HD For Indies

End of Year Blogwad: 12/31/06

I've been enjoying taking the week mostly off when it comes to blogging, but have been snagging items of relevance and letting the stack up, minimized in my dock.

I started this in 2004, so 2007 will be the fourth year that HD for Indies has touched. As always, thanks for all the kind words and support, and Happy New Year!

So go have fun tonight and think about your new year starting tomorrow, or read this with your hangover over eggs in the manana.

Here it all is, slightly organized:


END OF YEAR STUFF:
==================

Wired News: Best Shoestring Sci-Fi of 2006...although Wild Blue Yonder literally put me to sleep, several times.

=========
Videoguys Top 10 products of 2006

This is a very Windows-centric list, hopefully balances my Mac-centric tendency a bit today. Interested in doing HD stuff on Windows? Read this!

=========

CinemaTech: Ten Pivotal Events of 2006, from the Intersection of Entertainment and Technology

==========

2006: The year in Apple - Yahoo! News

========

Wired News: The Year in Online Video

===========

Biggest Box Office Flops Of 2006 � Screenhead

Read it and weep...but not for yourself. Most of these deserved their fates, but I'm sad to see The Fountain did so poorly, personally I really enjoyed it and found it very relevant/resonant.

But Poseidon goes down, down, down....buried under the weight of a $160M budget and only $60M in floatation devices....

============

ONLINE VIDEO:
==============

Xbox the top video download success? - DV Guru - Xbox 360 lets you download movies directly to a device that can display them on your TV. OH - and lets you download HD movies for direct display on your HDTV, even with analog connections (no HDMI requirement). Does that sound like stellar news to anybody else? Sure does to me!

Honestly, I think Microsoft is in a great position when it comes to HD content - you can play games on this thing, you can watch HD-DVDs for a $200 add-on to your $300-$500 base investment, or just download HD movies directly with a broadband connection. Or you can spend $500 to $1500 for an HD-DVD or Blu-ray player. Hmm. Not a very compelling argument.

Apple's iTV I think would play well to a different demographic than the stereotypical 24 year old male Xbox 360 player - families. They may not want an Xbox in their home, and the movies you can buy online? The Disney stuff, which includes a lot of the family movies the kids are going to want to watch over and over. And it'll undoubtedly play all your iTunes music, and let you watch your pictures the same way Front Row does now, connecting wired or wirelessly to your Mac or PC (photo functionality almost assuredly Mac only, certainly to start).

But if I had to guess, I'd pick the Xbox360 demographic as the bigger/better market to serve.

================

Apple holds 90% of video downloads - DV Guru: " 1.2 million households purchased a video download in the third quarter of this year, while five times as many people illegally downloaded videos from P2P networks. Of these legal downloads, Apple is responsible for 90% of the overall market:"

=============

Internet Video and how the Broadcast Nets are Missing the HDTV Opportunity. - Blog Maverick

Cuban's purely pro-HD and has a financial interest in seeing it succeed (after all, he owns HDNet, 2929 Films, etc.), so I don't think he's the most balanced voice of reason, but he does make some good points here.

I heard in a conference in the last coupla years someone talking about the crucial point of inflection for HD advertising would occur when HD sports were broadcast in major markets - Chicago/LA/NYC - so that the presidents of companies would see their SD ads looking like crap cut against HD shows and would call and bitch at their ad agency heads.

Cuban is talking about the opportunity for advertisers, and wisely mentions the hassle factor of advertising to a lot of smaller outlets rather a single larger entity. I wish, however, he'd include cost per impression in his argument - what's it cost you to reach a given viewer.

==============

CustomFlix Announces Support for Amazon Unbox: "CustomFlix Labs, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Amazon.com, Inc.,
(NASDAQ: AMZN) today announced its support for Amazon.com%u2019s video download service, Amazon Unbox, by adding video downloads to its current DVD and CD on Demand services. This new CustomFlix service now enables independent filmmakers and other DVD content owners to make their content available as video downloads to tens of millions of Amazon.com customers through Unbox."

===========

Possibly Maybe - Screens - Arts - New York Times Blog - make a web pilot, sell it, buyer pulls it. Learn folks, learn! If you don't leave the web stuff up, we won't follow the cookie crumbs....

COLORING/DI/SHOOTING STUFF:
==================

Colour My World: Repairing and styling colour, featuring 'The Grading Sweet'.

There's a set of color correction tools called The Grading Sweet, with a standard ($90) and Pro ($750) versions.

It is a hand-holding approach to color - you tell it whether the footage is under/normal/overexposed, temperature correct it (tungsten to daylight or vice versa or neutral) then a "sweetener" which sounds like some kind of contrast/saturation thing. Then it has a windowing option, as well as canned color treatment options, vignetting options, glows, and other stuff. There's a Pro version at many times the price as well.

It seems well suited for novice colorists to get their feet wet with this kind of stuff. Jude Cotter wrote the LAFCPUG article that I skimmed to make this entry.

(found via DVguru.com)

============

Maintaining the Vision Good article going over various aspects and pros and cons of color correcting projects: "We first went to a color correction house where it wasn't working very well. So we ended up going to a different house,%u201D he says. %u201CAnd once we did that it was great. They were really good, and on top of it.� Part of it is that you really have to have faith in the colorist to be able to tell you, when we blow up to 35, this is going to be okay.%u201D He adds, %u201CMaybe you have a little problem where it looks a little bit too saturated with blue, and they say, don't worry it'll be okay. It's really an act of faith at that point. I really feel that is how you should approach it. For a DP to be controlling the actual numbers is kind of folly, I think. There are guys who are doing it all day long. But you've got to get a good person."
...
“We ended up, mainly for budgetary reasons, going right to HD, telecine to HD,” he says. “In the color correction, I would find something and ask, can we make that a little bit more orange rather than red? And what happened is it would go too far. They'd say, we can't really -- it's got to be one or the other. It didn't have that subtlety of color adjustment which you do if you're going to a higher scan, if you're scanning to 2K or even 4K.”
...but I'd be curious to know what format they went to, was it 4:4:4, was it log, etc.. It seems pretty clear a good film scanner is going to give better results than a good telecine to an HD tape format, but with light or zero compression on a 4:4:4 log telecine, I'd be curious to know the quality difference, and I suspect the cost savings could be considerable.

==================

Somewhat related, Some TV stars fear HDTV's sharp clarity

While the purists used to argue film retained more resolution, the truth is HD provides a more detailed picture due to a lack of film grain's hiding properties.

Best summed up with the line:
hi-def clarity puts any and all wrinkles, pimples and pores on display in well-lit bathroom-mirror detail.

Oopsie, Brad Pitt.

Makeup artists are having to up their game to maintain good looking stars. Airbrushing is big, but doesn't work everywhere.

===========

How Clint Eastwood incorporated digital elements into Letters from Iwo Jima and Flags of Our Fathers. : "the DI ended up playing a central role in crafting the visuals for both movies, largely because the director had a specific plan for presenting the extensive battle footage of both films"

I should really read this whole thing...but I haven't. Beat me to it.

-----------------

Achieving a Film Look with DV and HDV Cameras this is the basics - 24p, gamma, lighting, motion rendering, depth of field, etc.

==============

Depth of Field Myth - explains how backing up and zooming in doesn't actually make the background any blurrier

=========

HD House back at Sundance - DV Guru

Going to Sundance? Check out HD House, will have stuff on:

Digital Cameras Exposed presented by Emmy Award-winning Engineer and Videography Technical Editor Mark Schubin
HD Camera Compendium presented by Cinematographer, Director and Visual Effects Supervisor Scott Billups
Digital Imaging Demos with camera and lens first-looks
The Workable Digital Workflow
Digital Intermediate Possibilities for Independent Filmmakers
Data and Digital Cinematography
Painting by Numbers: 4:4:4, 2K, 35, 16
Facts on the HDV Format

==========


DRIVE/STORAGE/HARDWARE STUFF:
=============================

Mac Pro 4-Drive Internal RAID Tests (Seagate 320GB, 7200.10 drives): "Mac Pro 4-Drive Internal RAID Tests
(Seagate 7200.10 320GB Drives)" - works pretty well, DiskTester and Kona benchmarks

----------

G5 PCI-X RAID Tests - 4 Maxline Pro 500GB/Seritek 2eEN4 SATA Enclosure/SeriTek 1VE4 Controller - QuickBench and terminal bash results

-----------------

Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6700 Quad-Core CPU (Kentsfield) Review: Content Creation: Media Editing and Encoding Benchmarks - review of the latest double double (quad cores on a single die/chip), which in a dual config would allow for an 8 processor system. On Windows, After Effects 7 (labelled 6.0 here) did pretty well, but we don't know what theirtest files were.

