Quick and Easy Transcoding

Quick and Easy Transcoding

I'm not a post guy. Never have been. But as the workflow has moved from film to tape and tape to data, I've had to learn far more about post production then I ever thought I would need to. Especially now as I'm often working as a video engineer, I need to know every single technical detail of the codecs and formats I'm working with and how they will make their way through the post production food chain. 

As for transcoding, or turning one file format into another, this is something I've found myself doing more than ever now that I've added the Canon 7D to my ever expanding gear pile... it's a sickness I tell you. I've found that in working with the 7D footage, I prefer to transcode to Apple ProRes from Canon's crummy, inter-frame, H.264 based codec. ProRes is Intra-frame, is well supported with all my hardware and software, and makes for a very robust and faithful image.

There's the sloooooooow way of transcoding - opening FCP, making a ProRes 422 timeline, dropping the Canon clip in there, not changing the settings when prompted, and then exporting. OR there's the quick and painless way of doing it, in a batch no less, that Jem has so graciously explained on The C47. In this video, he walks you through the process of building custom export settings in Compressor and creating a Droplet which you can use to transcode your Canon media to whatever format you specify simply by dragging the files onto the icon. Faster, easier, smarter. Watch it.

I've been doing quite a lot of this and I've discovered the ratios to be pretty predictable in how your original files expand or shrink depending on which ProRes codec you transcode to. Here are the numbers:

ProRes Proxy: x .75 - .8 of original file size

ProRes LT: x 1.4 - 1.6 of original file size 

ProRes 422: x 2.4 - 2.6 of original file size

ProRes HQ: x 3.75 - 4 of original file size

Very useful in figuring out drive space requirements or how many hard drives to bring to the job.

UPDATE 02/07/10:
Canon has announced the EOS E1 Video Plug-in for Final Cut Pro. It will enable you to bring Canon media directly into FCP via the Log and Transfer tool. When it's released, it will be available here:

http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/finalcutstudio/ 

RED post using RED Rushes

RED post using RED Rushes

Another great blog post on RED workflow by Art Adams of Stunning Good Looks. This one describes using the RED Rushes feature that is now built into RED Alert to facilitate a tighter workflow and what can go wrong with it. Really informative stuff here.

http://provideocoalition.com/index.php/aadams/story/red_workflow_redux/

RED build 16

RED build 16

Been working a lot with build 16 and I must say I'm pretty impressed. Some of my previous posts regarding RED have been less than positive and I don't want to create the impression that I'm anti-RED. Anything but. I think the addition of the REDspace viewing option is a huge improvement. Because RED is not digital video, I never understood why there was so much emphasis on working in REC709 color space in previous builds. Because most of us will be finishing our RED projects in HD, it makes sense to monitor and preview in the color space that you'll be mastering in but there was always something so wrong about the colors on the video tap. I find the REDspace to be much more complimentary to the color information in the Redcode RAW files and therefore more faithful for monitoring. That's the thing that's really cool about RED - it's not digital video so the possibilities for finishing are really endless.

Overall the image quality is on the up - less noise, a bit more latitude. There are some other features that while not so critical are nice to have such as 1080p playback and the VIEW RAW user switch. That key is actually pretty useful in that you can show production what they're going to see when they open the RedCode files. Takes a bit of the surprise away which is nice for them and for you.

When RED announced their upcoming products - Epic, Scarlet, and now the DSMC, I was a bit concerned that they were spreading themselves too thin and that they were no longer fully committed to making the One the best camera that it can be. I can say that with build 16 and the proposed features of build 17 that these guys are tireless and are totally committed to the One. In a few years this camera could easily be a fixture on most low to medium budget productions.

Basically what I see is that despite the rising cost of everything, there are new, remarkably affordable products out there that help to bring the cost of this new variety of post within the means of most productions. Products like the HP DreamColor monitor ($3000) which allows for color critical monitoring in 2k resolution. If you're wondering which monitor to use for color correcting your RedCode files, this is the one!. You'll need this too to get the most out of your monitor, the HD Link Pro from Black Magic Designs ($795). So there you have it - an affordable, color accurate monitoring solution for RED post that is under $4000. That's pretty amazing.