Some questions about Aspect HD

[Erik Rangel]

I've just started editing a 40+ min short with aspect hd and for the most part it's simple cut's and dissolves. But this question was asked to me by David Newman...

"Erik, I always want to ask Aspect HD customers this question: What is the greatest number of layers and effects you applied and still got full real-time will no dropped frames? The companion question is how is your PC configured."

and my answer is...

I haven't had the need to use too many effects but i have at least 3 to 4 video tracks working at once and they're all playing back beautifully fast.

Now i'm not a computer whiz or anything, but my little 17 year old brother is and this is the computer that he helped me build:

2.8Ghz P4 Hyperthreading, overclocked to 3.2Ghz
2 GB ram (don't know what kind but it had aluminum casing around it.)
2*36GB Raptor's Raid 0
2*200GB 7200's Raid 0
ati radeon 9600
Mother board had built in 5.1 sound card and i don't remember what kind it was.
Win xp pro
Blah blah

If anyone out there is using Aspect Hd please let me know what you guys are liking and disliking about it... because I still have 28 more days to decide if I'm gonna keep it. At 1200 bucks it was quite a gamble for me to order. But I like it so far.

E.

Oh yeah, I dont work for cineform. Just trying to make movies in Colorado with No Budget.

[Raymond Krystof]

To David Newman

It was a real pleasure meeting you last Weekend at DV Camps in Burbank. I purchased a copy of Aspect HD too late in the weekend. Hollywood Studio Rentals sold out during the weekend. However, I received my copy on Wednesday via Fed Ex. I’m up and running and already blown away. Although I’ve just started playing around, I can see what all the excitement is about. The real time previews are absolutely astounding. I’m only using edit cuts and your supplied transition so far, and as such the experience is exhilarating, After trying the included bundled KDDI software I wasn’t sure what to expect (I gave up on using that software altogether). Working with Premiere 6.5 with Aspect is on par and maybe even a better experience than my impressions of Premiere Pro with DV.

My computer is:
Sony 3.06 P4 Hyperthreading, with 533 FSB
1 GB ram
2*200GB 7200rpm drives (non raid) However, one dedicated to video.
Win xp home edition
Etc

As I continue to experiment I will let you know if and where I find limitations. But so far it’s been a very fluid and transparent experience.

Best regards,

[David Newman]

Thank you to both of you for such nice comments.

Ray, DV Camps was a lot of fun and I hope to do that again soon, it is bonus that we sold a lot of copies as a result. :)

[Chris Hurd]

Next time you do that, please say hi to Geoff Zimmerman for me. Thanks,

[Raymond Krystof]

Chris,

I thought the DVCamps seminar Geoff put together for the HD10 was very well done. I would be interested to attend some of his other "Camps" as well. If I do, I will also give him your regards as well.

Best regards,

[Heath McKnight]

I'd like to see HD10 camps in South Florida. :-)

[Kevin Shaw]

Davin N.: I just read a post elsewhere in which someone suggested that Aspect HD delivers good performance by effectively dropping the resolution of the image being displayed during playback. Can you comment on whether there's any valid basis at all to such a remark, and if so what would that mean for displaying output from Aspect HD via a video card with component outputs to an HDTV? Could it be that someone's just confused about, say, how Sony Vegas does previews versus how Premiere Pro with Aspect HD does previews?

[David Newman]

Then you probably saw the rest of the argument. It is tiring to explain all this, but yes Aspect HD has a preview mode that allow HD be manipulation at a higher speed than HD particularly should. Is an eligant approach that allows common single CPU systems and laptop edit is high speed, without compromise for most editing workflows. We can't explain the inner workings in detail becuase that is part of our secret sauce, but you should read "Mike's Review: Boxx Technologies Amazing HD[pro]RT" at http://www.hdforindies.com/ that scratches the surface on some of these issues, although not perfectly accurate it is a good starter on CineForm editing technology.

[Kevin Shaw]

Thanks David, I hadn't seen all that information in the review you referenced. Would it be more correct then to say that Aspect HD will generate full-quality playback if it can, and then starts to drop the resolution when real time capabilities are exceeded? As a general guideline, what level of computer hardware is needed to play a single stream of 1080i HDV at full quality using Aspect HD?

