[Clayton Macdonald]

Thanks for the clarification Walter! Please correct me if I’m wrong ( again?) but here is some info I have dug up… mixed in with speculation. I’m trying to figure out how things will play out in the CUDA/OPENCL race, which i believe was at the core of my earlier misunderstanding. Here goes:

CUDA may just be OPENCL with a different wrapper (?). NVIDIA is a member of the Khronos group ( led by Apple of course) which was responsible for developing OPENCL in the first place. The chipsets are the same, the GPU’s are all the same – does Adobe/NVIDIA really want to alienate the second larget company on the planet (Apple)? Me thinks not. It’s just another format war and NVIDIA is trying to get their licks in first ( usually a mark of weakness).

In other words, it may not be long before CUDA is trumped by its open-sourced competitor OPENCL. CUDA is just as important to the pro video industry as other proprietary stuff like Avid video codecs ( which is, not very important?). We can see plenty of other examples where open-sourced codes have simply overwhelmed their proprietary and inherently weaker counterparts ( Linux vs. Windows ).

So, to amend my earlier post, you may only need a certain amount of video card RAM to take advantage of GPU acceleration ( CUDA/OPENCL ), especially as OPENCL moves forward. Apparently the threshold is around 800MB.

cheers!

Clayton MacDonald
Online Editor
Greedy Productions Ltd.
(https://www.elecplay.com, https://www.reviewsontherun.com)

Clayton MacDonald
Video Editor
778-960-0569

[Clayton Macdonald]

there seem to be a few misconceptions re the imac on here with regards to Adobe CS5, so here goes.

NVIDIA are not the only video cards which support CUDA/ Mercury engine rendering in CS5. The ATI HD series supports it as well, although apparently you need at least 800MB of video card RAM so that leaves the 27″ imac with the ATI Radeon HD 5750 (1GB) as a valid option if you want to take advantage of GPU-aided rendering via CUDA/Mercury.

also, imacs are 64 bit. anything that ships with snow leopard is 64-bit. You do, however, need to boot it in 64-bit mode by holding down the 6 and 4 on startup.

Also, modern deliverables have blurred the lines of what is considered ‘broadcast’. If you’re delivering in NTSC, then you definitely need to preview your work on an NTSC monitor via a proper video card ie KONA3, and for that you’ll need a mac pro. If you deliver for the web, or anything other than NTSC ( including Blu-Ray) then you probably don’t need to proof your work on NTSC monitors. Also, if you need to ingest /output via SDI then you’ll need a KONA card as well.

So, to re-cap, yes there will be MASSIVE benefits to running Adobe CS5 on a hyper-threaded imac i7 with 1Gb of video RAM and 16GB of RAM. As a 64 bit machine, your imac will be able to make full use of adobe’s new 64-bit code, as well as CUDA/Mercury engine if your card exceeds 800MB of video RAM. It will be a fast and somewhat future -proof machine if you consider they are still shipping Macs of various flavours with 256MB video cards.

I picked this machine to cut my Canon 5DMkii footage on because the limitations re external drives don’t really affect me. Premiere Pro edits H264 natively at around 40mb/s, so FW 800 is plenty fast for me.

This ain’t your daddy’s imac, people, especially now that we are reaching the physical limitations of what a silicon chip can do.

Clayton MacDonald
Video Editor
778-960-0569

[Clayton Macdonald]

is this a version 6.0.3 thing? i am experiencing a similar problem with my animated project right now and i feel it’s partially due to too many media-managed transfers (project sharing).
i will try the 0%opacity slug and perhaps the random filter (bypassed?) to see if they can force the timeline to re-render the dissolves without having them ‘stick’. thanks for the posts

Clayton MacDonald
Video Editor
514.580.5627

[Clayton Macdonald]

thanks for the post…

we used DVCPROHD format, shot against a greenscreen, lit with kinoflo fluorescent banks, keyed out with the keylight plug-in for after effects…

it turned out looking great!

[Clayton Macdonald]

hi Bob

we’ve completed the test shoot using a green screen lit with kino flo fluorescents, 2 sets of 4. as it turns out, all of the silhouette work is being done using the keylight plug-in in after effects. we’ve shot it in DVCPROHD 720p, key everything out in HD, then deliver SD. so far it looks great and green screen is the way to go for sure – the silhouette is achieved completely is post. keylight rocks!

i’ve been checking out the ipod commercials more closely and there is alot of rotoscoping/digital matte painting, especially in the “sparks” commercial.

ciao for now

Clayton