Problem with transcoding ProRes 4444...

[John Bauwens]

So I am working on a short and our goal is to transcode the REDcode footage to ProRes4444 and edit that way. I get the footage into the Log and Transfer window, add it to the queue and begin the process. I usually leave it on at night, and when I come back I find that after a few hours the REDCODE plugin will crash and the video will just be solid green. Is there a reason for this, and more importantly, a solution? I am using Final Cut 7, along with the most recent build of the REDCODE plugin.

Thanks

 

[BigLu]

If you are going to take the time to Transcode to PR4x4 then i belive you want to give yourself the best possible image you can to work with.
Dont use FCP to log and transfer, its designed to EDIT not designed to do a nice as job as REDCine X for converting footage. It uses an Instant Debayer and your somewhat defeating the purpose of going PR4x4

Use REDCine X if you have never used it before dont let it scare you.
Its free, download it and give it a good shot transcode with REDCine X its so much better and gives you control over your debayer quality , color temp, iso and the list goes on and on and on. Sounds like you want the quality of PR4x4 so its a better choice for you all around.

Hope that helps.
If you cant figure out REDCine X. Ill guide you threw it
805 822 9870
Best of luck
Luis

 

[John Bauwens]

Question about delivery...

Question about delivery...

Wow thanks Lu. If I could ask you one more question...

Now I am just a cog in this system to our producer, who is still trying to figure out our final delivery. The idea is that once we have an edit, I send it over to Color and correct it there, then we make our final delivery. I know I am making up a DPX because we want to do a film print, but we also want to set up a digital delivery for a 2K projector. What would be the best path for that?

Thanks again Lu.

 

[Nick Gallegos]

Most post houses will be able to generate proper deliverables for 2K and film-out if you give them your final product in a DPX sequence. Just about every modern finishing system (DaVinci, Pablo, etc.) is compatible with DPX.

 

[Gunleik Groven]

If you have the bandwith, going to AJAlog @ redlogFilm would give you a pretty solid FCP workflow. Uncompressed is a bit more robust for grading than the prores route, and if you are making DPX deliverables, I would try to keep my path "clean" until delivery.

DPXs is also possible, but is very much a hassle in the FCP environment.

I would suggest, though - that you did a low-bandwith prores 422 offline, and a conform to uncompressed before online. Will save you a lot of diskspace and give you the best of both worlds (compressed/uncompressed).

Conforming between them and rendering is pretty trivial with Clipfinder.

Gunleik

 

[Ben Brainerd]

I have to second Gunleik's suggestion (Funny how that always happens. Man knows what he's talking about) about using compressed proxies.

There's really no reason to be using ProRes4 at this stage. If you *DO* want to do your whole edit with full-res ProRes4 files, using the L&T plugin is not the way to go.

I would suggest going one of two routes:
1) Offline/Online: Make edit proxies with ProRes422, or better yet, ProRes Proxy, edit with that, then use one of the various workflows out there to conform to either the R3Ds or to generate full-res/full-bandwidth files for grading.

2) Online all the way: (This seems to be the route you're headed right now) Use RedCine-X to build full-res files. Don't use L&T, as you've got very limited options, and if you're using PR4, you're not going to want to go back and make changes. Use RC-X to do a 'one-light', then take those rendered files to your edit and then to your grade.

To be honest, unless you've got a Rocket, going Online from the start is just a waste of time. You'll spend FOREVER rendering a bunch of footage that you'll never use. It's more efficient to do offline proxies and then render only what you need. Or, better yet, don't render anything and connect to the RAW for grading.

 

[David Brink]

I download and back up file-based media (mostly Red) with a windows based 1 Beyond Wrangler. Producers have been requesting on set transcoding to Prores which Windows won't do so I'm looking and a Mac Pro, Red Rocket and FCP7 for transcoding or extra downloading capacity. A dual core Mac Pro 1 (the first Intel model I believe) with 8G ram and FCP7 is available. Do you know if this would be enough machine to do the job with a Red Rocket added?

 

[John Bauwens]

David, I am using the same model without a Red Rocket and it is working, just taking it's sweet time to do it. The only problem is that I don't believe the first Mac Pro has the correct logic board for actually using a Red Rocket, but I am not positive about that and you may want to look into it more. What would the producer want for turnaround time?

 

[David Brink]

John, The producers probably want it to take to the hotel bar at wrap but might be willing to wait until they catch the morning plane. There have been a few requests for coding this year but I've only done one job. The DIT brought my Wrangler on thinking it could do the transcoding (I was unaware he had agreed to do it). It has CS5, a cuda card and I installed a friends Red Rocket but it couldn't code to Prores as it is Windows based. The excellent folks at 1Beyond told me this when I ordered the machine but at the time I didn't know ProRes from Pro Bowl and it just didn't sink in. Wouldn't have mattered anyhow as the Wrangler downloaded 2.5 Terabytes and wouldn't have had time for coding.
By the second day we rented a Mac Pro which by pure dumb luck has FCP7 installed (we had no idea it was necessary for the coding thru Red Cine-X). After a lot of net research I figured it out by the 3rd day and it all worked fine with the Red Rocket installed. Coded in something like real time.
I appreciate your warning and think the best move is to get at least a Mac Pro 4 series (refurb from Apple maybe) and use credit to do it right the first time. The Rocket is the bomb with Red media.

 

[Beer Buijsman]

Last time I had exactly the same problem I had an HDD with corrupted data. It didn't matter what file I tried to transcode, they would all go green after 30 secs. I ended up editing with the camera proxies and transcoding just the material I needed, instead of transcoding the entire shot. Luckily it was a commercial so there were just short shots in there. But it did the job. Maybe this workaround is of any use to you?

And isn't it easier anyway to edit with the camera proxies in FCP and then grade the R3D files in Color (by exporting your proxy timeline to .xlm and importing that in Color) and then output DPX from Color?