Cineform and Canon HD DSLR's

[Ross Webb]

Hi there,
A year and a half or so ago, I bought Neo 4K as I was doing a lot of RED work at the time and I really enjoyed working with it in Final Cut Studio.
Yes it was frustrating but we enjoyed it. It looks like this might be a great time with the new RT beta to get back to Cineform on Final Cut Studio.

I'm sure I'm not alone in this.

Recently I've been doing a lot of work on the Canon 5D (and more recently the 7D). It’s a great little camera and I love a lot of things about it.

My question is about using Cineform with the 7D. What are the pro's to using it over ProRes? I know that there's been discussion regarding 4:2:2 color space and we spend a lot of time grading the 7D footage and I'd love to know the advantages of Cineform. (I'm not trying to get into codec bashing here of course.)

I've looked through the forums and can't seem to find a succinct answer to this question so my apologies if its there and I haven't found it. I realise the hard drive space I would save and with the new RT abilities (Which I still need to test) it becomes very interesting again)

I also shoot a lot of slow motion (i.e. 720p 60 for approx 2.5 times real time) and would like to know how Cineform deals with such a transcode to 24fps. (or more precisely where to find out how to do it in Neo 4K)

Thanks again to Cineform for a great Codec and I'm looking forward to getting back to working with it.

[Henry Olonga]

Hmmmmmmmmm no one has bitten so I will try.First light is amazing mate. Gives you access to Iridas look files and access to simple colour grading that looks professional. It uses meta data so the file itself is not affected so it is non destructive.

I believe the HD link utility handles all the various frame rate changes as well but cannot answer the 60p to 24p one. It is the rate change option and there is a drop down list of the available ways to go with accompanying percentages if memory proves correct. eg 30p to 24p being 80%

[David Newman]

Thanks Henry!

HDLink does support 60p to 24p conversion.

[Marc de Jesus]

Sweet. i've asked this in the 7D forum. But how's the 60-24p conversion compared to the 60-30p conversion?? For example, is there a distinguishable difference in smoothness?? or do they look pretty similar?

My 7D arrives on Monday, but I have to figure out what frame rate to shoot at by tommorow. This way i know whehter or not I can incorporate the 5D.

Thanks for any tips

[David Newman]

I prefer content at 24 not 30, so the 60 to 24 is better for my eye.

[Marc de Jesus]

noted, thanks

[Ross Webb]

Thanks to all for replying. perhaps I worded the question badly.
Really appreciate the answers,
-Ross W

[Chad Haufschild]

Hi, Ross. I think I know what your getting at. Let me give it a shot.

I don't have any experience with the DSLR's so I can't speak to that. What I can speak to is the quality of the intermediate and the interoperability of the codec.

For me the big difference between Cineform and Prores is the kind of compression they use. Prores is an old school DCT where Cineform is a wavelet compression. I'm no engineer so explaining the difference in technical terms is beyond me, but the practical difference is how it stands up to multiple generations of renders and re-renders throughout the post process. And I could be wrong here but it's my understanding that the compression may be the cause of the dreaded gamma shift that haunts Prores users.

Henry's post about First Light I think is quite valid to this discussion as well. For FCP users it really makes working in Color totally unnecessary and in my opinion is far superior to Color is every way. First Light alone is worth the cost of Cineform. If you haven't played with it yet I'd highly encourage you to do so before making your final decision.

For me, it's cross-platform capabilities have been a real advantage. I use FCP at work but am an PC/Adobe guy at heart. (pause to let people snicker and chuckle)... I've passed files back and forth between Mac and PC for everything from editing to visual FX and have had only one major issue. That was with a post facility is LA but that's a different story. Other than that it's worked flawlessly and the quality remained very high without gamma issues.

I realize I can download a free plugin that allows working with Prores on my PC, but the quality I've seen from Cineform over the last 5 years has me convinced that there is no other codec that can compete with it.

Ultimately, I think it boils down to this, at least in my production world. If you're going to do any level of color correction, color grading, compositing, visual FX or anything that requires multiple renders of a piece of footage or if you want the highest quality codec available for a cross-platform workflow, than Cineform is a no-brainer.

[Ross Webb]

Thanks Chad,
I really appreciate that. I have already bought Neo 4K and after using the RED I kinda put it to bed so to speak.
we have been doing a lot of color correction work and some keying. The key with Cineform really seems to be better than the equivalent ProRes file.
It will be about trying to get the best file size and best color space from Cineform and playing out in real time.
I really appreciate your response.
I used to use Bitzjazz Sheer before Cineform was available for Macs and Loved cineform for the RED stuff we used. Now we're doing 99% Candon HD DSLR work in post I am really interested in Cineform again.
thanks again