can someone tell me me my online capture settings for my varicam footage? Gary Adcock?

[Shane Ross]

Well, if you wanted to do that, you could capture 8 bit uncompressed 23.98. It should remove the duplicate frames. What are the specs for your final delivery? What tape format? What resolution…1080p, 720p?

If you had the Kona 3 you wouldn’t need to do all this. You could color correct at your current resolution (which is full resolution), then output to the format you needed. The Kona 3 can cross convert and up convert in real time. That is what I did:

https://lfhd.blogspot.com/2006_09_01_lfhd_archive.html

Read the entry entitled ONLINE PROJECT OVERVIEW.

Barring that, with your current card if you capture 8-bit uncompressed HD with the dimensions you need (1080, 720) that should yeild you r best results. DVCPRO HD is an 8-bit codec, so going 10-bit gains you nothing but file size.

Shane

Littlefrog Post
http://www.lfhd.net

[Jeremiah Black]

“Well, if you wanted to do that, you could capture 8 bit uncompressed 23.98. It should remove the duplicate frames.”

Okay, that’s a relief. I was worried about it not detecting and removing the captured frames over SDI.

“What are the specs for your final delivery? What tape format? What resolution…1080p, 720p?”

delivery will ultimately be 1080i – D5. So, I’m just doing an 720p online, and I’ll Teranex to 1080i. If I had a Kona3 I could cross/up convert to tape after I’m done, but I don’t. So, I’ll take my uncompressed 23.98 720p timeline to a post house and have them make it 1080i on D5 tape.

“If you had the Kona 3 you wouldn’t need to do all this. You could color correct at your current resolution (which is full resolution), then output to the format you needed.”

I’m a colorist and I don’t like color correcting in an compressed space. There’s heavy CC work being done, and a lot of layers of graphics being overlaid in FCP for the final. I will want to work in an uncompressed space.

“DVCPRO HD is an 8-bit codec, so going 10-bit gains you nothing but file size.”

Yeah totally right, but I’ll render out my color correction from after effects at 10 bit, since I color in a 32 bit space.

thanks, Shane, I was really worried about that flagged frame issue.

ONE last question: If FCP removes the flagged frames duting capture, then, in theory, my hard drive RAID doesn’t have to be 132 MB/sec, since it only has to capture 23.98 frames, not 59.94. So I should only need a sustained write speed of, say, 66 MB/sec, right? I’m just hoping I don’t have to clear my drives and restripe another one into the mix to boost my speed. Right now my Raid is going a 100 MB/sec, and I REALLY hope I don’t have to wipe it, add another drive, and restripe.

[Walter Biscardi]

[jeremiah black] “Yeah totally right, but I’ll render out my color correction from after effects at 10 bit, since I color in a 32 bit space.”

We actually color correct all our DVCPro HD material either in a DVCPro HD timeline in FCP or in the DVCPro HD codec in Final Touch HD. It’s absolutely gorgeous.

As Shane notes, 10bit just gives you larger file sizes, no increase in quality. We work DVCPro HD codec all day, just about every day here and have no reason or need to go to 8bit or 10bit ‘uncompressed’ codecs.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Jeremiah Black]

“We actually color correct all our DVCPro HD material either in a DVCPro HD timeline in FCP or in the DVCPro HD codec in Final Touch HD. It’s absolutely gorgeous.

As Shane notes, 10bit just gives you larger file sizes, no increase in quality. We work DVCPro HD codec all day, just about every day here and have no reason or need to go to 8bit or 10bit ‘uncompressed’ codecs.”

Walter,

thanks for the response. I know that you never go back and recpture uncompressed; I have read many disagreements you have had with this with other people on the board. And that’s cool. But I don’t like recompressing my compositing and color work. This is why I like to work in an uncompressed space and keep it there. As far as rendering out 8 bit or 10 bit. True, there is NO benefit to capturing 8 bit material @ 10 bit, but there is a great benefit to rendering 10 bit if you’re coloring and compositing in a 32 bit or 16 bit environment. It keeps it so that what you saw is what you get after the render EXACTLY, whereas rendering back out to 8 bit after coloring ina 16 bit or 32 bit space, there are some rounding errors and the image is a bit off. If all the work you do looks great to you, then go for it- that’s awesome. But, matematically there is a real difference, and, more importantly, to my eye, as well. Do some test footge, run it thorugh scopes, you’ll see. It’s not a HUGE difference, but that extra 5% is worth it to me as the colorst. As an alternate solution, you can color the DVCPROHD footage wihout recapturing but then render it out as uncompressed. That’s pretty good, if you don’t want to rent a deck again, but i found that hardware decompession is a bit softer than software decompression.

Thanks again, Walter. I know we disagree on this, but thanks for the post.

[Shane Ross]

[jeremiah black] “ONE last question: If FCP removes the flagged frames duting capture, then, in theory, my hard drive RAID doesn’t have to be 132 MB/sec, since it only has to capture 23.98 frames, not 59.94. So I should only need a sustained write speed of, say, 66 MB/sec, right? I’m just hoping I don’t have to clear my drives and restripe another one into the mix to boost my speed. Right now my Raid is going a 100 MB/sec, and I REALLY hope I don’t have to wipe it, add another drive, and restripe.”

I can understand the need to go uncompressed for coloring. Better compression than DVCPRO HD, although no gain in quality. But I know that coloring in an uncompressed timeline can give better results. So I get ya.

But I am not sure about the drive speed. Uncompressed 10 bit, even at 23.98, requires a lot, so I don’t think 100MB/s is gonna cut it. You can try, but I don’t think that will be enough.