===========

Quick Takes on Real World Macintosh Performance ExpressCard SATA bandwidth woes: "Though the theoretical bandwidth of an ExpressCard is 256MB/s, the current speed limit of all ExpressCards is about HALF of that when used with a RAID set no matter how many drives are connected."

....as expected - I've been told the bus isn't fast enough for uncompressed HD work.

===========

REVIEWS:
========

Macworld: Review: 17-inch MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo/2.33 GHz Nice fast notebook (NOT laptop, cooks your thighs), big screen. Surprisingly a bit slower in their tests than the 15" version that ostensibly should match performance. Overall, pricey but good: "We can think of a few new features we%u2019d like to see in Apple%u2019s flagship laptop%u2014an eSATA port for external drives, for example, and maybe a built-in reader for flash memory cards. Even without those improvements, however, the 17-inch MacBook Pro is a marvelous machine. If you can afford the price and don%u2019t mind the size and weight inevitably associated with such a large display, you won%u2019t be disappointed."

=========

FresHDV | FX7 VS FX1 footage - translated from German, but lots of details, if you're debating which of these to get, read on

=============

Boujou4: "Boujou has been the industry standard for camera and object tracking software for quite a few years now. But, like most software, it has had its drawbacks, which most of the ingenious tracking artists have found workarounds for.� In its latest incarnation, 2d3 has answered these problems by opening the black box and letting the users tinker around. In years past, Boujou was used to track point data in the same way a soldier uses an automatic weapon. You simply fire and see what you hit. An artist would bring in the background plate to be tracked, put in the lens data (if he has it), and hit Feature Track.�Boujou would jaw on the frames for a while and try to come up with a solution.�When it worked, it worked well, and when it didn%u2019t, it was easier to move to a manual solution %u2013 often in a different piece of software.�At least, that has been my experience on numerous projects with numerous effects houses."

============


Sony HDR-FX7 Camcorder Review: "It’s hard not to like Sony’s HDR-FX7, and only a few years ago we would have loved it....Unfortunately for the FX7, the high-end “consumer” camcorder niche seems a threatened species....Until Sony lowers the price of the HDR-FX7, we can’t give it a strong endorsement...Our advice is to hold off on buying an FX7 until Sony drops its price considerably – or to give the XH A1 some serious consideration."

Stills and video from the FX7 here. Very interesting to hear the Canon so strongly endorsed in a review of the Sony gear. Of course, I'm also very curious to see some reviews of the Sony V1U camera as well.

=========

Oppo DV-981HD Universal DVD Player - $230, Faroudja uprezzing DVD player with HDMI output. After reading this article, makes me think waiting for high def discs isn't such a bad idea for most folks for the quality and results you'd get at the size and viewing distances most can afford.

==============

Avid, Final Cut Pro, and Streaming Training Courses: Creating Marker Durations In Final Cut Pro

=============

HD-DVD/BLU-RAY/DRM/MADNESS
==========================
Media, tech cos probe possible high-def DVD hack - Yahoo! News - maybe it has, maybe it hasn't, not sure yet. The real fun begins if this IS for real, and the studios start revoking keys. The way AACS works (protection scheme in HD-DVD and Blu-ray) is akin to CSS from DVDs, BUT there is NOT one master global key, each title has its own key. Seems that the hacker found a way to extract the key on a title by title basis from the HD-DVD playback software.

There's a video and everything...but that is easily fake-able.

SO....if this is the case, then the software manufacturer should issue a new version of the software, and in theory all new high def discs would include that version of the software on their "don't let this work list" - so if you're an unsuspecting user, one day all of a sudden you put in a new disc, and suddenly ALL your discs won't work....because the studios decided your player was verbotten.

There will ALWAYS be hacks. I was talking with a friend of mine about this kind of stuff the other day, his point was that so long as there is a system in place that keeps most people legal most of the time, it is OK. I countered that as long as there is ANY leak, ANYwhere, there will be the illicit bootlegs sold on the open market, which is where the REAL money loss comes from for the studios.

I suspect it will be possible to get one of the cheapest players out there - an Xbox 360 with the HD-DVD add-on -- and use a $1000 HD capture card to capture the analog HD output to DVCPRO HD, then re-encode and distribute illegally as one wished. If it can be circumvented, it will be. In the meantime, legitimate home users trying to time or media shift will of course be left out in the cold.

Grr. Or brr. Depending.

========

...but for all the whinging about next gen formats, DVD players finally outnumber VCRs - "For all of the talk about the battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray, both technologies are far, far away from most family rooms. Yes, the two are just now beginning what could be a long battle for entertainment-center supremacy, but keep in mind that the technology that they are vying to replace has only recently gained the upper hand against the previous-generation technology--a decade after first being introduced. Even if Blu-ray or HD DVD unexpectedly routs its opponent from the market in the next two or three years, it will still be several more years before the victorious format supplants the DVD."

========

PowerDVD Ultra: HD DVD and Blu-ray playback for the PC - DV Guru

========


OTHER/RANDOM:
============

johnaugust.com � Seeing The Nines at Sundance - John August talks about going to Sundance and how to do it, best quotes: "my threshold for tolerating crowds, schwag and auteur-theorists drops considerably when wearing a parka."

"Maybe you’ll meet that special someone who will change your life. Or convince you never to sleep with a singer/songwriter/gaffer."

Also Scott Kirsner's guide on Sundance:

http://cinematech.blogspot.com/2006/11/advice-on-attending-sundance-film.html

=============

Spielberg involved in "The Apprentice" like show for filmmakers - DV Guru: I like the cynical guess at how it will all play out from the DVguru writer:

"I am intrigued but here is how I think the first season will play out. Most of the 16 directors will be complete morons, power hungry, wannabe-divas that will be eliminated as early as possible. There will be a couple of the good conformist types. The final two will consist of a conformist and a diva. Of course, the conformist will go on to win the show. "

============

the Workbook Project is a new site for content creators, worth keeping an eye on. Found via DVguru.com

==================

No mentioning of the iPhone in Steve%u2019s keynote address! - aMobileME - this guy thinks he knows what Steve Jobs will say at MWSF. Doubt it is all correct, feel free to lambast him when he's wrong. I've been hearing rumors that Leopard has been missing internal bencmarks, so March is sounding optimistic.

===========

DVX100B of HVX200 for Tight Budget - DVXuser.com -- The online community for filmmaking - I argue the false economy of being able to "almost" afford an HVX.

==========


Camera 101: Rule of Thirds - a little bit of composition info for the noobs...like me (did I mention I'm not a shooter? I'm not a shooter).

=========


Studio Daily | News and Tools of the Trade - their version of a blogwad - bunch of tidbits of interest

================


FresHDV | Automated lip reading adds Hitler's voice to previously silent films

==========

A Film Festival Without the Film - DV Guru

Flipbook film festival - not HD, but cool, kool, kewl.

==============

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-==-

In the purely "because I'm self-centered enough to want to know" category, HD for Indies pageviews were 1.416M pageviews for the year (3900/day), that's up from about 956,000 in CY2005 (2600+/day), and an average of 1900/day pageviews the last quarter of '04 that I started using a particular tracking tool, after starting the site in March of 2004.

So after all this readin' and edumacation, I'm off to go celebrate the new year by avidly destroy some brain cells...TAXI!

: )

-mike

Last night I got an email from Jim Jannard, founder of Red, entitled "Spike is here!" - Red's goal was to get prototype/s built in 2006, and they are just squeaking in under the wire - Spike (prototype) is all put together and they are starting to put it through it's paces. Congrats to them!

There's a thread at the new Reduser.net showing off these same pics, plus a lot of discussion there as well.

Hats off to the whole team, and thanks to Jarred for taking these pics.

This is that same prototype as discussed in this post from the other day, just powder coated a matte black - looks good.

With powder coat and a lens on it, looks like a "real" camera now. Oh, and ports galore - to paraphrase Luke, "Look at the side of that thing!"

Looking forward to the first pics from Spike they feel like sharing with the public. But apparently this one doesn't do everything yet - as for the level of functionality in Spike, Jim said on Reduser.net:

"We aren't going to publish anything (for now) other than shots of Spike. We have a combination of test beds. Frankie, Frankie 2, Spike, and boards on a bench. I don't really want to get into the details of what each is doing everyday or what images came from where. I will say that Spike is not full function enabled at this time, nor was it intended to be at this point. We are bringing up different features on different test beds for now. Remember, the goal is to ship early 2007. All is good (today).

Jim"


They are squeezing in under the wire on 2006 protos, practically testing for real will be mostly in earliest 2007, with field testing probably starting in later January or February is my uninformed guess. But the revised goal of shipping in "early" 2007 still seems entirely viable, with early being defined as late as May 31st by Jim. They do hope to be shipping by NAB 2007, but as always, no promised ship date - they keep saying these are targets not promises.

