HDV 24p Work flow – ProRes 422 ?

[Jerry Hofmann]

I’m not sure that removing the pulldown is absolutely necessary… You’d need an SDI output to capture with a Kona 2, but a Kona LH card would capture the analog component from your camera/deck, and change it to pro Res. Pro Res would be better than DVCPROHD… Will work from very fast SATA drives internally or externally… better than firewire and cost about the same.

an Io HD would capture to Pro res too, and releave your CPU from doing the compression during capture from a Kona Card… it would also be sort of future proof too because your next mac will work with it, where the Kona card you buy for your mac now won’t… different pci busses involved. The Io HD sends pro res down an 800 FW cable…

Jerry

Apple Certified Trainer

Author: “Jerry Hofmann on Final Cut Pro 4” Click here

Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D

[Hooban Meyer]

Jerry,

Thanks so much for your response. It seems the AJA Kona IOHD is probably the best bet. So am I understanding correctly that with that, I won’t need any other cards or hardware (aside from the camera/deck)? It’s looking like the price is around $3k…ouch.

So if I’m capturing the HDV footage via IOHD as a ProRes 422 file, I may not need to do an additional pulldown removal to get it to true 24p? Why do you think that may be the case? Do you think that maybe the pulldown removal is occurring while creating the ProRes 422 file through the Kona card? Man, that would be great if that were the case.

Thanks again. You’re a scholar and a gentleman.

[Daniel Weber]

Just a thought.

What if you went with a box that converted firewire to SDI? Check out the Convergent Design forum here.

That way the image stays digital instead of going to analog via component.

You could then buy a cheap HD card for your mac (i.e. Blackmagic, Aja, etc.).

Your out of pocket would be cheaper than the IO/HD.

Dan Weber

[Chris Poisson]

Hooban,

I would seriously read every word of this thread before you do or buy anything else.

BTW your camera has HDMI out, and with a Convergent Design HDMI box and a Kona you’d be set, but read about editing native HDV here. Makes more sense than you might expect.

https://forums.creativecow.net/cgi-bin/new_read_thread.cgi?forumid=162&postid=864839&univpostid=864839

[Hooban Meyer]

Hey Chris,

Thanks. I have read that post in its entirety and there’s some good stuff there. The one element no one has included in potential work flows is the reverse telecine element. I would love to edit the whole show in native HDV and then send it out as an uncompressed format or a ProRes. However, HDV won’t allow for a reverse telecine (temporal frames), and because I’m trying to stay in 24p, I’ll immediately have to convert to another format to be capable of performing that reverse pulldown.

It sounds like I just need to figure out the best way to go from the Sony V1U to the G5 converting to a ProRes file. Maybe it’s via HDMI or maybe through the IOHD box. The questions are:

– Which is the better method (quality wise)?
– Can my Dual 2Ghz G5 handle each method?
– Do I still need to perform a reverse telecine after capturing, or can I capture the file (prores) through one of these methods without that pulldown in place, resulting in a true 24p file.

Staying in native HDV would be wonderful simply for space issues, but it just doesn’t sound like it’s possible.

You guys are great for thinking about it and responding. Thanks.

[Rafael Amador]

Hooban,
Get you a bit more of RAM and your editing life will be much easier.
Cheers,
rafael

[Chris Poisson]

Hooban,

I don’t have a V1 and my Canon A1 is with FedEx right now, and I have no experience with reverse telecine. Can’t help you with that one. But, since you say going to film is an “off chance'” why even worry about that right now? That’s like saying I might win the lottery.

I don’t think you can capture with puldown removal from that camera as you can with Firewire from a DVX 100, which is what my 24p experience is limited to, but with the new Studio, you can mix frame rates, so why not just go the native HDV route? This from a CD guy, not sure if it was in the thread I sent you or not, but it’s worth a look.

There are a number of viable workflows here that give similar results, but a couple considerations need to be taken.
The advantage of capturing directly into uncompressed or prores is time and integration of other HD-SDI sources (among other reasons): assume 1 hour tape
uncompressed/prores capture (via analog or HD-SDI through a converter): 1 hour for capture (encodes to prores on the fly), editing in prores is realtime and no output render time needed (for most effects) if going back to HD-SDI output
Native HDV capture with drop into prores timeline when editing is finished:
1 hour capture + time for render to prores (not done during capture, at least 1 hour) + time for rendering effects (variable).

Workflow 1: Analog component out to HD-SDI using a converter or capture card conversion.
Advantage: This is a great, inexpensive way to get to uncompressed video or prores on the fly, especially if your capture card already has component input.
Issues: Analog conversion losses (take a look at this video that shows the difference between all digital capture (via HDMI in this case, but via firewire is the same result) and analog capture: https://convergent-design.fileburst.com/AvD.wmv
Another issue is handling the audio and timecode/deck control.

Workflow 2: HDV to HD-SDI converter (HD-Connect SI or HD-Connect MI)
Advantage: no analog conversion losses, easy connections enable audio conversion along with deck control (through RS-422) and timecode. Realtime scaling to 720p/1080i, standard def.
Issues: Additional Cost (we’re working on that, the HD-Connect MI is down to $595)

Workflow 3: native HDV with drop into prores timeline once editing is finished.
Advantage: Most inexpensive solution.
Disadvantage: additional time is required for render to pro res

Each workflow would only have 1 transcode to prores. Analog capture would give the worst results with native HDV and HDV to HD-SDI conversion giving the same results (quality wise).

Hopefully this is helpful. Let me know if I goofed up anything.

Regards,

John Schell
Convergent Design Inc.

[Hooban Meyer]

Chris,

Thanks so much for this breakdown. It honestly helps a lot.

I’m really set on staying in true 24p even if there’s only an outside chance of a film print. I’m going to be putting so much editing and effects work into this that it would be a disaster if I ever had to go to a film print and had to somehow conform it all to 24p. Does that make sense?

So a reverse pulldown may be inevitable.

If I went with the HD-Connect MI what additional card would I need to support that? I would be going firewire into the HD-Connect and then how do I go from that box to the G5. Also, is my Duel 2 Ghz G5 fast enough to handle the prores capture?

[Chris Poisson]

With that camera you could use the HDMI out with the Convergent Design MI box, which is 200 bucks cheaper than the FireWire box, which is the SI. Then you would use any card or box with SDI in, and assuming you have a fast enough machine and drives, capture to Prores.

You still could transcode all your footage from native HDV to 24p whatever with Compressor, I’m not sure how long that would take or what would happen to your timecode, but who cares as long as you name all your captures.

I have a Kona LH, which has component plus SDI in, so I have a choice to go from Firewire with an SI box, or component to Prores, or, go native HDV and render later to an uncompressed format. My camera does not have HDMI out.

On going to 24 fps later, I’d ask around about the gotchyas on that, but I would think they may be minimized with the new Studio, at least one would think so.

[Hooban Meyer]

Thanks Chris, I’ll look into it.

I’ve always heard that you want to do the reverse pulldown through something like Cinetools rather than just convert it using compressor. I believe that’s because Cinetools is only pulling out the repeated frames where as running it through something like compressor is actually just meshing them together.