APPLE RELEASES NEW MAC PRO -- Our Take On the Matter

It was just over a week ago that Apple began shipping its newest edition of its Mac Pro computer and the creative world is teaming with opinions.  We've been reading first impressions, laughed at parodies and watched reviews and op-eds like WIRED, MacRumors, The VERGE.  There's one thing in common, everyone loves it...and hates it.

We went to the Apple Store at Fashion Place in Salt Lake CIty--the new shiny story at City Creek didn't have one--last week to put it through the paces with some of our 5k footage we shot in Morocco [watch some here] in October.  That's about where anything interesting ends.  Turns out that unlike a car company that shows you the car that has every option imaginable added to wow you, Apple's stores show you the entry, base, boring model.  I think you get a clear picture.  It got more embarrassing from there.  Apple just updated it's Final Cut Pro X software to 10.1, which means it is optimized for the new steroid-infused CPU and GPU and 4k cinema, only they don't have it installed on any of their machines, including the new Mac Pro.  Our Apple business rep was rosy in the cheeks.

Now we don't use FCPX, we migrated to Adobe's Premiere Pro CS6--are avoiding CC--and are migrating again to AutoDesk's SMOKE, so even if the Mac Pro had Apple's current software we wanted to test the machine with software we use.  Well--awkward pause--we couldn't install any software on the new Pro.

That's a long story to get to the point that, we didn't get much of anything out of our hands on with the Mac Pro.  Let's move past that and get a little more hypothetical and presumptive.  And be forewarned, you probably won't learn any major revelation here, but you will walk away with one more perspective.

Digital cinema professionals don't store their digital cinema projects on their computers.  So having only 1TB of storage internally doesn't create a problem.  And with it being the newest make of SSD (solid state hard drive) it is very responsive.  Applications, searches, tasks...they all happen very <emphasis added> quickly.  What is unfortunate are a few changes that have taken place which are different and yet to be determined  pro or con.

External docs, drives and chassis offer extreme customization but  also create a mess for the workspace.  Things like SANLink and ThunderLink offer thunderbolt to fiber connectivity. Sonnet Tech, MacSales, Magma and others give you a million and one--number is not proven and maybe slightly exaggerated--ways to add and connect hardware to your edit suite.  Gone are the days of hiding it in a larger silver cheese grader box.

Now what about working on footage, photos or sorting your Word docs?  How does the workflow standup to the connectivity changes.  We have iMac's, MacMini, MBPros and MacPros connected to our of our arrays.  It is a 72TB SAN and we edit 5k footage we film with our RED EPIC.  We use thunderbolt to fiber converters, AFP and 1GbE and it all works pretty seamless.  So, having not yet hooked up a new Mac Pro, we are under the assumption that it will be a fairly simple integration.

Where we're excited is to see how quick we can get read/write speeds to our array with Thunderbolt2 and a SANLink2.  Hooked up to a Thunderlink box at 8Gb speeds we had r/w speeds floating at 750MB/s.  That's pretty quick.  Will it be faster with the new hardware?  We'll let you know.  If you don't have a SAN you would have a Pegasus2 or equivalent for individual suite work.  Even through AFP and gigabit ethernet you can share a lot of data efficiently.

Its unfortunate that Apple eliminated PCIe slots, settled for 1GbE, didn't spring for HDMI 2.0 and created Medusa...roll with the punches.

The new Pro has been proven to be upgradeable, thanks to OWC's teardown.   Companies like AutoDesk, Adobe, AVID will need to rewrite software to take advantage of 16GB GPU power and 12 core processing.  Maybe that will eliminate the need for RED ROCKET, Kona cards or the like.  But don't expect it in the first few quarters.

When we've had ample time to do a real hands on with legitimate software and workflow assets we'll write an update to this.  In the meantime, get eat a nice salad and think happy thoughts.

