More thoughts on media and where to pull data from...

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Does RED RAY really need to work off optical disc?

If it will really play back 2 hours of 4K from a standard dual layer DVD-R (not quite 9GB), then do we need to really deal with optical media at all, with all of its shortcomings?

CF cards are becoming cheaper by the day. Write-once FLASH media is beginning to hit the market and will be available at even cheaper price points than rewritable flash.

2 hours of 4K on a dual-layer DVD sounds great, but that isn't enough for some feature film delivery. With the current implementation, would that mean that on a 2 hour and 20 minute film presented in 4K that we would have to "change the reel".

2 hours of 4K in less than 9GB. That's huge... It also screams out loud to be a format that can be easily downloaded or transferred. What about RED RAY (or whatever) server units or software. For large venue installations, corporate environments, even upscale home AV installs, what about the ability for the RED RAY to have gigabit ethernet connectivity so it can pull and play from a centralized server?

[JD Holloway]

Good point regarding cinematic delivery.
I do like the idea of a red ray player (non pro) every home though.
I wonder if JJ bought out the technology from these guys for the player and incorporated a way to get 4k on it.

http://www.theinquirer.net/en/inquirer/news/2005/03/31/red-ray-fights-blue-ray-in-dvd-disarray

This was a few years back.
Its funny to hear people talking about this delivery format like its a typical RGB delivery scheme compressed to hell. I cant for the life of me see how that would work. It almost feels like a bizarre hardware bayer RAW re/decoder real-time accelerator.

magic pixie time...

[Christoffer Glans]

With the same codec as the DVD-R would have when playing 4K material, wouldn't it be possible to put the same videofile on a CF card 8gb and play it from that? Seems more "safe" then optical discs and much faster...?

[Jeff Kilgroe]

With the same codec as the DVD-R would have when playing 4K material, wouldn't it be possible to put the same videofile on a CF card 8gb and play it from that? Seems more "safe" then optical discs and much faster...?

Yes, my thought exactly. It could also trim down the size of the player and eliminate an optical disc mechanism (moving parts) that can break. Flash memory is getting cheap. Even commodity FLASH can handle the transfer rates needed (theoretically, I'm coming up with < 10Mbps). So still not re-inventing anything here. 2 hours is going to be a bit tight on an 8.5GB DVD.. 12GB to 16GB CF and/or write-once FLASH just seems like a really slick option.

[Christoffer Glans]

A "Red" DVD that can only play on a Red Ray player and no other is kinda cancelling it's purpose out. If you have 8gb cards, then it's more likely that you play the videofiles from that. It's also safer for presentation. After a while a DVD player breaks down or gets slow. My computer DVD-burner/player has made so many discs and played so many movies that it's useless now and it's only two years old. Imagine what will happen to a device that is for pure playing and burning all the time and what will happen when working with that professionally ( = a huge amount of burned/played material)

CF isn't going to break down and you can fit more on a 16gb card then a DVD dual layer. They are even increasing in size and five years from now (if CF is still here), they will probably reach close to 100gb, perhaps.
If you then can choose quality vs lenght it will increase it's lifetime alot. So, a 2 hour movie on a 100gb card with a bandwith that is balanced (quality vs lenght) will create a hell of a player that will be usefull for many years to come.

Focusing on it's ability to play from CF cards is I think better then focusing on discs. If the DVD-R discs can't be played in any other player then a Red Ray, then I think the CF cards is a better way to go...

Just speaking my mind here... I'm with you Jeff on this.

[Dylan Reeve]

I very much like the idea of a TCP-based network stream option. Then even if we couldn't put something on disc, it could be streamed from a server, and some something like cinema projection, where multiple projections could be fed from a single server would be ideal.

[Dj Joofa]

I very much like the idea of a TCP-based network stream option. Then even if we couldn't put something on disc, it could be streamed from a server, and some something like cinema projection, where multiple projections could be fed from a single server would be ideal.

Sycophant, you really want UDP and not TCP based streaming option.

[Dylan Reeve]

Sycophant, you really want UDP and not TCP based streaming option.

Yeah, UDP, you're right. Multicast support would be cool too.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Could you imagine the ramifications on the AV industry if it could pull from any conventional UDP streaming NAS box? Or even any common Windows, Mac or Linux host with appropriate server software.

IP multicasting would be awesome too... The commercial / corporate applications for that would be enormous. Surf your UDP channels on your RED RAY at the upscale hotel... Guest service announcements and resort info continuously looped on port 1000, etc.. Large company CCTV broadcasts, hundreds or thousands of on-demand videos, all in glorious 4K on the same box or someone can simply insert a disc or CF card.

I know we can only speculate about RED's ultimate plans for RED RAY, but IP connectivity seems like a must, IMO. To me this makes just as much, if not more sense, than RS232 control and other features we're seeing requested.