But it's lookin' good! I'm looking forward to a lot of dropped jaws at NAB 2007 with working units in the booth in Vegas.

As usual, click for larger view, command-click to open in a new tab in Safari (you HAVE set your prefs for tabbed viewing, haven't you?)

-mike

PS - working on that long delayed blogwad...

(click for bigger view)
Several things of interest concerning the Red One camera have happened in the last 24 hours:

First Pictures of "Spike" - the first Red One functional prototype (a different pic than above)

Jim Jannard, Red founder, said on DVXuser.com (click for picture):

Here is a quick sneak preview of "Spike" before final assembly. It is a bit later in December than we had hoped for, but here she is. This is aluminum "Spike" and NOT a rendering. As soon as she is locked and loaded, we will post more images on the new www.reduser.net website, which should go live tomorrow. This is NOT from production tooling. It was machined at the RED garage in Orange County. She should be operational shortly (days, not weeks).

We have chosen not to show internals for obvious reasons... AND production RED ONE will NOT be shiny silver. :-)

Someone asked in that thread about whether reservations would open up again, Jim responded:

Chris... we have thought about this often. It is possible that we will open up reservations for a few days (maybe 3) early next year. The terms and pricing will be slightly different than the 1st round of reservations, but good just the same. We will absolutely open up for firm orders at NAB. My bet is that you would want to get in before that.

Somebody else asked if they are just now putting together prototypes, whether this would affect ship date, Jim responded:

The only timeline we have officially published is: 4k footage in the fall (2006)... we were two weeks early, our 1st camera together in December (that would be Spike), and production early in 2007. What we do with test cameras until shipping we reserve the right to do in private, especially since our plans change daily. Test units will certainly be out before production, but I don't want to commit to when, where, who and why. We'll keep you posted as we go along, but we have enough pressure to ship early 2007. We will not be held accountable for any other milestones.

While we have said that shipping 1st production units around NAB is our goal, "early" can technically be May 31st.


My read: if they are just getting the shell ready on Wednesday the 27th, that's good that it is ready. Far more important and challenging is the status of the guts of the thing and whether they are ready to go in and WORK. If the guts are ready to go in, they're in good shape. Ideally, they'd flip it on and shoot ANYTHING (how about Jim's smiling mug?) just to say "Did it!" and squeeze under the "in 2006" self-imposed target date. And if there is a snafu that pushes them back a week...I don't really care, they would still be generally on track. I'm not so concerned about shipping on a given day (although a big "We Are Shipping!" banner at NAB booth would have great PR value), as I'm concerned about shipping in GENERAL - if I can get mine by summer (and I mean the "normal" definition of June-August), I'll personally be satisfied...and I don't have an exceptionally low reservation number.

Jim mentions their goal is to ship "around NAB" - even that leaves them some slack. But it does sound like they will absolutely have working units, perhaps even production units, in the booth at NAB. And for PR and market reasons, that's the most important thing to have done.

There's also another picture here:

another "Spike" sneak peek... - Reduser.net

You'll notice that is on Reduser.net - it is the new new, Red specific forum board, started by DVXuser.com's Jarred Land.

Site looks good Jarred!

If you were a member of dvxuser.com you'll need to register again for reduser.net. The Red threads on DVXuser.com will be locked down in the next day or two for archival purposes, so start going to reduser.net for your new info. I predict that is where most of the up-to-the-minute skinny will happen, I'm just skimming the cream off and reporting it here (until Jarred barks at me to link not quote!) : )

So go sign up so you can see everything and post your own thoughts and questions over there.

And as always, check the above threads, lots of discussion/conversation going on over there. If you have a question, post it here (using Comments link below) or over on dvxuser or reduser and the Red team will usually respond pretty quickly.

-mike

PS - oops, I actually got at least one of these quotes from this thread on DVinfo.net:

Spike Sneak Preview... - The Digital Video Information Network

Walter Graff, a very experienced DP, has a great page with a ton of HD related articles that I just stumbled across. How good is it? Good enough that I've added it to the Great HD Links list on the permanent right hand side of this page.

The main page of articles is:

Bluesky Media - Instruction

Some of the ones that caught my eye are:

HDTV - more perception than defintion

Setting up an HDTV monitor for proper color rendition

Good HDTV: It's More Than a Numbers Game

SD or HD?: "SD or HD: down and dirty down conversion"

Lighting Is All About Chiaroscuro - THIS IS MY FAVORITE - read this one, has some great examples putting classic paintings next to frames from great movies that appropriated those looks.

Depth of Field Myth: "I can't tell you how many times I have heard the phrase, if you are shooting an interview and you back up your camera and zoom in your lens putting the person back into frame, you will decrease the depth of field making the background softer. I have heard this from first time movie makers all the way up to very experienced 25 year directors of photography. And there you have one of the greatest myths involving depth of field. It is such a myth that many textbooks print it to this day.
Let me quantify the statement and perhaps you will see where the myth comes from. If you are shooting an interview but the background looks too sharp and you back your camera up and zoom into your person again keeping them the same size as you did when the camera was closer while keeping the same f-stop on your lens, THE DEPTH OF FIELD DOES NOT CHANGE."

Prosumer HD - A Lesson In Marketing: The New 1/3' HD Cameras (Bigger does not mean better) -
If anyone was to use the term "better" when trying to sort out the different cameras available in the prosumer HD world then I think you are missing the boat.
Three different areas of processing are involved with these cameras that are important together in making the overall experience ; 1, the lens/CCD, 2, the DSP (converting that image to numbers and how the signal is processed), and 3, the recording format."

BlueSky - Lighting examples-Green Screen: "Down and Dirty Green Screen"

Walter Graff- Bluesky- Greenscreen #2: "What do you do when you are given an hour to set up a green screen"

Women Deserve Soft Lighting: "I Like My Women Soft "

6GOPHDV and P2-DVCPRO HD - HD100 vs HVX200

...and there's still many others.

LOTS of interesting looking articles here - good reading...

-mike

Variety.com - XBox up on downloads: "The relative success of video downloads on Microsoft's Xbox Live and disappointment of Amazon.com's Unbox point to two factors that differentiate Xbox from Amazon and its many other competitors -- consumers who download a movie want a simple way to watch it on their TV, and those with high-def TVs want high-def content.Thanks to the Xbox 360's direct connection to a TV and the console's focus on HD content, Microsoft can deliver both."

Xbox360 is a pretty logical choice for HD downloadable content - big company behind it, large user base, enough clout to realistically court the studios to make their content available. Oh yeah - and it is a killer game platform as well.

Apple's iTV advantage? It can show your pictures and play your music that is on your computer....but I'll bet that'd be cake to add to Xbox if it can't do it already. A nice user interface? Certainly something Apple can do. If they DON'T have HD movies available, and pronto, why WOULD you want to buy from Apple, other than they have a good rep for downloadable content? XBox 360 starts at $300 for a core system (right?), so about the same price. Some folks aren't going to want that kid looking device, nor certainly want to use a game controller or too spacey looking remote to control their HDTV content - consider this the Grown Up Factor.

But cross that against the core demographic of who is likely to download HD movies and...oops, Xbox 360 again.

Gee, Apple, you better be on the ball come January 9th. I'm rootin' for you and all, but still...

-mike

Best Mac Performance Products of 2006

Robert (aka Rob-ART) has this list of best performing Mac products - all backed up by his own testing.

A nice little list of goodies.

-mike

GRINDHOUSE on Yahoo! Movies

The trailer for Grindhouse, the Tarantino/Rodriguez back to back tag team movie pairing - Rodriguez does Planet Terror, Tarantino does Death Proof. Total, TOTAL back to the 70s trailer trash heaven.

Insert "Yeehaw!"

: )

Whatchoo wanna bet Rodriguez shot his digitally? UPDATE - he did, Genesis.

This was shot (at least in part) in Austin - they were shooting process car shots about 5 blocks from my house for a few days over the summer. Note the Death Proof poster shows a Burnet Road Drive In in Austin premiere date - hopehopehopehopehope...

-mike

Final Cut Pro: Troubleshooting Basics - the basics. You'd be surprised how many reader emails could be answered with this - stuff like "I shot 24p HDV and my Final Cut doesn't capture it. I'm using Final Cut 5 and an HDV preset and everything, why isn't it working?"

...because you're running 5.0, not the latest/correct version that supports that FLAVOR of HDV.

Stuff like that.