*images are not owned by sansom media but pulled from the sites listed [apple.com, Sonnet, Promise Technology macrumors.com, macrumors.fr, makeuseof.com, blog.gaborit-d.com, pix-geeks.com, technabob.com]

Business Expansion and Server Solution // Dilemmas & Suggestions

If you're not a business don't tune out just yet.  There will be some valuable info for you too.  Whether you're a blogging mom, music/movie junky, a small retail business or a larger production studio you've all probably felt the growing pains of digital storage.  You're left with a few option, buy another external drive, try yourself or pay someone to install a larger internal drive, buy a new computer or maybe abandon technology and go back to sticks and stones.

Let's lay out a few numbers.  Some basic math (if you can call it that) 1024 MB = 1 GB.  And in kind, 1024 GB = 1 TB.  A typical HD movie from iTunes will set you back 2-4 GB each.  A song from iTunes about 9 MB. If you have a 250 GB hard drive once you subtract room taken up by your OS, applications and such, you'll probably have 180-200 GB.  SO, you could put 67 HD movies, 22,200 songs or 9,090 RAW photos.  Sounds like a lot, until you run out of space.  You're not just going to have all of one and none of the others.

So at Sansom Media Inc. our dilemma is having footage spread over too many hard drives.  Here's our workflow.  Every project gets four hard drives, yup 4.  Two Lacie Rugged (500 GB or 1 TB each, depending on the project), and two 3.5 inch bare drives, usually 1 TB each.  I'll use our last commercial shoot for Rogue Fitness as an example.  While in the field, we use the two Lacie Rugged drives along with ShotPut Pro.  We'll either offload cards throughout the day or do them all at once, again depending on the project.  ShotPut Pro transfers the data to each Rugged and verifies everything.  This is a lot better than just copying them using Finder and dragging and dropping.  Mac's will write invisible files when you do this and you don't want extra stuff like that with your footage.

Once we finish the shoot we put them in our Pelican 1050 case (it fits two perfectly) and we carry them with us in a silver briefcase handcuffed to our wrist (slight exaggeration).  When we arrive to the studio we use Final Cut 7's Log and Transfer tool to transcode the footage to Apple ProRes 422.  These are now the files we'll work with.  And make sure you separate your raw footage drives to two different locations.  The two bare drives are now clones of each other, one being a back up while editing.

We have so many drives now and we're constantly pulling clips from each to create content for clients.  We need a solution that will store and distribute all the transcoded footage to multiple edit bays, be RAID 6 and not cost heaps of cash.  Here are the options we've found:

DROBO S/FS/Pro/800i/1200i $400 for 4 TB or $4,000 for 16 TB (drives not included)

• from USB 2.0 to iSCSI gigabit ethernet protocol but has a max of 125 Mb/s throughput, you can only 3-5 HD streams while editing.
• so easy a caveman's dog can use it.
• dual disk, RAID 6 style, back up
• great for business that have a lot going on but files are not HD video. (ie. documents, point of sale, brochures, images, small videos for social media. general data storage and retrieval.
• range of costs to buy and lower cost to expand

Promise Technology - Pegasus - $2,000 for 12 TB

• uses Thunderbolt and has a max of 10 Gb/s throughput or 1,125Mb/s  That's 1.25 GB/second. FAST!
• Drives aren't able to provide this speed yet (still trying to figure this one out).
• brand new and not industry tested
• no network RAID capabilities
• superb for high end editing and animation.
• average cost to buy and expand

G|SPEED FC XL - $11,000 for 16 TB

• 4Gb/s fiber channel
• all sorts of RAID configurations
• network friendly editing
• fast performance
• high cost to buy and expand

It's important to remember that RAID 5 or 6 save the space of two drives for back up so 16 TB is more like 11 TB in a RAID 6.

Our final opinion at this point.  If you're a music junkie or just have large amounts of file storage needs look at a Drobo or Drobo S.  You can have all your music, videos, family photos, Office files and more and not worry about storage again for a long while.  You can also use  file sharing on the computers at home to access files on that drive.  Wifi works, hard wired Gigabit ethernet is much better.