[Dj Joofa]

I know we can only speculate about RED's ultimate plans for RED RAY, but IP connectivity seems like a must, IMO. To me this makes just as much, if not more sense, than RS232 control and other features we're seeing requested.

Spiff and I had some discussion on this topic. Unless Red Ray is optimized for network protocols in existence its performance shall suffer. I can tell you from my experience that for streaming the number of pixels is not as important as the audio-video sync. You can search for 71654838433 publications out there on how to maintain audio-video sync on the Internet, but in the practise, it is not an easy task to maintain it well at all times, and people have to resort to simple mechanisms, which actually work pretty good a lot of the times.

You may view the thread at:

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=12838

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Yeah, I read through the thread... Sync problems and other streaming issues are a concern if this becomes a codec targeted for real-time or direct streaming over the net. I don't see that happening here. A/V sync shouldn't be an issue, nor should the codec itself. It only becomes an issue when audio and video are separated and handled, streamed or decoded separately. But if maintained together in the same data set, sync is only an issue on the end of the receiving unit as it decodes the data. Codecs themselves do not need to be specifically optimized for streaming and I don't think direct internet streaming will be a good application here anyway. At least not for a few more years until average internet bandwidth can greatly increase.

Based on the numbers we know thus far, we're looking at approximately 10Mbps sustained bandwidth requirement for streaming. So 100Mbps or better ethernet connectivity will more than suffice for LAN installations of up to say maybe 8 nodes, not considering other potential network traffic. We don't need to look at this in the same regards as streaming QT, RealPlayer or FLASH video online. But rather delivery of large data files over the network...

Don't think of it as typical web streaming... But more like playing or editing a video file on your computer from a NAS box or server down the hall or even just an external RAID. Most of your typical "streaming" issues like sync issues, come from compromises made in order to offset bandwidth limitations caused by network topography, latency and unpredictable routing issues. If RED RAY is going to allow playing from remote storage, I don't see it making such compromises, you either feed it with the bandwidth needed or you pack up and go home.

Some of the other points raised in that thread like what Spiff said about 4K not improving how films look can be true. Not all films out there are going to benefit from a 4K transfer... Film stocks have varying levels of grain and sharpness. Not to mention productions that could be inherently soft due to focus or lens issues or even just the style in which they were shot. 4K isn't going to magically make more detail appear. Most DI work and FX shots these days are still generated and finished at 2K, so transfers to 4K will do little more than a 4X up-scale on the master resolution of the DI frames. ...And will give the 4K authoring people an opportunity to add in all sorts of extra edge "enhancements" and artificial sharpening. <yuck>

Anyway, I hope that made sense. Seems like I rambled and repeated myself, but I'm tired. Gonna go find some sleep.

[Dj Joofa]

A/V sync shouldn't be an issue, nor should the codec itself. It only becomes an issue when audio and video are separated and handled, streamed or decoded separately. But if maintained together in the same data set, sync is only an issue on the end of the receiving unit as it decodes the data.


Video and audio data is typically in separate streams for several reasons, least of which is the different hardware clocks they use, and to put proper synchronization in RTP headers.



Codecs themselves do not need to be specifically optimized for streaming


They do, that is why Quicktime encoding lets you put those "hint tracks" for optimzed streaming. Please refer to H.264 standard which was heavily optimized for such issues.



and I don't think direct internet streaming will be a good application here anyway. At least not for a few more years until average internet bandwidth can greatly increase.


People/devices will always be bandwidth hungry. As Internet advances, demand shall increase accordingly and there may never come a utopian time with free luxurious bandwidths available copiously.



Don't think of it as typical web streaming... But more like playing or editing a video file on your computer from a NAS box or server down the hall or even just an external RAID. Most of your typical "streaming" issues like sync issues, come from compromises made in order to offset bandwidth limitations caused by network topography, latency and unpredictable routing issues. If RED RAY is going to allow playing from remote storage, I don't see it making such compromises, you either feed it with the bandwidth needed or you pack up and go home.


Yeah, this part I agree. However, if your concern is only localized network, then technology already exists for that. You can do a search online for that. Red Ray does not have to invent something new. Some very clean interfaces already exist for that.

[Jeff Kilgroe]

After sleeping and getting my brain right, I realize my previous post failed. I'd just delete it, but you already responded to it.

Essentially, I was just saying that I don't see RED RAY, or its associated codec, fitting into a web streaming application. No need to place unnecessary restrictions or potentially crippling factors onto the codec for this purpose. No reason to run separate audio / video streams, etc..

Of course, that's just my opinion. OTOH, if 2 hours of 4K can fit into roughly 8.5GB... Then an internet streaming / delivery consideration is inevitable. Assuming that 1080p will average 1/4 in size when treated with the same codec, that suddenly places Blu-Ray quality quality delivered in approximately 1GB per hour.