Has any info been released at NAB on this system?

Has any info been released at NAB on this system?

I was looking for it at NAB and had no luck. It is possible they were
stuck in a back room some place, but as I said, I couldn't find anything
and I looked.

Hello,

Yes, Reel Stream was at NAB in booth SU9969.

We showed the final form factor of the Andromeda device, installed on the DVX100A. The device now resides completely inside the camera itself, such that the only external physical change is the addition of a USB2.0 Mini-B plug on the side of the camera. Thus all accessories, such as the mini-35 adapter can be used.

The Andromeda device, when installed on a Panasonic DVX100(A), allows the user to record the uncompressed stream of image data right after it has been digitized from the CCD's, and bypassing all compression, decimation, and all other deterioration caused by the in-camera hardware. This allows for a maximum recording quality of full bandwidth RGB(4:4:4) at 36-bits per pixel in the full CCD frame size, as well as HD resolutions by making use of the physical optical pixel shift inherent in the hardware.

We demostrated footage shot on DV tape and Andromeda simulatenously on the same camera, and perhaps the most shocking improvement was the increase in dynamic range. The uncompressed footage exhibits 2-3 additional stops of dynamic range as compared to the standard DVX.

The final release will sell for $2999, and includes installation of the device, software, shipping back to your location within the U.S. and a warranty. The turnaround time is expected to be less than a business week.

There will also be a hardware/software beta testing stage, for which applications have been posted on our website: www.reel-stream.com. Because of the large number of applications we will have to chose a smaller number of people than all who have applied, and those selected will be notified by email on April 30th. The cost for beta testing is $1500 and includes hardware as well as software.

Please feel free to post any questions you have on this thread, or email me directly at Juan@reel-stream.com.

I just got back from NAB and I probably forgot to mention something, so ask away!

Cheers,
Juan

Gee Juan,

I am SO SORRY I missed your booth. I could not remember
Reel Stream and found nothing under Andromeda.

If I had found you (and I'm an idiot for missing you since I thought
I had covered the whole thing like glue & really wanted to see what you've
accomplished ;) these would be my questions:

1) How do you capture, convert and edit footage (workflow)?
(I work on a 2g/2g Mac G5 and FW800.)

a) File format? b) bandwidth in megabits?

2) When will you be able to offer this mod for the XL2?

In addition to Mr. Mersereau's questions -
- When will it be available for purchase?
- Will you sell packages of pre-made DVX100a's with Andromeda, or would we have to buy the DVX100a, then ship that to you for you to convert?

Hello,

No need to apologize, our booth was hard to find, and even though we got a continuous stream of people, a lot of people showed up with cocktail napkins that had our booth number on it and such. We distributed postcard-size flyers which hundreds of people got but they didn't have the booth number on it either. These were factors unfortunately out of our control.

Here are the answers to your questions:

Workflow:
For capture you connect the USB2.0 mini plug on the Andromeda DVX to your macintosh computer. We have been using a powerbook for everything, and have tested it on the mac mini, G5 and G4 desktops.

Our software SculptorHD allows you to monitor the uncompressed stream in real-time, along with the added dynamic range. Initially you capture to a raw uncompressed file which is then processed with SculptorHD into whatever format you desire. You can export individual frames, such as DPX, CIN, TIFF, etc. Or you can export movie clips in any Quicktime codec you already have installed, from uncompressed formats to compressed formats such as DVCPROHD. If you already have Final Cut Pro and/or Shake, you get the exact same codec list you can use in those programs. Essentially, the integration with editing/fx tools on MacOSX is as transparent as it is with any other aquisition system, because you can put the original uncompressed data in whatever format you desire.

Bandwidth:
At the maximum quality, the data rate at 24P is around 34MB/sec.

Installing on cameras other than DVX:
We will definitely move to another camera at some point, although at this moment we haven't made a decision. It could be one of the new HD cameras or an SD camera with HD capability at the chips such as the XL2.

Release date:
There will be a hardware beta testing stage for which there is an application on the website www.reel-stream.com. The beta testers will be selected by April 30th, and they will essentially be the first people to get to use the system. Depending on how beta testing goes, i estimate 1-2 months after beta testing starts.

