Working with HD Special Effects Project

[Steve Roberts]

The Nvidia FX 1500 is irrelevant. Doesn’t matter. So it’s OK.

I’ve worked with DVCPROHD 720P footage on a dual G5 with 4.5 GB of RAM, no problem. But DVCPROHD is compressed — basically DV100 (not DV25, not DV50). No big deal, can use firewire drives. When I did RAM previews, I often had to preview at half res, every other frame, but it was okay. I think you shouldn’t expect to make long previews at full res, playing every frame.

Regarding the monitor, I used a Decklink SP to preview to a Sony PVM SD monitor. The Decklink card was able to scale down the footage to play on the monitor. It wasn’t pixel-per-pixel, but it was fine at the time.

Hope that helps.

[Andres Bocan]

Hey:

But I am not talking about DV HD I am talking about High Definition High End ( Not DV ) I mean footage something like 2k or 3K I am not sure. Image format 16:9.

[Steve Roberts]

I think drive space would be an issue, along with RAM. Why not do a rehearsal? Make comps at the expected frame sizes, take PSDs at those sizes, apply some effects, and see how many frames you can RAM preview at full res, half res. Then you’ll get an idea of how much RAM you’ll need.

Anyway, I recommend you get a bigger hard drive, and 8 GB of RAM at least. Regarding the hard drive, figure out how long the project is and how big the frame size is, and figure out how much space you’ll need, calculating all source files and renders.

But if you have the money, yes, get a new 8-core with the X1900XT and 8-16GB of RAM. If you don’t have the money, just get the extra drive space and RAM.

And consider using proxies — check the help.

Anybody else?