PC updates to version 4.1.2 officially out.
 

Lots of tweaks and fixes, very nice rework of First Light making an already easy to use tool even easier (we even updated the FL manual.)

Update tools are NEO HD, 4K & 3D and Prospect HD, 4K and 3D. Yes 3D for Windows is finally out.

Download you update of trial from CineForm Product Downloads

David, FL gives me a "cannot start the player process" with the new update, and though it loads the program, won't import or play anything. This was on a 32bit XP ws, with CS3.

We haven't tried it yet on the x64's with CS4 and CS3 on them.

Suggestions?

Runs fine on the x64 machines with both CS4 and CS3.

I've got a clue now as to the FL weirdness on the 32bit machine. It had Prospect 4K on it before we downscaled to HD, and the loader is detecting that and the 3D version of FL is being loaded, instead of the regular HD.

Still won't run, so could that be from having HD instead of 4K on that machine?

I have not checked in for a while. Is the version "realtime"?

Stephen,

If FL is saying "cannot start the player process", for some reason it is starting in the wrong path. Right click on First Light shortcut icon (wherever you launch it) and open properties tell me what "Start in:" says. It should point to "C:\Program Files\CineForm\Tools" on a 32-bit system.

Tim,

No CS4 play module yet, this was the last big build before the CS4 playback gets integrated.

I'm floored
 

Prospect 3D is astonishing; I had no idea what was coming our way. We just this week returned from 6 weeks of gathering 20 hours of 3D material in far-away places. Prospect 3D is going to make our lives unimaginably easier and better. The work-flow is brilliant and, thus far, is feeling very robust. (CS3 - 32bit)

Countless thanks to the Davids and the whole of the CineForm team for the excellent tool.

David Wilson

I have a couple of issues with the FL histogram with ProspectHD. First, the histogram doesn't display correctly unless I put in some offset in framing (just 0.01 will do it). Otherwise the displayed histogram shows just a small amount of the information toward the dark end.

The second issue is that the histogram won't display in CS4, and it kills CS4 if I try to use it. I don't know whether or not the histogram is supposed to play in the editor - it would be nice. The histogram plays in my other viewers, albiet slowly.

Wow! I giddy with that comment. There is so much more we have planned for 3D, we are just pleased to offer something that enhances the workflow into the PC market (just as we did for the Mac.) PC is more my domain, so this one I've be personally working on for some time.

Histograms are tricky beasts, they often don't display much if the data is skewed with a lot of saturated blacks or whites.

Sorry about the CS4, no one reported that in the beta :(. However, I don't see it here, not issue, histogram is working, so please submit a trouble ticket with support.

That's OK, I'm giddy about the possibilities offered by P3D. Thanks again for all the work. I'm looking forward to the further releases.

"C:\Program Files\CineForm\Tools\scripts"

That's from the icon in the CF install folder. When I took off the "scripts" at the end, all is well....tnx

Need to double check installer
 

David, you might need to double check that installer on the latest build. One other x64 CS3 ws of our also had the wrong address as you mentioned. I corrected it and it now is okay.

Found and fixed an issue with the Prospect HD installer for the First Light short cut (P4K and P3D, and Neo seems fine.)

Trouble with export from PP from P3D muxed file
 

David,

I'm having a bit of trouble with exporting from a muxed 3D file in PP CS3.

I've muxed a right eye and left eye file to a file named A109_C029SeqLR_RAW.avi. That file plays fine in all 3D display types in WMP and shows up in all 3D display types in PP as well. I have full active data control of that file in First Light (color correction, Orientation etc.)

When I export from PP in any 3D display type except Side-by-Side (Anaglyph, Over-Under, Onion Skin etc.) the file will export fine in the appropriate 3D display type. When I attempt to export Side-by-Side, I get a side by side image without the color information (B&W) and without the stereo information (left eye only repeated two times). On occasion the exported file will only show one or two vertical green bars.

Other than this, I'm have a great time working with P3D. Many thanks,

David

Do please submit a report, as the 3d exports are needing enhance. They are primarily designed for preview, a full quality side-by-side is better in a two parse (export left then right and mix.)

Forward to support so they can confirm.

A little more information...
 

I did more tests and found the following:
All were exported from PP CS3 from a muxed 1920_1440 file.
The file shows correct color information and stereo information in Premiere.
I have tried multiple files and at different resolutions with the same results.

When exported from Premiere changing 3D Display Type in First Light...

Anaglyph Red/Cyan - good color information/good stereo information
Anaglyph Amber/Blue - good color information/good stereo information
Interlaced - good color information/lost stereo information
Onion Skin - good color information/good stereo information
Difference - can't tell
Over-Under - good color information/lost stereo information (left eye only top and bottom)
Side-by-Side - lost color information (B&W)/lost stereo information (left eye only on both sides)

On occasion an export will return a file with green bars only and a hint of image.