-mike

MacNN | Clovertown to debut alongside MWSF keynote

Intel is going to announce their quad core Clovertown processor at the same time Steve Jobs is going to be taking the stage at MWSF. Therefore likely that EIGHT processor Mac Pro towers will be announced...these are why I held off on first gen Mac Pro towers for myself. If follows usual Apple pattern, the lower end models will be either immediately available or quoted as "within weeks" with the top end model stated to be available in February, but it may take as long as March/April for them to be in steady/ready supply. Apple has been getting better at holding to announced ship dates since the move to Intel, with the exception of the delayed server.

Also, expect iTV to be announced/revealed in full at MWSF, and I'd be awfully surprised if high definition weren't mentioned a bit more. Why buy another box, and $300 at that, when Netflix, DVDs, Blockbuster, $50 DVD players, and VOD are all readily avaiable? Of course, this was said about downloadable music, too, and iTunes Store seems to be doing OK. But audio is a portable background experience in a way video isn't.

Anyway, Octo Macs. Kewl.

-mike

Best & Worst of 2006 - DV Guru

DV Gurus has posted their best and worst of the year. I gets a shout out as their Favorite blog of the DVgurus:
It is the most cited source on DVguru. We actually have a chip inside of Mike's brain so we can track him at all times.

Woot!

Thanks guys!

Oh, wait, I wondered why I woke up feeling hung over with a scab at the base of my skull that morning after the NAB party...but that explains why I get XM Radio through my back molars. (A-ha! Purported Voices In My Head explained!)

Red gets some luv for Best excitement generated by an unreleased product.

Youtube gets the expected accolades, Four Eyed Monsters gets some well deserved attention, HDV gets the nod over DVCPRO HD, and much much more.

Go read.

-mike

(and yes, I've always been kidding about voices in head)

...Christmas...ehhhhhhhverywheeeeeeerrrrrrre you goooooo...."

I mean, it's beginning to look a lot like a slow news cycle.

Gee, maybe I should go do my Christmas shopping...yeeeeeeeeah, that's the ticket!

Seasons greetings to all, and to all, an HD night.

Between a missing laptop power brick, present shopping, going out of town for a few days, the fact that nobody launches products around Christmas, and wanting to catch up on actually DOING some product reviews, this will be a good time to slow down on the blogging...

-mike

PS - ALTERNATE VERSION -

"...a lot like my optical audio port is stuck on....alllllll the tiiiiiime I goooooo........"

My Macbook is stuck with optical audio port on - the regular Audio Out doesn't show as an option, and it glows Red in the little port all the time. Maybe it is jealous of all those coolio Red images of black devices with a red glow coming from inside. It wants to sit at the big kids' table too.

If I try to adjust volume with the keyboard keys, it shows a little circle with slash through it UNDERNEATH the row of dots - never seen that before. In System Prefs under Sound, Digital Out is the only thing listed right now.

Anybody have any clues?

Would muchly appreciate it if anyone knows anything to comment below or email me (address top of page).

Thank you, and happy seasonal greeting of your choice/affiliation/spirituality to you all!

Truly and sincerely meant,

-mike

Another REDner. I mean REnDer. Render. Yeah, that. Click for larger view in another window, or command-click to open in a new tab.

Notes:

-EVF seems to be shaping up nicely
-is that a finger twistable knurled knob to adjust the angle of the handle? If so, NICE detail - hope all lockdowns are like this
-seems to be - I see two back by the Red Drive
-rods at bottom - I see that there are front and back rods, great for adjusting individually
-BUT I also see what appears to be a hard stop inbetween them - can't slide any further than that
-I'd kinda want the option of a single, continguous rod for greater strength. Maybe even if it weren't absolutely necessary, I'd feel better about it
-if they WANT a hard stop, fine, make a little flip-down lever that CAN stop rod progress fore and aft, BUT can flip out of the way for full length, contiguous rod usage - the power of AND, not the tyranny of OR
-I see the high speed port in their last few renders, maybe they are working on that as the Red Flash might be more finalized in design
-I like the glowing indicators on the side of the battery to indicate charge level
-be nice if the Red Drive had a similar indicator either on it or on the screen on the back of the device as a progress bar somewhere always visible (or certainly visible while shooting). I'd want that info on the viewfinder too, BTW
-progress bar and time remaining at current frame size/rate/compression ratio
-looking closely at the things that hold the rods on, they seem to have some kind of finger operable snap to tighten/loosen - good again
-I wonder where the SATA cable comes from the camera body to connect to the Red Drive? I'm getting a little worried about all the cables that will need to be all over this camera - consider microphone to body, battery to Red Drive (unless they mate somehow in the mount), battery to Red One, EVF to body, etc.
-thinking further on those lines, I hope they have some kind of positive latching connection from body to Red Drive, SATA and eSATA can pull right out. And if you're able to slide the rods to move the battery/Drive package fore/aft, could slide too far to unplug, or snag on someone/something to unhook. Yeah, gotta have a positive latch for body to Red Drive.
-user assignable buttons on EVF GOOD idea
-note little breathing holes on bottom of camera - fans draw air in or out of there I presume
-I spy 8 or 10 buttons around the screen on back, plus the twist 'n push control. Bodes well for getting into the frame size/frame rate/etc. controls pretty quick with something better than a drill down and down and down 1980's DOS menu structure.
-look at these from the other day, too, different view angle

OK, enough for now, yowza, 11:38pm, time for bed!

-mike

Here's the Blogwad I didn't get to over the weekend - a bunch of stuff of interest in no particular order:

==================

Studio Daily | BandPro Debuts the Sony F23: "4:4:4 1920x1980 RGB imaging, Three 2.2 megabit 2/3-inch progressive CCD imagers, 14-bit A/D conversion, Support for 1080/23.98p, 24p, 25p, 29.97p, 50p, 59.94p, 50i and 59.94i formats, Support for multi-frame rate and SR motion, with 4:2:2 Capture at up to 60 fps and 4:4:4 Capture at up to 30 fps"

"Cree ran down the design criteria for the F23, which required that it include “film-like conventions” with improved dynamic range, be a cable-free 4:4:4 system, offer advanced video processing, be off-speed capable and be available at a “reasonable cost point.” Cree also highlighted the camera’s weight (32 pounds with the lens and viewfinder) and said back-focus issues occasionally experienced with the F950 have been resolved."

Pricing to not interfere with F900 owner operators - read that as higher than F900s. F900R is $80 or $85K, I forget which. I
think I heard a guesstimate from someone of around $115K somewhere along the line, but I could be entirely wrong.

==================

A little Mikey Note on travel - I take my laptop with me when I travel, and in order to keep the voices in my head quiet, I like to read stuff online. Catch is, I don't always have online access on the plane or in the airport. So before I leave, I open all the articles of interest in tabs. Don't use Tabs in Safari? Oh, you SHOULD! Go into your prefs and turn it on. For articles like this, you can just Command-Click on your Mac on each link of interest and it'll open the article in a new tab within the window you're looking at. Give it enough time to load in the full page, check to see if the articles span to a second page (command-click those as well), and you've got all your reading cached and waiting to go. The only downside - with a bunch of windows open, especially if they have those stupid Flash ads going, it'll burn CPU cycles and thus chew through your battery charge faster. Minimize all but current window to allay this (hiding not as good I've found).

===============

ProLost: Now You Con Duit: "Pauli Ojala, one of the masterminds behind Conduit, has a blog where he demonstrates the power of the plug-in's nodal niftiness."

=================

First PS3, XBox HD DVD Add-On Sales Numbers | High-Def Digest: "PS3 has sold 197,000 units in the U.S. so far -- a total sellout of all domestic shipments Sony was able to deliver to retailers through November.
Meanwhile, Microsoft's HD DVD add-on for the Xbox has moved 42,000 units since
its launch in mid-November (the company has not released total number
of units delivered to retailers, preventing any sold-versus-shipped comparisons)."

You HAVE to buy a Blu-ray player with PS3 - it is integral. Whereas the HD-DVD add-on is an overt, positive, definitive statement of intent to watch HD movies.

So it isn't the 5:1 advantage that it might seem at first.

============

HDBlog.net � Blog Archive � PS3 Review by Ultimate AV: "Note that the PS3 decodes TrueHD to digital PCM, if you wish. Not so with DTS HD Master, however. If you want that track in full glory, you%u2019ll need to use the HDMI 1.3 connector to a receiver or pre/pro that supports DTS HD Master. And%u2026. none of them currently do.
While we%u2019re complaining, the PS3 also doesn%u2019t put out 1080p/24. Not a biggy, but it would have been nice. Note also that the PS3 can%u2019t convert 720p up to 1080i. Which would suck if you had a display that didn%u2019t accept 720p. (Of which there aren%u2019t that many out there.)
But how does the video quality look? In a word: excellent."

================

Final Cut Pro: Capturing audio and video to separate files not available with HDV - and Mike's Secret Notes on the pros/cons of split audio capture.

