Phantom Worklfow and more…

[Aaron Neitz]

ProRes is great and all… but if you’re doing a “lot” of compositing you really ought to consider uncompressed HD.

Gluetools makes a Phantom transcoder tool for Mac.

Not knowing your exact situation or project: Get everything in 1080/23.98. Work that way the whole way through. Then at the very end you can add 3:2 pulldown to your final piece and it becomes 1080/59.94 (you’re right: the same as NTSC 29.97, but referring to fields per second instead of frames)

[Russell Lasson]

I would suggest you have your film transfered to HDCAM SR at 23.98. Then digitize that in. You might consider doing the edit in ProRes, then for the FX, capturing just the footage you need to DPX sequences. That way you stay 4:4:4 for the FX shots. You can render the FX shots out to ProRes if you want, but then you will have a 4:2:2 master instead.

I would suggest doing the offline edit in ProRes, but then finishing on a higher end system so you’ll have a 4:4:4 master. ProRes is great, but if you’re shooting with both film and the Phantom, I would suggest trying to get the best master you can. It might mean conforming at a bigger facility that can handle 4:4:4 material.

-Russ

Russell Lasson
Colorist/Digital Cinema Specialist
Color Mill
Salt Lake City, UT
http://www.colormill.net

[Gary Adcock]

[Russell Lasson] “f you’re shooting with both film and the Phantom, I would suggest trying to get the best master you can.”

careful
best quality on a Phantom .CINE file is way beyond FCP. (some phantom cameras shot 16bit raw)

I will agree that the GT plugin is the way to go,

note that the white point is at 65535 (that would be 16bit)

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

[Russell Lasson]

[gary adcock] “[Russell Lasson] “f you’re shooting with both film and the Phantom, I would suggest trying to get the best master you can.”

careful
best quality on a Phantom .CINE file is way beyond FCP. (some phantom cameras shot 16bit raw) “

Gary brings up a great point. There are several ways to process Phantom files. Some are very processor intensive. It could bury your project very quickly depending on which way you try to process your footage. If you’re not comfortable with the workflow, you should really consider hiring a consultant or post house familiar with the different workflows.

Or you can do it yourself, but if you do, I strongly suggest that you test the workflow before you shoot.

-Russ

Russell Lasson
Colorist/Digital Cinema Specialist
Color Mill
Salt Lake City, UT
http://www.colormill.net

[Eli Mavros]

Thanks for the responses guys. Apparently the company I am working for has the Gluetools program, so that should be good on that end. I agree about the online/offline approach of this project using ProRes and then 10bit for the final compositing. Is the general concensus that I should have the film transfered and the phantom footage transcoded to 23.98 and then at the very end add 3:2 pulldown? Playing the devil’s advocate here, but say I had the film xfered to 30p, could the spot be finished progressively and then I throw it in a 29.97 HD timeline (upper fields first) and things would be cool?

Best,
Eli

Eli Mavros

[Russell Lasson]

[Eli Mavros] “Playing the devil’s advocate here, but say I had the film xfered to 30p, could the spot be finished progressively and then I throw it in a 29.97 HD timeline (upper fields first) and things would be cool? “

If you shooting film at 24fps, then you’ll want to have it be progressive when you bring it in for compositing. Adding a 2:3 pulldown is standard practice when making final masters.

-Russ

Russell Lasson
Colorist/Digital Cinema Specialist
Color Mill
Salt Lake City, UT
http://www.colormill.net

[Aaron Neitz]

[Eli Mavros] “Playing the devil’s advocate here, but say I had the film xfered to 30p, could the spot be finished progressively and then I throw it in a 29.97 HD timeline (upper fields first) and things would be cool?”

Sure: if you shoot 30fps in camera then your 29.97 post workflow is all progressive. We call it “30 for 30.” It was the fad in commercials for awhile.

But 905% of the time they shoot 24 for creative reasons.

[Gary Adcock]

[Russell Lasson] “If you shooting film at 24fps, then you’ll want to have it be progressive when you bring it in for compositing. Adding a 2:3 pulldown is standard practice when making final masters. “

AGREED.
note that if you shoot @24 then edit at 29.97, the delivery may be perceived as faulty on some displays.

Note that many of the modern consumer displays extract the pulldown on playback, causing odd cadence issues when the display starts removing frames,because every edit point may or may not have the A -Frame so the display starts looking for the next A- Frame to begin the removal sequence again.

so some of the pulldown is removed and some is not creating playback issues for the viewer at home.

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

Members

[Eli Mavros]

Hey Guys,

Thanks for the input. I am aware of the whole 3:2 process and everything with 24p footage being delivered for 29.97 broadcast. I have also worked with the 30 for 30 type of shoot. I guess my question is a bit of a preference issue. Since everything is being over cranked, the option to get quicktimes at 24 or 30 is up to me, as the film is not being shot at either frame rate but at 150fps. I just wasn’t sure if it would be better for me to work on the project at 30fps or 24fps since the delivery is 1080i 59.94 (also, I guess I am just confused as well because sometimes there is such thing as 60fps HD stuff and I never know how you know what the difference is via the crazy naming conventions out there…I guess you just have to ask the station to be specific). I just get confused about having clips that are 30p but then converting them to an interlaced format. There is some fundamental of interlacing that I still am too dense to comprehend. I just don’t know what would yield better results, working at 24p and then adding a pulldown for delivery, or working at 30p and then dropping that into an interlaced sequence at the end. Something about that latter approach that scares me into thinking I will have field issues. If you have progressive footage (like I always do with 30fps CG), when you drop it into an interlaced sequence (lower fields first for SD and upper fields first for HD), you are basically just telling the computer which fields of the progressive movie to display first? So there shouldn’t be any issue. The issue is when you have footage that was acquired with a certain field dominance and you drop it into a sequence with the opposite field dominance, right?

Thanks,

Eli

Eli Mavros

[Gary Adcock]

[Eli Mavros] ” I just wasn’t sure if it would be better for me to work on the project at 30fps or 24fps since the delivery is 1080i 59.94″

I gave the reasons not to work at 30 in my posts.

If you work at 30fps then you will need to shoot at a 25% higher frame rate on the phantom to get the same look and feel.

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