Questions for any Phantom experienced editors.

We are budgeting for a first time Phantom shoot and are having some problems coming up with cost figures.

Instead of just being upfront with all the costs, the rental company keeps adding more
gear they want to rent us or, more to the point here, charging for more steps in the post
process.

My questions revolve around getting the footage into FCP.

They say they want to do the conversion from RAW bayered files to a useful file type for FCP themselves.

I am not sure what they are charging for that but it must be vexing the producer since I
am now being asked about doing this process in post.

I looked up the Glue Tools option. There seems to be software that runs in Windows and converts the files to quicktime best as I can tell.

And there seems to be another piece of software that allows you to use the footage live
in FCP. It doesn't look like it will play real time in FCP unless you have a Kona 3 card.
Looks like this software allows you to do LUT's, scaling and other operations that you
you not be doing if you were editing with a converted quicktime file.

We don't have a Kona 3. So I am going to tell the producer the costs would be $999
for the Glue Tools software and approx $3000 for a Kona 3 card which of course
we would then have for other projects.

Does anyone have experience with this?
Does it seem right?

Or is the conversion of this media so problematic that it's just best to let them convert it.

I haven't done a full Phantom shoot yet but I did the research and some short tests for workflow.

You COULD use VisionResearch's Windows only software on a Bootcamp/Parallels/etc. Mac if you like or pimp out a Windows box solely for the purpose. Check that against the total cost of Glue Tools and Kona3.

My short tests lead to me choosing the GlueTools route for ease of use. You can edit right from the RAW (.Cine?) files if you like but that's only for really fast turnaround and not a snappy process even with a Kona and FAST drives. Use the GT to generate your ProRes files and then test out the workflow from FCP finished edit to whatever you are finishing on.
DPX into a grading system is a good proven workflow.

Whether your costs account for a system fast enough to do the conversions is another matter. Do you need same day conversions like feature style digital dailies, or "whenever" conversions like a low budget doc where editing might not start until after everything is captured?

Are the files being verified on set and are the copies being checksummed for verification? Some of this might be included in their quotes but you won't know until you see a breakdown of what they're offering.

ak
Sleeplings, AWAKE!

Do what we did on one project was play out from the Phantom to a P2 recorder in the field...the P2 Mobile. That recorded onto P2 as AVCIntra 1080p 29.97. We didn't touch the raw footage the Phantom recorded.


www.shanerosseditor.com

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sorry, but what is a phantom project?

[www.visionresearch.com]



www.strypesinpost.com

Phantom editors:




www.strypesinpost.com

Phantom is a camera. Or a series of cameras, I guess.

They are known for their range of high speed cameras.



www.strypesinpost.com

OK guys, thanks very much for the input.

We have scheduled a meeting with myself and the rental facility later in the week.

What I think we have settled on for this shoot is to go ahead and let them do the conversion.
This will cost about $900/hr of shot material.

If this project goes well, we will likely be shooting more with the Phantom cameras and will
then probably go with the Glue Tools software and a Kona 3. At least that's what it looks like now.

Shane, I will inquire about using the P2 Mobile and avoiding the RAW media entirely.
But for this first shoot we will go with their Cinemags.

We will let them help us get our feet wet with this project and go from there.

Might be worth getting a competing quote from Fotokem's nextLAB.

- Justin Barham -

Phantom v710 there new beast capable of taking 1.4m fps

Yes!

1 million 400 thousand frames per second!

1,400,000fps

[www.visionresearch.com]



For instant answers to more than one hundred common FCP questions, check out the LAFCPUG FAQ Wiki here : [www.lafcpug.org]

At a resolution of 128 x 8 pixels.

- Justin Barham -

Noah Kadner is shooting with that cam as we speak. When he has time I'm sure he will chime in and speak to this thread.

Michael Horton
-------------------

Noah will be a good lead and if I was producing this series (I will be pitching a show this Summer that will use some high speed photography), I would make a couple of friendly calls to colleagues who are already producing shows that use the Phantom on a regular basis like:

1. BASE Productions - Fight Science on Nat Geo [www.baseproductions.com]
2. Workaholic Productions - Extreme Marksmen on History [www.workaholictv.com]

Both are LA-based and if you are nice and make an inquiry, I bet either would take a few minutes to educate you to a lot of the gotchas in using the Phantom. I find with using high tech new products like this, it is always prudent to talk to your colleagues who have done the same thing, in a real world workflow that has successfully gone to air. There are often potential minefields that have nothing to do with the pure tech when you use products like the Phantom. You might also consider the Weisscam as well, there are pluses and minuses in comparison.

I did a review of the AG-HPG20 for Ken Stone last year [www.kenstone.net] and out of all of the solutions around, I really like Shane's idea. AVC-INTRA is a great codec, we are already shooting our shows on P2, why not consider recording the Phantom output with the AG-HPG20? I would want to run a couple of tests to compare quality between the Phantom output and what the AG_HPG20 could record but it should be close in quality as AVC INTRA is such a solid codec.

Dan