Visualisation possible workflows

[Eryc Tramonn]

Joon, so After effects is going to be able to hack it in 4k? Can you set up a new project at that resolution (I guess that's the only factor... it's not doing anything realtime so it can take as long as it wants to calculate...)

I got no problem tediously piecing my movie together in AE if the program can do it... put music on and do one sequence a day...

Several years ago, a motion graphics buddy of mine at a company called Logan (or was it Stardust...anyway) was working on a really HUGE piece for Intel. And if I'm not mistaken, the project topped out AE's ability at a max. resolution of 30,000 x 30,000 pixels. So yeah, it can handle 4K files...you just need an ass load of time and the fastest machine, or cluster, you can get your hands on.

 

[I Bloom]

Good on YOU, Myktyl. That is exactly what I am planning to do. There has been a lot of talk about FCP not being capable of handling Filmouts in some threads. FCP will do everything we need only with some extra time. Does that matter. No. Not if we are planning a low budget film. Once we have couple of productions under our belt, we can go to best of Post Production Houses and get the job done. Until then, it is RED+FCP+COLOR+AFTEREFFECT

I think a lot of emphasis is put on achieving 4K grades that can compete with Laser Pacific or DuArt etc. I think that's a good goal. But just to put things in perspective for indies, I was working with a friend who made an indy short on 35mm that went back to print recently. I showed him RedCine and I was like, yeah this is great but there is no keyframing or secondaries...we haven't figured out how to monitor it properly etc. And he put things into perspective, he was like "On a 35mm print all we have are timing lights and two answer prints. F&*k it just use this shit and get your movie done." Interesting perspective.

After effects is good. Don't forget about Shake either, also a nice tool.

IBloom

 

[Eryc Tramonn]

I think a lot of emphasis is put on achieving 4K grades that can compete with Laser Pacific or DuArt etc. I think that's a good goal. But just to put things in perspective for indies, I was working with a friend who made an indy short on 35mm that went back to print recently. I showed him RedCine and I was like, yeah this is great but there is no keyframing or secondaries...we haven't figured out how to monitor it properly etc. And he put things into perspective, he was like "On a 35mm print all we have are timing lights and two answer prints. F&*k it just use this shit and get your movie done." Interesting perspective.

After effects is good. Don't forget about Shake either, also a nice tool.

IBloom

Good quote IBloom...that's why I can be so irreverent on this board. Don't take sh!t so seriously. Just get your fuckin' movie done the BEST that YOU can. Ultimately, who gives a shit how you get it there. People, myself included, have a tendency to get too caught in the minutiae and begin wallowing in too many details at times. Let the law of parsimony guide us - you know, the one where that dude Occam spouts off about razors and such... K.I.S.S

 

[Elizabeth]

Good quote IBloom...that's why I can be so irreverent on this board. Don't take sh!t so seriously. Just get your fuckin' movie done the BEST that YOU can. Ultimately, who gives a shit how you get it there. People, myself included, have a tendency to get too caught in the minutiae and begin wallowing in too many details at times. Let the law of parsimony guide us - you know, the one where that dude Occam spouts off about razors and such... K.I.S.S

"All other things being equal, the simplest solution is the best." Agreed!

"Don't take sh!t so seriously." Absolutely!

Although, it seems to me that there is no way of knowing exact which thing are in fact equal without a high degree of thorough investigation ... start broad and come into a elegant simple path through solid knowledge. I have heard it said that "God is in the details". I am not sure entirely of the veracity of this, but I do know I sure have found myself in a few very painful editing and budget purgatories, all because I overlooked one small, silly detail. The whole reason I am interested in the RED system is because of the potential promise of relatively affordable path to 4K quality and MY mission here at Reduser.net is to conduct a feasibility study into what it will take to reach that worth goal.

I HAVE to look beyond the sale pitch of the camera and emotionality of my response to this potential and peer into the stark reality of what details it will take to make an efficient 4K system from start to finish, ie. exactly how long before RED's intended features are fully functional, what additional hardware and software will be needed and at what obvious and hidden cost. I am not entirely sure that "The RED Road" is the one for me right now ... it is this study of the details that will inform my decision. There are several other methods to get to where I want to go that fall just short of the 4K promise and I may have to accept one of these instead ... but not without a good try at the 4K first.