If you're a small retail business give the Drobo FS or 800i a try.  For small production companies, do individual workstations dedicated to specific clients and maybe one bay for the smaller, less frequent group and when you need to access media from the other dives use file sharing on the computers.  You can even write a simple apple script that will tell the computers to automatically connect to each other when  turned on.

For the larger production studios that want to have multiple bays edit off of one server the G|SPEED FC XL (fiber channel, extra large) will probably be your best bet.

Hopefully this has been helpful and not confusing.  If anything it's a good place to start as you search for increased storage solutions that suit your needs.  We'd love to hear what you've found.  Comment and share it with everyone.

Also, check out the workflow video Chase Jarvis Inc. did.  It's another great resource.

Apple's Final Cut Pro X - RELEASED TODAY

Final Cut Pro X images courtesy Apple Inc.

Final Cut Pro X released this morning and it's so exciting and yet so never racking.  I want to jump up and down for joy and stand on guard, nervous to let it into my life.  So many confused feelings.  Not everyone gets to be Larry Jordan and use if for two months before the rest of us coach class-less professionals.  He says he loves it, wishes it had some features that are forthcoming, but loves it nonetheless.

"Finally!  Apple released Final Cut Pro X (and new versions of Motion and Compressor) this morning at 5:30 AM.  I've been working with the program for the last two months, and talking extensively with Apple about this new version since February.

Final Cut Pro X represents a complete rewrite of the entire application.

* Background processing of just about everything.

* 64-bit memory support so project size no longer crashes into RAM memory

*Multi-processor support so everything is a LOT!! faster

* A totally new interface

* Amazing new features like the magnetic timeline, connected clips, and built-in color correction."

You can buy Final Cut Pro X on Apple's App Store for $300.  Motion 5 and Compressor are both available for $50 each.  You're $400 all in.


So a few things to look for when moving over to the new Final Cut Pro X; given that this is a total rewrite of the software there is always the chance that something could go terribly wrong.  I'd run a few test with the program and some FCP project files.  Make back up copies of your projects in the FCP 7 friendly format because most likely once you convert them to FCPX you won't be able to revert back.

More useful links:

Final Cut Pro X, Motion 5, Compressor 4: Graphics card compatibility - LINK

 Final Cut Pro X Supported Cameras - LINK

ProApps QuickTime Codecs - LINK

Gary Adcock - Ready Or Not, Here It Comes Chicago Illinois USA ©2011 CreativeCOW.net. All rights reserved.

Gary's Review

Compressor and Motion 5 freeze frames below.

Compressor images courtesy Apple Inc.

Motion 5 images courtesy Apple Inc.

My Best Joke Yet... And Probably Ever

Unintentionally, I came up with my best joke to date… Why did Apple Inc.'s name for Final Cut Pro 7 jump to Final Cut Po X (10)? Because 7, 8 9. Yes the punchline isn't original but neither is Jay-Z's song, Young Forever, and it's still good.  If you're still saying I don't get it, I feel sorry for you.

Now that I'm done proving myself… We wrapped a little early today which was not a bad thing at all. Today detoured a little from the purpose of this shoot, film 3 commercials, as we ended up filming some great interviews and other footage. We also filmed a guy named Joe. He uses a multi-million dollar laser to do precision cutting of steel. Cool technology and a super cool dude.  As Tim put it, "he resembles Willie Nelson."

We used two AF100 panasonic cameras on the interviews.  One with a Nikon 50mm f/1.8 and the other, Tim's 50-135mm f/2.8 Pentax. Both work really good in interview situation.  Attached to the two AF100s are SmallHD's DP6 monitors. Tim turned me onto them a while back and it's been one of the best additions to the AF100 kit. I've stuck a few pictures in this post so you can see them in action. …sorta. Tomorrow is a broll day of Columbus and the surrounding countryside. Clouds are finally breaking today after hard rain since Monday. It should be a stellar day for Columbus beauty shots.