Hope this helps,
Juan

This is the first I've read that it will connect with Mac laptops.
- Are PC laptops also going to be supported?
- Will it be possible to capture directly to a portable HDD device, like Firestore?

All throughout development we've been working on Macs. There will be a PC port but not for a few months.

I've discussed with several people about the difference between having a laptop versus a hard drive. First of all, having a hard drive is a lot more expensive for both manufacturing and the end customer. We couldn't make it as inexpensive if we had a direct to disk connection.

I had a discussion at NAB for example, with a person who shoots hanging from cliffs, etc. He asked why it couldn't connect instead to a USB2.0 drive directly. We both started thinking about what it would take...for example, assuming it did connect to a USB2.0 drive directly, what drive can you get that can handle that data rate...we both came up with a LaCie d2 at least. This is a drive that's bulky, heavy, and not designed to be banged around, rather than sit on a desk. On top of this, you still would have to figure out how to provide the 12V from which it runs on. The resulting drive+battery(ies) is heavier, and bulkier than an inexpensive Apple ibook, which can easily record to the internal hard drive.

If you need more storage, you can easily add inexpensive SmartDisk firelites or similar tiny drives on the laptop. The point is, power has to come from somewhere. The minute you think about making the camera the host(whether USB or firewire) and connect directly to a drive, the idea of having the device inside the camera goes out the window, and you need to carry yet another box which prevents accessories from being mounted on the DVX, not to mention the actual drive. There's just no way around it, because we are working with an already designed camera and there is limited space in it.

It ends up being much simpler and lighter to carry just the camera with an internal device, and a small notebook, which nowdays are light and slim. All accessories work as usual on the DVX, and the device takes power from the USB bus, which is already managed by the laptop. An ibook or powerbook running with the screen off in a backpack/shoulder bag is a tiny price to pay to get uncompressed 24P HD. Your other options are extremely expensive and/or heavily tethered.

Cheers,
Juan

OK, so what are the minimum specs required for the mac?

Assuming one had a Powerbook with 5400rpm 100gb hdd, and I kept 1/2 of that for capturing footage, how many minutes could I expect to capture of maximum quality 24p?

When I have reached capacity, would I then dump the captured files to an external drive and then reconnect the Powerbook to the Andromeda to continue shooting, or is there some kind of way to route the footage straight through to the external drive if I wanted and just swap external drives?

Basically, you can use the 34MB/sec for a good approximation. Take the number of free space in MegaBytes, and divide it by 34, this will give you the number of seconds of uncompressed video you can store...this is at a 1540x990 native frame size.

Do remember however, that you do not HAVE to record at the maximum quality. You can take your pick of any sampling pattern as well as color precision, and take advantage of the reduced data rate and increased recording times.

You can record the footage on whatever drive your computer recognizes. One of the features I am about to write will allow you to write to a drive and then seamlessly transfer to another without stopping the camera, thus allowing you to 'ping-pong' back and forth...so you can start at an external drive, switch over to the internal when it is full, during which there is enough time to swap external drives, or even unload it.

Machine wise, I think any new mac will do. I haven't tested on the tiniest ibook, but we are going to aquire one soon and test it. The mac mini works just fine, the internal drive seems to be as fast as the one in the powerbook.

Cheers,
Juan

I believe the LaCie big disk has USB2 and holds about 500gig.
Would that have enough bandwidth for capture Juan?

I found a really cool product made by Jadoo at Vegas.
A fuel cell generator that will produce up to 60 watts of
12v for 2 hours using hydrogen.
What we might need is for one to produce A/C to drive laptops and
hard drives.

The Jadoo system with two gas cartridges, charger and fuel cell
generator was on sale for $2400.
It has Anton Bauer gold series mount. Pretty light weight,
silent and produced no water I could see.
They make a larger cartridge that is expensive, but will last for 10 hours.

I haven't tested the newer lacie drives, but I have an older d2(?) which was the first one to come with firewire800. It works great over FW800 but the USB2.0 is slow.