This is one of those little points of arcana that can make such a difference. If you do split captures (which this article is telling you HDV can't do), that allows you to get away with more realtime layers if you're using audio from one clip and video from another. FCP when doing non-split captures has to read all the video data as well as the audio data - two full video tracks. Imagine doing this if you had uncompressed HD files. With split capture, it only has to read the tiny audio file in a mixed edit, not the unused enormous video file. BUT...that means twice as many files to keep up with. In a fully tweaked setup, I recommend a separate drive for audio that has fast seek times. RAID 1 with SoftRAID even better - protected data, striped reads.

But more files to keep up with, can be confusing when batch recapturing & relinking, etc. Hassle vs. payoff.

===================

General Specialist - Tips, Tricks and Tinkerings: Behind-the-Scenes of ILM: "Here's an interesting but hard-to-read look at the VFX for Pirates of the Carribean, including some light reading on motion capture, plus some behind-the-scenes videos and images."

====================

General Specialist - Tips, Tricks and Tinkerings: Floating in 32-bit Space (where no one can hear you scream): "Sure, you might have been able to use 32-bit/HDR/float in After Effects 6.5 by using Stu Maschwitz's plugin eLin, but if you're anything like me, you never got around to it.It wasn't until the 32-bit mode in the AE 7.0 beta that I finally took the plunge and 'saw the light.'Here are a few starting points that explain the workflow in AE 7.0 Pro:"

==================

Brightcove's CEO on Future of Television - DV Guru: "Jeremy Allaire, the CEO of Brightcove.com recently discussed 'The Future of Television,' at his Keynote speech from the Fall 2006 Video on the Net Conference (video below). If you are really serious about using the internet to distribute your content then Brightcove is definitely a company you should be considering. Listening to the various talks that Jeremy gives will really help you see where the industry is heading."

===============

AVCHD Converter From Canopus - DV Guru: "Canopus 'will be releasing a new AVCHD converter product that will convert your footage into an editable format. However, because of the fact that it converts it into the 'Canopus HQ Codec,' it is unlikely that the files will be usable outside of Canopus' Edius NLE systems.'" - so the issue of being able to edit is STARTING to be addressed, but I wouldn't want to cut a feature on Canopus. But you could then transcode from there...maybe.

====================

Chris Anderson of Wired Magazine talks about Web TV and niche audiences - DV Guru: "Chris Anderson, the editor of Wired Magazine, was interviewed by Levi Shapiro of IPTV Evangelist prior to Chris' Keynote address at the National Association of Television Program Executives (NATPE). In the interview Chris discusses what he calls silvercasting (the use of a medium such as the internet to reach micro audiences),"

===================

Pre Roll adverts unlikely to be beneficial to small time content creators for time being - DV Guru headline says it all...I agree, read on for details.

==================

2006, Brought to You by You - New York Times - good article on user generated content - link found via DVguru.com.

====================

Best Screencast Codecs - DV Guru - total geekage. I need to read this for my own usage - what codec is best to use for screencasting - recording and then broadcasting your on computer screen stuff?

=====================


Studio Daily | New 4K Mastering and Playback System Doremi JPEG2000 based mastering and playback system, feeds 4 HD-SDI or 4 DVI links to generate a 4096x2160 image - just over 4 times 1080p size.

=====================

FatFreeFilm - Scott Billups, digital guru/honcho, talks pixels 'n stuff.

==================

NetFlix new film previews leads to movie download rumors - DV Guru: "It is rumored that NetFlix may be planning a video download service after the company launched a film preview service where you can watch previews of movies that NetFlix thinks you might like. It uses Windows Media Player and the quality is good and like the Amazon Unbox service you need to install something first to watch the videos." - It is was more than rumored - Netflix CEO has talked about downloads are the future, but that DVDs will be with us for at least 5+ years I saw on CNN or somesuch. But anyway, it is a step in that direction for them - leverage their net play to make it more likely that you'll watch. Trailers is such a natural for them. But I don't like that you have to download and install something to watch. Ah, well, Apple makes you download iTunes, so...

-=-------------------

Choosing archival CD/DVD media - DV Guru: " a thorough technical explanation of optical media and what makes a good disc. To summarize his findings:

DVD R has superior error correction and burning control.
Taiyo Yuden makes the best discs.
Gold plated discs don't offer any added protection. "

Go read the full deal to get a better understanding.

===================

Photoshop CS3 hoopla, links to join in - DV Guru - all things CS3 to learn all about the new version. I see no video specific goodies, like YUV color previewing, 4:2:2 previewing, new video aspect ratios, title/action safe, etc.

DURN IT! Hopes dashed.

=====================

Mac Rumors: ZFS in Latest Leopard Builds [Update] This is groovy because it allows for saving versions of a file, and if a write fails, you still have the last saved version. It makes sense that Time Machine (the backup system for OS X 10.5) would be predicated on this. Great for boot and file drives, performance concerns for media drives and arrays. Somebody told me ZFS allows for expanding a RAID set - adding drives without having to restripe the whole thing - that sounds tremendously useful...

Also see:

Think Secret - Gallery: New Leopard build reveals OS far from finished, but earning its stripes (or spots) for latest on OS X 10.5 progress & screenshots - it has a ways to go, no way shipping announcement at MWSF.



====================

FirmTek SeriTek enclosure and adapters for Intel Macs

We tested the two bay SATA enclosure using both the ExpressCard/34 host adapter on our MacBook Pro Core 2 Duo and using the PCI Express host adapter on our Mac Pro

ExpressCard did better than I thought - short of a PCIe card, but not at all shabby. Not appropriate for uncompressed HD, but certainly compressed HD.

==================

Complex 3D tracking in a TV commercial - DV Guru: "Great 'how we did it' article over on fxguide that discusses the challenges of creating a TV commercial for a railroad association. The look of this commercial needed to provide the illusion that it was all one continuous shot. The creator utilized green screens, rotoscoping and 3D tracking to pull off the desired result. "

====================

FxFactory 1.0.1 reviewed - DV Guru: "The FxFactory software includes an assortment of visual effects packages, including filters, transitions, and generations for both Final Cut Pro and Motion, with a Pro version that lets you easily create custom effects. David A. Sarceno took the software for a run and shares his thoughts"

=======================

Get into After Effects expressions - DV Guru: " Expressions are based on JavaScript and provide a way of programmatically creating interactions between elements in an After Effects animation. That sentence may be scary to you, but it's really not too bad. " Expressions are waaaaaaaaaay powerful - the dark juju of After Effects. Here's a place to get started.

============

CinemaTech: From CustomFlix: Filmmakers Can Now Sell Movies on Amazon's Unbox: "Good news for indie filmmakers who want to make their work available as a digital download, alongside studio content: CustomFlix (a division of Amazon) now makes it possible to sell movies on Amazon.com's Unbox download service. "

===========

Apple to release HD-format Disney movies in 2007 - Digital Lifestyle - Macworld UK: "Apple may release HD versions of Disney movies through the iTunes Store in 2007." - well, "Durf!" as my friend Dianne would say - I've only been predicting this for about a year and a half. Why do you think those iTVs have HDMI not component connectors on them? Why do you think Steve Jobs said "those big flat panel HDTVs in your home" at the launch? 960x720 native res to start I'll betcha, just to take a swing at it. Maybe 960x540 if they are REALLY gimping it. I just HOPE they'll do non-square pixels aspects, so we can get widescreen playback advantages.

===================

Creative Workflow Hacks � Blog Archive � Help me beta test a Sequencing Utility for Final Cut Pro Geeks unite! Pull that starter cord on your propeller beanie and dig in!

==============

CardRaider 1.0 %u2013 Mac OS X %u2013 VersionTracker: "CardRaider's familiar Mac OS X interface makes it simple to detect and unerase lost pictures." - not HD, but handy - I have a similar utility....somewhere...

......aaaaaaaaaaand that's all, folks!

Colorista is a new color correction tool that works in Final Cut Pro, After Effects, and Motion on Intel Macs (and G5s, of course, adding Avid Xpress Pro), and After Effects, Premiere Pro, press DV, Xpress Pro, Media Composer, and Avid Symphony on Windows based systems.

It works the same way in all programs.

It works like the high end tools do - lift/gamma/gain rings, and shadow/midtone/highlight color wheels - just like Final Touch, Lustre, discreet, daVinci, etc. high end color correction & grading systems.

You can do power windows - soft feathered resizable/rotatable square/oval vignettes.

You can stack multiple instances safely without tearing up your image.

Your 10 bit projects STAY 10 bit when using this in FCP...unlike Color Finesse and some other options.

It uses the GPU and can be realtime in up to 720p projects.

And it is only $200.

Insert Keanu "Woah." Merry Christmas to us indies indeed!