My hat is off to each and everyone of you who have forged ahead, and I appreciate your generosity with your experiences. Thank you.

 

[Eryc Tramonn]

"All other things being equal, the simplest solution is the best." Agreed!

"Don't take sh!t so seriously." Absolutely!

Although, it seems to me that there is no way of knowing exact which thing are in fact equal without a high degree of thorough investigation ... start broad and come into a elegant simple path through solid knowledge. I have heard it said that "God is in the details". I am not sure entirely of the veracity of this, but I do know I sure have found myself in a few very painful editing and budget purgatories, all because I overlooked one small, silly detail. The whole reason I am interested in the RED system is because of the potential promise of relatively affordable path to 4K quality and MY mission here at Reduser.net is to conduct a feasibility study into what it will take to reach that worth goal.

I HAVE to look beyond the sale pitch of the camera and emotionality of my response to this potential and peer into the stark reality of what details it will take to make an efficient 4K system from start to finish, ie. exactly how long before RED's intended features are fully functional, what additional hardware and software will be needed and at what obvious and hidden cost. I am not entirely sure that "The RED Road" is the one for me right now ... it is this study of the details that will inform my decision. There are several other methods to get to where I want to go that fall just short of the 4K promise and I may have to accept one of these instead ... but not without a good try at the 4K first.

My hat is off to each and everyone of you who have forged ahead, and I appreciate your generosity with your experiences. Thank you.

I've heard it the opposite way..."The devil is in the details." I guess either way you look at it, the details are definitely something to concern yourself with to a point. I completely agree with your approach to the RED camera, and see myself proceeding with the same trepidation. Unfortunately, I don't have bottomless coffers, so I have to be extremely cautious. However, I would so love to buy one of these things....I'd give almost anything to get my hands on one, but the practicality of life has a way of putting the kibosh on things sometimes. In time.

 

[mezmo]

Hi Dip,
Nice workflow for a short film music promo or TVC.
Would it work for a feature film? Where do you
store the one million or so DPX444 log frames for a
feature drama shot at a 15-20 to one ratio?
You seem to be missing the Mother of all SAN's there in your
first workflow.
And will IQ be able to find and present selected sequential frames
from a good ole FCP EDL? I know it's good but.......
Potential "world of pain" IMHO.
Mezmo

 

[mezmo]

Thanks Kosmos and Ylem.

That's pretty interesting. Looks like it can be achieved to some extent, as soon as FCP can render out a 4K final movie from the editing that's been done to the proxies in the timeline in 2K...

Well I'm not a REAL Reduser 'til february 30th or so. But after that I'll be looking at everything I can to find a workflow for us pawpers to squeeze glorious 4K out of nothing more (or very little more) than FCS2 on an 8core Mac. I'll post a "Lowend 4K" thread with suggestions then.

Hi Myktyl,
Sorry to butt in but here is the cruncher, will FCP2 after being upgraded to handle R3d
files ever be able to render out to 10 bit 4K or even 2K DPX from those finished and edited R3d files?
My guess is probably 1080p 8 bit only. Hope I'm wrong here.
I have a hunch we'll still be looking at boxes like Scratch to do the big stuff for some time yet.
Son of Shake may be able to help here, don't know.
Time will tell.
Mezmo.

 

[ChristopherKenworthy]

Hi Myktyl,
Sorry to butt in but here is the cruncher, will FCP2 after being upgraded to handle R3d
files ever be able to render out to 10 bit 4K or even 2K DPX from those finished and edited R3d files?
My guess is probably 1080p 8 bit only. Hope I'm wrong here.

4K, no idea. 2K can be done now.

I just tried it with the RD3 file of the drag cars. Created the QT H proxy with Red alert, dropped proxy into timeline, went to File>Export>Using Quicktime Conversion, and from the dropdown selected DPX Image Sequence. Clicked OK and a few seconds later it's all there as DPX. (You need Gluetools installed, of course.)

