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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 :)

REDAlert! question

Stephen Pruitt

Stephen Pruitt

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Hi all. . .

We just got our RED and shot some (awful) footage just for fun and to learn how to use the REDAlert program. Here's my question:

When I look at the screen on REDAlert, it responds to our changes in exposure and saturation and color (etc.) like a charm. We like the look on the REDAlert screen. However, when we render this footage, it doesn't look like what it looked like on the REDAlert screen. Is there any way we can ensure that the output files form the render process will look like the REDAlert screen?

Thanks much.

Stephen
 
What format are you outputting and which RA version?
 
hey stephen. can i piggy back on your thread and ask another redalert! question? it's sort of a dumb newbie one...

i understand redcine, but, uh, what is redalert?

thanks!
 
Hi there, Deanan. . .

I'm using the latest REDAlert version (just downloaded it yesterday).

I was outputting to QT movie with Apple ProRes (HQ). The colors are just richer and more saturated on the REDAlert version than on the ProRes QT movie. I'm looking at both of them side by side, and there's a very obvious difference between them.

I'd love to know what to do to make the output look just like the REDAlert version.

Thanks much.

Stephen
 
The other thing that is quite evident is that the REDAlert image, at the same size, is quite a bit sharper than the rendered REDAlert outputs. No comparison, actually.

I REALLY want the image to look like it does on the REDAlert screen (where it looks stunning!), versus "good" on the rendered output files.

Stephen
 
Last comment on this tonight:

When the REDAlert frames are stopped, they are MUCH sharper than when it is playing (very slowly, of course). There is about a 1/2 second delay from when I stop REDAlert to when the image snaps into great clarity and sharpness. I want ALL of the images to have the sharpness and clarity of the stopped REDAlert frames.

Thanks much.

Stephen
 
Hey Stephen.. sounds like a gamma problem.

as for the redalert sharpness during playback in redalert, during playback the resolution lowers to allow for faster playback, when you stop it, it reads back the full quailty for that frame. if you are seeing that on your output files, make sure your decode quality is set to FULL.
 
Quite often a quickly subsampled image (like the one in redalert for the display) can appear to be sharper but it will have more aliasing artifacts.
A proper downsample will be a bit softer but the edges will look better.
The downsample filter also has an effect on the sharpness after scaling down.
 
Hey, Jarred. . .

Why would a gamma problem make what a difference between when I am seeing on REDAlert and on the REDAlert output files? It seems to me that both of those images should have the exact same gamma.

Is there a sharpness adjustment in REDAlert? I don't see one anywhere?

When I set the debayer quality to "full," in REDAlert, the resulting output in ProRes (HQ) won't play at normal speed. It stutters and stops and then skips way ahead. It will only play normally with "half" quality. Any suggestions on this?

BTW, I have version 1.5.6.

Stephen
 
Back at it this morning. . .

Okay. More REDAlert strangeness. When I render (not in REDline. . . whatever REDline is, it blows up on my computer and gives me an error message) using the Full debayer choices, I can't play those movies back in real time using either QT player or importing those files into FCP 6. But, stranger still, once the imported movie in FCP starts playing, the overall picture comes MUCH less rich and saturated, only to return to it's REDAlert look when I hit the FCP stop button. It then looks just like it did in REDAlert.

Surely the problem can't be my MacBook Pro? Is a MacBook Pro not capable of doing renders on REDAlert? I don't want to buy a new Mac Pro unless absolutely necessary.

Stephen
 
Jarred. . . can you provide me with EXACTLY the settings you are using on REDAlert that work for you to play in FCP and look the way they are supposed to?

Thanks.

Stephen
 
Can you check the resolution of the QT files you are creating?

For the gamma issues, what is your system gamma set at and
do you have FCS compatibility checked in the QT Player preferences?
 
Hi there, Deanan. . .

As it happens, you asked the crucial question. My output files, despite me THINKING that I was scaling, were 3000 by 1500 or something like that. I forgot to click the "scale" box at the top left. Once I did that, the footage was the appropriate size (I took it down to 1440 by 720) and played just fine in QT player.

I'll undoubtedly do something else really stupid soon enough, so please stay tuned.

:-)

Thanks for pointing me in the right direction.

Now, as to the "system gamma" I don't even know how to set that. And as to the FCS "compatibility" I don't see any "FCS compatibility preference" in REDAlert. Can you be more specific on what that is?

Thanks again for your help.

Stephen
 
The FCS compatibility is not a REDAlert setting, it is a QuickTime preference setting. Go to QuickTime -> Preferences -> Enable FCS compatibility (slightly different depending on QT version)

This is supposed to make the gamma correct whether playing in FCS or QuickTime.
 
Hi there, Mr. Shultz. . . thanks for your input. My question is this:

Since I'm currently going from RED to REDAlert to downsize to QT.mov files and then inoto FCS 2.0, why would anything on the QT player (which I don't even use in this "workflow" such as it is!) have anything to do with FCS???? Or am I supposed to be using QT to process the footage in some way before going into FCS????

Thanks so much.

Stephen
 
Well the QT settings were designed to keep your output from FCS looking the same when you play it in QT. Since the Mac native gamma settings are 1.8 and FCS sets it correctly to 2.2, once you render out from FCS and play back in QT it might look entirely different.

Ultimately you're going to view your file in QT after rendering out from FCS. Setting the preference makes sure you're going to see what you thought you should.

Deanan was asking the question because you were seeing different looks in different environments and he was trying to eliminate possible causes.

You're rendering QT out of REDAlert before going to FCS. It's best to make sure all your software is on the same page gamma-wise.
 
Wow. . . I'm dumber than you all thought. . . sorry about that.

Greg. . . I'm still not sure what you are asking. My QT player never enters into the "workflow" (again, I use the term loosely here, since I just shot my first footage yesterday). I was using REDAlert to create the QT files, but never used QT itself at all. The QT files that REDAlert created I directly imported into FCS, so I never used the QT player, so it would make sense to me that the only preferences that would matter would be the REDAlert preferences or FCS preferences, not the unused QT Player preferences.

Or am I missing something?

Sorry for all the stupid questions. . . but I'm just loving the images I'm seeing created by this camera!

Stephen
 
wshultz said:
The FCS compatibility is not a REDAlert setting, it is a QuickTime preference setting. Go to QuickTime -> Preferences -> Enable FCS compatibility (slightly different depending on QT version)

This is supposed to make the gamma correct whether playing in FCS or QuickTime.
Click to expand...

now i feel like a dumb ass - i've looked under both QT pref panes and can't find this option... I have QT Pro 7.4.1(14) -
 
Under the "General" tab, it is at the very bottom of the list. On 7.4.1 it says
"Enable Final Cut Studio color compatibility" and explains below that what it is doing.
 
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