that Helium has 13-ish stops in camera ... hmm don't know what to say. So that is my only dilemma. For all other stuff I shoot, Raw all the way of course.

Doing aerial, more DR is always better because you cannot control light, especially in super high contrast scene. You can do so by expose correctly. So with Helium, until now I expose to the left, knowing that shadows are better.

Nevertheless, I was not trying to complain. As I said in some other post, what Red is doing is tremendous. And I am a very happy Helium shooter since early stage.
But with all the different discussions on reduser, things can get confusing at times.
 
Last edited:
Graeme Nattress said:
Remember there's only extension in clipped regions. It would be unwise to rely upon clipped regions for shooting. Best to think of them as gravy rather than the main course.

Graeme
Click to expand...

Thanks, Graeme. This is how I understood too.
All fine :)
 
Graeme Nattress said:
Yes, that's called the SDK. The SDK is tested in REDCine-X which also provides a reference point, as well as being a key workflow element for many users....

Graeme
Click to expand...
I don't see ARRI, Sony, Canon etc keep pushing their own processing software onto the users, just so Red is able to continue to refine their own color science. I truly think, that Red is doing a huge disservice to the Red community by continuing to perpetuate this "us against them" mentality. Red is just one of many camera manufacturers and to continue to push the software, that can only be used with just one camera is not productive. Frankly, nowadays, I rarely get to work on the projects, that only uses one type of the camera. No one argues, that you need tools for internal testing, then why not keep RCX just for that? I think it would be better to stop spending money on the development of the software, that no one really NEEDS and pass the savings to the users...
 
I'm sorry you don't get it Jake. But I have zero interest in taking time on a weekend to explain it to you.

Graeme
 
Graeme Nattress said:
I'm sorry you don't get it Jake. But I have zero interest in taking time on a weekend to explain it to you.

Graeme
Click to expand...

Yes, I'm sorry too Graeme, that you are missing the main point, that days of a single camera used on shoots are long gone. We all live in a multi camera environment and in that environment, RCX has negligible value. And don't forget the efficiencies gained by using a simple workflow, without the need to keep jumping between various software. Just look at the work BMD is doing, which is hard at work combining editing, sound and color grading in one piece of software- Resolve. FilmLight and SGO are hard at work adding VFX capabilities to it's main grading packages as well...
 
Arri = closed beta
RED = open beta

RCX may not be apart of your workflow but I'm sure you can appreciate that there are other workflows in the world that may use it?

And even if no one in the world uses it to accomplish actual work, it's still a great tool for RED to open beta test it's software code. Then, once they are absolutely sure that it's up to par, they can send out the SDK to the other major software vendors. Because while red may be interested in all major post workflows, they only write code for one type of workflow and leave the rest to adobe, BMD, Foundry. etc.

Once IPP2 is out of BETA, and released to all the major software companies, you can go back to ignoring RCX.

Unless I'm missing something, all this info is not revolutionary or controversial? This open beta philosophy has been how RED has operated since the mid 2000's. So why are you antagonizing Graeme for it a decade later?

Also, it's a really big, and unnecessary, stretch to say that RED having their own raw viewing program is perpetuating an us vs them mentality, especially when there are so many other stronger examples from pretty much every company, RED included.
 
Just gonna add that if this was a true release build, instead of a beta, but you still had to go through RCX to use it, you would have grounds to stand on in your argument.
 
Marcus Friedlander said:
Arri = closed beta
RED = open beta

RCX may not be apart of your workflow but I'm sure you can appreciate that there are other workflows in the world that may use it?

And even if no one in the world uses it to accomplish actual work, it's still a great tool for RED to open beta test it's software code. Then, once they are absolutely sure that it's up to par, they can send out the SDK to the other major software vendors. Because while red may be interested in all major post workflows, they only write code for one type of workflow and leave the rest to adobe, BMD, Foundry. etc.

Once IPP2 is out of BETA, and released to all the major software companies, you can go back to ignoring RCX.

Unless I'm missing something, all this info is not revolutionary or controversial? This open beta philosophy has been how RED has operated since the mid 2000's. So why are you antagonizing Graeme for it a decade later?

Also, it's a really big, and unnecessary, stretch to say that RED having their own raw viewing program is perpetuating an us vs them mentality, especially when there are so many other stronger examples from pretty much every company, RED included.
Click to expand...

