5D2 RAW video Builds 14-Bit

[Redrocks]

Question: should you save the DNGs and delete the .RAW files which come directly off the card? I don't see any point holding on to them once converted.

It depends on your needs, but any footage that is valuable to you is more valuable in its original form. I got an answer to a related question here:

http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=6731.msg56002#msg56002

I can't speak to Cineform, but Resolve round tripping is working great for me. I was very comfy with AE / PP / SG before RAW, but found the Adobe workflow to be sluggish and counterproductive in that I was faced with grading decisions / opportunities before I'd cut a single shot and if I really need ACR, I can always introduce that after I have gotten a feel for the edit (quickly) using Resolve proxies. I also like the limitations of the higher ratios and the way they foster discipline. If I know I will only need a certain length shot, I select a ratio that can just about give me that knowing I will crop to a lower ratio anyway, whilst having room to later reframe. Liked your vid, btw.

[Redrocks]

You're getting bad frames with that lexar. You should be continuous @ 1880x800+

He's shooting in 16:9 which is limited to 1728 for continuous right now.

[xNiNELiVES]

He's shooting in 16:9 which is limited to 1728 for continuous right now.

how? Just a few posts above ours a guy @1856x1003 gets "continuous ok" until the 42gb mark, a glitch.

1880x800 is only 60.1mb/s. We with top end cards we get 75mb/s. 1880x1003 is 76.4 mb/s ...

Edit: nvm I get it he's filming 16:9 only. My bad.

[Ethan_Reitz]

@xNiNELLiVES You're right - I could shoot higher res and then upscale inside a 16:9 project which would also give a little room for re-framing. Between filling up the 32gb lexar and offloading the files I would fill up a 16gb sandisk - I wanted the footage to match and I got a little over 300 frames at that res, which was fine with me so that's the thinking there.

@Redrocks Thanks for the tips and the link. I don't have Resolve and it looks like a fairly big learning curve. I know the AE workflow isn't optimum but it feels creatively intuitive at the moment you are playing with the light in terms of highlight and shadow. For a larger project it would definitely be problematic.

Here's the benchmark for the 600x 16gb sandisk: http://www.flickr.com/photos/79873293@N03/9284673262/

And here benchmark for the 1000X 64gb komputerbay: http://www.flickr.com/photos/79873293@N03/9281892929/

I couldn't figure out how to get a clear screen for the 16gb benchmark and for the second it doesn't seem to be in film mode. Hm. Well, if I should do them again for anyone, just let me know. Btw. the komputerbay card is brand new and completely unused.

[guentergunter]

shot with the 29th June build in 1728X972 with a Lexar 1000X 32gb Card and a Sandisk Extreme 600X 16gb Card. I could shoot continuous on the Lexar and got 310 - 340 frames on the Sandisk - long enough for a quick shot and I actually liked the limitation because it forces you to think fast.

Sound is H4N/sennheisser me66 + G3 and lav.

Nice Clip! I really like it. Remembers me to my Berlin trip last summer ;-)

Just a question: Do you own a VAF (Video Aliasing Filter) for your 5D?

[vikado]

It depends on your needs, but any footage that is valuable to you is more valuable in its original form. I got an answer to a related question here:

http://www.magiclantern.fm/forum/index.php?topic=6731.msg56002#msg56002

I can't speak to Cineform, but Resolve round tripping is working great for me. I was very comfy with AE / PP / SG before RAW, but found the Adobe workflow to be sluggish and counterproductive in that I was faced with grading decisions / opportunities before I'd cut a single shot and if I really need ACR, I can always introduce that after I have gotten a feel for the edit (quickly) using Resolve proxies. I also like the limitations of the higher ratios and the way they foster discipline. If I know I will only need a certain length shot, I select a ratio that can just about give me that knowing I will crop to a lower ratio anyway, whilst having room to later reframe. Liked your vid, btw.

Can you explain how youre using acr in your workflow with resolve?
My current wworkflow is raw>>>raw2cdng>>>resolve>>>premiere cc (via proxies)>>>and back to resolve for final grading and render.
I'd just like to introduce acr before cutting

[Ethan_Reitz]

@guentergunter  Thanks!

