iMac Retina 5K or Mac Pro for basic 4K editing

[Rob Katz]

Originally Posted by Jeroen Wolf

Thanks for clearing up that audio issue, William.

jeroen-

i was wondering if you had any updates on your imac retina 5k as a fcp x edit tool?

have you done any heavy color correction or work with raw footage?

any and all thoughts are appreciated.

be well.

rob
smalltalk productions/nyc

[Jeroen Wolf]

Originally Posted by Rob Katz

jeroen-

i was wondering if you had any updates on your imac retina 5k as a fcp x edit tool?

have you done any heavy color correction or work with raw footage?

any and all thoughts are appreciated.

be well.

rob
smalltalk productions/nyc

No heavy corrections, Rob. I don't really do that- yet... Until I start shooting S-Log and use Da Vinci hopefully later this year. Light corrections, yes, all the time with 4K material from a GH4. What can I say? It seems fast enough, really no complaints.

RAW- nope.

The machine crashed once yesterday- for the first time. No idea why. I was uploading a bunch of footage using FileZilla.

I enjoy working with the iMac Retina, it feels good, the screen is great, for the quality and real estate. I like the 3TB harddrive. It has made me forget my 2011 Mac Pro faster than I thought...

So... no surprises, major insights or news, just a good solid editing machine for all my work. 4K, HD, long and short stuff...

[William Hohauser]

And so it comes:

OS X 10.10.3 Now Supports Dell's Dual-Cable 5K Monitor on Retina iMac and Mac Pro - Mac Rumors

[Brock Burwell]

Just got an the 5K iMac i5 3.5 about 2 weeks ago and I have to say that this computer is amazing. I got it for work and I can see myself purchasing this computer for my home in the next couple months.

I have been shooting footage on a gh4 (so 4k) and I have had absolutely no issues with slowdown so far. I've only worked on a couple projects (one being a 2 minute video with around 40 individual clips) and it has run very smoothly. I am having issues with Lightroom being slow, but I hear that may be more about Adobe than my machine.

I absolutely would not hesitate to get this computer again.

[Jeroen Wolf]

Originally Posted by William Hohauser

And so it comes:

OS X 10.10.3 Now Supports Dell's Dual-Cable 5K Monitor on Retina iMac and Mac Pro - Mac Rumors

Who needs 5K at that pricepoint? I prefer a decent, affordable 4K monitor...

[William Hohauser]

Absolutely, I agree.

[James R. Wilson Sr.]

I've been thinking along the same lines and researching users comments and opinions. One is hard pressed to push the iMac price to four grand with all the bells and whistles. Do the same thing with a Mac Pro and you can be at 10K quickly, before you add a monitor or two. I decided to go with a loaded 5K iMac to get up to speed on 4K editing. I'll find a dozen other uses for it if it proves too inefficient of the 4K task, and I'll bite the bullet on the Mac Pro. For that difference in investment, it's almost worth going iMac just to see how it does the job.

[Sabyasachi Patra]

How is the iMac Retina 5K monitor for colour grading? Is it good? Do you further need to calibrate it?

[James R. Wilson Sr.]

I've been out on assignment and haven't had time to pick my 5K iMac unit up from the Apple store. When I get back to town and get it up and running, I'll give you a quick review. Funny thing about calibration, I have spent hundreds of dollars on color calibration tools/software over the years and I always end up going to "Adobe RGB 1998" as my color choice . Did the same thing on this new 15" MacBook Pro that I got a few weeks ago. The spyder calibration units and the other display choices never look as good as plain old RGB 1998 to me.

[William Hohauser]

Apple now includes color space choices for Rec709 and SMPTE. These are better for color grading however you still need to be careful especially with third party monitors. Download grey scale charts (preferably a linear gradient from left to right and a step chart with at least a dozen grey scale increments more is better) and import them into FCP or whatever program you use to edit. See how the chart looks on the timeline. If the blacks drop off to quickly or the light grays go white too soon (the step chart will really show this), you need to start calibrating first with the monitor itself in the case of a third party monitor or via software in the case of an Apple monitor. Apple monitors happen to be very well calibrated out of the box but they may not be exactly broadcast or cinema quality. If your work is for the web then you are probably OK. Hardware calibration works only if you have the monitor already set to see a full gray scale.

[Erick Perdomo]

hello everyone. I want to replace my classic imac 27" i5 from 2009 which still works...slowly...a good machine..and I want to get the latest 27" 5K i7 but...is too much for my budget..so looking at buying used.
I came across a late 2014 i7 with 32GB Ram, 4GB video and a 3TB fusion drive...this sound fantastic..
I know that the latest 2015 imacs have a newer processor but the late 2014 is a a great machine except that while doing some research I keep coming across forums discussing overheating issues...I know that some people will always freak out over computers but some of those high temperatures are not ideal I think...
I read that the new 2015 5k imacs run cooler so all those reports about the earlier model cannot just be geeks overreacting..I will use the computer for FCP 7 (if I can really install it! I know it's old but works for me) or Premiere 5.5 or even FCX...some AFX- not intensive...some exporting to Pro Res and converting those videos (some as long as 2 hours) to H264...
fellow videographers who own the late 2014 5k imac with an i7 processor and the 4GB video card...what's your experience? Are those reports of overheating real or an overreaction?
thanks a lot for your input...

Erick

[Jeroen Wolf]

Never had any issues with mine...

[Erick Perdomo]

thanks for the feedback Jeroen. I guess that some intense -gaming etc activities could make the imac work really hard...my cameras are all 1080p now but some 4K might be in the future and I believe you have a GH4 which records in 4K and the video I just watched looked great- interesting project by the way...like a document of human existence. From babies to over 90! wow... amazing document.
I'm considering buying it for $3k CDN which is about $1700 less than buying a new imac from Apple here in Canada-with similar specs...
thanks
E

[Jeroen Wolf]

Glad you liked the video, Erick, thanks.

Shot most of that with the GH2 and some with the GH4. Have done a lot with the GH4 though and never felt the computer was struggling. What I did find though was that working with HD was ridicilously fast!

But I received my Sony FS5 this weekend and as soon as I have the time, I will start working with the camera and its files on my iMac- and that should be the real test.

The XAVC codec from the FS5 is supposed to really strain your editing station...

[Sabyasachi Patra]

I need your opinion on the suitability of the iMac with the following specifications for 4k editing. iMac with i7 skylake processor is not available in my country. iMac specs:
Late 2015 retina 27 inch
3.3GHz quad-core Intel Core i5 processor
32GB memory
2TB Fusion Drive1
AMD Radeon R9 M395 with 2GB video memory

I am told that apple online store is not available in my country, and the i7 is a configurable option. So it is not available. Please let me know if the above specs are fine for normal 4k editing with heavy VFX.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi