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Data Wrangling with a MacBook Pro... eSATA via Thunderbolt?


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have you guys used the Proxymill add-on within ShotPut Pro? I have thought about adding this to my kit. Wondered if it added too much render time to the overall process.

 

I really struggled with ProxyMill on my last episodic. We had a mix of cameras and some would not render the video properly- I went back and forth with their tech support but was unable to get it fixed.

 

Setting up a watch folder in Adobe Media Encoder was easier and faster in the long run.

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Doesn't anyone use ffmpeg? Maybe chained onto a frameserver to do burn-ins as required?

 

Man, I feel 80 years old.

Correct me if I am wrong, but FFmpeg is a command line encoder, right? There are a lot of tools out there with easy to navigate and powerful GUIs- not to mention their efficiency in leveraging multi-core chips and GPUs for encoding.

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Yes, although it's invariably used as an adjunct batching and scheduling applications in this circumstance. Setting up watch folders to run an ffmpeg command line is something that can be written in on the job - I've done it - and there are many frontends available. When I was considering doing this, I would have used ffmpeg as the backend.

 

Systems involving avisynth (which doesn't need to involve AVIs) and other tools can be built to do advanced things (burn-ins, cubes, scaling, audio mixdowns, etc).

 

A lot of parts of ffmpeg are multi-threaded, and much of it is highly optimised for performance. It is also capable of creating ProRes on non-Apple machines. There are features for streaming from and to the web, and capturing from devices.

 

I don't want to come off as an unqualified supporter - it's open source, with all the issues of documentation and usability that implies, and there can be some quite tricky issues with luminance levels because the software engineers are code people not video people and don't really get it. Someone recently reported some performance issues with the lut3d filter. But the list of capabilities is absolutely gigantic.

 

P

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I just don't see any point in spending time writing scripts- especially on set- when there are so many tools that do these things great already. I want the most streamlined and reliable workflow for any given job nailed down and ready to go before I even hit the set- tricky issues with luminance issues and performance hits when applying LUTs are an invitation for breaking the workflow and my concentration. That needs to be avoided at all costs- hence mature tools with great support and established workflows.

Edited by Kevin Colber
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Well sure, but in a pinch...

 

Also bear in mind that the concept of the DIT with a cart full of $50k worth of stuff making $750/day in rental alone is mainly a USA phenomenon. Here, a lot of people who are called DITs are really a guy with a five year old macbook copying stuff around, at which point Silverstack starts to look a bit expensive.

 

P

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Well sure, but in a pinch...

 

Also bear in mind that the concept of the DIT with a cart full of $50k worth of stuff making $750/day in rental alone is mainly a USA phenomenon. Here, a lot of people who are called DITs are really a guy with a five year old macbook copying stuff around, at which point Silverstack starts to look a bit expensive.

 

P

Not really. We call those guys Data Wranglers. No producer that values his or her short hours of sleep hires them.

 

I get hired by the DP, not production.

 

Just a thought.

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A guy "with a five year old macbook copying stuff around" is a huge liability and I don't know a single DP or have worked on a job that would take that risk. I've known some reality folks that operate like that.....scary stuff. It's safe to say that the majority of real production here in the states requires even media managers to have some basic DIT skills.

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A guy "with a five year old macbook copying stuff around" is a huge liability and I don't know a single DP or have worked on a job that would take that risk. I've known some reality folks that operate like that.....scary stuff. It's safe to say that the majority of real production here in the states requires even media managers to have some basic DIT skills.

 

Not too different this side, Kevin. Not too different at all. If only I was allowed to talk about the setups going on...

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I don't know a single DP or have worked on a job that would take that risk

 

Oh boy, I have.

 

I think we're talking about rather different ends of the market here. Of course one wouldn't expect to see that on a big feature or upscale TV drama, but it's pretty normal for someone to rock up with a laptop and get busy at the lower levels (where I live). On a world scale, most of the stuff that is done at all is probably done on this basis. The high end approach is rare, if you think about how much low end stuff there is out there.

 

And of course at some level there may be nothing wrong with it; it just depends on what sort of services you're after and what your performance expectations are. While I don't really want to argue for the low-end approach, it's important to recognise that a five year old macbook is just as capable of copying and verifying a file as anything else. In fact, I'm not really sure what the alternative approach is. Computers work on bits of data. There are no special, high-end bits, which I think is often misunderstood.