A VAF is on my list but for now I just try and avoid surfaces which cause the nastiest antialiasing/moire, keep my camera moves and my shutter speeds slow. I would love to try out a VAF but the thing that I found most useful which I bought lately was a variable ND from lightcraft - motion blur seems to negate a lot of choppy aliasing artifacts.

[Redrocks]

@Ethan I hadn't used Resolve till a few weeks ago and I'm far from an expert, but Color Grading Central and AETUTS have some excellent Resolve tutorials. I'd love to see ACR enabled in Premiere and find it strange that the company who created DNG don't fully support it. Until then it's horses for courses and I would advise anyone to familiarize themselves with all of the workflow options.

@Vikado It's a mixture of round tripping and dynamic link. Export your XML to Resolve and if you have any problems you need ACR for, you can go back to PP and dynamic link to AE, do your stuff then render that out and import the results to Resolve.

My VAF arrived last week and I love it. Will up some comparisons tomorrow.

[F.T.I. ARMY]

THIS WORK FLOW IS GREAT, AND WORKS PERFECT WITH THE MARK II DNG FILES.

[aaphotog]

@Ethan I hadn't used Resolve till a few weeks ago and I'm far from an expert, but Color Grading Central and AETUTS have some excellent Resolve tutorials. I'd love to see ACR enabled in Premiere and find it strange that the company who created DNG don't fully support it. Until then it's horses for courses and I would advise anyone to familiarize themselves with all of the workflow options.

@Vikado It's a mixture of round tripping and dynamic link. Export your XML to Resolve and if you have any problems you need ACR for, you can go back to PP and dynamic link to AE, do your stuff then render that out and import the results to Resolve.

My VAF arrived last week and I love it. Will up some comparisons tomorrow.

What do you mean, I load my DNG's into After effects just fine(not cinema DNG's) and am able to pull up ACR any time I want to as well.

[Ethan_Reitz]

@Redrocks looking forward to that VAF comparison. ACR in Premiere would definitely be good.
@F.T.I. ARMY yeah - that workflow looks straightforward and the result is very good. I'll have to give it a try.

I have to admit, I know very little about coloring and I go for some pretty unsubtle choices. Those Alexa like skin tones look very good and I can really see the appeal in it.

[kgv5]

If you are interested in VAF - you can also check VAF-6D threads, I believe that the results would be the same.
BTW: the filter is great, i see huge improvement in picture quality so if you cannot switch to 5D3 the VAF would be a very nice improvement.

[Redrocks]

What do you mean, I load my DNG's into After effects just fine(not cinema DNG's) and am able to pull up ACR any time I want to as well.

AE has realtime playback? Correcting 100's of clips isn't a chore? Sure you can do it in AE, I'm saying the process is inefficient is all.

[Ethan_Reitz]

re: AE - yup. Inefficient for sure. You grade sequences from your first frame and if you are doing run and gun and your camera is pointed at the ground you'll probably do it over later. Also - unless there's another way to do it - each sequence requires a separate Comp.

And on my machine forget realtime playback, I don't playback at all. Just load, adjust ACR and export Cineform AVIs to edit in PP.

[Redrocks]

You can use Bridge to open all frames within a clip at once, but you still have to reopen it to make further tweaks. Everyone has their own way, I just don't like the idea of grading too much before picture lock and prefer to be working with RAW footage after that.

I've got a small render farm headed up by a hex core with 64GB of RAM and every AE correction still requires rendering, whereas Resolve gives me real time playback of my whole project. The ability to add more GPU's is interesting too.

[guentergunter]

@Redrocks looking forward to that VAF comparison. ACR in Premiere would definitely be good.

If that's what you're looking for:

[Redrocks]

Ted Ramasola also posted tests, mine are cityscapes with lots of sharp edges and patterns that normally destroy RAW shots. A VAF pays for itself the first time you use it, IMHO.

[a.d.]

