CineForm HDMI Recorder Concept Posted

Steven Thomas · December 16th, 2008, 08:22 PM

Is there any news on the Cineform recorders?
It's been over a year since first mentioned.

Tim Bickford · December 18th, 2008, 08:12 PM

I'd like to know too!

Alex Raskin · December 18th, 2008, 08:51 PM

I'm sure this is a tough project to pull off. Look at FlashXDR/nanoFlash folks: they don't seem to be having it easy, either.

Bill Koehler · January 5th, 2009, 02:12 AM

...And in the case of the Convergent Designs XDR/Nanoflash product, by their own admission they get the MPEG2 encoder chip from Sony.

I can easily see where doing the design work to get the Cineform codec converted to a hardware encoder chip would be difficult. And expensive. But I repeat myself....

Tony Koorlander · January 17th, 2009, 03:43 PM

Hi David,
Now.. if you could only get a Canon firmware mod to output HDMI at full res from the EOS5D MkII (I've got one :-)) ... during video record to 1920x1080 30P .... then you'd have a path being beaten to your door. The 4GB limit on file size with CF cards in the EOS5D MkII and the daft firmware that STOPS instead of writing a new file like most NLEs do in capture ... is SO frustrating. And then there's the 'hot' sensor problem I know ..

Anyway - well done for getting this underway .. as you know from our chats in the past, this was my dream project .. but I got sidetracked.

NOW ... why does my NEO HD crash when trying to turn the H.264 .MOV files off the Canon EOS5D MkII into Cineform .AVI for editing?????

I've got so used to working wiht the NEO HD codec and its wunnerful quality that I'm desperate to use the output of the Canon with it.

David Newman · January 17th, 2009, 08:46 PM

Wrong thread for this in general. Can you turn off the overlay in HDMI mode? That is what is needed for HDMI cpature solution to work with that camera.

We do support the Canon 5D indirectly, some systems need more help than others for simple conversions to CineForm AVI (most work fine with Core AVC and registering the MP4splitter.ax) If the instruction in other threads don't help, file a trouble ticket at cineform.com/support

Bryan Daugherty · January 18th, 2009, 12:22 AM

David, i am new to the board and just found this thread and your concept looks incredible. I have been giving consideration to purchasing SONY's CF recorder some time this year but could put it off until next year if this thing might be in production in the next year or two...Where does it stand? Do you think there is any chance it might be going to production at some point in the next 2 yrs? Thanks!

Alex Raskin · January 18th, 2009, 10:32 AM

Bryan, isn't Sony HVR-MRC1 unit HDV only?

This would negate the advantages of such external recorder on full HD cameras, such as EX1 - while Cineform recorder would be perfect...

David Newman · January 18th, 2009, 11:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bryan Daugherty

David, i am new to the board and just found this thread and your concept looks incredible. I have been giving consideration to purchasing SONY's CF recorder some time this year but could put it off until next year if this thing might be in production in the next year or two...Where does it stand? Do you think there is any chance it might be going to production at some point in the next 2 yrs? Thanks!

The project clearly got delayed, but it is still of strong interest to us. Can say how soon as there are external market forces at play, so it will not make this year NAB.

Bryan Daugherty · January 18th, 2009, 06:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alex Raskin

Bryan, isn't Sony HVR-MRC1 unit HDV only?

This would negate the advantages of such external recorder on full HD cameras, such as EX1 - while Cineform recorder would be perfect...

That is very true but since I am using an HD1000U and looking at a Z7U, Z5U, or FX1000 to purchase this year I would not get less from the SONY unit then i am getting from tape but would have an edit ready digital file on CF with tape back-up.

But this project from CINEFORM...this is a different beast altogether. Real HD from the HDMI with passthrough to an external HDD for dual back-up...I think I am in love. And while this item would put the SONY unit out of my kit, I would rather wait one more year and save the cash to apply to this purchase if it might be coming to a cart near you in the next 2 years. If not then i would rather go ahead and get the SONY unit now for time and security reasons and wait patiently for CineForm to get this beauty perfected.

PS. David- Feel free to add me to your beta tester/demo/review list if it means getting to see an advance proto in action!

David Taylor · February 5th, 2009, 05:06 PM

We apologize for our delay in getting updates to you about the HDMI recorder. Let me give you an update.

