Komodo 6k R3D + Davinci Resolve. What's your PC/Mac configuration?

[Haven Cousins]

Hi. I'm new here. I'm just curious to hear from any users (Mac or PC, either one) who have had a smooth experience with 6K R3D in Resolve. I've been having some GPU issues and I'm pretty sure I've narrowed it down to not having enough vram (8GB gtx 1080) in my circa 2016 PC, which I'm considering upgrading or replacing. Not here to troubleshoot Resolve or my PC. I'd just love to hear from anyone who'd care to share their successful configuration. Especially if its not a beast, I'm more interested in what others have gotten away with budget-wise and still have a rock solid experience for basic editing and grading.

 

[Mike P.]

Try to enable GPU Debayer *and* decompression, if you haven't already (I think the default is just Debayer). And set it to CUDA, which last I checked (admittedly years ago) should be slightly faster than OpenCL.

It's in Preferences>"Memory and GPU">then in Decode Options, have the "Use GPU for R3D" drop down menu on "Decompression and Debayer."

It will either run back smooth as butter, or run noticeably worse than just GPU Debayer (if your GPU can't actually handle 6k r3d)... But 8gb should be enough for 1/2 res playback.

 

[Haven Cousins]

Thanks, I've been through all those steps (and a ton more). And you're right "Decode and Debayer" gives me 24fps at 1/2 res... for a while. Interestingly, at first I was testing the camera shooting almost all 2.4:1. I had a short timeline ~2:30, and I was able to work with no problems as long as I was at 1/2 res. (In the task manager Vram hovers at about 7 gigs used). I thought I was in the clear.

Then I went out and shot some 17:9. Those timelines will play smoothly for 1:15 or so. I can watch the Vram usage creep up to the ceiling before the application craps out. (sometimes "vram full" errors, sometimes just a hard crash). I was able to replicate the crashes/errors with longer 2.4:1 timelines, it just takes longer. It seems like the card is right on the cusp of being able to handle the additional resolution. I've rolled back resolve and my nvidia studio drivers in every combination, and I've watched RED's videos about resolve workflow, including the advice above. (In those videos the presenter talks about being able to play 8k R3D at speed using an rtx 5000 (16 gb vram) Even though I'm at 6k, I'm going to try one of those out and see if it fixes things.)

Anyway, this is why I was just curious to hear people's configurations.

 

[Sean Crowley]

Hey, my setup isn't too far off, I have a 1080ti, not standard 1080, but I don't have any issues with Resolve, unless the project gets insanely huge AND uses denoising (which can cause the same low memory issue).

I have a 3800x and 32gb of ram, I don't know what your CPU is, but I don't think that's the only thing effecting it.

But there may be something else giving you issues: the Komodo uses a DCT for compression, which is different from all other Reds before it. Rolling back is probably going to hurt a lot more than it helps. As much as people here will tell you to avoid the newest versions of editing software, this may be a case where that's not actually the best idea, since they may not be optimized for the newer compression.

Something you can usually do to avoid the VRAM issue is to reduce the timeline resolution. Try a 4k timeline and see if that gets rid of the issue or at least allows longer edits. You can always change the setting back at the end before exporting. (or export at the higher resolution)

 

[Haven Cousins]

Interesting. Thanks for the insights! The 1080Ti is an 11GB card. This lines up with my suspicion that 8GB in my setup is not cutting it. I'm using a UHD timeline, I should have specified, and I've also since reverted to the latest driver/resolve version since none of the rollback combinations worked.

If I use a 1080p timeline, I get by with no issues. The problem with that workflow is that the 4k export still crashes, and switching back to CPU for Decode/Debayer for every export is not a tenable workflow for me.

Thanks again, the fact that your 1080ti with 11GB works fine is just the sort of info I'm looking for!

 

[Haven Cousins]

For anyone interested, I got my hands on an RTX 5000. It's very nice, to say the least. I ran some tests and at the point in the timeline where it used to crash using my poor old 8GB 1080, my new card reports about 10.1 GB Vram used, and sails right through. (and that's at half res playback) When I have it set to full res it reports between 11-12 GB used. I can watch it fill up to 14GB and above moving quickly between the edit and color pages, switching timelines, and scrubbing aggressively, and it remains completely stable. Thanks to those that chimed in. The rtx wasn't cheap, but I'm just happy to have a usable experience in Resolve now.

 

[Maira Fravel]

This is weird, it should work just fine. The responses on this thread are interesting.

