Kevin Watkins
Forum Replies Created
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Thanks Dave. I was planning on sending it out to have the frame rate converted via an Alchemist system. Tried this as a test and the QT file is difficult to gauge, as I mentioned.
If its too good to be true…
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Gary,
Thanks for your reply. You’re absolutely right – I am switching out the terms ‘render’ and ‘output’. As I understand it now, when I send the Color file back to FCP and have to render the fades & dissolves, FCP is rendering down to 8 bit?
I intend to make a final Master file using Compressor. I assume this would be simply ‘output’ rather than a render and I’ll get by 10 bit files…? (Not going out onto a deck.)
“the reality is if you sell it, they will want the masters for their version of the finish…”
True, but the objective with the post side of this film was to learn as much as possible about finishing a 10 bit RGB uncompressed HD project. Better to do it on my time and dime…Been quite a ride too!
“depending on what version of the PSD camera raw plug in you used, (you said 3 years on this project) you are working in a color space beyond the limits of the Raw conversion”
It was PSD CS2 which I am pretty certain can do 16 bit conversion. (We started shooting in Summer 2005, so its not quite 3 years.)
Thanks again.
Kevin Watkins.
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Gary,
Sorry, I should have mentioned how I created these files: They are Digital Stills from a Canon 8.2MP D20 (this film is a combination of animation and some 35mm live action.) We shot the stills in RAW, converted to PSD (AE doesn’t support 16bit TIFF) and have kept everything at 16 Bit RGB since. FCP has been used to edit, but all work on files has been in AE. Where we might have needed in-between files, we rendered out in either Sheer or Microcosm. Mostly we just nested the comps. When creating the final clips, I used AJA’s 10-bit RGB codec. The film was transfered to the same codec and provided on a drive, by a large post house here in NYC.
If you render the files out in color, how do you output the file, except through FCP? I would rather send this to AE than Motion. Hence Automatic Duck.
I am not intending to do a film out, just HDCam. But I need to create a Master file for the post house to lay-off. I ideally want to end up with a 10 bit RGB Master.
Thanks.
Kevin Watkins
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This is a long shot, especially as you have not changed anything in your set-up, but I had a similar problem and eventually discovered that there is a known issue with playback. If you check in the Release Notes PDF with the V4.0 driver you’ll see this: “There is a known issue with video output and Dual Link HD log RGB and RGB 4:4:4 1080PsF 23.98/24 for driver version4.0. If you are working in either of these formats AJA recommends that you continue using Final Cut Pro V5.1X with the version 3.4 driver…”
This doesn’t explain the HD DVCPro issue, however. Not sure if this’ll help. If you do think this is your problem, please email them an urge them to fix this – I encountered this over the summer and am still waiting for an answer…
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Their suggestion of a work around is to uninstall FCS 2, go back to 5.1 and Kona driver v3.4. The problem for me is that I have edited in FCS2 and would have to re-do everything – the FCP files are not backwards compatible.
Please email them and ask about the fix to the update!
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I had similar issues…turns out its the AJA 10b codec. Its a known problem on AJA’s side. They actually warn against it when upgrading. Send them an email and help hurry them up with the fix..!
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I spoke with AJA and this is a know issue. Version 4 of the driver has problems with playback in RGB 4:4:4. AJA suggests ‘downgrading’ to FCP 5.1 and AJA driver 3.4. That’s a problem. Yet another reason why upgrading in the middle of a project is a really bad idea. (I need Color, so I figured I’d risk it.)
It still doesn’t solve some oddities about this but at least I have a rough idea of what’s wrong.
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Sorry, its a 2.7GHz dual (I have no idea why I got that wrong…old age?) I’m happily watching the rest of my animated files, its just the transfered stuff I’m struggling with (they are inter-cut on the same timeline.) If I create an AJA 10b uncompressed (YUV 4:2:2) time line, drop the clip on it and render, it plays fine…I can watch the QT file on the desktop no problem…Its just when its on a timeline that EXACTLY matches its codec, with the playback set to the same setting, that I have trouble. Like I said, the animated clips play fine, which means to me that something is wrong with these transfered files – but what?
One interesting thing, the Quicktime info window shows these clips as not being exactly 23.98 (they vary from 23.5 to 24). The post house assures me this is not a problem and QT is wrong. My files are all reading as exactly 23.98…anyone heard of this before?
As for a ‘VTR at my facility’, er, its just me in a small office in NYC. I had them transfer the files to save myself the cost of the deck rental. They are not some small post house either. So it must be me…
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The drive is populated with 14 drives, 2 banks of 7 in RAID 5. ‘Allow Host Cache Flushing’ is off (Controller Write Cache and Drive Write Cache are both enabled). Interestingly the AJA test has a Disable Files System Cache option, which if I un-select, the write/read goes down to 179MBs/163MBs. Running this test using the 4GB file at 1920×1080 10b RGB setting.
The other files I have do not stutter, only the transfered files…so would that still indicate the RAID as the issue?
Thanks for your input. I’d like to figure this out.
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Thanks guys. What I have found is that a previous Auto-saved version works fine (Auto Save now my standard working method!) What I Plan to do is output an ALPHA version up to that point in time (3s10f) and then duplicate the file, get rid of the keyframes up to that point, get another 3secs done and repeat the process. Hopefully I’ll hobble home using this method.
Any answer to the question of a MAXIMUM number of masks/key frames though? Is the file corrupt or have I bumped into a limit with AE7?