Vegas 6 and Decklink working great!

[J Smith]

Are you aware that digitizing is not yet 100% frame accurate?

[Gary Taylor]

Hi Lance,
I was wondering something about Vegas 6. Do you know if effects in Vegas 6 support 10 bit rendering with the Decklink cards?
Thanks in advance!
Gary

[Lance Bachelder]

I’m working on an animated comedy series so we haven’t had to capture or lay of to tape yet. We plan to render to the Blackmagic codec and go out to tape via the Blackmagic utility.

Lance Bachelder
Southern California
Cow Forum Host- Magic Bullet

[Lance Bachelder]

I believe Vegas still renders everything in 8 bit RGB. You can render to the 10 bit codec for output to tape but not sure how Vegas is processing it all. This seems to be a problem with other NLE’s internal processing too – they support the 10 bit codecs but still do the 8 bit thing internally.

Lance Bachelder
Southern California
Cow Forum Host- Magic Bullet

[Gary Taylor]

Hi Lance,
Thanks for your answer. Do you know of any other NLEs that do 10 bit internal processing besides Final Cut Pro?
Thanks again,
Gary

[Dom Silverio]

Avid is capable of up to 16 bit.

[Bj Ahlen]

Many NLEs, including Final Cut Pro, support doing effects, color correction and transitions etc. in higher bit depths, but then the result is truncated to 8-bit. That goes for FCP too.

Even FCP5 is 8-bit output only per Apple’s techs at NAB. Gotta be careful with interpreting vendor “marketing BS,” this goes for all vendors! I was just surprised to find out only now that FCP HD never supported the ITU 709 color space that is specified for “real HD.” The ITU 601 color space that is the standard for SD doesn’t have the same punch at all.

I’ve been working with Vegas for 10-bit uncompressed (using BMD’s excellent codec) since last year. This stays 10-bit as long as you only do straight cuts. For anything else you have to go to Combustion or equivalent. PITA for sure, but nice to have the extra latitude of 10-bit.

Even a $100K XPRI system is still only 8-bit. There are a few other fairly pricey NLEs that claim to do real 10-bit, but I am beginning to hear that even those don’t have it implemented fully. Needs more research…

[Lance Bachelder]

Also remember everything we watch on TV is 8 bit, all DVD’s are 8 bit. 8 bit isn’t necessarily a bad thing, depends on the quality of the original footage and how it will be shown in it’s final form. 10 bit is great for effects and color grading and pulling keys but it will still be shown in 8 bit.

Lance Bachelder
Southern California
Cow Forum Host- Magic Bullet

[Kaspar Kallas]

FCP is 8 bit in RGB colorspce in YUV it good 10bit in 4.5 and I think was that evene before that

-Kaspar

[Bj Ahlen]

I like to maintain 10-bit for as long as possible in the long chain to the final render that is usually 8-bit today, as Lance indicated.

Maintaining 10-bit means more latitude to change the look of the footage anytime. It also helps a lot in an effects chain, where truncation after each step (in 8-bit NLEs) can lead to banding or even major artifacts in some cases. The cure for now is offlining the footage to Combustion, Fusion or AE Pro which can all work in 16-bit and beyond.

Some NLEs work in YUV natively. This reduces conversion which is good, but the color space (2.75 million colors) is less than one fifth of RGB (16 million colors) which makes it less suitable for effects work.