This is not because of the USB protocol, but limitations on the chipset used on either the host or the slave...in this case it is the slave because the mac host can go pretty darn fast. It is very possible that the newer lacie drives use a newer faster USB chipset and can meet the specs just fine.

My tool of choice for testing a hardrive is called 'iozone', which you can download for free at www.iozone.org. It is a command-line tool and there is a version on the internet for MacOSX somewhere, if you google iozone and MacOSX.

You can customize the tests, and target a specific drive, plus specific operations, such as just write()/fwrite()/pwrite() which is what is relevant for Andromeda. It takes a while to run, but it gives you the actual continuous write rate for the drive.

Juan

A compact HDD enclosure that includes a rechargeable lithium-ion battery with 10+ hours of usage per charge:

http://www.macpower.com/productdetails1.cfm?sku=AMS25K&cats=&catid=311,316

I feel something like this would be perfect in tandem with the Andromeda. It is much smaller than a laptop, lasts for longer between charges, and HDDs could be swapped out of the enclosure easily. Would this be a possible solution Juan?

Assuming the drive is fast enough, this would require a USB/Firewire HOST inside the DVX, which is a lot more expensive, and it would require a battery itself. In addition, it would be larger such that Andromeda would need to be outside the camera, thus limiting the addition of some accessories.

Juan

Has anyone experience with long runs of cable for USB2.0?
Would using "repeaters" be feasible?

We've tested it with a 15 feet cable, no problems. USB cables can be longer than this, i don't remember the exact figure now.

Hubs will act as repeaters, the only problem is that some hubs slow down the signal a bit, so it might cause a problem with larger data rates.

Juan

Sorry if I missed it, but is there a mailing list one can join to find out when new images or information is posted to reel-stream.com?

Yes, if you go to www.reel-stream.com, select CORPORATE->CONTACT, or just click here:

http://www.reel-stream.com/corp_cont

We have posted some frames from footage we took at vegas, together with the corresponding DV frames which where recorded simultaneously on the same camera to the DV tape. So literally we have posted the exact same frames, from the same camera at the same moment in time, just recorded via two different mediums.

Because we were recording with Andromeda, we exposed for the uncompressed footage which has 2-3 stops over the DV footage. This is why the DV frames look overexposed.

Here is a link to the gallery:
http://www.reel-stream.com/cap_hd


Cheers,
Juan

That's really interesting Juan. Any plans on making Andromeda for any interchangeable lens cameras like the XL2 or maybe even the HD100 when it comes out?

If there is enough support for the current version of the device(which at the moment it seems so), we will definitely be adapting the concept to another camera, either the XL2 or one of the new HD cameras. We haven't decided which one, but i'm leaning way away from the Sony FX1 because it is interlaced.

We already posted some HD stills from footage shot in vegas on our website www.reel-stream.com.

We've been debating how to post video, just because uncompressed HD is so large, some people suggested compressing it but i'd rather not. So we will be posting a ~5 second clip in uncompressed 1540x990 frames together with what the DV tape recorded. Should be done today or tomorrow.

Juan

We haven't decided which one, but i'm leaning way away from the Sony FX1 because it is interlaced.

Oooh, sorry to hear that. Can you explain a bit as to why? Alot more difficult to work with?

Not really. And I like the way the camera controls and everything is setup, very cool. But the sensors are interlaced, and there is just no way to get around it. There are very few people (if any) that have contacted me looking for uncompressed interlaced video. Everyone wants progressive.

In order to get something close to progressive out of the Sony, we'd have to de-interlace and that looses a ton of resolution together with a whole host of other problems.

It just doesn't make sense, when there are several other cameras that have HD chips and have progressive scan.

Cheers,
Juan

Wouldn't you better start from a camera that has real 720p instead of 1080i? 720p would give better images than the recompiled 1080i.

Yes, that's exactly what I mean. De-interlaced 1080i will probably yield less than 720 lines. Not to mention that the actual images are taken at completely different moments in time than a camera recording 24fps.

Juan

I understand your reasoning. Why work with 1440x540 when you can have the full resolution with other cameras.