[David Newman]

It doesn't quiet work that way in today's Aspect HD, the article was based on Prospect HD (even then it isn't exactly correct.) We haven't unlocked AHD with some of the PHD features, but feature trickle down happens in every new release. So today's version of AHD doesn't enable the highest preview quality over PCI-e cards (yet) primarily because we are still awaiting our samples of those cards to try that out. When it does 3+Ghz P4 should be fine for a single stream out PCI-e to HDTV. There is another AHD release in the works (free upgrade to existing customers) that should enhance performance even further. We are a moving target, our features and performance are growing a good rate, so when you are ready to purchase, download the latest trial version and see if it meets your needs. There is cool stuff coming.

[Kevin Shaw]

So if I use the current version of Aspect HD with Premiere Pro 1.5 on a nice fast computer, what exactly am I seeing in the preview window on the computer monitor? In other words, what is the best display quality I can expect with the current Cineform software?

[David Newman]

When scrubbing you see everything, no preview mode, no compromise, to a external HD display if you wish. As you scrub faster the dynamic stuff kicks in and scrubbing occurs at half res (making timeline manipulation faster -- remember HD is big.) Playback uses the half res mode as the current default *. It looks much better than other half res decoding solutions as it is wavelet based, not DCT. The wavelet vs DCT advantages for preview is not something that is readily understandable by the market, that is why we don't discuss it much (wavelet offers beautiful filtered averages at multiple resolutions.) It was due to the wavelet quality on last years HD Road Show (Adobe, BOXX, CineForm and Microsoft) where we showed timeline previews from HDSDI through a Christy projector, the audience couldn't tell the difference ("Dust to Glory" previewed its color correction is much the same way.) We continue to tweak the pipeline and codec to get more speed and even higher quality. We will also adapt the engine to match new hardware options (like PCI-e HDTV cards) and faster/dual core CPUs. Software can be changed at a very short notice. ;)

- David

* this is subject to change, as pipeline/codec is designed for more flexibility than we are currently shipping.

[Steven White]

I've had my FX1 for a while and have been doing numerous workarounds to produce HD solutions, however I'm getting fed up working with the MPEG-2 files, and would like to start actually editing in HD. From what I've read, Aspect HD combined with Premiere Pro 1.5 seems to be the most versatile solution... so I want to ask some questions.

I have Premiere Pro 1.0, and have been resisting the upgrade, but it looks like it will be necessary to work with Aspect HD. Is this true?

Some of the footage I'm working with is Cineframe24 material. I would like to be able to edit this in a 24p timeline relatively painlessly, as well as add effects to natively 24p footage. Does Aspect HD 3.0 handle Cineframe24 footage well? Does it remove the 2:3 pulldown and make a 23.976 fps file that can be frame-accurately edited? Or does it retain the file as a 60i file and deal with pulldown in software?

I do need to be able to work with the footage I edit in After Effects, and I understand the PPro 1.5.1 solution doesn't enable this, making the full Cineform product necessary. Is this true?

Is there a noticable advantage in After Effects working with the Aspect HD files, or could I simply take PPro 1.5.1 and export to an uncompressed AVI do my AE work? (We're talking $500 US here, so that's a lot of frustration).

-Steve

[David Newman]

The upgrade to Premiere Pro 1.5 (and then the HDV patch release 1.5.1) is recommended for all users. Certain Aspect HD features will only work using 1.5.1.

It is not recommended to reverse the the pull-down on CF24. It seems most agree on this, here is explanation why http://www.adamwilt.com/HDV/cineframe.html from Adam Wilt. If enough users want this we may add this in the future to AHD. Currently for 24p work using a tool like DVFilm is recommended (from 50i/60i sources) to produce much better results.

The After Effects option requires the full Aspect HD.

Aspect HD is worth every penny -- otherwise I need to find another job. :) You can use uncompressed, but that become a clunky process, particularly when reimportanting back into Premiere. If you use Aspect HD you can cut and paste from Premiere straight into AE, no near to waste disk space and time with an uncompressed export.

[Steven White]

>>It is not recommended to reverse the the pull-down on CF24. It seems most agree on this, here is explanation why<<

Yeah, I've read all that. The bottom line is that I have CF24 footage that I want to do frame accurate, real-time 24p editing on with the pull-down reversed... recommeded or otherwise, it's the workflow I require for this, and probably any future narrative project I intend to do on my FX1.

On the Aspect HD 3.0 site it says:
"24p editing workflow. If exporting to M2T, automatic pull-down conversion from 24p to 60i is provided"

According to my understanding of english, that means I can take 24p files and render them to 60i with a 2:3 pull-down... but not necessarily the other way around.

How I can exploit the Aspect HD, Premiere Pro 1.5.1 and After Effects 6.5 and do frame-accurate 24p editing of CF24 footage in Premiere Pro?

-Steve