 

[Ed van der Kruijssen]

Nice workflow for a short film music promo or TVC.
Would it work for a feature film? Where do you
store the one million or so DPX444 log frames for a
feature drama shot at a 15-20 to one ratio?
You seem to be missing the Mother of all SAN's there in your
first workflow.
And will IQ be able to find and present selected sequential frames
from a good ole FCP EDL? I know it's good but.......
Potential "world of pain" IMHO.
Mezmo

A San based architecture won't fit in a Indie workflow budgetwise.
I must admit 4K uncompressed is huge - around 32 mb per frame. I think it's managable but you need a lot of patience and a lot of hard discs too!
To give you an idea: converting 1 hour R3D to 4K 444 DPX will take about 3 days. And for 15 hours of DPX 4K 444 footage you need about 45 TB of storage.
Let's hope that R3D off line in FCP and Automatic Pull in Redcine will be avalaible soon. We made two schemes: one based on the Uncompressed workflow but now more focussed on Feature film.
And one with the future possibility R3D editing in FCP and automatic pull and convert in Red Cine.

 

[John Tissavary]

But why would you spend for an iQ session when you can use Scratch, which will conform & grade r3d files natively? Unless you already own an iQ I don't see any justification for the extra expense.

regards,

john t.

 

[M Most]

But why would you spend for an iQ session when you can use Scratch, which will conform & grade r3d files natively? Unless you already own an iQ I don't see any justification for the extra expense.

I don't think the chart was indicating the IQ as much as it was illustrating how much of the process was to be handled as "diy" vs. moving it to a finishing facility. The impression I got from the chart was that "finishing and grading" meant "what the finishing facility does," and the IQ is only there because his particular facility of choice happens to use it. Or perhaps because he keeps reading about how "Crossing the Line" was finished. In either case, I don't think he was advocating a particular piece of equipment, rather, he was indicating a workflow.

 

[Fredrik Harreschou]

IF you really need or want to work and finish in 4K, ironically that's best done on a PC... :nerd: On Windows you can transcode all your files to Cineform 12 bit 4:4:4 4K from RedCine and work with those files from offline to final output in premiere/after effects etc, never having to touch your R3D-files again.
Realtime 4K editing in Premiere Pro.

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=5976

 

[Ed van der Kruijssen]

possible workflows

possible workflows

I don't think the chart was indicating the IQ as much as it was illustrating how much of the process was to be handled as "diy" vs. moving it to a finishing facility. The impression I got from the chart was that "finishing and grading" meant "what the finishing facility does," and the IQ is only there because his particular facility of choice happens to use it. Or perhaps because he keeps reading about how "Crossing the Line" was finished. In either case, I don't think he was advocating a particular piece of equipment, rather, he was indicating a workflow

.

You're correct we're not promoting Quantel IQ. Were just want to share thoughts about how to set up an Uncompressed 4k/2k workflow.
And yes we happen to own a Quantel IQ which give us the opportunity to experiment with 4K uncompressed within a Quantel environment.

Ed

 

[mezmo]

.

You're correct we're not promoting Quantel IQ. Were just want to share thoughts about how to set up an Uncompressed 4k/2k workflow.
And yes we happen to own a Quantel IQ which give us the opportunity to experiment with 4K uncompressed within a Quantel environment.

Ed

Hi Dip again,
If you own IQ and I assume PABLO why do you need a indie workflow?
Your a major player in the post business and have already spent big
bucks. Just get a basic (cheap) version of Scratch now to handle R3d
data, conform up and send it off to IQ in whatever DPX flavour required.
Use FCP as is now to offline (no R3d upgrade required), Scratch will do the rest.
45 days to convert 15 hours of R3d to DPX.......man.
World of pain dude.

 

[mezmo]

IF you really need or want to work and finish in 4K, ironically that's best done on a PC... :nerd: On Windows you can transcode all your files to Cineform 12 bit 4:4:4 4K from RedCine and work with those files from offline to final output in premiere/after effects etc, never having to touch your R3D-files again.
Realtime 4K editing in Premiere Pro.

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=5976

This is another excellent CHEAPER option.
The use of another (non Red) intermediate codec
Mezmo

 

[mezmo]

oops, see below

 

[mezmo]

4K, no idea. 2K can be done now.

I just tried it with the RD3 file of the drag cars. Created the QT H proxy with Red alert, dropped proxy into timeline, went to File>Export>Using Quicktime Conversion, and from the dropdown selected DPX Image Sequence. Clicked OK and a few seconds later it's all there as DPX. (You need Gluetools installed, of course.)