The recorder remains very high on our new products priority list. However, there has been a change in the status of a very key supplier we were counting on. This change has rippled into our intended development schedule. We're working on a strategy around this, but it means there is not a short-term release schedule. As much as I wish it were otherwise, I wouldn't be surprised if the recorder does not make it to market in 2009.

I get regular emails from people offering feature suggestions for the recorder. Don't hesitate to continue sending those to us as hopefully we'll be able to get this back on a scheduled development track.

Alex Raskin · February 5th, 2009, 05:31 PM

Well, here's one suggestion: forget external hard drives and stick to the flash memory.

I was a proponent of the external HDDs for storage, since they used to be so much cheaper than the memory.

And they still are; but I grew to love EX1's internal recording to the tiny SDHC cards (with this adapter), without a hitch.

So yes, flash your memory, baby!

Also: which memory? Do you see any advantages of using, say, CF vs SDHC cards?

And... what I'd really want to see... are the cameras that give you an option to record into Cineform (RAW?) internally. EX1, Scarlet S35, new generations of Canon/Nikon DSLRs with HD video options... yoohoo - why not record internally into the most popular (AFAIK) editing codec in the first place?

David Newman · February 5th, 2009, 06:14 PM

Yes we are thinking the same way. Flash everything and that is getting easier, but that was not the issue. Our first choice DSP vendor went away, they don't survive the market change, so we still pursuing a certain computer power per watt to make this happen (without the huge engineering costs of an ASIC -- hardwired CineForm on a chip.) I was on another conference call early today to find the suitable part.

Elliott Tucker · February 6th, 2009, 01:07 AM

David, I thought about you when I read first reports on the Nvidia ION platform. A pre-cedia hands-on report included a picture of the tiny motherboard being held in the palm of a hand. I think that report said 10 watts power usage. But the AnandTech report below says 20 watts in a test sample that was running photoshop. I don't think you would need all the connectivity options that were on their test sample. Here is a link to the AnandTech report: AnandTech: NVIDIA's Ion Platform: Performance Preview Here is a link to the PC Perspective report: http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=663

Thanks for your recorder status update. I feel encouraged that the dream is stlll a possibility.

Craig Irving · February 6th, 2009, 08:12 AM

Thank you for the updates David & David.
It's good to know where things are at. I look forward to the device coming to market in the future.

December 16th, 2008, 08:22 PM	#406
Steven Thomas Trustee Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Gilbert, AZ Posts: 1,896	Update? Is there any news on the Cineform recorders? It's been over a year since first mentioned.

December 18th, 2008, 08:12 PM	#407
Tim Bickford Major Player Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: New Hampshire Posts: 448	I'd like to know too! __________________ Tim Bickford

January 17th, 2009, 03:43 PM	#410
Tony Koorlander New Boot Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Bideford Devon UK Posts: 12	Cineform recorder Hi David, Now.. if you could only get a Canon firmware mod to output HDMI at full res from the EOS5D MkII (I've got one :-)) ... during video record to 1920x1080 30P .... then you'd have a path being beaten to your door. The 4GB limit on file size with CF cards in the EOS5D MkII and the daft firmware that STOPS instead of writing a new file like most NLEs do in capture ... is SO frustrating. And then there's the 'hot' sensor problem I know .. Anyway - well done for getting this underway .. as you know from our chats in the past, this was my dream project .. but I got sidetracked. NOW ... why does my NEO HD crash when trying to turn the H.264 .MOV files off the Canon EOS5D MkII into Cineform .AVI for editing????? I've got so used to working wiht the NEO HD codec and its wunnerful quality that I'm desperate to use the output of the Canon with it.

January 17th, 2009, 08:46 PM	#411
David Newman CTO, CineForm Inc. Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Cardiff-by-the-Sea, California Posts: 8,095	Wrong thread for this in general. Can you turn off the overlay in HDMI mode? That is what is needed for HDMI cpature solution to work with that camera. We do support the Canon 5D indirectly, some systems need more help than others for simple conversions to CineForm AVI (most work fine with Core AVC and registering the MP4splitter.ax) If the instruction in other threads don't help, file a trouble ticket at cineform.com/support __________________ David Newman -- web: www.gopro.com blog: cineform.blogspot.com -- twitter: twitter.com/David_Newman

January 18th, 2009, 12:22 AM	#412
Bryan Daugherty Major Player Join Date: Jan 2009 Location: Lexington, Ky - USA Posts: 552	David, i am new to the board and just found this thread and your concept looks incredible. I have been giving consideration to purchasing SONY's CF recorder some time this year but could put it off until next year if this thing might be in production in the next year or two...Where does it stand? Do you think there is any chance it might be going to production at some point in the next 2 yrs? Thanks! __________________ 3x-HD1000u - Ikan 8000HD- custom i7 PC - Vegas Pro 13 and 11 64 bit - Premiere Pro CS4 - and a whole mess of other equipment...