Shane

Littlefrog Post
http://www.lfhd.net

[Jeremiah Black]

“I can understand the need to go uncompressed for coloring. Better compression than DVCPRO HD, although no gain in quality. But I know that coloring in an uncompressed timeline can give better results. So I get ya.”

Yeah, that’s what I’m always saying, “sure, there’s no GAIN in quality, just less loss in the process.”

“But I am not sure about the drive speed. Uncompressed 10 bit, even at 23.98, requires a lot, so I don’t think 100MB/s is gonna cut it. You can try, but I don’t think that will be enough.”

Yeah, well 8 bit uncompressed 4:2:2 footage with a frame rate of 59.94 requires about 110 MB/sec (132 for 10 bit). But if FCP is removing flagged frames and only capturing the 23.98 frames that are wanted, then the Hard drive speed suddenly drops to a requirement of around 66 MB/sec. you can do a test youself. Take a clip and render it out of AE or whatever program @ 10 bit uncompressed 1280×720 @ 23.98. Open it in quickitme and you’ll see the data rate is only around 66 mb/sec. The published uncompressed frame rates for HD are really high because the specs are 60i or 59.94. but if you’re only using 23.98, then the specs are much lower.

[Walter Biscardi]

[jeremiah black] “If all the work you do looks great to you, then go for it- that’s awesome.”

Actually we go by what the networks tell us which is we’re delivering some of the best HD material they’re receiving “by far.” So I know the DVCPro HD workflow is incredibly clean.

[jeremiah black] “Do some test footge, run it thorugh scopes, you’ll see. It’s not a HUGE difference, but that extra 5% is worth it to me as the colorst. As an alternate solution, you can color the DVCPROHD footage wihout recapturing but then render it out as uncompressed. That’s pretty good, if you don’t want to rent a deck again, but i found that hardware decompession is a bit softer than software decompression.”

Done the tests, did the math, did the tests again, ran some more math, did split screen with Avid DS/HD, it’s all the same to us. We’ve owned our 1200A for almost 2 years now so we’ve tested this to death. If uncompressed makes you feel better, then by all means work in uncompressed. That last thing I want to do is convince you to work in a format you’re not comfortable with.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Jeremiah Black]

“Actually we go by what the networks tell us which is we’re delivering some of the best HD material they’re receiving “by far.” So I know the DVCPro HD workflow is incredibly clean.”

Hey that’s great. Now just realize that it would be even better if you stopped recompressing it and throwing away information.

“Done the tests, did the math, did the tests again, ran some more math, did split screen with Avid DS/HD, it’s all the same to us. We’ve owned our 1200A for almost 2 years now so we’ve tested this to death.”

Um, if you don’t notice a difference than that’s cool. But you obvioulsy didn’t “do the math”, because the math says not to recompress your footage into a lossy codec. There’s no differnt “math” you could’ve done, ace. And I doubt you “did the scopes? because I have, and there’s always a difference. How could you not expect an image to look ANY different after compressing it? Geez, you can see the difference even on a software scope in FCP.

“If uncompressed makes you feel better, then by all means work in uncompressed. That last thing I want to do is convince you to work in a format you’re not comfortable with.”

Don’t patronize me, Walter. You are simply wrong, wrong, wonrg. and everyone on these boards knows it. I’ve read you argue time and time again with people that have 10 times your intelligence and knowledge (graeme nattress comes to mind), and you are wrong everytime. No one agrees with you. Let it go, dude. If you want to work that way, that’s cool. And if your material looks great, even better! But quit spreading factualy innacurate info on the boards, just because you have some desire to think that the way that you do it is “the best way”. It’s not. You’re wrong. Don’t pollute the boards with bad facts. People come here to get answers. The truth is that the DVCPROHD codec is awesome, and looks great. You can even recompresses footage into it twice (as you do) and it’ll still look good! But the way to preserve as many bits of your image as possible is to either capture it uncompressed for rendering back into uncompressed, or just redering the DVCPROHD footage into uncompressed out of a program like after effects. This is the best way to preserve all your original information. If you are doing a “cuts only” edit with no rendering, then don’t bother with uncompressed. But if you’re rendering alterations, then don’t recompress. These are the facts. Please stop subsituting your “reality”.

[Shane Ross]

[jeremiah black] “Now just realize that it would be even better if you stopped recompressing it and throwing away information.”

Who’s recompressing? If you capture via firewire, it is at native compression…no recompression occuring. Or are you talking about taking the footage from FCP into After Effects then back to FCP? If so, then yes, you would be better off working in an uncompressed environment. But if you are staying in FCP, and using Final Touch to color correct, then editing DVCPRO HD native is fine.

Or, are you saying that when you render ANY filter that you are re-compressing the image? Hmmm…didn’t think of that.

Shane

Littlefrog Post
http://www.lfhd.net

[Jeremiah Black]

“Who’s recompressing? If you capture via firewire, it is at native compression…no recompression occuring. Or are you talking about taking the footage from FCP into After Effects then back to FCP? If so, then yes, you would be better off working in an uncompressed environment. But if you are staying in FCP, and using Final Touch to color correct, then editing DVCPRO HD native is fine.”

Or, are you saying that when you render ANY filter that you are re-compressing the image? Hmmm…didn’t think of that.

Yeah, that’s what I’m saying. Sorry if it’s not well put. BUt, essentially when you render ANY filter to the image it has to write data and make a new file snd compress. If you’re in a DVCPROHD timeline it’s compressing (recompressing) your file into the DVCPROHD codec. If you are in an uncompressed space, it isn’t recompressing your footage. That’s why if you do a cuts only edit, uncompressed doesn’t matter, because the footage is untouched, and won’t be rendered/recompresed