 

P

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Oh boy, I have.

 

I think we're talking about rather different ends of the market here. Of course one wouldn't expect to see that on a big feature or upscale TV drama, but it's pretty normal for someone to rock up with a laptop and get busy at the lower levels (where I live). On a world scale, most of the stuff that is done at all is probably done on this basis. The high end approach is rare, if you think about how much low end stuff there is out there.

 

And of course at some level there may be nothing wrong with it; it just depends on what sort of services you're after and what your performance expectations are. While I don't really want to argue for the low-end approach, it's important to recognise that a five year old macbook is just as capable of copying and verifying a file as anything else. In fact, I'm not really sure what the alternative approach is. Computers work on bits of data. There are no special, high-end bits, which I think is often misunderstood.

 

Even medium budget commercials in my small market spring for a real DMT or DIT- many small budget as well. As for it being a laptop, a modern MBP is an astonishing machine. It is a great collection of special, high end bits.

 

A 5 year old laptop may be just as capable for copying and verifying data, but it is slow as hell and will keep you from being re-hired unless you are on a flat rate (even then production doesnt want to sit for 2 hours while a 5 year old machine moves 128GB of data over FW800 and verifies using md5- not to mention getting the cards back with the camera package on the last day). As this pertains to the original posters question- that setup is not a reasonable option for the OP to be successful. A modern MPB utilizing thunderbolt ports to leverage maximum speed out of peripherals is not just recommended, it is expected these days.

 

I'm not exactly sure where this discussion is going, or what point is trying to be made, but I think the DIT's in the thread have made it pretty clear what is expected of the position both in experience and gear. I'm going to bow out of this one unless the OP or other knowledge seekers have questions I can help with, it seems like this thread is headed off the rails :)

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You misunderstand. You're operating on an entirely different level to the OP (and I). What you consider to be a medium budget commercial in the US is probably what we'd consider a feature film budget here. You're on mars. It's a completely different world. There are people in the UK who do what you do, turn up with a magliner with $75k of gear on it and make $1000/day in rental. That working practice does exist, but there are probably four such people in the entire country. I am not kidding or exaggerating. John appears to be one of these hyper-rare individuals and I'm sure he'll agree.

 

So that's not what we're talking about here. Different world. Our original poster is talking about getting £250 worth of portable storage to do a bit of basic offloading work. Nobody is ever going to be willing to pay for more than that. Nobody can afford it.

 

The world of an "IATSE Local 600 Digital Imaging Technician" is on another planet from most of the work that's done outside the US.

 

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To the OP- your system is more than capable of quick transfers. Look for a second hand Echo Express, pop an ESATA card or two in there and you are transferring nice and quick. You will even be able to do some solid transcoding with it. Thunderbolt has more than enough pipe. You'll hit the hard limit of the spinning drives before running out of bandwidth for transfers.

 

When I said "that setup" in the previous post I was referring to a 5 year old macbook pro, not your system. You can leverage that thunderbolt port heavily for a lot of flexibility.

Edited by Kevin Colber
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To the OP- your system is more than capable of quick transfers. Look for a second hand Echo Express, pop an ESATA card or two in there and you are transferring nice and quick. You will even be able to do some solid transcoding with it. Thunderbolt has more than enough pipe. You'll hit the hard limit of the spinning drives before running out of bandwidth for transfers.

 

When I said "that setup" in the previous post I was referring to a 5 year old macbook pro, not your system. You can leverage that thunderbolt port heavily for a lot of flexibility.

 

Thanks Kevin, I got an Echo Express and an eSATA card (you mentioned using two - how would I add another in there?) It worked great and I managed to transcode all of the footage on-set, except the last card. The shoot ran over and we had to leave the location as soon as I'd backed up.

 

I'm on another this weekend shooting Epic Dragon and using the USB 3 card on day one. Day two and three I'll have a tower and the power of a Red Rocket-X. I've never used one of these so I'm preparing myself to be blown away!

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Great to hear things came together for you!

 

It looks like of the 1st gen Echo Express only the pro had multiple slots for cards. Still a great peripheral that will remain a major part of your mobile kit. Have fun on the next one!

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