 

[Christoffer Glans]

Using a single 2080ti with a 16 core 32 thread Intel processor at 2.60 GHz base and 64GB memory. I can edit and do lots of grading in full premium 6K and 8K. Sure, editing in the way I edit narrative will never be replaced by using native files over proxies, but for commercial applications, I have no problems with just this single card. As I skip generations I will update to the 4090ti or whatever it's gonna be called and it will be even faster. Since we're not really pushing resolution anymore (whatever people like to think about it), the tech is catching up with the resolutions we've worked with the past 12 years. When I started with Red, it was extremely tedious with R3D 4K files, and over the course of the last decade resolution and bandwidth have increased in line with the tech processing it so there's never really been a bump in processing power until now. Personally, I don't think RTX Quadro cards are worth the cost, the minor improvements to workstation application with that card are generally most apparent in applications like CAD and alike. For Resolve, however, a 3090 11GB card is extremely powerful.

 

[Michael Lindsay]

I am very interested... ;-)

When you say RTX 5000 you mean the Quadro RTX 5000 not the NVIDIA RTX A5000??

For anyone interested, I got my hands on an RTX 5000. It's very nice, to say the least. I ran some tests and at the point in the timeline where it used to crash using my poor old 8GB 1080, my new card reports about 10.1 GB Vram used, and sails right through. (and that's at half res playback) When I have it set to full res it reports between 11-12 GB used. I can watch it fill up to 14GB and above moving quickly between the edit and color pages, switching timelines, and scrubbing aggressively, and it remains completely stable. Thanks to those that chimed in. The rtx wasn't cheap, but I'm just happy to have a usable experience in Resolve now.

 

[Han Vogen]

I’ll chime in here. Working with a 30 minute project, I did notice that DR failed to render once. I did the cache hack to workaround the failure. But in all honesty, I’ve never had a need to do such things when rendering in FCPX. Truthfully, in my experience FCPX is far more dependable than DR. That said, DR had far more robust tool for both color grading and audio.

One point I’ll also make, which may or may not be of impact, is the fact that I was working with Sony footage at the time.

 

[Christoffer Glans]

DR had far more robust tool for both color grading

Maybe because it's at its core a color grading software that is among the top tier used in the industry. FCPX does not have remotely the same abilities in terms of color grading and no colorist uses FCPX for color grading.

The biggest problem with Resolve is that it's often very unreliable and broken. They push forward so hard that they never really stop and make the code super stable. So always backing up projects and always having "fail-time" planned for a project deadline is crucial. But when it works, I cannot see how Adobe, Apple or Avid can even come close to the speed you get with Resolve. Blackmagic really understand why GPU based architecture is the best way to go.

At the moment I'm doing the final touches on a project and I've been doing 20 exports of heavily graded 6K material mixed with 4K ProRes 4444, H265, TIFF sequences with Alpha and so on, it just exports it in realtime, not sweat. However, our motion graphics designer use After Effects and he can't even export a 16 bit internal render for a 3-second clip without it taking two hours because AE doesn't use GPU and it even caps the amount of CPU cores you use. When it comes to speed and modern handling of decode, debayer, supersampling, effects and color grading I am stunned at how back in the stone ages Adobe is in comparison. And we're paying a lot each months for a subscription for something that is basically the same year after year. All while Blackmagic releases a lot of new features each year... for free and also for free for those who paid once or if you bought an output card from them, which you still need, you get it for free. Adobe sucks, Apple sucks, Avid sucks... reliability and stability are the ONLY things that makes me still keep Avid and Premiere, otherwise I'll happily leave those NLEs in a ditch sometwhere.

 

[Haven Cousins]

Using a single 2080ti with a 16 core 32 thread Intel processor at 2.60 GHz base and 64GB memory. I can edit and do lots of grading in full premium 6K and 8K. Sure, editing in the way I edit narrative will never be replaced by using native files over proxies, but for commercial applications, I have no problems with just this single card. As I skip generations I will update to the 4090ti or whatever it's gonna be called and it will be even faster. Since we're not really pushing resolution anymore (whatever people like to think about it), the tech is catching up with the resolutions we've worked with the past 12 years. When I started with Red, it was extremely tedious with R3D 4K files, and over the course of the last decade resolution and bandwidth have increased in line with the tech processing it so there's never really been a bump in processing power until now. Personally, I don't think RTX Quadro cards are worth the cost, the minor improvements to workstation application with that card are generally most apparent in applications like CAD and alike. For Resolve, however, a 3090 11GB card is extremely powerful.