Google- open perpetual beta, Apple internal beta testing. Red endless open color science beta testing, Arri internal beta testing. Are you starting to see the correlation in end product quality between open beta testing and the proper internal testing?
Once more, no one is arguing about the need for internal testing tools. the question is why subject users to the incomplete and untested tools before they are ready. Test it internally by using whatever tools necessary and then release the SDK.
And once more, RCX only works works with R3D files as is the RRX. If the price is an issue, Resolve also is free! In my opinion, it is much better use of anyone's time and efforts to learn more UNIVERSAL tools used by just about everyone in the business...
 
I definitely see the correlation. But this isn't that complicated of a subject. You either have open betas or closed betas, and your corporate culture will probably dictate which one you choose.

And it sounds like you want to have a discussion about the merits of open betas vs closed betas. But honestly I'm not that interested because neither of us runs a camera company. So, we can only speak from conjecture, and not from expertise.

But, on a side note, you know you don't HAVE to use the beta software right? You can continue using DC2/RLF until IPP2 is fully released (like I'm doing) or you can try out some bleeding edge tech, at the cost of having to do so through a FREE single use software. But no one is getting subjected to anything! That's a bit over dramatic don't you think? Especially when the users are volunteering to be testers. (Kind of like what BMD does every year with it's Resolve beta releases.)

And if you are only going to learn one program, then I'm not going to argue the merits of learning a universal programs vs a single use programs, because that's an obvious answer. But RCX is a free program that takes 15 minutes to learn, and is a good way to practice the basics of color grading. Are you really going to argue it's not worth the time to learn? Especially if you find yourself consistently using R3D files?

For example, once I started shooting RED and specifically shooting RAW, I knew I needed to learn color correction. So I started learning the basics of balancing images, using curves, and using color wheels, all in RCX. Then, once I felt comfortable with the basics, I moved on to a significantly more complicated program, Resolve.
 
jake blackstone said:
Google- open perpetual beta, Apple internal beta testing. Red endless open color science beta testing, Arri internal beta testing. Are you starting to see the correlation in end product quality between open beta testing and the proper internal testing?
Once more, no one is arguing about the need for internal testing tools. the question is why subject users to the incomplete and untested tools before they are ready. Test it internally by using whatever tools necessary and then release the SDK.
And once more, RCX only works works with R3D files as is the RRX. If the price is an issue, Resolve also is free! In my opinion, it is much better use of anyone's time and efforts to learn more UNIVERSAL tools used by just about everyone in the business...
Click to expand...




we use resolve, flame, nuke, premiere and many other programs in our work flow. And yes we work with all the cameras out there and most of them got a similar tool like RCXP and we use most of them to. Have you ever hard of Arri Raw converter? Or the tool made by visual research to deal with phantom footage?

Simply every reduser is not a colourist sitting on a grading setup like yours.

Infact most red owners are far from it, more of the photographer / Cinematographer kind of people and most such are not willing to spend the time it take t learn resolve. Sure it would be great for them if they did but they usually find it more important to focus on the filming part of things. But when out in the jungle shooting its great to be able to just get back in the tent and see if the picture holds up simply just hook up the mag reader and alter the meta data to see whats there.

A lot of the still photographers are used to deal with Capture One and similar tools get quite confused if they are introduced to normal grading platforms. RCXP on the other hand are quite close to their normal workflow of debayering and then further processing in photo shop. I dont know how many Still photographers I worked with since I got into red that just love to sit and scrub their clips in RCXP and pull out stills. It´s as I see it a rather good platform and it does not take more than minutes for somebody that is used to work with pictures to lear how to alter the meta data copy it between clips, render out proxies etc. And normally thats all they want to do. The final colouring is done later. They simply like to sit in the hotel after shoot and simply pull colors and contrasts around to get it somewhat close to what they wanted it to be before the proxies are rendered out for the offline. For such use I think RCXP is outstanding.

So as I see if red did not have RCXP it would have been if not an impossibly sell to many, atleast a much tougher one. And if nothing else RCXP is a good measuring point. If something behaves oddly in a piple line it´s good to see how the colors etc are dealt with when doing the same in RCXP. We have a case now with resolve at the moment where there is a bug / difference between different OS X versions and just to have RCXP on the side to see that its actually resolve doing the error and not the computer / graphics or what not is making it far easier to pin point where the trouble is.
 
Just wanna say thanks Graeme for all you and the team's hard work, coming from working with Canon and Sony, the flexibility of what you've given us is something that blows my mind every time I get into post with RED.
 
