1920x1080 HD Broadcast workflow not quite there!

[Deanan]

May be that is the reason Red was able to keep its price down; they moved some upstream (in the camera) hardware-based processing including demosacing, scaling, color correction for white balance, RGB->YCbCr, etc. -- to software based solutions downstream (on a PC). Hence, moving many of these processes from RedCine / Scratch / etc., upstream shall naturally increase the price of the system, and the camera may begin to loose one of its strong selling point -- price.

Price is not a consideration in chosing a RAW based workflow. Final image quality is.

[Gavin Greenwalt]

I believe Scratch can read R3D files and output them over HDSDI in 1920x1080 in real time. You could string together all your clips in scratch, play them out real time to your HDCam SR deck, then recapture it. This would also create an HDSR master of your raw footage. Wouldn't take as long as redalert.

I'm relatively certain the OP wants full quality files not 1k simple-debayer proxies.

I'm relatively (aka more than 50%) certain that you can't do a full 1080p debayer/downrez in anywhere near real time in scratch.

Processing times for full resolution (which is what you want to go to if you are planning on downscaling currently) are what they are. Scratch doesn't magically make it happen 24x faster.

Price is not a consideration in chosing a RAW based workflow. Final image quality is.

RAW might offer the maximum image quality. But 10bit HDCAM SR in 1080p is pretty freakin' good. You add another $20,000 in electronics and you could choose which is more important. If price and time was of no object then the RED would have a 1080p out option, 60p redcode at 100MBs options and much much more, consume enough energy to fuel a small star and fire laser beams.

Of course I'm relatively certain whatever this playback device is that they're intending to announce at NAB should fit the bill (I'm assuming it has HD-SDI 1080p output from an attached REDCODE drive (and who knows it might be a pretty penny less than $20,000. But that doesn't do anything for people now.

----

Anyway all of this is beside the point. The correct answer is:

Add another $20,000 in computers. (10x quadcore machines, GIGE Switch, SAN, Rendermanager) and start distributing the load. That's the only fool proof solution to delivering a 1080p master in close to real time. Or you could sell your HDCAM deck and pay someone $60k a year to manage your $40k renderfarm and really zip along. Or you rent processor time on a dedicated renderfarm.

Convert to a 1080p RGB Format. And then you should be able to transcode to DNxHD like you're doing from HDCAM right now.

[Mark L. Pederson]

I'm relatively (aka more than 50%) certain that you can't do a full 1080p debayer/downrez in anywhere near real time in scratch.

You would be more than 50% wrong. We are doing 2K FULL (from a 4K .r3d) in RT right now at 24fps. Can't give details yet. Stay tuned.

[Gavin Greenwalt]

Mark is a cheater. :D


Edit:
P.S. Is this unmentionable enhanced processing as good as a 4k debayer -> 2k RGB conversion? Can it go to any arbitrary resolution or is it exploiting a supersample algorithm in the debayer process that limits it to 1/2n resolutions? Is it taking all 4k sensor sites into account?

I ask because I'm already out one chocolate bar and I'm runnling low on candy. ;)

[M Most]

Mark is a cheater. :D

No, Mark is an Assimilate customer. The advantages he has are available to all Assimilate customers with the proper hardware and the latest Scratch builds.

P.S. Is this unmentionable enhanced processing as good as a 4k debayer -> 2k RGB conversion? Can it go to any arbitrary resolution or is it exploiting a supersample algorithm in the debayer process that limits it to 1/2n resolutions? Is it taking all 4k sensor sites into account?

Aribitrary resolutions are often created from fractional extractions (such as 1/2, 1/4, etc) via cropping, which has very little processing overhead.

(from im.thatoneguy)
Or you rent processor time on a dedicated renderfarm.

Or you can work with a post company that can do the dailies prep for you, often for less than you would ultimately spend to do it yourself, at least on an individual project.

[David Birdy]

No, Mark is an Assimilate customer. The advantages he has are available to all Assimilate customers with the proper hardware and the latest Scratch builds.



Aribitrary resolutions are often created from fractional extractions (such as 1/2, 1/4, etc) via cropping, which has very little processing overhead.



Or you can work with a post company that can do the dailies prep for you, often for less than you would ultimately spend to do it yourself, at least on an individual project.

What post company might that be Mike?

Dave

[M Most]

What post company might that be Mike?

That would be a rather lengthy list.

[Mark L. Pederson]

That would be a rather lengthy list.

But, here are three names I like -

CineWorks, Miami
PlasterCity Post, Los Angeles

oh yeah ....

Offhollywood, New York

[Gunleik Groven]

Paper Bag, Norway

(Beat you to it Fredrik)

Gunleik

[Mark Pedersen]

Price is not a consideration in chosing a RAW based workflow. Final image quality is.

OK... That's a nice grand statement, but most of us live in the real world, where price/quality tradeoffs must always be made.

Then there's the issue of time. Which equals money.