This again corroborates the evidence that ~11GB is a good number for having a smooth, stable experience with R3D in Resolve. While I agree that the Quadro cards are pricey, with the demand for graphics cards right now, (crypto mining, chip shortage...) things even out. A new 2080ti is at least 1700 USD. Used you can find them buy-it-now for closer to 1400. I was able to get an rtx 5000 for 1800 used in great condition. Will I ever need the extra Vram overhead? Maybe not, but the market puts a premium on gaming cards right now, (crypto demands raw performance over Vram) and the primary difference with quadro is the available Vram, which Resolve seems to like. (In RED's Resolve workflow videos the presenter always makes a point of calling out the demo machine as having an rtx 5000) Overkill? Perhaps. If this 16 GB card gives me issues I will be ...irritated.

I am very interested... ;-)

When you say RTX 5000 you mean the Quadro RTX 5000 not the NVIDIA RTX A5000??

Yes!

I’ll chime in here. Working with a 30 minute project, I did notice that DR failed to render once. I did the cache hack to workaround the failure. But in all honesty, I’ve never had a need to do such things when rendering in FCPX. Truthfully, in my experience FCPX is far more dependable than DR. That said, DR had far more robust tool for both color grading and audio.

One point I’ll also make, which may or may not be of impact, is the fact that I was working with Sony footage at the time.

Thanks. I'm pretty embedded with using Resolve. (I don't have a Mac workstation so FCP is out) I have Premiere, but I like to do shorter projects all in one place. I like coloring in Resolve's node-based system. And I was specifically interested in the intersection of Resolve users and R3D users, as Resolve has very specific optimization options for decoding and debayering the footage using the GPU. And with every bit of evidence I can find, 11GB Vram+ is the safest bet.

Thanks again to all that replied.

 

[Michael Lindsay]

Hi Haven

Thanks for answering...

One thing to note is that since you are using historically unusual r3ds - from a Komodo based on DCT compression (for the past 13 years all Red r3ds used very computationally intensive wavelets) things may just get better and easier this year as Red tweaks and improves the SDK - and all 3rd party software decodes with this SDK

Anyone (inc me) giving any advice based on assumptions derived from previous non Komodo r3d experience is prob not really super relevant. Nvidia really helped Red put wavelet decoding on to GPU but that work may have not have helped DCT based R3ds at all.

Komodo files really have a lot in common with the compressed Raw files you get from a Venice and from my experience they decode very fast. I would expect Red to tweak to they are just as fast.

I love Resolve when it is working well... but one of Red's greatest assets (the packaging of very high quality Raw files into a relatively small space) combinded with the complexity of decoding choices does also cause issues for many in post. There are a number of very significant grading houses who won't grade of R3ds :-(



Note: A while back when I put a Komodo clip on my Resolve setup I found it worked much better with the CPU doing the decode and the GPU doing the debayer. Everything was RT at full res.

 

[Haven Cousins]

Michael, this is really great info! It's interesting because I agree that the speed at which applications decode/debayer the Komodo R3D is quite fast. My old card would play them back 24fps no problem, and it was the first generation pascal based nvdia gpu. I have a feeling that computationally they aren't burdensome. Christoffer above was breaking down the realities of the speed of these cards between generations as well, and it does seem like there is diminishing return in terms of raw graphics card speed. My issues came from running out of Vram. However Resolve is currently optimized (or isn't) for Komodo's DCT R3D, I could get momentary playback no problem. Sustained playback was the issue. I think if I had a newer cpu, I might have been able to avoid the GPU upgrade, and potentially split the decode/debayer duty as you have. Alas, I'm holding off on an all new rig (I'm waiting to see what happens when apple applies their new RISC architecture to a 'pro' solution) So for now the rtx is a bandaid that, if it gets me another year or two of projects using my Komodo, I'll be happy.

 

[DC Chavez]

I had the guys at Puget Sound spec out a system for me... Once I realized how much they were charging to put it together, I ordered the parts myself, and with the money I "saved" putting it together myself, I upgraded and watercooled. This thing rips...

This thing is a beast- even for my 8K Helium footage...

i9 9960X 16 core 3.1ghz processor

128GB DDR4 2666 RAM

Dual Samsung 970 Pro 1TB NVMe SSD's

Dual NVIDIA 2080 Ti Founders Edition GPU's

Gigabyte Designare EX Motherboard

Custom loop watercooling with CPU and GPU waterblocks

Dual radiator setup

Phanteks Evolv X Case

 

[Christoffer Glans]

I was able to get an rtx 5000 for 1800 used in great condition..

Sure, but why not save it for when chips get cheaper and production gets going and regulators start saying no to scalpers and crypto haulers? I used a Titan X up until my RTX2080ti and even though it was slower for R3D, I've worked with R3D for 13 years now and if I didn't have the 2080ti I would just use the fantastic cache system in Resolve, edit proxies, cache one-light nodes, then do grade and deliver.