December 18th, 2008, 08:51 PM	#408
Alex Raskin Trustee Join Date: Sep 2003 Posts: 1,435	I'm sure this is a tough project to pull off. Look at FlashXDR/nanoFlash folks: they don't seem to be having it easy, either.

January 5th, 2009, 02:12 AM	#409
Bill Koehler Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: Alpharetta, Georgia, USA Posts: 760	...And in the case of the Convergent Designs XDR/Nanoflash product, by their own admission they get the MPEG2 encoder chip from Sony. I can easily see where doing the design work to get the Cineform codec converted to a hardware encoder chip would be difficult. And expensive. But I repeat myself....

January 18th, 2009, 10:32 AM	#413
Alex Raskin Trustee Join Date: Sep 2003 Posts: 1,435	Bryan, isn't Sony HVR-MRC1 unit HDV only? This would negate the advantages of such external recorder on full HD cameras, such as EX1 - while Cineform recorder would be perfect...

February 5th, 2009, 05:06 PM	#416
David Taylor Major Player Join Date: Sep 2003 Location: Solana Beach, CA Posts: 853	Status update on HDMI recorder We apologize for our delay in getting updates to you about the HDMI recorder. Let me give you an update. The recorder remains very high on our new products priority list. However, there has been a change in the status of a very key supplier we were counting on. This change has rippled into our intended development schedule. We're working on a strategy around this, but it means there is not a short-term release schedule. As much as I wish it were otherwise, I wouldn't be surprised if the recorder does not make it to market in 2009. I get regular emails from people offering feature suggestions for the recorder. Don't hesitate to continue sending those to us as hopefully we'll be able to get this back on a scheduled development track.

February 5th, 2009, 05:31 PM	#417
Alex Raskin Trustee Join Date: Sep 2003 Posts: 1,435	Well, here's one suggestion: forget external hard drives and stick to the flash memory. I was a proponent of the external HDDs for storage, since they used to be so much cheaper than the memory. And they still are; but I grew to love EX1's internal recording to the tiny SDHC cards (with this adapter), without a hitch. So yes, flash your memory, baby! Also: which memory? Do you see any advantages of using, say, CF vs SDHC cards? And... what I'd really want to see... are the cameras that give you an option to record into Cineform (RAW?) internally. EX1, Scarlet S35, new generations of Canon/Nikon DSLRs with HD video options... yoohoo - why not record internally into the most popular (AFAIK) editing codec in the first place?

February 5th, 2009, 06:14 PM	#418
David Newman CTO, CineForm Inc. Join Date: Jul 2003 Location: Cardiff-by-the-Sea, California Posts: 8,095	Yes we are thinking the same way. Flash everything and that is getting easier, but that was not the issue. Our first choice DSP vendor went away, they don't survive the market change, so we still pursuing a certain computer power per watt to make this happen (without the huge engineering costs of an ASIC -- hardwired CineForm on a chip.) I was on another conference call early today to find the suitable part. __________________ David Newman -- web: www.gopro.com blog: cineform.blogspot.com -- twitter: twitter.com/David_Newman

February 6th, 2009, 01:07 AM	#419
Elliott Tucker New Boot Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: Georgetown, Texas Posts: 12	Nvidia ION Platform: CineForm Potential? David, I thought about you when I read first reports on the Nvidia ION platform. A pre-cedia hands-on report included a picture of the tiny motherboard being held in the palm of a hand. I think that report said 10 watts power usage. But the AnandTech report below says 20 watts in a test sample that was running photoshop. I don't think you would need all the connectivity options that were on their test sample. Here is a link to the AnandTech report: AnandTech: NVIDIA's Ion Platform: Performance Preview Here is a link to the PC Perspective report: http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=663 Thanks for your recorder status update. I feel encouraged that the dream is stlll a possibility. Last edited by Elliott Tucker; February 6th, 2009 at 01:25 AM. Reason: Add PC Perspective link

February 6th, 2009, 08:12 AM	#420
Craig Irving Major Player Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: Toronto Posts: 539	Thank you for the updates David & David. It's good to know where things are at. I look forward to the device coming to market in the future.