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EPIC, a disappointment


Vincent Sweeney

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Sorry but I don't get the excitement. Forget resolution, it's not really an issue anyway. The highlight handling ability of this camera and the skin-tone rendering left me pale after another test. When will it get to the point where film really does have a replacement? It's not there yet Jim and fans. Oh and whats with these buggy cameras? 4th time on a red product for me and the cameras still feel like prototypes with things not working yet (no playback?) battery issues that seem to never end, etc.

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Sorry but I don't get the excitement. Forget resolution, it's not really an issue anyway. The highlight handling ability of this camera and the skin-tone rendering left me pale after another test. When will it get to the point where film really does have a replacement? It's not there yet Jim and fans. Oh and whats with these buggy cameras? 4th time on a red product for me and the cameras still feel like prototypes with things not working yet (no playback?) battery issues that seem to never end, etc.

 

The only issues I have found is post houses not having a clue how to deal with the footage, transcoding & grading on an Avid after a quick debayer.

 

Even without HDRx DR is wide, I expose as I would film, meter set to 800 iso, highlights seem fine, sounds as though the iso was set low either in the camera or in post, as it's raw it does not matter as long as the people handling the footage know what it's all about.

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The only issues I have found is post houses not having a clue how to deal with the footage, transcoding & grading on an Avid after a quick debayer.

So, why doesn't Avid support Redcode RAW?

Is it a political thing, or have they just not gotten round to it yet?

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So, why doesn't Avid support Redcode RAW?

Is it a political thing, or have they just not gotten round to it yet?

 

I think it's a next version thing, a little like 'the check is in the post'

 

It's even possible the post house has a version that does support, they just have not installed the software, things happen slowly in Switzerland. 'Nobody got sacked by doing it exactly the same as last time'

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Stephen,

 

DS has worked natively w/ Red footage for over two years now. And Media Composer has worked natively with .R3D files since MC5 was released in June, 2010.

 

I'm sitting right in front of MC5.5 and have Red files natively linked.

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Stephen,

 

DS has worked natively w/ Red footage for over two years now. And Media Composer has worked natively with .R3D files since MC5 was released in June, 2010.

 

I'm sitting right in front of MC5.5 and have Red files natively linked.

 

They were sending Epic files I shot to the Swiss importer of Avid last week & I was present for a 1 hour telephone conevrsation yesterday, it's still not working........

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Stephen,

 

Keith was talking about Redcode RAW, which MC and DS have been working with for quite awhile. The Epic is new, and yes, for that camera you need to transcode using RedCine-X. This should change in Media Composer 6, which is due out quite soon (but no date has been announced yet).

 

I find it hard to fathom that Avid or Red have said, to date, that MC or DS works natively w/ Epic files.

 

 

P.S. There is also a bug w/ RC-X transcode for Avid of 25P footage w/ sound, so you might want to look out for that. It's been dicussed on both the Avid and Red forums. HTH.

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Stephen,

 

Keith was talking about Redcode RAW, which MC and DS have been working with for quite awhile. The Epic is new, and yes, for that camera you need to transcode using RedCine-X. This should change in Media Composer 6, which is due out quite soon (but no date has been announced yet).

 

I find it hard to fathom that Avid or Red have said, to date, that MC or DS works natively w/ Epic files.

 

 

P.S. There is also a bug w/ RC-X transcode for Avid of 25P footage w/ sound, so you might want to look out for that. It's been dicussed on both the Avid and Red forums. HTH.

 

Hi Peter,

 

The thread is about Epic, which records in Redcode RAW, which is what Keith is talking about when replying to my post.

It's is not yet working....

 

Avid have not said they support Epic files. Epic M went on sale in November 2010, my camera is in the 1200's so there not that rare. BTW After effects & Premiere Pro 5.5 do support Epic files.

 

Best Stephen

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Avid have not said they support Epic files. Epic M went on sale in November 2010, my camera is in the 1200's so there not that rare. BTW After effects & Premiere Pro 5.5 do support Epic files.

So is Epic Support for Avid by way of some sort of Plug-in, or do you need an actual upgrade of Avid?

As far as I can see, most of what REDCODE penetration there is into the mainstream market seems to be via "upstream" transcoding to some other industry format and then into Avid, which was never the way Redcode RAW was intended to work.

 

I don't know much about that, but I do know that having RED shills and fanboys continually braying at their betters for not adopting their own particular favourite half-arsed platform-of-choice is hardly likely to achieve anything.

 

RED really need to swallow their doctrinaire-ness and get into bed with Avid to offer a FREE upgrade if they ever hope to get anywhere. Otherwise it's going to be same ol' same ol' albatrossware-land business-as-usual. How many times have we seen THAT happen?

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Sorry... clarification. AVID supports RED ONE R3Ds and EPIC 5K support starts with Media Composer 6. We are working closely with AVID and all other major players.

 

Jim

Yes, but does that mean you can make older, installed versions of Avid work with R3Ds, or do you have to pay for a new version of Avid?

If the latter, sorry, but Albatross is definitely being spoken.

 

The problem is, it's really hard to get people in prosperous, well-established, well-respected production houses to spend money, or (as Stephen has pointed out) basically fiddle with something that is already working. (Unfortunately "Upgrade" doesn't always mean "just add some new features", it often means: "completely re-design the user interface because some propellor-head thought it would be cool to do so." (For example: Windows XP to Windows Vista/7). The average editor simply hasn't got time to piss around learning new software, unless there is a very good reason for doing so.

 

Yeah, there are any number of smaller upstart startups, fair busting to tell everybody how hip and software-savvy they are, but I'm afraid you need more than an overextended credit card and a big mouth to gain credibility in this industry. The only contribution most of those places wind up making to the industry is as a source of cut-price equipment when they go belly-up.