I would never pay a double price on GPUs today when it will get back to more normal pricing. Until then, the amount of work is lower due to the same pandemic pushing the prices and the work that does gets done can be done with older cards with a bit of planning (and it will still be a normally fast workflow). I would rather save the money for when prices get normal and by that time we might even be close to the 4000-series.

But that's just me.

 

[Haven Cousins]

Sure, but why not save it for when chips get cheaper and production gets going and regulators start saying no to scalpers and crypto haulers? I used a Titan X up until my RTX2080ti and even though it was slower for R3D, I've worked with R3D for 13 years now and if I didn't have the 2080ti I would just use the fantastic cache system in Resolve, edit proxies, cache one-light nodes, then do grade and deliver.

I would never pay a double price on GPUs today when it will get back to more normal pricing. Until then, the amount of work is lower due to the same pandemic pushing the prices and the work that does gets done can be done with older cards with a bit of planning (and it will still be a normally fast workflow). I would rather save the money for when prices get normal and by that time we might even be close to the 4000-series.

But that's just me.

Valid point regarding the proxy workflow. I think this is a matter of personal preference. My main issue with it is how terribly slow rendering would be. (I'd be forced to use CPU rendering to avoid crashes, I have an admittedly mediocre CPU). You dropped another great clue, which is the use of a titanX, a 12 GB card. While it may not have been fast, it didn't run out of VRam, which is really the only point I've been trying to make. Vram is a bottleneck in DR.

As for paying double, I did not do that. The crypto tax hits gaming cards the hardest (for a 2080ti I'd have to pay ~150% markup, used) Crypto is less interested in already pricey quadro cards, in that case I actually got about $700 off MSRP.

Maybe you're suggesting I paid double what I would have had to pay, to get similar performance, hypothetically, if prices were normal. Possibly! The truth is, there are many factors contributing to high GPU prices. Waiting for global regulation/intervention in crypto?? For the pandemic to end, and for the dozen other factors that contribute to the chip shortage to abate? We're definitely looking at 1, 2 years + before things return to normal (if they do). I'd rather take the 1800 I paid and count it against increased productivity for the next two years with peace of mind knowing my stuff will render fast and that what I see is what I get. As for the 4000 series? I'm sure they will be great (at least the ones with 11+ GB of Vram will, lol) But, as has been discussed, until the next paradigm shift in resolve, raw speed is not really the bottleneck anymore.

Again, if I had had a 1080ti like you do, I would have paid zero dollars and been very happy.

 

[Sean Crowley]

Hey, I had commented about having the 1080ti earlier in the thread. I was working on a very large project today, all 6k Komodo footage, lots of power windows, local adjustments, etc. A few clips had noise reduction where needed as well.

About 12 minutes into the timeline (dunno how long IRL) it slowed down HARD from about 30fps average to 2.5. And it was just a normal clip, with fewer adjustments than most, and no noise reduction.

Task Manager said VRAM was basically full.

I realized I had Firefox opened, so I close it, and it shot back up to 20-30 fps for the rest of the render.

So it seems like Resolve is extra touchy when it's right on the edge of memory, as you had thought. I can't say for sure if this is only Komodo footage, since that's all I've worked with in the last few months, but the problem certainly seems to be VRAM related.

It seems like Resolve on MacOS can usually get away with half or a quarter of the ram (sometimes even less), at least with older Reds, but Windows always needed extra the extra VRAM.

Glad to hear you were able to get something, GPU prices are crazy right now. It's making my 1080ti is looking like some of the best money I've ever spent, lol.

 

[DannyF]

I'm purchasing a Lenovo Thinkstation P620 next month which is a workstation, and it might be overkill for editing/grading Komodo files in Resolve, but will also be doing some VFX work from the Komodo image, so I deff need all the power I can get. But interesting to note, the new Nvidia RTX A6000 (48GB), Puget Systems rated it the fastest card for DaVinci Resolve .
Like I said, may be overkill for editing/grading, i'll definitely come back and let you guys know how it performs.

 

[Haven Cousins]

So it seems like Resolve is extra touchy when it's right on the edge of memory, as you had thought. I can't say for sure if this is only Komodo footage, since that's all I've worked with in the last few months, but the problem certainly seems to be VRAM related.

It seems like Resolve on MacOS can usually get away with half or a quarter of the ram (sometimes even less), at least with older Reds, but Windows always needed extra the extra VRAM.

Glad to hear you were able to get something, GPU prices are crazy right now. It's making my 1080ti is looking like some of the best money I've ever spent, lol.

Thanks! Since I started the thread I've done a couple projects with the rtx5000 and its been rock solid. Interesting that you say Macs don't seem to be as susceptible to the Vram issues. Honestly I'm just biding my time for apple to turn out a pro level solution with their Mx chips, and crossing my fingers it works well with Resolve.