[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Bob.

Only thing that I can think off is if it is guide-lines put in by the designer, or pencil strokes that wasn’t deleted, that is somehow converted to alpha/transparent.

They don’t look random enough to be machine generated.
Paint out, or create a matching black mask.

I could be wrong, as always – just my 5 cent 🙂

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey John,

Any reason for not going for external scopes all together?
I miss mine, but don’t have a SDI interface, unless I turn on my UltraStudio 4K – which apart from making a lot of noise, is also power hungry.

On my big screen I’m happy to use the scope provided by Adobe, although at times it decides not to show.
However, when on-site at client LOCATION, I would love to have a break-out monitor (HDMI or Display-port), that could also as an alternative perform as a scope with an Broadcast Standard accurate reading of the video only from Adobe CC Premiere or AE.
I suspect that may never happen, unless someone knows a secret that I have not yet found..?

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey John,

If you are looking for a broadcast monitor with SDI in, you are going to be hard pressed on the $ 2,000 budget. Although, in the UK we have seen quite a few auctions recently with Broadcast kit, including monitors of various brands, at a very low cost.
I do have a very old Panasonic HD-SDI LCD monitor. I still use it for location shoots, but it came out before 4K…

In my editing bay I have a 27″ EIZO Coloredge monitor that I am very happy with. It does not have SDI, but it is able to self-calibrate to Adobe. I use the internal Adobe scopes for grade. And, if in a tight spot, I add a Broadcast Safe filter (BorisFX) to the Premiere Pro Timeline.
https://www.eizoglobal.com/products/coloredge/index.html

Blackmagic for me is a bit of “hit & Miss”, but you could maybe combine your new monitor with their SmartScope Duo 4KSmartScope Duo 4K – although somewhere along that path you will need a HDMI/SDI converter, or similar.

Looking forward to hearing what solution you come up with, as many of us are in the same boat.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Hope,

For avoidance of doubt, my main work-horse is a HP ZBook Pro with 64GB of RAM.
I do have a Mac Mini M1 with 16GB Ram for all Mac work, such as FCPX – a great little machine, that is happy enough with anything that I have thrown at it up to 4K.

My initial thoughts are:
If you are happy with your current iMac, then spending $175 on upgrading to 64GB of RAM is a no-brainer – and much more cost effective than buying a new one (whether Mac or PC).
(I don’t know my RAMs for Mac, but even if it doesn’t work out, your RAM may be able to work in a new iMac – but you better ask Apple/dealer that question)
Not sure that you’ll be able to run the latest CC on your current Mac, but once you have gone to CC there is no going back – and you would not want to, as it is a world away from CS.

You don’t mention storage, but it may be worth hanging a Samsung T7 1TB
or 2TB SSD drive on the back of it to speed up renders etc. Although the
Intel i7 will only ever go as fast as it can. That is what we have the night-time for – rendering.

The real question is whether you are doing it for business (profit), of whether it is a nice side gig/hobby that you enjoy, but don’t need to spend $ 4,000 – $ 6,000 on to make it work for you?

Atb

Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Stamos,

Sorry, I think that this is one for Adobe to sort out.

All I can add, is that recently I’ve had problems inside Premiere Pro with MXF files of Sony FX6 & FX3 cameras. Where either the transcribe, or the render effect options would work.
It gave some “funny” error messages…

Hope that you get it sorted.

One suggestion to consider, which I found when it didn’t want to render effects in timeline, Premiere was happy enough to export a video file. Before getting in too deep, maybe you should do a check export of an edited sequence, at full resolution?

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Stamos,

Have you tried to play the original files outside of Premiere Pro, maybe even on another device?

The other thing that I would check, is frame rate settings.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Tim,

No problem, we are all busy – and it is always nice to hear back on replies to posts.

3) In theory you can go as high as you like with H264. I’ve just checked in Premiere Pro, which will in CBR (and VBR) allow you to go to 50 Mbps – your bigger problem with that, is whether the playback device to screen can handle it…

4) Many years ago I worked on some the first Digital HD slomo, DOP’ed and Directed by Michael Brennan. It was a football getting kicked, and weirdly enough (hope Michael won’t mind me mentioning this 🙂) the shot got unintentionally better because of rain and issues with lights.
There was an article written on it, which I haven’t found.
But Michael have later won an award:
https://definitionmagazine.com/features/gtc-member-michael-brennan-wins-for-best-risk-shot-at-golden-eye-festival/
The take-away is that the closer to the subject you get, the better the slow-motion will work – unless you intentionally want large images with little movement in.

Question:
Why are you limiting yourself to 240fps in 1080p?
Is it a financial restraint, or just that you already have the kit?
If concerned about future proofing, I would suggest going 4K.
If done right, you might even find some additional “funding” through Pond 5 and other stock websites.
You should also consider doing some tests where you shoot interlaced, as that will give you more options on the rate of slow-motion + you can always export it in progressive mode.

Project sounds interesting – looking forward to seeing it when it goes online.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Chris,

I am mainly working on a HP ZBook Pro with USBC Thunderbolt ports.
I don’t really notice whether my external device are USB or Thunderbolt, as the USBC interface is fast enough for most of the work that I do.
Adding, that for editing I use my internal SSD’s, and rarely connect to an external drive unless it is for backing up or moving a project back into Post.

Rather than getting stuck on one or the other, I think that your main point is that Mac has a limited amount of ports, without the ability to expand the hardware. Adding, that if you are really unlucky and don’t “eject” your drive before unplugging, you can run the risk of losing data.

So having all your drives connected to a break-out box might not be a bad thing, regardless of being USBC only, or with Thunderbolt.

However, there are smarter people around here, including Bob Zelin, who will rightfully ask about your back-up and disaster recovery. As if you have all your eggs in one basket, or sitting on one connection as it would be, they could all fail spectacularly simultaneously.

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Chris,

Although they look the same connection wise, have you checked whether your USB-C drive could be a Thunderbolt Drive?

There are a few companies around offering break-out boxes.
For a little while I’ve had my eyes on the OWC Thunderbolt Hub for my Mac Mini, but have not yet ordered it. It supports both USB-C and Thunderbolt (currently in stock with scan.co.uk in the UK):
https://www.owc.com/solutions/thunderbolt-hub

There are plenty of other brands around doing the same.
Some which has bigger selection of connections + card-reader built in.
What is worth keeping an eye on, whatever you choose, is the data throughput on the ports.

Hope that this helps?

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Tim,

With regard to shooting MP4, that depends on quite a few factors.
1) Where will your final master be used – if OnLine only, the audience might be more forgiving, as opposed to cinema where the picture might start breaking up or show artefacts in the projection.
2) What lens and imaging chip does your prosumer camera use?
3) MP4 does not need to be heavily compressed – it depends on the camera, and the codec + speed of cards. The higher bitrate in MBPS, the better quality.
4) Most importantly: Do you know how much the production wishes to slow down the video? And, have you planned out the shots?

I would suggest that you investigate whether you can attach an external recorder (normally via HDMI – Atomos or similar). You might be able to get one that can record “straight” from the imaging chip to a ProRes format.

You could also ask around for a hire for that particular shoot.

Phantom has a list of Rental Partners on their website:
https://www.phantomhighspeed.com/contactus/findyourphantom/rentalpartners

Oh, don’t forget to match your lights “flicker”, to that of the camera shutter shooting the slo-mo…

My day job is as a video editor – in other words, don’t trust me, except that I have experience in fixing slo-mo video when it went wrong.

Hope this helps.

Atb
Mads