Allan White
Forum Replies Created
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Resolve 9 and the new BMD Cinema Cam look stunning. VERY slowly getting info out of their site (which is gorgeous, BTW). Must be getting hit hard by all the Cow readers! =)
BMD has really internalized (and, more importantly, executed well) the lessons from Apple on the value of integrated hardware and software design. A very impressive business accomplishment, that I don’t see any of their competitors or peers doing to this level.
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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Excited. Hard to get info though, the site is being hit hard. Anyone know of any video demos or posts up regarding Resolve 9?
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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Right now we’re just using the XDCAM Transfer app to ‘wrap’ the video in a QT container. That seems to work fine in CatDV and all our other software.
If you have to convert to ProRes, Compressor 4 is the fastest in our tests.
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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Looking hard at that option. At the least, looking at using a Mac Mini as a redundant MDC.
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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Bob, you see things clearly as always. Have you heard anything about how reliable the new XSAN/Lion server is working for people?
We have the physical infrastructure paid for; what interests me now is the cheaper seats. With the new Thunderbolt-to-FC adapters, that’s opening up some neat new possibilities for some of our people with Thunderbolt-equipped machines. But, that’s a lot of new newness at once, so thought I’d ask the experts. =)
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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With the recent FCPX fail, I (and likely, others) am also interested in best practices for developing a workflow with Premiere CS5 (Mac). I’ve been using OnLocation, for instance, to do field recording. It’s pretty solid*.
The Adobe apps seem to be teeming with metadata (and places to put it). They really get the value of metadata in video workflows. I’d love to see any tips or ideas in this area.
*Except for its powerful speech transcription, which is great if you want to stay in Premiere Pro. There seems to be no way to export it to XML for the Verbatim Logger. Which would rock.
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Thanks for responding, Rolf. So, can we upgrade our clients from 8 to 9, and pay the client upgrade fee (we have 3 Pro seats)? Or, will that require a [larger] server upgrade also? I think I’m hearing you clearly but wanted to make sure.
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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Greetings gents. Great to see forward progress on the CatDV ecosystem.
Will the point release of the server require a paid upgrade? I’m guessing not as it seems we’ve only paid for major releases (eg. 5.x to 6.x), but thought I’d ask.
The “Events” feature is exciting, can’t wait to try. Thanks!
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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Thanks Rolf, that’s a useful picture of both the state of CatDV and some helpful things to try. You’re correct – I haven’t sent any useful crash logs of late, deadlines have kept me a bit too busy to send useful feedback. I’ll make sure I do that. The last item, ‘full size thumbnails’ is new to me, I’ll try that.
Thanks for responding in a constructive manner – I appreciate your work and attitude! I really want to see CatDV and Squarebox succeed.
– Allan White, Video Producer, Luis Palau Assoc.
Quad 3Ghz Mac Pro, 10GB RAM, X1900 GPU, XSAN, CatDV Server
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I’m getting a lot of crashes on OS 10.6.6 running 8.1.11. There seems to be no consistent cause, though manipulating markers and just general playback. Yes, I’ve toggled the “protected player” setting. These bugs have persisted for many versions. I’ve sent some crash logs to Rolf and the gang, and I’ll be sending more as I have them – usually I’m in a rush and don’t take the time.
I’m to the point where I’m looking for other options. I see few good ones (esp. in this price domain). I want CatDV to “just work”. As Mac OS X has evolved, CatDV – and the Java foundation it sits on – feels like it’s crumbling.
Looking forward, I have grave concerns about this foundation. Look around in the marketplace – how many Java apps are there for the Mac OS? I hear of none. It’s time to consider a full-blooded Objective-C Mac client. Perhaps Java is more of a “native citizen” on Windows. It’s sure not on Mac OS. Apple has done so little to maintain the Java runtime on OSX – not to mention Quicktime and QT for Java.
I feel like I’m going ten years back in time when I launch CatDV on my modern Mac. Ask any current Mac developer today out there – how many are developing on Java? Are there any tracks for it at WWDC 2011? At what point with Java on OSX cease to work – especially when QuickTime X emerges in Lion (QTKit and AV Foundation)?
Every time CatDV crashes, my producers trust it – and me – a little less. I really, really don’t want to go back to the old, “let’s just scrub the tape and search for the clips” method that existed before me. “I won’t go back!!” =)
I write these critiques out of respect for you hard-working devs and love for this tool. You guys “get” video workflow in a very deep way. And I’m no programmer, just a geek who loves video and elegant workflows. You may have great reasons to stay on Java, and Obj-C/C# may be no panacea. Perhaps Squarebox have big plans. But I have to wonder why no one else in the Mac universe writes big GUI apps with Java. The lack of stability of CatDV makes me wonder. I’d love to hear your reasons, and I’d be happy to be proven wrong if it means a better CatDV.
All the best,
R. Allan White