Jason Myres
Forum Replies Created
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[Andrew Golden] “Yes, the 1,1 doesn’t have 64-bit bios and can’t boot into the 64-bit kernel.”
That’s exactly what “prevent you from taking full advantage of 10.6” means. lol.
There are a ton of forum threads out there that have discussed this issue ad nauseam. That being said, early Mac Pro’s have some important limitations, and there are a lot of people who purchased attractively priced, used machines, only to have regretted it later. I was just trying to keep Ryan from being another one.
JM
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If you are going to be doing video using modern software packages like FCS3 or CS5, I would get an Early 2008 (3,1) or newer, 8-Core. The 1,1 doesn’t have 64-bit bios which will prevent you from taking full advantage of 10.6, and CS5 which makes real use of a 64-bit machine. This is a big deal.
Also, the 1,1 is very limited if you want a modern video card. The lastest card it can take advantage of is a Radeon 4870, which is over two years old now. I have heard the 5000-series Radeons may work, but it would be a waste in a 1,1 as the PCIe 1.1 bus is just too slow. Most modern cards require 64-bit bios and PCIe 2.0 to work correctly.
$1100 sounds reasonable for a 1,1 but I would use a machine like that for 2D graphics, web, or audio work. I was in exactly your situation, and bought a mint 2006 2.66GHz Quad after having only a laptop for a long time, and quickly realized it was not going to be enough for what I was doing (FCS3, AE CS4/5, C4D). I upgraded to a 2008 2.8GHz 8-core that handles everything I throw at it, and has become one of the best machines I have ever owned.
JM
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Although I have not used Isilon in a day-to-day environment myself, I have heard nothing but good things about it. Volume management and expansion are very elegant from what I hear, and if you factor in what your hourly time is worth, in the long run, I’ve found it’s always better to go with a smart solution with greater up-front costs, than a bargain-basement solution, that quietly nickel and dimes you to death over it’s lifetime in administration and productivity costs.
I see companies using Isilon more and more as a SAN alternative. The company where a good friend of mine works, is on the brink of replacing their aging V1.4.2 Xsan with a large Isilon installation. That being said, it is not a SAN replacement. You have to remember it’s a well-designed, intelligent NAS, but nothing more. An Xsan/ StorNext installation will smoke it in terms of per client bandwidth (400+ MB/s), aggregate bandwidth (1,500+ MB/s), scalability (2PB), and real, file-level locking across several (64), simultaneous users.
That being said, the advent of ProRes (27.5 MB/s) and other bandwidth-friendly formats has made it so that a Formula One-caliber SAN is not as necessary as it once was, when we were all staring down the barrel of having to use Uncompressed HD (150+ MB/s per stream) if we wanted to output high-quality work.
If you carefully manage your work flow, and do not overcome Isilon’s bandwidth limitations, than you will enjoy a lot of it’s benefits. You will need to have a plan, however, if the day comes that you need greater per client bandwidth. Also, keep in mind, all of the components that go into an Xsan or StorNext system (servers, RAIDs, switches) are all able to be re-purposed in a myriad of different ways if your needs change. If you do decide to buy an Isilon, just remember, that is all it will ever be.
JM
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Todd’s not kidding. After Effects will use every resource you can throw at it. But, if you can get an Early 2008 Mac Pro or newer with as much ram as you can afford, you’ll be able to get some honest work done in FCS and Creative Suite. Do not get an older 1,1 or 2,1 Mac Pro, as they have hardware limitations you need to avoid (32-bit bios, no PCIe 2.0).
JM
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[mark wilkinson] “i mean call me crazy but its a movie file.”
If these are just your home movies, sure. But if you’re doing this prefessionally, yikes. I wouldn’t let a director hear you saying that. You should probably read this:
https://broadcastengineering.com/infrastructure/where-tapeless-workflow-begins-2-20100704/
Pay close attention to the section on transfer software.
JM
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Memorize all the key commands you can. I haven’t taken the test yet, but from what I’ve heard from others, that’s a large part of it.
JM
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[Walter Soyka] “After Effects is a great compositor, but a lousy NLE. When I do non-standard AR projects, I offline in FCP and online in AE.”
Totally agree. If he has to cut together something complex, he’s in for some fun. But, none of us know the creative requirements, so it may just be a few clips strung together. But, at 720×2560, I’d imagine it’s a short loop of some sort.
JM
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[Rob Grauert] “won’t this lead to software that can get past the copy protection?”
Isn’t there a lot of software already out there? Not that I personally do it. Just sayin…
JM
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A couple thoughts:
-Final Cut Pro can’t handle greater than a 2k frame size so you’ll probably have to edit this in an application that can, like After Effects.
-The easiest thing to do would be to shoot at 1920×1080 with a DSLR, then crop and stretch to fit your final output. But, assuming you need this to be pixel for pixel, you’ll have to splice together the images from two different clips, and then crop down to your final size. That should be pretty easy to do in AE, so hopefully your client is OK with that, creatively speaking.
-If they are not, and it needs to be one continuous video that will fill the entire frame, then you’ll need a camera with a large frame size like a Red One.
-Once you’ve created your video, you can crop and output to your target frame size using the render queue in After Effects.
-Another thing to consider, might be creating a project with your target frame size right from the beginning in After Effects, then filling it with video and motion graphics components to make it look like one seamless composition, but that may be outside what your client is looking for.
-If you don’t know After Effects well, I’d find someone who does to help you. Either that, or hopefully you have a lot of time to experiment.
Sounds cool though. Good luck.
JM
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I know, but modern drives are getting good enough (like a G-Tech) where it might be possible. She’s using a an XL1 which means MiniDV at only 3MB/s. So, its at least worth a try given the costs to upgrade her camera, or move up to a 17-Inch MBP.
JM