CineForm and Premiere Pro CS3 / After Effects

[Douglas Turner]

Peter - I'm getting these errors when rendering the timeline (haven't even tried a long export yet).

Kicked off a big render overnight and it failed 4 hrs in (although I'm coming to the conclusion that adding FX and rendering to preview is a bad idea for the whole project... and I should just leave the rendering to the export stage - where perhaps Frameserver or avi w/cf wrapper might do the trick!).

I'll try adding the other 3 projects to this one - to make it the whole movie... that'll tell me whether standard scrubbing is still buggy and memory leaks etc have been fixed.

[Douglas Turner]

So, have combined my 4 split smaller projects into one large PPROCS3 project. Size of prproj file is now 71MB.

Basically thousands of clips (about 800GB of CFHD avis indexed) - waited ages for the audio to conform - editing during this process is possible, but unreliable and slow.

So far, so good though. Will report back.

Right-clicking on an item in the Project window only works when you click on the same line to the right of the item (ie. not under the Name column).

So far the only downside I can find is the inability to edit audio in Audition/Soundbooth from right-clicking on the audio - disabled in this Beta :(

[Peter Ferling]

Douglas, I have a project file that is repeatedly getting the "error compliling movie". The only fix for that, and for an earlier, more intense project was to use the "microsoft avi" choosing the cineform encoder, and in settings, selecting "medium", and "automatic".

This has worked consistently so, that when I can export CFHD, I just go the other route. Nothing else short of uncompressed worked. I could not even push an adobe M2t. It's not a cineform issue. My best guess that however PPro2 writes the project file, some specific code is readable in PPro3 (not changed) and what causes PPro2 to crash does so with PPro3.

I have an employee two-day soccer tournament that is waiting for edits. About 8-hours of HDV material. It's not mission critical, (unless you ask the players whom keep knocking at my door, or droping me hints). This weekend my wife is going out of town... the new Prospect 2K is in... The beer (edit juice) is getting cold...

It's time to see if I can crash this application, (not that I'm tired of hearing "...I fixed my PPro woes by switching to Vegas, and my world is now a complete utopia... ahhh."). But I have yet to real test this application.

[Peter Ferling]

Prospect 2k installed without issue. Though I get a dialog box for v2.3 when PPro3 starts, I'm sure it's 2k v3, checking registry and dll's confirms this.

Hmmm. Upconvert 4:2:2 to 4:4:4 RGB? I smell an HD-SDI test during tommorrows lunch break. Time to test that greenscreen I've been putting off.

My troublesome projects are on the BOXX in the studio. My Dell 650 w/Dual Xeon 3Ghz is running fine. Not too bad for Min. spec. No playback or render issues so far. In fact, I'm seeing a few more layers in RT. Before I swore only the video showed in RT, now I'm getting two more layers of titles in RT.

So if PPro3 is using more threads, it looks like Prospect 2K is also doing the same and thus it's a 30% gain in performance? I haven't loading this up on the other machine. I'm gonna pay close attention and do a comparison.

It's late, as my two year old says: nigh-nigh.

[David Newman]

Peter, where are you seeing the "v2.3" text? I need to update that.

As for the "Upconvert 4:2:2 to 4:4:4 RGB", also experiment with the 4:4:4 rendering options in the compiler options. Put some red titles on a blue background to really see the benefits.

[Peter Ferling]

David

1. Yes, it's the "2.3" text on splash screen. (HDlink's splash shows it correctly with the new graphic and version). Can we get that fixed so I can proceed with the render? (Kidding :)

2. Ok, you asked for it.

[David Newman]

Peter you may not be running PHD v3.0 within CS3. The splash should say 3.0 as it does on my home PC (and show the film reel.) This is like an install issue with CS3 and PPro2.0 installed, new components only go into one Premiere installation. See if the new files went into the 2.0 plugins fonder, if so copy them into CS3.

[Peter Ferling]

Yes, that was the case, sorry. I just installed on my BOXX, and it went into PPro3. I then copied to PPro2.

I am happy to report that my particularly troublesome PPro2 project managed to render a High quality CFHD right over the troubled areas, and within PPro2! I did not have use the wrapper, nor export to PPro3.

I imported the PPro2 file into PPro3 for testing, and the app crashed (processors spiked, PPro3 disappeared) right at particular spot with three layers of high-rez tiffs. Even scrubbing over that spot in PPro3 crashed.

However, in defense of PPro3, a particular PPro3 originated project, where I had a similiar sequence that refused export directly to CFHD, I was able to so with Prospect 2X 3.0.

It's a little early, however, it looks like I can now render troublesome PPro2 projects without having to export them to PPro3, or an elaborate workaround.

Douglas, it might be worth a shot to use the P2K trial and see if you can put an end to your rendering woes. I can put this particular project to bed and move on!

BTW, when I fired up HDlink PK2, I was surprised to see a capture window pop up for my Xena card. I've gotta try some 444 capture next.

[David Newman]

Handling large TIFFs (or images in general) is a bug in CS3, it will crash in the non-CineForm edit mode. To increase the importance of adobe fixing this, please submit a bug report. Note: turning off 32-bit processing will help, but that is only a poor workaround.

4:4:4 is not offered as a capture format yet. When it is it will be in the Wafian HR-2, Prospect 2K Ingest and NEO 2K Ingest only. 4:4:4 support is currently geared toward file based workflow (DPX, TGA, TIFF, etc) and for the highest quality effects rendering.

[Peter Ferling]

1. Verified and Bug'd. Even if it doesn't crash, just place some moderately size tiffs on four or more layers deep, add a few cross disolves, and preview render the timeline and playback in the monitor is erractic. (Bug'd that one too).

2. I meant to capture 4:2:2 SDI and upconvert to 4:4:4 (forgot to bring my viper in... must have left it in on the dresser at home :)

[Peter Ferling]

Dave, I couldn't get PPro2 or 3 to capture live from the XHG1 via Xena HS. I can see the output image, via monitor from the Xena card. Xena, adobe project and cineform settings are 1080i 60Hz (SDI port is also enabled on the Canon and set to HD, auto). Adobes' HD-SDI edit mode did not work either. Nor would HDLink. It recognizes the card, but there was no image.

I ran out of time, and will reinstall/update the Xena drivers tommorrow.

How are you connecting your Canon via SDI?

[David Newman]

Make sure you are using the Xena drivers shipped with Prospect. These are located in C:\Program Files\CineForm\AJAIO.

[Peter Ferling]

Cineform specific Xena drivers? Maybe I should have read the instructions first :)

Will do.

[Peter Ferling]

Installing the cineform version of Xena drivers did the trick. We're in business. I'm now keying 10bit 4:2:2 HD-SDI material in PPro3.

[Peter Ferling]

I'm having some fun with PPro3 and the new Prospect 2k.

I have about eight-hours of soccer video to cut, but decided to do something a little more interesting. A VFX project to put this software through it's paces. (It's been a long while since I've working on something this heavy without one single incident).

I've provided some media here, and I know it does little justice for the original content, which is simply beautiful. Capturing 4:2:2 HD-SDI that keys at uncompressed quality, yet acts and plays at the speed of compressed? A quality that is imperceivable from the original, exported to AE and back again for final edit... amazing.

If you want something higher rez (or different from divX), I'll have to find another means to upload an m2t file.

http://stage6.divx.com/user/peferlin...ineform-plugin