Hi Chris ,
Now render out to 2K dpx.
If you have transitions, are they 8 bit?
Mezmo.

 

[Michael Stanmore]

Hi Myktyl,
Sorry to butt in but here is the cruncher, will FCP2 after being upgraded to handle R3d
files ever be able to render out to 10 bit 4K or even 2K DPX from those finished and edited R3d files?
My guess is probably 1080p 8 bit only. Hope I'm wrong here.
I have a hunch we'll still be looking at boxes like Scratch to do the big stuff for some time yet.
Son of Shake may be able to help here, don't know.
Time will tell.
Mezmo.

Yeah I doubt it to be honest...but Moore's law is still ticking along and we'd be fools to rule it out in a couple of years...by then Red will be selling 4K monitors *rolls eyes*

It's not really necessary though. As Ylem and others point out so well is that for us indies...a 4K out isn't really necessary. We pay the bills doing TVCs and music videos that presently all end up SD broadcast and nothing more than an HD master is necessary...but keep the lovely 35mm DOF etc etc etc

Then when we make our big breakout feature film to try to sell... well we'll do what Robert Rodriguez did and deliver in a format that we KNOW we can deliver in... a beautifully graded 1080P version is lightyears ahead of what he had to work with, and we know we've got our glorious 4K files sitting backed-up ready and waiting. When our movie catches the right people's attention, THOSE people can pay to get the 4K version made and lasered onto 35mm etc.

 

[Eryc Tramonn]

Yeah I doubt it to be honest...but Moore's law is still ticking along and we'd be fools to rule it out in a couple of years...by then Red will be selling 4K monitors *rolls eyes*

It's not really necessary though. As Ylem and others point out so well is that for us indies...a 4K out isn't really necessary. We pay the bills doing TVCs and music videos that presently all end up SD broadcast and nothing more than an HD master is necessary...but keep the lovely 35mm DOF etc etc etc

Then when we make our big breakout feature film to try to sell... well we'll do what Robert Rodriguez did and deliver in a format that we KNOW we can deliver in... a beautifully graded 1080P version is lightyears ahead of what he had to work with, and we know we've got our glorious 4K files sitting backed-up ready and waiting. When our movie catches the right people's attention, THOSE people can pay to get the 4K version made and lasered onto 35mm etc.

Brilliance. As a matter of fact, you're downright effulgent right now.

 

[Eryc Tramonn]

Yeah I doubt it to be honest...but Moore's law is still ticking along and we'd be fools to rule it out in a couple of years...by then Red will be selling 4K monitors *rolls eyes*

It's not really necessary though. As Ylem and others point out so well is that for us indies...a 4K out isn't really necessary. We pay the bills doing TVCs and music videos that presently all end up SD broadcast and nothing more than an HD master is necessary...but keep the lovely 35mm DOF etc etc etc

Then when we make our big breakout feature film to try to sell... well we'll do what Robert Rodriguez did and deliver in a format that we KNOW we can deliver in... a beautifully graded 1080P version is lightyears ahead of what he had to work with, and we know we've got our glorious 4K files sitting backed-up ready and waiting. When our movie catches the right people's attention, THOSE people can pay to get the 4K version made and lasered onto 35mm etc.

You think like this, and in my humble opinion, you'll have the most longevity in this business. Just because you throw money at a project, doesn't mean you're going to sell big...so no matter how wealthy you are...eventually the money will run out...unless you get really lucky and hit the jackpot. We have to be very cautious. The trick, as I see it, is to spend as little as possible, but in turn acquire production values seemingly larger than what was put into the film financially. Now that's not an earthshattering formula, but you'd be surprised how many people don't get that simple fact and I'm sure you all know how difficult it is to pull it off. I'm preaching to the choir.

I've seen guys spend $10 to produce their reels, and then get signed with major production companies based on the strength of their creativity alone. As a matter of fact, I'm in talks right now with a major network for something shot with XL1's. In the end, broadcast standards are flexible if you have what they're looking for. I always argued the opposite with my producers, but the network is proving me wrong. And if they want to buy it, I'll shoot it on toilet paper if that's what they want to pay for. And then use the money to embark on something else.

Just my .02