DPX Format with r3d

[Christopher Tay]

Hi Jennifer,

The special effects team would render the final results back in DPX format so it not possible to reference back to the original RED r3d files, unless the special effects team use the original RED r3d files instead and then render the final results to DPX format for you to grade in Resolve.

On a side node, you may want the special effects team to give you the mattes that they have created so that you can use them for isolation in Resolve. If a shot has different mattes, you can ask them to put them in a single DPX file as Resolve now supports different mattes in the DPX RGB channels.

-chrispy

[Jennifer Mendes]

Thanks Christopher for responds.

If I understand I can ask the staff of the special effects to give me only the mattes of the effects created by them in DPX.
Then I put in DaVinci these DPX files over the original r3d files to correct the color without losing the metadata. Isn’t it?

[Toby Tomkins]

That is one way to do it, and it let’s the fx be separate from the master (which would remain as RED/r3d, below the vfx with the matte). You will need to have 3 files for each vfx shot;

1. The master (Red/R3D)
2. The VFX shot
3. A matte/alpha to cut out the VFX

Ideally you want to have the master on v1, the vfx shot on v2 and then import the matte like so (Thank you Peter Chamberlain!);

‘Within the media pool, select the clip that the matte needs to be associated with, now in the clip details window, select the matte, right click and select, …. Matte…
You will see in the media pool the image clip now has an indicator showing an associated file.
Now in node graph, right click to add matte, link as needed.’

Note, the matte needs to be the exact same duration as the SOURCE clip

This also let’s you grade the vfx separately if need be.

Another alternative would have been to render out to RedLogFilm (Gamma) DPX sequences for the VFX, and then use a display LUT on the vfx clips while grading to monitor in (The LUT doing a RedLogFilm to RedGamma (or whatever gamma space) conversion), this let’s it feel/look like a normal R3D and gives you the full colour latitude of the RAW file. Of course the VFX are ‘baked in’ but if the VFX has been done right and no more colour matching is required this should be fine.

Let us know how you get on!

Best wishes,

Toby

[Jennifer Mendes]

Thank you for the tips, I’ll do some experiments.