ProRes: What are your thoughts?

Met up with a friend recently over the Final Cut World Tour, and one of the things we were discussing was ProRes. He seems to have some render problems with ProRes and avoids using it for now. I have worked with the codec a few times and personally, I love the quality and data size. But I would like to know what your thoughts are on it and what issues you may have on it, if any.

Feel free to state your system (intel or ppc, quicktime/fcp/os version, rendering prores in color/fcp, codec you commonly work on, etc..)



www.strypesinpost.com

My facility is going to FCP / ProRes HQ approximately end of July from all PC Avid systems (good riddance to bad rubbish). After doing a battery of tests on my MBP, I like the quality & file size very much... but it's a very "vanilla" codec. I wish there were more customizable export settings from Quicktime Pro:

? Embedded alpha (Millions Of Colors + = we need a new Alpha Channel codec option that doesn't kill us in file size)
? Choice of interlace or deinterlace (currently interlace only)
? Choice of RGB or 601 / 709 color space (currently "Enable Chroma 4:4:4 Filtering" only)
? Resolution choices

It exports cleanly out of FCP BUT I found a little bug when exporting a ProRes HQ clip out of Quicktime Pro 7.4.5 = the gamma changes (export is much darker).

When life gives you dilemmas...make dilemmanade.

> Embedded alpha

Checked out Microcosm yet, Joey? Haven't tried, it myself, as companies are generally very scrimpy on cash.

[www.digitalanarchy.com]

[codecs.onerivermedia.com]

> Choice of interlace or deinterlace (currently interlace only)

Isn't it progressive if field dominance is set to none?

>Choice of RGB or 601 / 709 color space

I think it acts like the Uncompressed codecs- render on a SD frame size and it renders as 601, render in HD it becomes 709. No reason to think otherwise (SD rendered in 709!?)

They were smart with the ProRes codec to include the chroma smoothing.. Think it's been a feature request for a while on the Uncompressed codecs.

Else, it would be interesting to hear from you... I checked that there are some gamma shifts going in and out of AE with ProRes.



www.strypesinpost.com

I use ProRes extensively, and in some pretty wacky ways. Last week I had to do some SD-to-HD blow-ups, on a timeline that prevented sending them out to be done in hardware. I ran them through Compressor using ProRes as my destination codec ? but at 1920x1440, so I could crop them in After Effects. Worked great. Turned out to be around 180 Mbps.

The only complaint I have is the aforementioned one about no alpha-channel support. That's hardly surprising in a YUV codec, I think. But if it's even technically possible, it'd be a nice addition when doing graphics.

It largely depends on your acquisition format and delivery format.

If your shooting uncompressed HD you should check out [www.bitjazz.com] This is a great "LOSSLESS" codec that solves all of the issues (and many more) that gafixjoe raises.

In the "LOSSY" codecs (Which ProRes is one) there's also Cineform - [www.cineform.com]

If quality output and working with effects applications is a concern then both of these codecs are probably a better choice. However, last time I used either of these codecs FCP did not allow them to be placed with the other codecs supported by FCP's realtime rendering such as DVCPro etc. I was editing a feature and it really didn't impede my progress.

If workflow is an issue and you predominantly do the vast majority of your work within the FCS then its pretty hard to beat ProRes.

One thing to keep in mind is that if your finishing in HD then you DON"T need to work in ProResHQ, the 140Mb ProRes works great. If your going out to film you might want to run a test with ProResHQ.