Rogue Fitness Commercial Shoot - Columbus, Ohio

I've brought Tim Irwin with me on a commercial shoot for Rogue Fitness this week and while making our way here we stopped off in an airport and while changing planes we encountered this.  Pop quiz… What is this and where is it?

Day 2 here the beautiful capitol city of Ohio -- Columbus -- if you haven't freshened up on your geography lately.  The last time I was here was during The Arnold Classic a few months back and the weather is pretty much the same, cold, windy and wet.  Although it is now 40 degrees and not 19 so there is green on the trees.

We're shooting with two Panasonic AF100s and a mix of Lumix, Nikon, Sigma and Pentax lenses.  We also have a small slider dolly that has been fun to use a bit too.  Mostly, however, we're sticking to our guns -- handheld and sticks.  Today consisted of welding, drilling, cutting, scraping, grinding, pressing...a lot of 'ings.  The commercials are gonna be great and the concepts are pretty solid but quite simple, just the way we like it.  I've been going overboard lately and complicating a lot of things when in the end we need a solid storyline and stellar footage.  Luckily we have five more day of just that!

We have a 4 card SDHC offloading solution for now (this post talks about the problem).  It works well -- we just offloaded 4 16GB shot cards to redundant drives at once (see the picture below) and had no problems.  It just isn't as clean as the cube with four slots.  It consists of a Belkin USB four port hub, two Lexar Professional compactflash/SD card readers, a SanDisk reader and the MacBook Pro SDXC card slot.  To offload the footage we're using the trusty ShotPut Pro application.  Love, love love it!  And checking all offloaded footage in Final Cut Pro (soon to be Final Cut Pro X -- AND we'll be able to edit in the native codec rather than transcode everything)!

Apple Debuts Final Cut Pro X At NAB

image courtesy Apple Inc.

So Apple debuted the latest upgrade to their pro film editing software Final Cut Pro.  It's new name, Final Cut Pro X (10).  I'm not quite sure why they went from the current Final Cut Pro Studio 7 clear up to 10, but stranger things have happened in the universe.

Looking at the two screen captures above iMovie 11 (the pumpkin) and Final Cut Pro X (the Audi), look quite similar.  I suppose its what's under the hood that counts.  I don't have time to tell you all the features so a few that I like (pulled from Larry Jordan's blog):

• 64-bit, which will allow the program the use of as much RAM as you give it.
• Background Rendering
• Sample rate precision in scrolling an audio clip
• Pitch corrected audio scrolling in slow motion
• Displaying waveforms at a size big enough to see what they look like
• Displaying audio levels within the waveform that are approaching clipping (as one engineer near me remarked, “And THAT took us a LONG while to figure out.”)
• Displaying audio peaks for the entire mix that are approaching clipping
• Improved audio cleanup controls, which can be applied or ignored by the user (these look to be borrowed from Soundtrack Pro)
• Adding fades with a keystroke, or by pulling in the top corners of a clip, with four different fade shapes, rather than the limit of two inside FCP 7; these, too, borrow interface ideas from Soundtrack Pro.
• FCP X now uses all the processors on your system, not just one and a half.
• It supports editing video image sizes from standard definition up to 4K.
• It uses fewer tools from the Tool palette (which is no longer there, by the way) by making the cursor smarter. WHERE you click something determines WHAT you can do with it.
• A lot of existing features are jazzed up (linking and grouping are replaced by the much more elegant Clip Connection and Compound Clips)
• While new features like the magnetic timeline, permanent audio sync and auto-metadata generation are flat-out stunning.

MacRumors reports that the version debuted today was "nowhere near the final version" and the sources say to expect much more to come.

RELEASE DATE: June 2011
PRICING: $299
AVAILABILITY: App Store (downloadable)

Larry Jordan Blog

For your viewing pleasure.  Thanks Emmanuel Pampuri.