[John Davidson]

[Andrew Richards] “What Apple needs to open up and publish is ProRes. They are unlikely to do so, but they still should.”

I’ve been thinking about this a lot because we still get lots of random codecs. If you work in FCPX and are 100% committed to the platform, you’re already working natively in ProRes because you’re most likely optimizing your media upon import. In a way, Apple has just taken that FCPX love of ProRes and applied it to the whole dang OS. As frustrating as it is to have to batch convert everything under the sun (especially for graphic elements because as I’ve mentioned in our AE thread, something is going on with non-ProRes codecs in Mavericks that affects After Effects renders), I don’t consider it to be the end of the world because I want that ProRes only future.

Animation is my Grandpa’s codec – I feel like we’ve been using it since the 90’s. If clients delivered everything in ProRes that would be fantastic. Until then, we’ll just convert as needed to the most appropriate flavor of ProRes.

In terms of Apple handing out the codec, I immediately thought that they should do that because it will not become an industry standard until PC users can render to ProRes. If everyone can render to ProRes, there’s no debate on whether ProRes can become the default codec. But then….what if your goal is to sell Macs too? Giving the codec away makes your Mac Pros less special, because why buy a mac if your $300 pc can render to ProRes when you need to deliver to a client like abc, who requires ProResHQ for all final series deliveries?

And that, I think, is the point. You sell more macs when they’re the only ones that can perform certain tasks required to complete a project. Apple isn’t trying to change the industry standard for codecs as much as they’re trying to change the entire industry to mac only. Personally, I like this because I am not a fan of PC’s, however this might be terrifying to some people.

[John Davidson]

Derp. That’s what I get for posting w/ an iPad.

Here’s the After Effects forum:

https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/2/1043821#1043821

And the OS X forum post:

https://forums.creativecow.net/readpost/71/863688

Jpeg codec still works, as does AVCHD. You can tell just by what plays back when you hit spacebar. Otherwise QTX will creat a converted copy to either an H264 codec or ProRes. Currently there’s a little quirk with converting 720p PNG/Alpha channel based QT’s. Instead of converting to ProRes 4444 it converts to H264, thus losing the alpha channel.

For heavily used qt’s, you might want to consider doing a batch convert via Compressor to ProRes4444. We did/are doing that now. In fact, we’re doing an entire media overhaul and rebuilding our folder organization, so this kind of fits into that overarching plan.

[John Davidson]

Here’s a list of every code thats out.

https://forums.creativecow.net/thread/335/61363#61363

We had a pretty good thread about it in the aftereffects forum as well I think l.

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

This week we started converting a ton of our old graphic quick times that are png, animation, etc., to Prores (hi-res) or H264 (web-res). It’s a pretty painless process using Compressor to batch convert. On the bright side, OS X really loves ProRes, so you’ll probably have a subtle performance increase by not using those older codecs anyways.

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

Thanks for that list. Looks like we’ll be running Compressor in overdrive this week to convert everything.

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

I’m budgeting about 8k per fully loaded mac pro with 64 gigs of RAM.
Cinema Display 27″- just 1. We’ve been using a single monitor with great effect for about 18 months. With 2 x 27″ displays we needed wheels to slide from one screen to the other – it felt weird. 1k each.

Storage – $2500 for Promise Pegasus R6 I believe.

Audio monitoring. Drop $500 for some Bose Companions and you’ll be happy. We have Adam’s in one system, Mackie’s in another, and another brand of speakers in a third – the Bose one’s are what we like the most. No mixer, because there’s less a point to them these days unless you need deck monitoring or want to play out from a DVD player, in which case studio speakers are preferred.

Ability to connect – the tube mac has GigE – which works fine for most HD formats. The server switch is up to you though – Server storage is a whoooooole other beast. Talk to Bob Zelin or Small Tree or David Roth Weiss at Promax.

Mavericks still runs FCP7, but Mavericks is still a little new and has some glitches here and there. Should be better by December (my guess).

Throw in a Blackmagic Mini-monitor to HDMI out to a Vizio Razor 37″ monitor (your preference). $700 for mini-monitor and TV.

That help? In my opinion less clutter is more. Dumping the the mixers was a big deal for us. We have one left for sale if you really want one:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/171163620276?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

Nobody really knows what the mac pro will cost fully loaded, so this might all change in December.

Good luck!

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

We’re thinking this is more a core issue in how Mavericks handles older QT media. It’s surprisingly gnarly. The process of having to convert a EVERY QT to a more mavericks friendly codec is terrible.

[Dave LaRonde] “Although I’m of the mind that if you don’t absolutely, positively need a new OS, it’s best to let someone else be on the bleeding edge and go through all the grief for you.
“

Anyone who buys a mac now has no choice.

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

Jack did you find a solution for this?

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

Good to know. My client machines are all mavericks now, but I won’t touch the server.

Thanks Bob!

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.

[John Davidson]

And if you haven’t turned on enhanced dictation, do it. I set mine to double tap left cmd key to activate. Enhanced checkbox will download 750MBs of data so that dictation doesn’t have to ‘phone home’ like the iPhone does.

It’s so fun.

John Davidson | President / Creative Director | Magic Feather Inc.