[Peter Wollsey]

Thanks Bourke,

Interesting about the gamma…..

Probably to do with this issue:

https://support.apple.com/kb/HT2912

Not sure what the best solution is…..

PW

[Peter Wollsey]

Grading on the Panasonic BT-LH2600W 26″

PW

[Peter Wollsey]

Hi guys,

Thanks for your responses…and although I don’t see any answer to my actual question regarding the best / easiest way to transcode from AVID DNxHD to Pro Res, I will contribute to the discussion you chose to pursue…..

1. I guess the main reason for doing this in Color is that the director wants to specifically work with me based on personal recommendations and seeing examples of my work. While I have cut on both FCP and AVID, as a colorist I use Apple Color, with a control surface and broadcast HD monitor with hardware scopes (which by the way show exactly the same readings as the scopes in Color – so for me, they are actually not needed).

2. Bourke noted that I might have a deck whereas the director & editor might not – he was correct – I have an HDCAM SR deck patched into my KONA3.

3. I know I am as fast as a Da Vinci colorist because I have graded over 100 episodes of broadcast TV with Color, using a control surface. I have sat in on Da Vinci sessions on some of the same series and they take the same length of time. If you have a control surface and experience, I don’t see why grading with Color should take longer than grading with Da Vinci.

4. I get a bit annoyed when people complain about the prep time with Color vs Da Vinci. For Da Vinci you need to make a perfect final textless master on tape – this takes TIME. Everything has to be rendered properly, checked, the deck setup, tape setup with black at start, then go to tape in real time and then check the master. Then the Da Vinci session creates another tape (cost of two HDcamSr tapes – around $200). Depending on length and complexity of the show, this might take 30 mins, might take 3 hrs. That’s my experience with onlining broadcast TV shows. Additionally, a standard all FCP workflow there is an advantage over the Da Vinci workflow in that you get handles and transitions do not have to be ‘fudged’ with keyframes.

5. I have razored a 90 minute feature in under an hour, by bringing in the edl and moving from cut to cut extremely quickly by putting the edl timeline on V1 and my quicktime on V2….tab from cut to cut with the arrow key and click with the mouse to razor.

6. Render time: I work with shared media over a SAN and use a render station. I split up a show into 10 – 20 minute sections and once I have finished grading one section, I open the project up on the render station and start rendering it. This means that over a 10 hr day I can usually have a 45min DVCPro HD show graded and all rendered. The render station is a mac pro with the same specs and graphics card as in my grading suite, but without kona card, broadcast monitor etc (approx $5000 setup).

7. The grading suite I generally use cost about $30k all up. I’m sure there are better broadcast monitors available, but the one I am using is frequently used for broadcast grading in Los Angeles.

There are probably other points I could make but will do another posting later as my 3yr old is yelling for me to read her a book right now…..

PW