Building a Red Editing Bay

[Tyler Leisher]

I'm looking into building an edit bay for editing RED footage. I haven't read too much into it but what are the minimum specs needed (and the recommended ones) for an edit bay?

Mac/PC? Final Cut, Premiere Pro, Avid, etc?

For those of you who built one, what are your system specs?

[Uli Plank]

How much do you want to spend?
You can edit RED footage on a Mac Book or on a million dollar system, it's mainly a question of price vs. speed.

[Tyler Leisher]

Well, I'm looking to build a full service post-production house for films/commercials. I'm not worried about paying a lot, but something reasonable.

I mean, $10,000 would be my limit. But that should include monitors, the computer, monitors, break out boxes, decks, etc.

I'm also curious about monitors, what's a good monitor for color correction/viewing in full resolution?

[Uli Plank]

For that price you can barely get a working solution based on FCP without serious color grading. What do you mean by full resolution? 1920 x 1080?

[Tyler Leisher]

Yeah, 1920x1080.

How much would I need to get a good working station?

Ideally, I'd like to be able to take footage shot for a commercial, edit, color correct and export to tape for use on TV.

By the way, I updated my post to $10,000. Not sure if you are basing it on my $3k number or the $10k one.

[Uli Plank]

10 K sounds more realistic.

Get an 8-core MacPro, maybe a refurbished one from last year and an ATI graphics card (the 3870 should be quite cheap by now). Stuff it with RAM (third-party, but Mac oriented), 2 GB per core. Stuff it with hard disks like Samsung or WD and make a system based RAID-0. But take good care for extra backup, since RAID-0 is dangerous.

Finally, get a BlackMagic I/O card and a good calibrated monitor. The latter one will be the most expensive single item, but it's crucial for any serious work. Have a look at Flanders Scientific or Tamuz.

This is picture only, I don't see where you can fit serious sound sweetening into the budget.

[Tyler Leisher]

Yeah, my friend (who is an audio engineer) is going to handle the audio end.

I've looked into building a Mac Pro on their website, an 8 core with 2 graphic cards, 2 1-TB drives and 8 GB of RAM (Should I take this up to 16 GB then?).

Also, for exporting to broadcast quality tape, do I need a DigiBeta tape deck or could I use a DVCam deck?

[Liam Hall]

Also, for exporting to broadcast quality tape, do I need a DigiBeta tape deck or could I use a DVCam deck?

That depends on your broadcaster. They all have their own delivery specs, but don't worry about tape machines, just get the best system you can afford and find a posthouse you can use for grading and mastering.

[Tyler Leisher]

Alright, if that's the case do I need to get the blackmagic card? Is the card used for importing as well?

Lastly, Do you guys charge rental fee's as well if you are the only one using your edit bay? Or do you just build in the cost of the edit bay into your fee for editing something?

[Liam Hall]

Alright, if that's the case do I need to get the blackmagic card? Is the card used for importing as well?

No. You don't need a card if you're not using external devices like tape decks or broadcast monitors.

Everything is chargeable, if a client is willing to pay:)