John, some feature clarification, please?

[Keith Nealy]

Is "Capture can autochop based on the timecode"
The same thing as scene detection?
- Will it work with camera date stamp as well?
- Will it have optical detection?

Describe the DV and HDV out thru firewire in more detail:
- Is it full rez or compressed?
- How much of a performance hit is taken to do that?
- You say it's "a NewTek first" - why is it so special?
- Any chance we'll see program out thru DVI like AVID?

DV Print to tape from the timeline
- does this mean there is 422 contol of tape decks and frame accurate control?

Will there be batch capture?

Anymore feature you can think of?
-many of these are sorely needed and relieve the frustration we have been feeling.

Thanks for your hard work John, and sleepless nights - and thanks for the communications

it really helps.

aloha,

Keith

[Tony R]

Regarding a few of your questions Keith:

Philip said there will be no deck control with SE. It is firewire only at this point.

Also, arent HDV and DV already compressed when being transfered through the firewire cable?

[ScorpioProd]

Well, remember, firewire itself does support deck control.

[John Perkins]

Is "Capture can autochop based on the timecode"
The same thing as scene detection?
- Will it work with camera date stamp as well?
- Will it have optical detection?


It looks at the date stamp and the (sorry, can't remember the actual name) camera start/stop flag.

It doesn't have optical detection. They always seem to cut during pans or miss subtle cuts, so we didn't go there.



Describe the DV and HDV out thru firewire in more detail:
- Is it full rez or compressed?
- How much of a performance hit is taken to do that?
- You say it's "a NewTek first" - why is it so special?
- Any chance we'll see program out thru DVI like AVID?


It is full rez, but it is compressed. They are two different things. Every pixel is there, but the quality is compressed for the 1394 transfer.

The DV output is full DV quality, just like rendering and going back to tape.

For HDV preview, it depends on the HDV device. For example, Sony 1080i is extremely picky about what we send to it. JVC 720p lets us get away with more tricks, so we can get a much better quality preview.

One cool feature is that you aren't limited to DV projects on a DV preview device or HDV projects on an HDV device.

What that means is that you can edit an HDV project, preview on a DV device and record it to DV directly.:D

Not everyone has an HD monitor, so this can be very handy even for editing.


It's hard to quantify the performance hit, but it seems reasonable. For realtime HDV with the HDV preview, you will want a fairly fast system, but you don't need a dual quad core or anything, just a good recent system.

Nobody else has attempted a realtime HDV preview. They have enough trouble with playback ;)

The HDV preview is not a legal standard HDV stream, i.e. not recordable. We got pretty creative to make this functional as a visual preview. The upside is that on some cameras it will look better than the final recordable HDV stream.



DV Print to tape from the timeline
- does this mean there is 422 contol of tape decks and frame accurate control?

Will there be batch capture?


No 422 control. SE 1.0 is 1394 and disk only.

If you need analog and 422, you will want a VT5 and its version of SpeedEDIT. Without analog inputs, 422 is of little use.

Batch capture will be in VT5, but would have delayed SpeedEDIT further. It will be in a future update to SpeedEDIT.




Anymore feature you can think of?
-many of these are sorely needed and relieve the frustration we have been feeling.


I'm too close to it, so I'm finding it way too easy to forget features. If I think of anything I'll let you guys know.


Thanks!

[Seattle-HotShot]

John

Ok, so from what you said, that I could edit HDV, and preview it out to DV, wow, that's sweet!

You mentioned earlier you were using a Sony DVMC-DA1, is that also working to preview HDV (as DV)?

God Bless the Aliens :)

Carlin

[SBowie]

Ok, so from what you said, that I could edit HDV, and preview it out to DV, wow, that's sweet!This is correct.

[John Perkins]

You mentioned earlier you were using a Sony DVMC-DA1, is that also working to preview HDV (as DV)?

Yep, it's about the most standard, simple DV device there is.

Works great.

[Keith Nealy]

Thanks John,

the one question you didn't answer about preview is it possible (in a future release) t get program out thru the DVI port?

I'm till trying to figure out the HDV preview. Is it using more of the processor or more of the graphics card to do this... and if it's the graphics card is it using openGL to do it?

---and if it's a "better looking stream" -

1. why isn't it recordable?
2. the purpose of a preview is to tell you how the image looks so you can make corrections - is this going to be accurate enough to make substantive decisions or do you recommend a better way - say for final color grading?

Thanks John

Oh.. and any idea when the final ship date ill be?

Who says you need sleep... :eek: sleep is for wimps... :sleeping: :caffeine:
Eat at your desk like a real man...
pee in a cup - we can't afford to lose any more time...
And don't forget to whistle while you work!!:compbeati

Aloha,

Keith :cool:

[John Perkins]

Thanks John,

the one question you didn't answer about preview is it possible (in a future release) t get program out thru the DVI port?


You already can, however, the fielding may not be perfect due to several factors. For 1080p and 720p it's nearly perfect.

When you double click in the output window, it goes full screen. If this head is set to the project resolution (1080p, 1080i, 720p, etc) and is connected to an HD TV, there is your output.



I'm till trying to figure out the HDV preview. Is it using more of the processor or more of the graphics card to do this... and if it's the graphics card is it using openGL to do it?


It's a little of both, but mostly CPU. You do need a card that is DX9 compliant, although a lower quality preview is available if you absolutely need it. I'd shell out the $30 for a video card, personally. ;)

You don't need a uber fast GPU, but it has to handle DX9 shaders and you will want 128MB or more onboard memory. For using a large output window while simultaneously running things such as LW that also use a lot of video memory, go for 256MB+.

PCI-Express is highly recommended for HD. AGP8x at the very least, or else you can't force a 1080i image through it fast enough to display.

You can use a smaller output window to work on slower systems, but you seem to want the best preview possible.

For editing HD in realtime, system memory speed is the #1 gotcha. The images are simply massive. A single frame of HD is like 4 SD. 800Mhz dual channel RAM is a must, but if you can support the newer 1066Mhz, all the better.

Otherwise you will be background rendering a lot, but it would still be usable, especially with a smaller output window.


---and if it's a "better looking stream" -

1. why isn't it recordable?
2. the purpose of a preview is to tell you how the image looks so you can make corrections - is this going to be accurate enough to make substantive decisions or do you recommend a better way - say for final color grading?


1. It's not a legal stream. It's close enough that the camera can be tricked into displaying it, but not close enough to write to tape. Writing a fully legal stream takes too long for current computers.

In some cases we can actually double the HDV datarate and get great looking images, but not all devices can handle it.

2. It depends on what quality of the image you are interested in and what device you are previewing on.

The color should be really close, however, the detail may or may not be there. Using a combination of the output window, which can show pixel for pixel and the HDV preview you should be in pretty good shape.

We have no delusions that the RT HDV preview is pixel perfect, just better than other comparable software-only solutions.



Thanks John

Oh.. and any idea when the final ship date ill be?



I hate that question ;)

No, all I can say is very close. We are still hammering away on release candidates.

I can't wait to show it off, but at the same time, I want it as solid as possible.

I'm not even TOUCHING those last comments...8/

LOL

[Keith Nealy]

Thanks John, for such detailed answers.

You da man.

You win a bunch of silly drinks with umbrellas the next time you come to Hawaii.

aloha,

Keith