I'd been holding off waiting to do a big long write up on why this is a big deal, but Stu, the creator of it, beat me to it, and probably puts it better, too. I'm wholeheartedly (with permission) ripping off his blog entry on it, since he puts it well. I try to avoid press release regurgitation, but I know, like, respect, and trust Stu, so I'll let him speak for himself (plus I'm short on time):

-------

Why did we make a 3-way color corrector to sell to people who, with the exception of After Effects users, already have a built-in 3-way CC tool? Six reasons:

Correct Like The Pros
Colorista works like Final Touch, Da Vinci, Discrete Lustre, iQ, and other professional grading systems that use the industry standard color model of Lift, Gamma and Gain. The ASC is even working towards codifying this into a system that can be communicated as universally as an EDL. Lift/Gamma/Gain allows you to correct highlights, midtones and shadows, respectively, but without the need to define the value ranges, which means you spend more time color correcting and less time fiddling with controls. In other words...

Fewer Controls, More Power
Colorists need to work fast and efficiently, so having fewer knobs is a good thing. We took the most-used aspects of professional grading systems and packed them into an efficient, easy to use package. Colorista does more than most built-in 3-ways, and with fewer controls.

Power Masks
Isolating areas of the frame to correct is one of the power tools in the colorist's kit. What can you do with piddly little circles and squares? Ask a Da Vinci operator. Sure, sometimes you need deeper masking, but for that you can jump into After Effects. Face lights, vignettes, and spot corrections should be fast, easy, and render in realtime.

Realtime?
Depending on your hardware and video resolution, yes! Works especially well in host applications that lead the market in realtime operation, such as Apple Motion and Adobe Premiere Pro 2.0.

Grade, Don't Degrade
In After Effects 7, Colorista is a 32-bit floating-point plug-in. Stack as many of them on top of each other as you want, you cannot hurt your image. Finally, a tool you can use to effortlessly color correct HDR images.

Three Rings to Rule Them All
Just when you started to master Levels, you need to do some color work in Final Cut Pro. Just when you learn to produce decent results with FCP's 3-way, you take a freelance gig using Avid. Colorista works the same in every host application, meaning that you can learn it once and use it everywhere. And one seat of Colorista licenses you to use the plug-in in every one of the host applications, on Mac or Windows.

---------

Click here to go to Stu's blog entry that has a nice little demo of how this rocks.

Stu and I have swapped a couple of emails on this, and I'd asked, in light of his upcoming book (review/interview forthcoming), whether this changed the picture on using FCP for finishing, or whether to stick to using After Effects as a render pipeline like the DV Rebel's Guide suggests. He said that since you can use this plugin in both, do your temp/pretty damn good work in FCP, and finish with a better/best render in AE (I'm paraphrasing, pardon Stu). OooooOOOOOOOOooooohhhh....good indeed! Scaleable options are always BEST!

The only omission that makes me sigh is the lack of secondary color correction tools - but this is a version one product, and the developers are keenly aware of the user base's demand for this feature. Besides speed, that is one of the key features that truly separates the professional tools from the rest.

Other coverage on Colorista:

ProLost: Colorista!

Magic Bullet Colorista v1.0 - overview page from Red Giant

Magic Bullet Colorista - features page from Red Giant

Studio Daily | Red Giant Offers New Color Correction Tool: Magic Bullet Colorista

Red Giant presents Magic Bullet Colorista v1.0 - DV Guru

MacNN | Red Giant ships Magic Bullet Colorista

So I'll have more to say after talking to Stu as soon as I can arrange it. I need to spend some more time with it myself - it looks incredibly promising, offering the kind of power & control that Final Touch did that I worked and sweated over for months. It won't be as fast, but at a tiny fraction of the cost, without the pain of leaving the FCP environment, this is a big big deal.

-mike

PS - It has been possible to use Color Finesse for a similar workflow - do CC in FCP, then Duck it into AE for rendering, but in FCP, Color Finesse was limited to 8 bits (like Magic Bullet was), and was non GPU accelerated, and cost more, and wasn't Universal Binary until quite recently (just noticed something on it a few minutes ago). This just seems Mo Bettah at the moment.

Man, I am all about Red this week. Every time I sit down to try to sift the coupla hundred articles of possible blogging interest, there's another Red tidbit out there that is just so easy to write up in 90 seconds in my obsessive compulsion to be THE place to get all the latest info.

Click the above images for the full size view, and for much, MUCH discussion on them, read the following:

RED ONE render (newer)... - DVXuser.com -- The online community for filmmaking

Here is another RED ONE render... - The Digital Video Information Network

Comment away here (using comment link below) or over on either of those sites to discuss likes/dislikes and questions.

-mike

LITTLE FROG IN HIGH DEF: DVCPRO HD GREEN SCREENING

Keylight does a nice job for Shane on motion blurred footage, but he's noticing noisier blacks and elevated luma. One reason - crazy luma handling behavior between FCP and After Effects, boiling down to QuickTime issues.

I say key it in Keylight, color correct in FCP.

-mike

Blackmagic Design: Intensity

Blackmagic's $250 Intensity card is now shipping - it does HDMI in and out, but that's it.

Interesting for:

INPUT - if your camera has HDMI outputs, you can capture uncompressed 4:2:2 or online JPEG (Windows) or DVCPRO HD (Final Cut Pro) on Macs. Note no device control on card, gotta use FireWire device control. May be possible to use serial adaptors for 9 pin control? Maybe at best. Note HDMI standard only supports the broadcast standards, so no 1080p24/23.976.

OUTPUT - low cost HDMI based HDTVs are a low cost monitoring solution. I'm not aware of any that have professional callibration features like blue only or underscan mode, but if you're on a super tight budget, this is a great way to see what most consumers will be looking at when your project is done. NSTC/PAL/720p/1080i capable.

It seems like the inexpensive JVC 17 DTV-1710CG HD CRT is going away - that was the last inexpensive professional HD CRT on the market I'm aware of.

That leaves two lower cost options - Blackmagic's HDLink to an LCD panel (1280 or 1920 wide depending on video format desired) or the Intensity card paired with an HDMI equipped HDTV.

This card also comes with the new On Air software, which allows you to mix two live signals and output live, with graphic overlays (wow!). For low cost live HD 2 camera mixing, a great deal. And yes, as this implies, you CAN have two of these cards installed - so two ins with a live mixed output.

On Air 2.0 allows for mix and match as I understand it - so an Intensity card and a Multibridge in theory could be used together AFAIK.

-mike

PS - this reader tip was so good and on target for indies, it deserved promotion into the article itself:

Other cool uses for this card:

1) JUST AS AN OUTPUT CARD for SUITE #2: In a studio where one person has a full HD capture card, captures footage, hands the drive over to a second editor on a less expensive system that has a consumer HDTV. Now HDV, DVCPRO-HD, and uncompressed HD, captured from a pro system, can be monitored live from the timeline in suite #2 at minimal costs.

2) A HDV TO DVCPRO-HD transcoder: if your footage is being captured from an HDV camera with HDMI, you can LIVE transcode to DVCPRO-HD on the fly and then monitor your DVCPRO-HD timeline.

-Christopher S. Johnson


Well said, Christopher! Entirely right.

-mike

Specs changes... - DVXuser.com -- The online community for filmmaking

Late last night, after I posted this article, Jim Jannard posted on dvxuser:

Specs changes...
Here we go. We are in the process of simplifying the record options in camera. With the development of REDCODE and REDCINE, it seems evident that the number of format options can shrink without consequence. We will be posting the new Format Options page shortly. Anything you want will still be available either in camera or with REDCINE.

As a side note... anyone who doesn't record REDCODE is making a mistake (IMHO).

Jim


....so a clear example of "specs subject to change at any time"

Jarred posted shortly thereafter (in part):

....2k REDCODE RAW records almost 2x as much time as 1080p RGB.

....which means my calculations are off somewhere, I'm showing something closer to a 3:1 difference - 6.4 vs. 18.1 MB/sec for 24p. Since they are about the same resolution....hmmm....don't know where I'm off there...which is too high or too low?

For details on what got changed, see the article below, and either click on the UPDATE link towards the top of the article or just scroll to the bottom of it.

-mike

...so earlier I wrote the previous piece (see below or here) talking about how the Red Drive is now a small two drive RAID with 320 GB capacity. Almost certainly two 160GB drives. If they'd said 360GB, that would open the door to three 120GB drives, with possible fault tolerance (third drive for RAID 3 parity storage). But they didn't, it looks like a two drive solution. So that got me thinking about about what kind of storage times you'd get. And that got me thinking about other recording formats and what kind of datarates, storage requirements, and storage time on Red RAID you'd get.