Glen David Miller said:
I'm sorry to butt in here - but - having worked for 20 plus years in the film industry across projects like Star Trek, Titanic, and the beginnings of Avatar, there are things being said over and over again without ever reaching the ultimate answers. So, in old school terms....

1) If you wanted to see the same display on camera that the RED TEAM has given you in software, your camera would probably have cost $10,000.oo to $20,000.00 more than it did - just to pay for the processing power needed to display that little extra information. The camera would have required either more CPU power, or a more refined display - or both. It would have cost more and most of us wouldn't have been able to own the camera. On the other hand, the OTHER BIG Companies would have matched the display to the footage for you - cutting both off at the lower point in both the camera AND software. And never told you that they could push the software later in the computer. But RED is different. They are telling you, we can give you that extra power - there are extra stops if you will - that a special algorithm can pull more out of the RAW data in software on your PC or Mac, thereby outperforming the camera - giving you even more that should be possible! PERIOD. END OF STORY. That should be seen as Freaking Fantastic!! Software development is hard - damn hard - and with time, discoveries are made. In a year, they might figure out a way for the CPU in the camera body to catch-up, or they might not. Again, the other companies would never have let you look behind the curtain. You would have had less and never known about the extended range.

2) THE SDK is what powers all that RED DATA in all of those other grading apps. It's code. it must be refined. RED refines the SDK code utilizing RCX. When it works, they send it out so the other companies can write the format into their software. Until the SDK is finished, it does no good to send that code out. Refinement takes time. For better or worse, we are shooting near the cutting edge. It's part of the deal. We should all have to agree that we understand this by signing a contract before we buy into the system. Today, we all want more and more and more, and complain when "it" isn't coming out fast enough, and then complain when it doesn't work because the company was open enough to share THE BETA with you. Well, you can't. It shows you don't respect the enormous set of tasks at play. As everything is refined, training will be released, everyone will learn, and soon we will all be jumping up and down because we are using one of the greatest imaging tools ever created as simply as drinking a glass of water.

3) On Board Prores and the other non-raw formats are shortcuts; a convenience for editors; not a finishing format. RAW footage is shot to be graded later for the highest quality format. If Prores could do, or was meant to do, what RAW can, then why would RED take so much time to develop RAW? They wouldn't. It's like knowing the difference between the Inverse Squared fall-off on a 650 vs a 2K vs a 10K. They all put out light, but they all light very differently. Again, with time, Prorez might be able to match Raw out of the camera - but it would have cost you $10 or 20$ thousand more for your camera to have the extra processing power to record, grade, transcode, and rewrite the data. As it is, you now have the ability for the client to edit their footage almost instantly while they refine the RAW image and render out stellar images to use later - like professionals do. If clients want to work with an iPhone pipeline, inform them their footage looks like it looks - which brings me to the talk of exposure -

4) What happened to the goalposts on camera? I don't recall they walked away. If you don't clip your goalposts, then you aren't going to clip your footage. If you are, add some fill light into the shadows to bring them up into the range of your highlights to your camera can do its best job. Physics hasn't changed.


I'm still waiting to receive the call that I can even upgrade. So, listening to everyone complain is a little upsetting - because I would trade my "on-pause" situation with those of you who have been shooting for months with the new sensor/camera in about two seconds. And I would sit and grin that I have a imaging tool/ camera sitting on my lap that is better than most professional filmmakers in the history of the world had ever had access to during their entire careers. And I would probably be sending the RED software team donuts and pies every week!!

-Glen

PS - Looks like David and I started writing at the same time. :D
Click to expand...

Totally make sense my friend... right on!!!
 
The few folks not agreeing and pointing on RED would probably wouldn't if RED leaves everything as it. Meaning that the extra craving is being criticized while it should be considered a BIG PLUS for us and no company does that for customers who pay a price fixed of a camera and keep getting goodies along the way...

I think we should appreciate what RED is doing, because before IPP2 99 pct of us were happy... Now to BITCH at IPP2 and workflow limitation seems absurd to me. Instead, lets ask Graeme, suggest to him and learn from this workflow plus extra benefit we are all getting... For Free... RED could charge like apple, more CPU, more resolution, more prores, more highlight recovery...more money $$$$... But, they are not doing it... It's free...So let's stop bitching...

My 2 cents...
 
