Newbie R3D Workflow

[Imran Farouk]

Just out of curiousty,
There is a lot of workflows I understand for R3D, some use the Proxies, some edit with Adobe others FCS,

I'm wondering, what is the difference between editing with native R3D file and the proxies?

Also what is the best workflow, I understand its different for everyone but I obviously want to know the one that will give out the highest quality, Don't want to Up-Rez anything...

REDCine --> FCS --> Colour --> FCS --> Quicktime file...

Is that the way? I've got some test footage and wanted to try and push for a 4K digital out but most people say thats very difficult it seems...so everyone opts for 2K for their finals (At least thats what it sounds like on the forums),

I know that I should test stuff out myself, which is what I'm doing but obviously if all fails I just want to be able to know that there is a way that actually works and not my 'blindfolded' way

Thanks,

 

[Noah Kadner]

Out to film or tape or what?

Noah

 

[ThomtheEditor]

editing with the R3d is editing with the proxies in final cut, only adobe edits directly off the red; the proxies are the same thing, wrappers for the red file in quicktime format so quicktime based applications (like fcs) can read them given the right codec interpretation. In general terms of finishing in highest quality, just about any workflow these days will allow you to access the full RAW information right before your final output. I prefer to transcode to prores>edit>media manage out unneeded clips/multiclips>reconform the timeline with H proxies thru clipfinder>CC in color off of the raw>render to 2k proresHQ

i like this workflow b/c it allows for full editing freedom, of quicktime files. editing off the proxies with more than one stream at a time is extremely taxing on the system as they're mostly ram driven, but that's just me, some people don't feel like taking the time to encode offline clips; it's whatever works best for your editing system/timeframe/budget.

 

[Imran Farouk]

Well i wanted to out it just to a Quick time file...so neither tape nor film...rather just plain digital...

That workflow though with the transcoding and conform sounds pretty sweet...I'm sure a 4k out is possible through color now that it works with RED much better...

Although I'm having issues with REDAlert, can't seem to find how to get the corrections to change over time, the lighting at the start is fine once corrected then at the end of a clip is rather dull...so I might just skip transcoding through REDAlert and just go straight for editing with the low proxies then conform with the full ones and straight to color...then out it again....given I'm worried that color will do the same thing as REDAlert...

Why doesn't anyone out 4K instead of the 2K in their workflows? Is it because of the render time or rather because its much more difficult in terms of workflow?

 

[ThomtheEditor]

it's because there's not much that requires a 4k out; 2k is good enough for film, there's very few 4k projectors out there and no medium to play back on. 1080i is still the broadcast deliverable for HD television and 480i for SD; the nice thing about shooting in 4k is that you are capturing all this extra data that looks super crisp when squished down to an hd or lower frame. Even a 4k quicktime file would be too big to fit on most computer monitors; i'm sitting in front of a 26" cinema display and that is only 1920x1200!

And as for color; you can keyframe any corrections you make except for settings to the red metadata (can't keyframe Kelvin, tint, red settings saturation, exposure, contrast, iso, etc but can get the same result by keyframing anything else)

 

[Charles Angus]

And as for color; you can keyframe any corrections you make except for settings to the red metadata (can't keyframe Kelvin, tint, red settings saturation, exposure, contrast, iso, etc but can get the same result by keyframing anything else)

AFAIK, you can't keyframe the curves, either.

 

[Imran Farouk]

Thanks for the info :thumbup1:

I've just run across a few issues though through the workflow,
I'm not quite sure where RED Alert fits into the whole workflow, Is that for the end? I can't see that going in at the start unless your going 2K the whole way through just because if you go low and then want to re-connect with the 2K proxy you lose that colour change in the process!

I've started with REDRushes because working straight from the P proxy in the R3D files has caused the issue of nothing showing up in my FCP sequence drop menu! As in, after i accept the fact that I want "change the sequence settings into the clip settings?" it then only gives me 'playback base layer' and two other options, 'full quality' and 'use playback quality',

Is this the nature of the Proxies? I've started using REDRushes and it seems to have not acted up since then, but REDRushes is taking a while even on 'eighth res'...

When you said you keyframed you colour corrections, was this done in 'Color'?

Thanks again!

 

[ThomtheEditor]

key framing is done in color; yes thank you charles, no keyframes on curves, but those too can be recreated using high mids and low corrections.

RedAlert is just one tool in the R3d workflow; one that doesn't get much use in my world anymore. red alert is for creating base grades that can be universally applied across batch renders in either L&T or RR. I also use it to regenerate any proxies that might have been deleted before i do a conform in clipfinder back to the r3d's. Other than that it doesn't do much as it's limited to single shot renders.

As for RR taking too long on renders, it is a multithreaded application, so check your settings for how many cores oyu want to use and how many clips you'd like to render at once; yes red footage takes awhile to transcode; but at least now you can get more than one going at a time!

 

[Imran Farouk]

Hi Again, apologizes for resurrecting this thread but I appear to have hit a minor bump...

I've finished editing my clips in FCP...I export the XML to Clipfinder....Clipfinder conform XML to full quality...
THIS WORKS...but it doesn't show up properly on the screen...
So i tried...High...
High presents almost 95% of the timeline having green clips...
Mid is the same...

I've tried doing a grade in colour with the R3D...it imports the R3D xml i did with the conform in Clipfinder...it appears to have the timeline...as When i double click on clip name in the shot window it appears to give the in and out point of that clip...
however...
i CANT see the clips..as in its like an invisable timeline and in turn it won't let me grade...

Either way color I think I'm just going to avoid for now as its constantly crashing on me...even with the 8th res clips that i directly sent to Color from FCP...

My major problem is just these green clips for now...I've googled it...Green clip issues with XML...nothing appears to come up...did I skip a process or something?

any info would be great...Thanks