next thread »

[pld]

Hi.
I study film production an the class will now make our last film here at the school and the photographer and the producer want to hire an Arri Alexa to shoot the film with but none of us has ever worked with this camera before so it starts to came some questions about the post production workflow and I hope you can help me with this questions.

They want to shoot the material in ARRIRAW and my question is which way is best workflow with ARRIRAW when it will be edited in Final Cut Pro?
They also want me to be on set and transfer the material to a MacBook Pro and sit and log on set. What is the best way to get the material into the MacBook Pro on set?

I guess ARRIRAW takes a lot of space on the hard driver so we will probabley need to buy more hard drives, but how much space is usually an hour of material take?

We will then edit the film on a Mac Pro with 2x2.66 Ghz Quad Core Intel Xeon and 16GB of memory. Will this computer handle to work with the material?

Thanks
/Jesper

[robstiff]

The Alexa can record both to the SxS cards in HD while you are recording to an external device that
captures (.ari) ARRIRAW files. You can do your edit using the ProRes444 quicktimes recorded to the SxS Cards
and then later conform your edit decision list to the ARRIRAW files since they share the same time code.

If you are using DaVinci Resolve for your color grading you can copy your graded settings per clip by taking grabs
in Resolve from the HD footage and then later apply them to the ARRIRAW files.

We actually color graded ARRIRAW footage (2880x1620) on a newer iMAC with DaVinci Resolve and then brought it into FCP 7 with no issues. However it will be much easier on the graphic card to edit and grade with 1920x1080 HD footage.

If you can color grade your footage on a good monitor like the new Sony Professional OLED Picture Monitor you will
see just how amazing the Alexa Footage really is....

[pld]

Thank you for the answer.

So the best way is to use the Prores files for edting and then when it's time for color correction I conform an EDL to the ARRIRAW files? We will use Apple Color for color correction.

I have read that Prores 4444 takes about 131GB/hour on the hard drive but how much hard drive space does the ARRIRAW material takes?

/Jesper

[robstiff]

There's a lot of options out there to do the job!

ARRIRAW (.ari) files are 7mb for recording using the 16:9 Alexa Sensor Crop Standard in the Alexa EV & EV+
So, if you record 60 seconds of footage at 24 frames per second that's:
60 seconds X 24 fames X 7mb = 10080 mega bytes = 9.84 Gigabytes of ARRIRAW footage in a shot folder,
plus an audio file and an XML file.

Apple Color, not a fan of since Apple discontinued it. You can get DaVinci Resolve Lite for free; however you will
only be able to grade 1920x1080 footage, nothing higher resolution unless you buy the full version. You can speed grade
the LogC Alexa ProRes444 footage in DaVinci Resolve lite using the auto color feature or applying the built in
Alexa LogC to Rec709 3DLUT in the software.

The new Adobe Premiere will also ingest native ARRIRAW footage for direct editing.

[robstiff]

The new DaVinci Resolve 9 that was shown at NAB has editing capabilities
similar to Final Cut Pro. It also has a bunch of built-in looks such as the Bleech By Pass look, etc.
I heard sometime in June it could be shipping.

Again, there is a great variety of options working with Alexa footage.
I can say up to this point it has been really simple and going with the Alexa was the right choice!

[Guenter N.]

Jesper,

the first and most important question I would ask - why do you need ARRI Raw?
Does this project involve a lot of CGI and green screen?
Do you plan a theatrical distribution?
ARRI RAW will require additional external recorders and requires also more post cost.
There's no doubts that you will get the best results with ARRI RAW- but it will cost you a lot more.

I would think ProRes 4:4:4:4 1920x1080 is a great choice and it will work with your Final Cut and APPLE Color software.
Just make sure all SxS footage is recorded in Log-C and not in Rec709 to allow 14 stops of dynamic range for best grading options.

Good luck.

[Nick Shaw]

… then when it's time for color correction I conform an EDL to the ARRIRAW files? We will use Apple Color for color correction.

Apple Color does not support ARRIRAW, so that is not an option. If you really need to go ARRIRAW then DaVinci Resolve is probably your best option, but it sound like you might be better sticking to LogC ProRes 4444 as Guenter says.

[Michael Borenstein]

FYI.  The Gemini was just officially certified for ARRIRaw recording by our Workflow team.

Happy Shooting.
Regards
Mike

[adrianjebef]

I have been Beta testing the Gemini 444 recording ARRIRAW for almost 3 weeks now. The results have been fantastic and as Mike mentioned, ARRIRAW Certification is here. The Gemini is your most cost-effective option.

However, if you have no prior experience with recording, handling, or posting ARRIRAW or uncompressed 444 HD material I would hesitate to commit to these workflows. File size, quality control, and simple workflow management are much more complex when going from a ProRes workflow to an ARRIRAW one. I would highly recommend that you have the chance to demo, apprentice, or simply visit an ALEXA ARRIRAW production before deciding to embark on this path...

[robstiff]

Send Convergent Design(http://www.convergent-design.com/) an Email requesting a
link to download a ARRIRAW  (.ari) test sequence.
You can then bring it into DiVinci Resolve Lite (Free) and work with it, convert it into ProRes, Etc.
DaVinci Resolve Lite does automatically down convert the resolution from 2880x1620 to 1920x1080.

Once you use an Alexa, it will be the only digital cinema camera you will want to use for your projects, etc...