Chuck Spaulding
Forum Replies Created
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There are a lot of variables that can effect the performance of ProRes. I’d recommend capturing some of the same footage with the ProRes “medium” quality 145Mb setting and see if that works better.
The only reason I’d consider using the ProRes HD 220Mb is if I were mastering to film. DVCProHD is 100Mb, Sony SR is 140Mb, so 145Mb should be plenty for mastering to HD.
If that doesn’t solve your problem check out the SheerVideo codec. Although it doesn’t compress as much it is much better than editing uncompressed, is lossless, 8 or 10bit, YUV or RGB and has an embedded alpha.
DVCProHD will work, but I only use it as a last resort.
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Making the comparison between the data rates of ProRes [HD] and uncompressed SD is just BS marketing hype that has caused way too much confusion.
Which codec you choose depends on what you hope to accomplish with it.
If, for example you wanted to film out then obviously uncompressed is the way to go. But as you pointed out the data rates are around 192 MEGABYTES per second/11GB’s per minute. For many the cost associated with that amount of data is too high.
SheerVideo, which is a lossless codec providing about 2 to 3:1 compression including an optical [embedded] alpha channel, supports RGB and 4:4:4, and is platform and application agnostic. versus uncompressed, this is much more cost effective work flow if you want to master to film or digital cinema.
If your mastering for broadcast there’s Cineform and ProRes, both are lossy offering approximately 5 to 10:1 compression. However, Cineform works on both Mac’s and PC’s, not only is ProRes Apple only its FCP only, also, neither supports alpha channels. The lack of an embedded alpha channel means that compositing requires two streams of data for each overlay instead of just one, exacerbating the already painful disk thrashing problems associated with such large data rates. So although the data rates of the SheerVideo codec are higher it is still probably a better choice if you are doing much compositing.
As the battle for NLE supremacy continues there is no single or right answer. I think the best we can hope for at the moment is to not get locked into a work flow that we can’t easily change.
If you can’t [or don’t want to] afford working with uncompressed HD and you are a single artisan always working on the same system with direct attached storage then ProRes might be the right solution for you.
But if the projects you work on are spread across multiple artisans on different systems with various applications then the ProRes work flow is probably NOT the right way to go and you should test both the SheerVideo and Cineform codecs.
I’m sure there will be more debate regarding work flow as people experiment with codec other than DVCProHD. All of this may be confussing but at least we are beginning to have some choice.
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This is the second time you’ve asked this question and the answer is still the same! This is not a standards conversion problem, I’m sure Graeme would appreciate it if you purchased his converter but you don’t need it.
From your previous post:
There’s a field switching filter that will change the order of the fields without having to recapture.
I believe that in FCP 5.1.4 (and FCP6) if you place SD footage in an HD timeline it will add the filter automatically and the opposite is true for HD in an SD timeline.
Go to Effects >> Video Filters >> Video >> Shift Fields.
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What kind of camera are you capturing from and what is the setup of the camera?
You might have a 1280×720 image in a 1920×1080 [1440×1080] timeline which places the image in the center and you get a black border all the way around. This is a guess, but I’m guessing your using a JVC or another HDV camera that captures 720P.
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You don’t need to do that. There’s a field switching filter that will change the order of the fields without having to recapture.
I believe that in FCP 5.1.4 (and FCP6) if you place SD footage in an HD timeline it will add the filter automatically and the opposite is true for HD in an SD timeline.
Go to Effects>>Video Filters>>Video>>Shift Fields.
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Also, do you have a black power cord or a grey one?
I’ve heard that the back ones get way too hot and the quad core really slow down…
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There is a lot of confusion regarding this issue, hopefully this reply won’t add to it.
There are sever things to consider, what is the deliverable, SD-DVD, HD-DVD/Tape, HDV tape?
Your DP is correct FCP must recalculate [conform] the B and P frames. If for example this was a cuts only project with no effects it only goes through this process once so your not re-encoding for every cut. So in this example you would lose one generation. Obviously HDV is lossy but if this is all you did the difference from the original would be imperceptible. However if you had a lot of cuts it might take a very long time conforming. If your going to master to HDV tape this is probably the best way to go.
If your going to master to DVCProHD it would be better to capture to the DVCProHD codec but this requires an Aja or Black Magic card that can capture analog component. I’m not sure [somebody else will probably speak up to this] whether I would trust making the conversion using batch export from FCP or compressor.
A workflow that will provide much better quality would be to convert to the SheerVideo codec, it is lossless, platform and application agnostic and works well with FCP 5.1.4. Like everything else there’s a trade off. This codec was designed to improve the workflow for uncompressed HD. Using it with HDV will significantly increase the data rate and file size. But if you have enough RAID storage this is a very good alternative to editing HDV natively. I probably wouldn’t choose it for short form work but for long form where you may live with this project for a while I would.
You can check it out here: https://www.bitjazz.com/en/products/sheervideo/
Regarding the Apple Intermediate Codec, again I might use it on some short form work but definitely not on a project where quality was important. It is a 4:2:0 8-bit codec, the only advantage it offers is converting it to a frame based timeline, kinda like big DV. DV is certainly easier to edit but I don’t think people look at it and exclaim, “wow that look great!”
If the JVC BR-HD50 has an SDI out you could always capture uncompressed HD — which is a whole different thread.
I hope this helps.
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Hurry.
Need help.
Battery failing…
ahrgggg — thud
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Thanks for the replies.
Currently I have two FCP work stations with 3TB’s each of fiber channel storage and a third workstation [FCP/Graphics] with about 4TB’s of SCSI and three 1TB FW drives that are used for sneaker net.
This is plenty of storage but with all the artists working on the same projects its a real challenge trying to keep the filesystem organized. It takes an incredible amount of time either rendering new render files, because inevitably the sequence was created on the “other” system, or copying data from workstation to workstation.
I’m hoping to retire the SCSI and be able to attach the current fiber channel storage to the Terrablock so that I have about 10 to 12TB’s of shared storage.
How well does FCP work in a shared file system environment?
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We just completed a DVCProHD show that included just about every format known to man using three FCP 5.1.4 edit bays. It was a nightmare.
Not so much because of the performance difference between FW, SCSI and Fiber channel [though there are some real issues there too] but more because of the incessant back-ups and transferring of data.
Walter, are any of the drives your looking at, the MaxxDigital for example, a shared storage solution?
Has anyone used any shared storage solution that wasn’t fiber channel based and if so how well did it work and how much did it cost?
Wayne, how many NLE’s do you have attached to the 12D? Also, if you wouldn’t mind letting me know approximately how much you paid for the 6TB 12D.
Anyone in the Los Angeles area using this storage solution mind if I came by to “witness” how well it works first hand?