UPDATE - so since yesterday when I posted this, the Red One Formats Chart has been updated - scroll to bottom for latest info

So I put on my propeller beanie, and got to thinkin':

Redcode RAW compressed 4K@24p is 27.5 MB/sec, thus 1.15 MB/frame. This is what we've been told by Red on the record, but all specs subject to change, yadda yadda. (I said uncompressed earlier, my bad.)

4K frames are 4096x2304, or 9,437,184 pixels, and only one channel (RAW, remember?)

What if you want to shoot 1080p or 1080i?


1920x1080 is 2,073,600 pixels, but is RGB - so three channels. Multiply by 3: 6,220,800 pixels.

So, if the compression ratio juju is all the same, short of any more firm data from Red, it looks like 1080pRGB could/should be about 2/3 the amount of data. Assuming everything is constant (which it probably isn't, but lets wing it for now), that would imply 1080p RGB frames would 2/3 the size of 4K RAW frames - so about 0.755 MB/frame. 1080p24 would thus be a bit over 18 MB/sec, 1080p30 would be 22.65 MB/sec, and 1080p60 (from which 1080i60 would be derived) would be 45.3 MB/sec. That's a lot of datarate! Oddly, note that the format required to record broadcast standard 1080i60 RGB is higher than that of 4K@30p RAW.

What about 720p?

Following the same kind of math, 720p (1280x720 RGB) frames are 29.3% the size of 4K RAW, so about 0.337 MB/frame. Thus:
720p24 Redcode RGB = 8.1 MB/sec (cake!)
720p25 Redcode RGB = 8.4 MB/sec
720p30 = 10.1 MB/sec
720p50 = 16.8 MB/sec
720p60 = 20.2 MB/sec
and the maximum 720p120 recordable onboard is 40.4 MB/sec

So given all that, the biggest challenge is 1080p60 RGB - and all the broadcast folks will be wanting that (but don't forget you can spit that out the HD-SDI live as well).

So back to the Red Drive - at 320 GB, I'm presuming it is two drives, thus 160 GB drives. Looking at Tom's Hardware, there are two 160 GB 2.5" SATA drives on the market:

the Hitachi Travelstar 5K160:

Min sustained read: 23 MB/sec
Max sustained read: 46 MB/sec
Min sustained write: 18.4 MB/sec
Max sustained write: 45 MB/sec

and the Fujitsu MHV2160BT:

Min sustained read: 15.6 MB/sec
Max sustained read: 41.3 MB/sec
Min sustained write: 20.3 MB/sec
Max sustained write: 41.3 MB/sec

The challenge for a storage device like this is that it needs to be able to read and write the worst case scenario ideally across the entire capacity of the disk - the fastest outer tracks to the slowest inner tracks. Whatever you can write you better be able to read in real time as well to play it back. So you have to find the WORST performance of minimum read and write and go with that. Since we're talking a 2 drive RAID (at least, I'm presuming two drives), we can almost double the performance of the drives. In my experience there is some overhead penalty vs a single drive - on my 4+ drive RAIDs under Mac OS X, which probably isn't the case here, but let's assume the worst for the moment - a 10% hit in RAID config.

SO:

Of these two drives, the Hitachi looks preferable - it's lowest performance is an 18.4 MB/sec write. Hmm. In a two drive RAID, with idealized performance, that is still only 36.8 MB/sec - well short of the 45.3 MB/sec required (and that with no overhead or safety margin!). So I'd guess off the bat that if they are using the Hitachi drives in a RAID, they'd have to partition it to NOT use that too slow portion of the drive - I've described coping strategies for this kind of thing here - you partition at the point beyond which performance is below target data rate + overhead.

So you'd have to figure out where performance is over 48.3 MB/sec plus a safety margin - let's say 20% to pick a small but plausible sounding figure - thus about 58 MB/sec. I don't have a chart handy specific to the drive falloff of the Hitachi, but based on typical performance of other 2.5" hard drives, I'd guess that point would be very roughly around 70% capacity. So in the end, you'd sacrifice about 30% of the capacity of the array (about 90 GB) in order to ensure ALL formats could be recorded to ALL portions of the array at ALL times.

Otherwise, it would get far too confusing for the typical shooter - imagine you've been shooting for 1080i60 in the morning, switch to 1080p24 for a while, and the Red is telling you there is still 20 minutes of 1080p24 space available. You switch over to 1080i60 mode, and it oops, it is too full, the array is too slow now, no 1080i60 recording availble. Who'd want to deal with that?

So that knocks about 30% off the possible recording times. The stated data rates haven't changed, just how much of it will reliably fit on the array with realtime performance.

SO - based on all my potentially erroneous assumptions above, here's what recording times might be with a 2x160 Hitachi based 320 GB RAID 0, IF it can only use 70% of it (about 207 GB):

720p24- 7.1 hrs
720p30- 6.9 hrs
720p50- 3.5 hrs
720p60- 2.9 hrs
720p120 (highest frame rate possible recordable onboard) - 1.4 hrs - but played back at 24p, that's over 7 hours!
1080p24- 3.2 hrs
1080p25- 3 hrs
1080p30- 2.5 hrs
1080p50/for 1080i50- 1.5 hrs
1080p60/for 1080i60- 1.3 hrs (these two are the biggest surprise, so a common format records almost the least amount of time)
2Kx1080 RAW @ 24p - 6.4 MB/sec - about 9 hrs - wow, what a deal!
2Kx1080 RAW @ 25p - 6.7 MB/sec - about 8 1/2 hrs
2Kx1080 RAW @ 30p - 8.1MB/sec - bit over 7 hrs
2Kx1080 RAW @ 50p - 13.4 MB/sec - about 4 1/3 hrs
2Kx1080 RAW @ 60p - 16.1 MB/sec - about 3 1/2 hrs
2Kx1080 RGB has been removed from the format chart - no longer an option - see bottom of article for details
4K@24p or 4K@25p - a bit over 2 hours
4K@30p- about an hour & 40 minutes

An interesting note for folks interested in lightweight packages that can get a lot of recording time per day - windowed 2K compressed RAW is actually the most space efficient format the camera can shoot! 2Kx1080 windowed RAW at 24fps is only 6.4 MB/sec based on these calculations, that's about 23 GB/hr. Note that is BETTER than 720p24, which you'd think would be the most efficient shooting format. NOPE. Since 720p is RGB, thus 3 channels, and 2K RAW is only 1 channel, 2K RAW is actually lower datarate. With a lightweight PL mount 16mm lens and a single Red Drive, assuming you have enough batteries you could shoot for NINE HOURS nonstop 2K windowed RAW 24p! Whereas is you shot 1080p, you'd have to be recording in RGB, and would only get roughly a third of the recording time. 2K windowed RAW is a DEAL when it comes to shooting efficiency - the only tradeoff is that the 1080p RGB COULD (doesn't have to) be derived from full sensor so you'd get 2x oversampling in both dimensions - 2K RAW you MUST shoot windowed, no oversampling. But....it is always nice to have choices!

Conversely, 1080p60 RGB for 1080i60 delivery is surprisingly "expensive" in terms of recording time - IF these calculations are correct, you'd only get about an hour and 20 minutes of record time on a Red Drive. If you could convince your producers to go for 24p on the project rather than 60i, you'd get nearly SEVEN TIMES the recording time on the Red Drive. Sounds crazy, but true.

I also suspect that lower res formats may need to be run a little "rich," on data rate, whereas higher res can get away with being run a little leaner based on the nature of wavelet compression, so that may well influence all this too.

Keep in mind, there's a boatload of presumptions and assumptions in all this, so this is just the sketchiest of guides. Those decimal places are misleading - these numbers aren't that accurate. - the idea being, a 320GB RAID won't yield a full 320 GB of storage capacity - reason one being formatted capacity (knocks you back to 296 GB), reason two the slowest part of the array may need to be partitioned off and not used in order to guarantee performance. If they are using some other drive, or can get clever with counter-striping (one drive starts writing at inner tracks, other drive starts writing at outer tracks), the situation may be much better. But my understanding is that Medea, now owned by Avid, has a patent on such implementations, and they may not be in a mood to license that technology to other vendors. (Anybody know for sure? Clue me in if I'm wrong.)

If they DID counter stripe, and it worked the way I think it might, they'd be in luck - if they could use the full capacity of the array, those times would all go up 40-45%.

The other issue with this announcement - a RAID 0 (still what I'm presuming until I learn otherwise) is an inherently riskier data situation than a single drive. Not only are you doubling your risk of failure (one drive fails all data lost in RAID 0), BUT in the event of a drive failure, RAID 0 DATA IS NON-RECOVERABLE, UNLIKE A SINGLE DRIVE. Or at least, that is what I've been told from data recovery firms when I've asked. With a single drive that fails, you grit your teeth and pay several hundred to a few thousand dollars and get your data recovered if you have to. With RAID 0, I've been told it isn't possible.