@all WINDOWS user
Sorry Guys! Please redownload the today release of raw2dng.exe! During cleaning up the code I forgot to add the Camera Tag.

@F.T.I. ARMY
Another Command Line Freak
I recommend dcraw instead of ufraw-batch - it seems to be a lot faster on OSX. ffmpeg suports image2pipe, on the fly rendering, however if you want to render to ProRes 444. There's a bug in ffmpeg prores_kostya profile: The export file is being detected by Quicktime as ProRes 422, therefore I use ffmbc instead.

@Ethan_Reitz
It depends on your computer, but ...
After Effects supports realtime RAM previews playback + multi Core Rendering since CS5

http://forums.adobe.com/thread/734343
http://www.peachpit.com/podcasts/episode.aspx?e=7b2f2790-ea34-4adc-add2-487e40d40d6f

[reddeercity]

Ted Ramasola also posted tests, mine are cityscapes with lots of sharp edges and patterns that normally destroy RAW shots. A VAF pays for itself the first time you use it, IMHO.

I have been toying with the idea of getting  a VAF-5D2b Moire / Aliasing Filter,
but i watched Ted Ramasola 's Video of shooting charts,
After watching that i don't think i will , What i notice was the morie pattern are still
there, but with a big Sharpness Drop with H264 & Raw.
I like its being de-focus or Soft focus. Plus i noticed a WB Change.
to a Yellow over-tones.
I was wondering it in Real world, do you notice these problems ?
Is the Sharpness lose a issue ?
  

[lagunak47]

Let some friends shoot some plates of the fire out in vegas for their feature film. Hard to see the fire but pretty sky! Love the way the colors match what I actually saw with my eyes.

[Hazer]

I was wondering it in Real world, do you notice these problems ?
Is the Sharpness lose a issue ?

There is no sharpness loss.  What you perceive as softness is actually the true resolution of the camera which is revealed by the filter.  Yes, it's that soft in H264 mode -- scary.  Aliasing creates false detail / jagged edges, which is why mark ii footage in raw sometimes looks a little "crispy".  The filter removes this.

With the filter the images are really nice, and very detailed.  I saw the charts before I bought one, and I was skeptical.  However in most *practical* situations, the jaggies are greatly reduced.  Hair is a great example.  Hair almost always looks terrible with no filter -- horrendous false color that is visible with the slightest motion of your subject.  This is nearly eliminated with the filter.  However if you shoot things with lots of geometric patterns, then a 5D2 is not for you, even with the filter.

Also, the filter does reduce the resolution of still images.  You must remove the filter for full resolution stills, and this can be a little annoying.  For things like taking a snapshot of lighting setups, I just leave it in.  The images are surprisingly useful.  In fact, taking a 21MP still with the filter installed, and zooming all the way in, is a good way to see just how good the filter really is.  The images are far more detailed than H264 mode.

[kgv5]

I have a 6D with VAF-6D filter and I can confirm everything what Hazer said.
Because of the lack of false colour and false details with the filter you can also add more sharpness in post without exagerrating picture artifacts.

[ted ramasola]

I was wondering it in Real world, do you notice these problems ?
Is the Sharpness lose a issue ?
 

This attached video is an example of my real world use of the 5D2+VAF. I shot this for non-profit work to raise funds for a church restoration, it will show a lot of wide shots of a brick structure that will simply be very difficult without the filter. Also shows some person interviews, I intentionally did not sharpen the interview shots since the person is old and it would "enhance" his wrinkles.

There was no raw video yet so this is H264, but Magic Lantern was used so I could monitor the sound and split the audio channel for safety, auto rec restart is also useful in long interviews.

Please view in 1080p.

Mostly people shots on this one.

[Daedalus0506]

@ ted ramasola, did you notice that you have used the german national anthem in the beginning?

[ted ramasola]

@ ted ramasola, did you notice that you have used the german national anthem in the beginning?

Hahaha! Sounds similar though, but it was an improv, live piano a music professor was playing for me at the seminary. But yeah, sounds similar. Can't remember the title but he was playing from notes "he said he made".