Forward to support please.

I will send this information on to support but

Hmmmm... I think I'm missing something about the workflow. I had thought I would 1)convert right and left eye files to CFAVIs. 2) Mux R and L files together in First Light. 3) Correct orientation and color correct the Muxed 3D file in First Light. 4) Import Muxed 3D shots into Premiere and edit. 5) Export the completed project from Premiere in Side-by-Side 3D Display Type for presentation with Stereoscopic player.

The things that confuse me are how do I correct Orientation if not on a Muxed file? And then how do I create a side by side of the finished edit if not from a Premiere export?

We shot side by side mirror box and are breaking the Right and Left eyes into separate files doing two windowed R2CF passes for each file (thanks to your insight to do this earlier this year).

I'll send what I've found about the exports on to Jake.

Thanks for the help.

if you got the files muxed and using steroscopic player, you can ask the player to play side by side (or over 2 different screens) , so there is no need to demux ?

We will address bugs in the side-by-side rendering. However, we don't consider side-by-side a finishing format, just a hack for displaying on today's 3D tech. With blur-ray 3D just around the corner, and theatrical presentations, only full resolution per eye with do.

David and Giroud,

A light finally went off in my head and I understand that side-by-side, interlaced, anaglyph etc. are really for previewing only (which is great).

So I'm assuming then to output edited 3D Premiere timeline I would set First Light to Left Eye and export from the Muxed edited timeline yielding an edited Left Eye file of the edited piece. And then set First Light to Right Eye and export the timeline again yielding a Right Eye file of the edited piece.

Am I loosing resolution exporting Left and Right Eye files from the Muxed master? If I'm not, this makes perfect sense. I definitely need full resolution for each eye.

I think, however, I'm experiencing a bug in First Light such that whether I have First Light 3D Display Type set to Left or Right Eye the resulting file is always only Left Eye.

In fact i still have to find a manual (or any description) to work in 3d with cineform.
I am not even sure that ProspectHD is supporting it, since 3D is advertised only for Neo3D.
Anyway, you can easily get work on the left side into a project and then replace all clips with the right side, by just switching between two folders.
When you got both sides rendered, you can mux them, depends the format.
Muxing is not supposed to reduce resolution, since it is just adding another stream of video in the file structure.
but it will give huge files, so if you know the technology used to display, you can build a file that keeps only the necessary data .
For example in you use interlaced display, you can skip half of the lines in each file.
If you use page flipping or dual projector, then it is better to keep the two streams intact.
I doubt that your final encoding will be in Cineform codec, but rather a WMV or mpeg2 file if you want to distribute easily.

Giroud,

Thank you very much for your reply. Actually CineForm (just at the end of last week) released Prospect3D (the PC equivalent of Neo3D). I am using a trial right now. It is not inexpensive but from our perspective the primary advantage is that it allows us to do corrections on our shots - specifically we can get the convergence fine tuned, fix any vertical discrepancies and adjust any skew as well as color work. We shot with a mirror-box (on a 4K sensor) so the two streams are always in good sync. Our first step with any shot is then to break it into two independent streams that we then mux together through p3D.

We were very careful in our shooting and thought the 3D was pretty good on our shots but when we look more closely through Prospect3D, it turns out that some correction (throughFirstLight3D) on every shot makes it better. Our hope with the CineForm product is to be able to have all of our shots with the stereo and color correction just where we want them (as metadata) in a single muxed Premiere timeline and for finishing export from that timeline both a Right and Left Eye stream which we can present in our small theater through Stereoscopic Player (great tool) on a Mitsubushi DLP. P3D is nice in that it allows us to preview our edit as we work in 3D through anaglyph, interlaced, cross-eyed or whatever means we choose.

That's where we stand. The product (P3D) is very new and I think there are still a few bugs in it. I may be doing something wrong but at the moment from the Premiere Muxed timeline I am able to only export a Left Eye stream of our edit (no matter what setting I use in First Light) which is forcing me to build in Premiere another Right Eye version above the Left Eye which it seems I shouldn't have to do.

Thanks again for your thoughts.

that's a great news, because i am using Premiere CS3 and found that dual editing is a bit tedious without proper preview. I use 2 Sanyo FH1 parallel mounted (2 inches space between center of each lens). I made some test and it seems there is no need for any adjustement and rushes are ok right out of the SD card
i got 2 Optoma EP1080 for display with circ. polarizer, so i need both stream with completed resolution and frame rate for the big screen
I use a Zalman 22" 3D monitor for 3d preview/editing , but it use interlaced, so in that case the full res is not necessary (half of the vertical lines are skipped by the player)
it would be great if i could activate preview in 3D from premiere on the zalman.

Giroud,

Although I don't have a Zalman (actually will likely get one tomorrow for another purpose however), I'm all but sure that P3D will support interlaced preview on that monitor.