Björn Benckert said:
we use resolve, flame, nuke, premiere and many other programs in our work flow. And yes we work with all the cameras out there and most of them got a similar tool like RCXP and we use most of them to. Have you ever hard of Arri Raw converter? Or the tool made by visual research to deal with phantom footage?

Simply every reduser is not a colourist sitting on a grading setup like yours.

Infact most red owners are far from it, more of the photographer / Cinematographer kind of people and most such are not willing to spend the time it take t learn resolve. Sure it would be great for them if they did but they usually find it more important to focus on the filming part of things. But when out in the jungle shooting its great to be able to just get back in the tent and see if the picture holds up simply just hook up the mag reader and alter the meta data to see whats there.

A lot of the still photographers are used to deal with Capture One and similar tools get quite confused if they are introduced to normal grading platforms. RCXP on the other hand are quite close to their normal workflow of debayering and then further processing in photo shop. I dont know how many Still photographers I worked with since I got into red that just love to sit and scrub their clips in RCXP and pull out stills. It´s as I see it a rather good platform and it does not take more than minutes for somebody that is used to work with pictures to lear how to alter the meta data copy it between clips, render out proxies etc. And normally thats all they want to do. The final colouring is done later. They simply like to sit in the hotel after shoot and simply pull colors and contrasts around to get it somewhat close to what they wanted it to be before the proxies are rendered out for the offline. For such use I think RCXP is outstanding.

So as I see if red did not have RCXP it would have been if not an impossibly sell to many, atleast a much tougher one. And if nothing else RCXP is a good measuring point. If something behaves oddly in a piple line it´s good to see how the colors etc are dealt with when doing the same in RCXP. We have a case now with resolve at the moment where there is a bug / difference between different OS X versions and just to have RCXP on the side to see that its actually resolve doing the error and not the computer / graphics or what not is making it far easier to pin point where the trouble is.
Click to expand...


Couldn't agree more... I'm one of those users who loves to review footage and make small adjustments in RCX. It's my preferred way of viewing digital daily rushes. RCX is one of the many reasons why I love RED.
 
David Grigorian said:
Couldn't agree more... I'm one of those users who loves to review footage and make small adjustments in RCX. It's my preferred way of viewing digital daily rushes. RCX is one of the many reasons why I love RED.
Click to expand...

Same here. For a lot of things I do I simply launch RCXP look trough the mag (not even copying the data before I do) Set some base settings so I think it looks good. Trim clips to get rid of stuff I dont need and set it to render r3d trims to a seperate drive together with some low res proxies.

Sure that can be done in resolve or such but I would love to see a resolve user be as as fast. Its super convenient way to alter the meta data, copy part or all of the setup onto a selection of clips and set batches to render with different resolutions etc. It´s not grading, its more about file managing and making the rendered proxies looks somewhat right and also nice that all that is meta data and proxies and source actual has the same settings stored.
 
Björn Benckert said:
We have a case now with resolve at the moment where there is a bug / difference between different OS X versions and just to have RCXP on the side to see that its actually resolve doing the error and not the computer / graphics or what not is making it far easier to pin point where the trouble is.
Click to expand...
Don't use beta software, problem solved...
 
Alain M said:
The few folks not agreeing and pointing on RED would probably wouldn't if RED leaves everything as it. Meaning that the extra craving is being criticized while it should be considered a BIG PLUS for us and no company does that for customers who pay a price fixed of a camera and keep getting goodies along the way...

I think we should appreciate what RED is doing, because before IPP2 99 pct of us were happy... Now to BITCH at IPP2 and workflow limitation seems absurd to me. Instead, lets ask Graeme, suggest to him and learn from this workflow plus extra benefit we are all getting... For Free... RED could charge like apple, more CPU, more resolution, more prores, more highlight recovery...more money $$$$... But, they are not doing it... It's free...So let's stop bitching...

My 2 cents...
Click to expand...

Agree I would get shit bored if my camera just worked. Like if nothing happen to it until I bought a new one. To me the little improvements bug fixes etc are a big part of why red interest me. Got my first red, the epic M when there where no sound or playback on camera. Well I did not care much about that at the time as I was super stoked to be able to shoot 5k out of a coffee box. And the faults where easy to overcome. Just a prores recored on the SDI for of camera playback and record sound separate. Like we always done before anyways.

Now the new got 8k which is quite remarkable if you compare to the other companies offerings. People now bitch about helium not displaying colors well in camera or color science not being finished. Well I dont care much, because you know what? I can shoot freaking 8k.
 
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