How to determine 8-bit versus 10-bit ProRes media?

[Bill Russell]

Okay, off the beaten path a bit, but here is more I found on the After Effects ProRes at 8-bit problem:

…you have to edit your After Effects setup text file to get ProRes to write out to ACTUALLY 10 bits – so that “Trillions” will be available instead of just “Millions”

For anyone looking to modify the After Effects setup file, it is (on a Mac) located at /Library/Preferences/Adobe/After Effects/[version #]/Adobe After Effects [v#] Prefs

For me it was about line 1800 under
[“QuickTime 64-bit Output Codecs”]
that I added
“apch” = “1”

apch refers to ProRes(HQ)

“THE LOST SKELETON OF CADAVRA” –

And more…

[Rafael Amador]

[Arnie Schlissel] “AE supports 10 bit media quite well. “
Right, but you need to set AE in 16 or 32b rendering otherwise everything is crunched to 8b.
In AE there is not like in FC that you can export without re-compression. In AE everything is processed.
rafael

http://www.nagavideo.com

[Gary Adcock]

[Bill Russell] “If the film-out folks said my file was 8-bit, and the Quicktime I gave them was Apple ProResHQ, and Apple ProRes HQ can ONLY be 10-bit… then problem is on their end, no? “

Did you bother to ask them if they accepted ProRes files?
did they prefer something else and you just gave them the ProRes.
I agree that this sounds as if they out put via AE in windows on a machine that was not set correctly.

I will confirm that ProRes is a 10bit container, but that does not always mean the content in the file is 10bit. what was your camera master and how was it handled prior to being laid to D5.

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows

Check out
https://www.aja.com/kiprotour/

Inside look at the IoHD
https://library.creativecow.net/articles/adcock_gary/AJAIOHD.php

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Bill Russell] “Okay, off the beaten path a bit, but here is more I found on the After Effects ProRes at 8-bit problem:
“

That’s old news. The latest version of AE does this automagically. I have had trillions available since CS3.

Jeremy

[Bill Russell]

That’s old news.

If they have CS3! 😉

“THE LOST SKELETON OF CADAVRA” –

And more…

[Bill Russell]

Did you bother to ask them if they accepted ProRes files?

Oh we went around on that a bit — everything had to be transmitted through the rep — but the final message was yes, indeed. They understood what ProRes was (Apple proprietary), sounded like they’ve worked with it, and said it would be good.

did they prefer something else and you just gave them the ProRes.

No, not that they told us anyway.

I agree that this sounds as if they out put via AE in windows on a machine that was not set correctly.

Yeah, that’s what I’m thinking happened. Can’t think of anything else. AE or another “converter” that is not real ProRes friendly. (Unless, as Jeremy touched on, maybe they made a visual determination, found some banding on a shot or something, and declared the media 8-bit? Though that would make me stomp my feet and make annoying little noises in the corner, as I’m really attentive to these thing, or try to be!)

I will confirm that ProRes is a 10bit container,

Wow, thank you, that would be good to know! The white paper overview says PR handles 8-bit and 10-bit material, but the way it is worded it is unclear if they simply mean that 8-bit benfits, well, just like DVCPro handles well when converted to 10-bit uncompressed, or that ProRes actually has an 8-bit data structure option like DNxHD. (If latter is the case… then back to the original question… how to determine and control bit depth!)

but that does not always mean the content in the file is 10bit.

You mean original visual quality of 8-bit, like in example of DVCPro upconverted to 10-bit uncompressed? or do you mean actual resulting data structure, like DNxHD 8bit instead of 10bit?

what was your camera master and how was it handled prior to being laid to D5.

Super 16mm, telecined (all of us there for days doing careful shot-for-shot grooming) at Post Group, to D5 — all ‘spensive, intensive and pro like. The resulting digital projection and 35mm film prints (of the actual movie, not the trailer in question in this thread) are gorgeous. All that work was uncompressed.

Later…Only recently did they digitize the D5 edited master for us directly to ProRes HQ, from which we made the trailer and delivered ProRes HQ for film-out…. which film-out people (different, also reputable company) said was 8bit.

(Whew – sorry for the long story!) Short answer: Telecine to D5. Definitely full bit depth source.

“THE LOST SKELETON OF CADAVRA” –

And more…