CineForm supports 5D Mk II editing
 

I wanted to let all Canon 5D Mark II users know that CineForm now supports conversion of Canon 5D Mark II footage on both Windows and Mac for editing in your preferred NLE.

The only minor correction to the above is the Mac version is available today as a public beta, and the Windows update will be available shortly. Here is the thread in the CineForm forum: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/cineform-...available.html.

This is awesome news. Sales told me yesterday and said to keep it a secret, which I'm really bad at, and I've been dying to tell everyone. 5D2 support to fix the black crushing and smooth editing performance for only $129 is awesome news. The Mac is out pretty much now and Windows in a week or two.

I am so there.

Sounds awesome! One thing I cant figure out is how is it lossless when an avi wrapper is used? Does it work like a proxy file?

The AVI wrapper just identifies the contents within. You can use an AVI wrapper around uncompressed video, which is lossless by definition.

That said, I don't know about the details of the compression. Is it visually lossless? Is it lossless to the pixel and bit? I'm interested in learning more...

Hi David.

I've been fighting with NeoHD for a couple weeks now (about 6, really). I hear from tech support about once a week if I bug 'em, so that's been a frustration for me.
But what I don't quite understand is, I thought that Scene was for HDV, while NeoHD was the ticket for our 5D2. Things have changed? I'm not complaining, mind you. The price is a lot more attractive and accessible.
I didn't see an updated comparison chart, comparing the different products. Did I miss that somewhere?

Also will the PC version be as fully loaded the Mac version?

And, last, on the Cineform forum, David N. said, "30p to 24p is not recommended. The NEO Scene 24p extraction is designed for sources with pulldown, with a fallback mode for 60i sources, it does do 30p to 24p well. Use timewrap in AE for that, or similar."
I'm not quite sure I understand. You say, "is not recommended," but then say, "it DOES do 30p to 24p well," THEN say, "use timewarp in AE for that." Should that line have read, "it does NOT do 30p to 24p well"?

I edit on PC using Vegas Pro 8 and/or Adobe CS3, so I'm not really a Mac guy, but I absolutely love Cineform and have been using since I started using Vegas 4. It's an awesome codec with amazing editing capabilities. I'm thrilled that this is coming out.
...now... if I can only get it to work on my system...

Absolutely fantantically fabulous.... now, if I can just get the camera.....

I thought the same. I've been trying to get the HDLink demo to convert my 5D2 files without success the past week or so; it always fails out of on the log (or, if I force re-wrap from MOV to AVI, gives me a file w/ no video but with sound).

I haven't tried to figure it out that much because I've just been waiting for the official 5DMk2 support. Looking forward to the PC version!

If you wade through their website you can get a pretty clear picture. It is lossless AND compressed.

Cineform on the mac
 

Hi everyone, this is exciting news. I have one question. i see that the mac version will have .mov file for FCP and the windows version will have an avi for vegas, CS3, ect. What i would like to know is, would the mac version of NeoScene, .mov work on CS3 for the mac? I can't ever find any information for CS3 on the Mac. its premiere CS3 for windows or FCP on the mac, never CS3 for the Mac. I have premeire CS3 on the mac and i hope the Mac neoscene version will work in CS3.

Sony Vegas tactics
 

This thread is great news, NeoScene looks to be the missing link for the 5d2. A tactical question, after installing NeoScene and QT and the a3 filter I can convert 5d2 mov's into beautiful avi's as played on QT. But Sony Vegas 8.1 only shows the audio from the new avi, what am I missing?
Thank you.

This is really interesting.

I do have some questions though: how is the converted media managed? what software can you use to build an archive? the only thing I saw a reference to is Final Cut Server. At the moment I actually use Photomechanic, a piece of stills management software or Adobe bridge to browse my archive but I'm guessing it may not recognise the Cineform files, does anyone have experience of this? I've looked around the website and there doesn't seem to be a lot of answers.

With the converted files being so big is there a way to only convert a subclip as in Mpeg streamclip? or do you have to convert the whole file?

Dan

My advice is to stick with the 32 bit Vegas 8.0c. The 64 bit Vegas 8.1 will not use 3rd party 32 bit codecs, like Cineform, within an AVI wrapper. The present workaround is to also convert the 5D2's original MOV file to a Cineform MOV file. Vegas 8.1 will then open the MOV file, but it may have no audio. So you have the audio from the Cineform AVI (or the original 5D2 MOV file) and the video from the Cineform MOV file. It hardly seems worth it. Further, this can only be done with NEO HD, not NEO Scene.

Take a look at this thread:

Canon 5D2 support? - The Digital Video Information Network

I've been holding off on CS4, because of the lack of Cineform support, so I can't help you there, but I can tell you that Bridge CS3 recognizes Cineform AVI files and correctly displays thumbnails. Bridge CS3 does not show any metadata for a Cineform AVI, unless you manually enter it. Maybe someone else's experience is different.

With NEO Scene, you can only convert the whole file, unless I'm misunderstanding the question.

Look here:

CineForm Technology

If you wander around the Technology pages of the Cineform website, there is additional information on the codec.

Jay,

Thanks for that, you understood correctly about converting the whole file. In converters like MPEG streamclip and Sony's XDCAM transfer tool you can choose just to convert a portion of the file by marking ins and outs, with long interviews this can be essential and also keep disk space use and conversion time down. I don't really want to have 35gb of data every time I shoot an interview for a 1 minute clip.

Looks like NeoScene isn't going to work for my workflow yet.

Dan