 

Every now and again on one of our major TV networks I see a segment of a "Morning Show" (News & Chat type) program, and one of the regular info-mercial segments is clearly being shot with a TUBE camera! (It has somewhat severe registration errors, and I know they have nobody there that would know how to fix that. Somebody probably just tweaked the vertical scan to 16:9 and left it like that).

It's pretty much the same story everywhere. State-of-the-Art DVB-T digital transmissions; complete sh!t on the input....

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Keith, WTF is your problem?

 

Does Adobe make CS 3 work w/ .R3D's? Sony make Vegas 8 work w/ .R3D's? Apple make FCP 7 work w/ .R3D's? No; at some point you have to buy new software to get more functionality. And Avid's upgrade policy pricing is very generous.

 

Like I said, Avid Media Composer has been working natively w/ .R3D's since June of 2010, and Avid DS well before that. Despite Stephen's defense of your previous post, you clearly have not a clue about how to use Red footage in post or Avid in particular. So you're complaining about something you know nothing about.

 

I used to find your posts informative and even amusing. But your constant and persistent obsession w/ bashing all things Red has gone from amusing to ludicrous to down right creepy. You've managed to turn this site into your own little pissing pool, which I'm surprised has been allowed to happen.

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The bigger problem with this is that Red's JP2K variant is not, as far as I can see, really intended to be an intermediate codec in any case. The purpose of that codec is to store sensor data, albeit somewhat approximately, so they don't have to put the demosaic in the camera, which is the only reason they could ever do that camera for that price - it is

in some respects.

 

This means that if you use it as an intermediate codec, in your NLE, you're burning CPU cycles doing a job that in my view should have been burned at some other time. I don't particularly want to think that my grading session, for instance, is that much less interactive because I'm doing a job that Sony would have done on a big lump of silicon at the time of capture.

 

It is for this reason that dedicated intermediate codecs like ProRes and DNxHD are actually pretty basic, technologically.

 

P

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Keith, WTF is your problem?

 

Does Adobe make CS 3 work w/ .R3D's? Sony make Vegas 8 work w/ .R3D's? Apple make FCP 7 work w/ .R3D's? No; at some point you have to buy new software to get more functionality. And Avid's upgrade policy pricing is very generous.

 

Like I said, Avid Media Composer has been working natively w/ .R3D's since June of 2010, and Avid DS well before that. Despites Stephen's defense of your previous post, you clearly have not a clue about how to use Red footage in post or Avid in particular. So you're complaining about something you know nothing about.

 

I used to find your posts informative and even amusing. But your constant and persistent obsession w/ bashing all things Red has gone from amusing to ludicrous to down right creepy. You've managed to turn this site into your own little pissing pool, which I'm surprised has been allowed to happen.

 

Why do you think I have a problem. I think I have solutions; a way forward.

I apologize if you thought my posts were informative or amusing. I'm not sure why you would think that.

 

Actually this all started because I was a bit upset over Jim's snide comments about the size of my mouse in a different thread.

I found this old Gaming Mouse in our samples room. It's the biggest one we have, and I hope that will put that argument to rest. (I bet you haven't got a 40" 1920 x 1080 PC monitor anyway).

 

2gwavy8.jpg

 

The mouse has some buttons on the side, and when I pushed the one marked "JJ", all the above posts came out.

I think the one marked "EM" might be for Emanuel; I couldn't make any sense out of what it produced anyway....

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Sorry... clarification. AVID supports RED ONE R3Ds and EPIC 5K support starts with Media Composer 6. We are working closely with AVID and all other major players.

 

Jim

 

 

Could Avid release a update for the older MC systems to support the newer codec? Have they said anything about possibly doing that or will they only support the newer codec on MC6?

 

-Rob-

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Avid supports R3Ds natively. So does just about every other major app except the new FCP-X. And that is coming. Albatross not spoken here.

 

Jim

 

The new free LightWorks reads R3D, but can't output it. Too bad, that would be an interesting synergy for a lot of individual Red owners. Buy a camera, get free editing software....

 

 

 

 

 

-- J.S.

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The new free LightWorks reads R3D, but can't output it. Too bad, that would be an interesting synergy for a lot of individual Red owners. Buy a camera, get free editing software....

 

 

Will that be the case when the subscription version comes out? An advanced RED tool set seems to be on their road map for Q1 & Q2 2012.

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Will that be the case when the subscription version comes out? An advanced RED tool set seems to be on their road map for Q1 & Q2 2012.

 

It depends on what kind of deal they can make with Red. Their principle is to charge money for the things that cost them money, but to try to do as much for free as possible.

 

There's some amazingly good stuff in the open source movement now. I've been using MuseScore, and just found a very useful little program called MediaInfo....

 

 

 

 

 

-- J.S.

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Even without HDRx DR is wide, I expose as I would film, meter set to 800 iso, highlights seem fine, sounds as though the iso was set low either in the camera or in post, as it's raw it does not matter as long as the people handling the footage know what it's all about.

 

It may be fairly wide but it isn't film or Alexa wide, at all. I want to like this red poop, really, I try to, I just keep having bad luck I guess. Inconsistent, buggy... all has been said before. In some ways larger budget productions benefit the most from having the resources to deal with red. Most indie work seems better off with F3 type cams. I know the last feature I worked on benefited from the simple codec and camera operation.

 

I was there the day Jim opened up that tent in 2006 and I was really into the whole thing at the time. The new Scarlet announcement/price is even making me consider owning a camera again (someone talk me out of it). I guess I should have asked about my sunglasses in 2006.

 

 

Yeah Keith, give the comments a rest. Are you a working DP, AC or director, by the way? What's the drive?

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