Bigger is awfully convenient in the field, but also is a bigger basket with all your eggs in it. A tape goes completely bad, you lose one hour of footage worst case scenario. A Red Drive goes bad, if my above conservative calculations are correct, you could lose up to 10 hours of footage (full capacity usage of 720p24 footage) - ouch! So protecting against a head crash, directory damaging power loss, or other risks will be crucial on the Red Drive. I've been running RAID 0 arrays with 8 to 10 drives in my studio for a couple of years now - I presently have two 8 drive arrays and one 10 drive array that I own in the studio, and loaner/review units of 4 and 6 drives in the studio. I have yet to have a data losing crash or failure with any of my arrays, BUT:
-I am careful
-all are ALWAYS on a UPS
-the important data is backed up at all times
-MOST importantly - they all just sit perfectly still and are off when not in use.

With 2.5" drives in laptops, which is a similar situation as compared to Red Drive - it gets moved, knocked around, much higher risk of getting dropped - so the life expectancy is MUCH shorter. I've had a laptop drive fail on me in less than two years (my 12" PowerBook), I've also had THREE friends have their laptop drives die on them in less than three years, and they then came crying to me. Point being, life for a hard drive used in a portable environment is TOUGH. Putting that in a two drive RAID 0 doubles the risk, so again, shock isolation will be key, and it'd be good if there were some way to know how much use a given unit had been through (rental market especially?) to know when it was time to retire it.

Of course, if any of that makes you nervous - just get the Red Flash recording module - only 32 GB to start, but solid state - MUCH more secure recording technology - just higher cost per GB - we've been told 32GB will start around $1000. Drat, now I'll feel compelled to make up a chart on that one...maybe I'll update later in the day...UPDATE - now with Red Flash estimated times: yeah, I couldn't resist - I added a third image to the Excel sheet screen grabs, is on the same page as the Red Drive rates (see link next paragraph). The surprising news - for narrative shooters, 4K @ 24p you get about 18 minutes. But for broadcast folks wanting to record 1080i, you get as little as 11 minutes if recording in RGB. Ouch! For broadcast types, that's pretty damn slim. Of course, you SHOULD be shooting 2K RAW windowed 60p (for later crop & conversion to 60i) and you'll get half an hour of recording time - much more reasonable. And 2K windowed RAW 24p? A whopping 77 minutes - take THAT, P2! : ) And solid state has a consistent transfer rate (AFAIK), so no partitioning worries there. And of course, 64 GB would double all these record times.

To figure all this out, I made an Excel sheet and took some screen grabs, peruse it if you wish - based on all my guesses in here, has MB/sec data rates, GB/hr storage requirements, and recording times for a Red Drive with and without partitioning based on assumptions. For the zillionth time, this is my guesses, all extrapolated from public info, is not official from Red, etc.

On a related note, there's a thread over on DVXuser about footage handling on location & archiving footage with the Red camera. I was in a pessimistic mood and got all frothy in posts 41 and 45. I talked about the practicalities of freelance shooters working with digital data and the issues I'd experienced in the past when having to hand over a lot of data to clients on relatively pricey media.

-mike

PS- for the curious, here's some links used in researching this article:

One new spec... - DVXuser.com -- The online community for filmmaking (Red Drive RAID announcement and discussion)

footage handling on location & archiving footage - DVXuser.com -- The online community for filmmaking (my stuff starts on page 5)

Tom's Hardware - this is 2.5" hard drive minimum sustained write speed comparison chart, with Hitachi and Fujitsu 160 GB highlighted. You can use the pop-ups at top to see other specs (min/max sustained read/write was what I was most interested in) and to highlight other models. Super duper handy page! Also available for 3.5" disks as well, see test link above chart.


200 GB, 2.5", SATA: Fujitsu's MHV2200BT | Tom's Hardware - drive performance falloff chart. Shows how drive speed falls. I used the shape of this arc as a guideline for estimating Hitachi falloff point, scaling to pertinent values of Hitachi.


2.5" Hard Drives by Toshiba and Western Digital Rev Up | Tom's Hardware - another similar chart, used to double check for the reasons stated directly above

RED / RED ONE Format Options - this chart updated a few weeks ago, and I used it to verify max frame rate/frame size/format stuff


UPDATE TUESDAY MORNING -

So the Red One Formats chart has been updated - it used to be this, now it is this

Here's what has changed:

2K RGB has been DROPPED entirely - you can either record 4K RAW, or 1080p RGB for full aperture, or 2K windowed RAW with 16mm/B4 lenses, or 720p RGB.

1080i RGB recording has been dropped entirely - as Stuart mentioned in an interview I did the other week, 1080i formats are derived from 1080p recordings - so shoot 1080p50 for 1080i50 and 1080p60 for 1080i60.

OK, so what about 1080i formats out the HD-SDI? Losing that would have a huge negative impact on the viability in the broadcast market for live events. RECORDING 1080i is clearly out, but what about passing it through? I'd be very surprised if they dropped it, but confirmation that it still exists would be nice. UPDATE: CONFIRM FROM RED - 1080i OUT THE HD-SDI IS STILL THERE.

Perhaps never a clearer example of "all specs subject to change at any time" - I think I may have hastened the chart update with this article.

Since 2K RGB was sendable over the HD-SDI, I was presuming 2Kx1080 since that is a SMPTE standard that I know can be sent over HD-SDI. But 2K RAW couldn't - perhaps it is 2Kx1152 or somesuch? Why the discrepancy? Because 2Kx1080 isn't 16:9, it is just what would fit down HD-SDI. 2Kx1152 is a true 16:9 aspect ratio. If it were 2Kx1152 not 2Kx1080, then my datarates for 2K raw should be about 7% higher to account for the taller frame.

I've edited this article a bit since originally posted, and I will update the graphs shortly on the linked page...

Also, my math is demonstrably wrong somewhere - both Jim and Jarred have told me that 1080pRGB is about twice the datarate of 2K windowed RAW, not nearly 3 times as I've calculated. I'm not sure where my error lies, but know that my guesstimates are wrong - probably on the 1080p data rate side. I'll double check my math...

-mike

So a friend of mine emailed me:

Mike,

Trying to figure out what I need from BMD to work with my system.

I have a PMG5 1.8DP/512/160/SD/GF5200/PCI-X-USA

I essentially want to be able to ingest analog HD & SDI and output to SDI at times, analog component HD others and DVI and HDMI.

I guess the ideal would be the Multibridge Extreme but I don't have PCIe.

It looks to me that the DeckLink HD Pro 4:4:4 PCI-X only does digital in & out.

The HDLink™ with HDMI and DVI is probably what I need for monitoring.

What to use for ingesting?

Thanks for your wisdom on this.


I replied:

BlackMagic Design (BMD) makes the DeckLink HD Extreme ($1000) which has analog in and out, but that is PCIe only. As are the Multibridges, including the Multibridge Pro ($1600) which would otherwise be perfect for you. At one point they were talking about a PCI-X adaptor for it, but that never happened.

DeckLink HD Pro 4:4:4 PCI-X is their last PCI-X card, BUT it doesn't do analog in, it doesn't do DVI/HDMI out. List is $1500.

So, options as I see it:

AJA, however, is still making the Kona LH card - is PCI-X. List is $1800 on that, add $450 for a HDLink for HD-SDI to DVI to 23" LCD for pixel for pixel monitoring and you can do all you want.

However, if you get the Kona LH, that won't go into any future box - everything is PCIe now.

At that price, however, you might think about this - That $2250 or so you'd be spending is almost a new box right there - if you had a PCIe box, you could spend only $1000 for the BMD DeckLink HD Extreme for everything but HDMI. Hell, for an extra $250 you could throw in an Intensity card as well (CAN have 2 BMD cards installed). Or $1600 gets you the Multibridge Pro - does EVERYTHING on your list. Actually, is just HDMI out, not DVI - if you want DVI w/HDMI adaptor and 4:4:4, splurge for $2600 and get the Multibridge Extreme.

If you wanted AJA gear, Kona3 ($2700), a K3-box ($300ish) and an HD10AVA converter for analog in (around $900) AND an HDLink for HD-SDI to DVI would get you there as well...for over $4000.

If you DID get the DeckLink HD Pro 4:4:4 PCI-X, you could buy an AJA HD10AVA converter, and that would get your analog HD in. But then you'd need the HDLink for output as well, and that's a lot of money - around $2900, and no breakout box.

This might be time to upgrade if you really need all those capabilities - then you could use that $1000+ device in the next box.

And MacWorld is right around the corner, with a likely announcement of 8 processor Mac Pro towers....

-mike

A few new things going on over in the Red One camp in the last week-

1 - Red Drive is vastly expanded in capacity