• Adobe Premiere Pro

  CS6 Multi-Format Workflow (RED 4K, Super-16mm, iPhone, VHS)

  Posted by Derek Katz on April 23, 2014 at 7:01 am

  Long time reader of these forums. I am shooting a project that will be using a combination of formats. Interiors will be shot in 4K on a RED One MX and exteriors in Super-16mm (scanned at 2K) with an Arriflex 16SR2. There will be some 1080p iPhone footage along with VHS footage.

  Final output: 2K DCP

  The workflow difficulty comes with the variance in material. The RED and Super-16mm will be both shot at 24fps. We could use Filmic Pro on the iPhone to shoot at 24fps, but that won’t shoot a reliable fixed frame rate, so it will fluctuate – which could create problems? The PAL VHS footage will be 25fps, so I suppose after transferring, we’d have to convert to 24fps before inserting into the timeline?

  Now, the other issue at hand – and very much a modern dilemma – is whether:

  1) to stick with a 2K workflow through-and-though and downres the 4K RED to unify the 2K, 16mm, and 1080p iPhone/VHS.

  or, 2) to invest a little (so to say) and edit on a 4K timeline – in the process upresing the 16mm, iPhone and VHS footage to 4K before exporting at 2K.

  Despite outputting at 2K DCP in the near future, the latter workflow will conform and remain up-to-date with the eventual and every-increasing resolution, but it’s something I can’t wrap my head around. Also, the RED/16mm screen-time is approx. equal.

  Cheers.

  Angelo Lorenzo replied 12 years, 4 months ago 2 Members · 1 Reply
• 1 Reply

• 

  Angelo Lorenzo

  April 24, 2014 at 9:35 pm

  1) Edit in the size of your known delivery format: 2K. There is zero advantage to editing in 4K and upscaling most of your footage only to downscale it again – both moves are destructive to image detail.

  2) For VHS, just drop it into the timeline. Premiere will automatically deinterlace (as long as the digital capture from VHS is correctly set as interlaced) and it will resample the frame rate. If this automation produces unsatisfatory results then you can pre-conform your material by deinterlacing and/or retiming it with any number of plugins and approaches.

  3) As for the iphone… I’m still experimenting myself. These devices tend to be variable frame rate and I haven’t invested time to figure out a proper workflow just yet.

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