Hmm...and.... what does this mean for Network Rendering and HDV workflow?

I have been experimenting more with Network Rendering - and decided to see what would happen with an HDV resolution project. The rendering times for an HDV style project are much longer than for a DV res project (not surprisingly*) which means to me the workflow would be very appropriate for this sort of work. BUT..... I can't imagine that you would render using the native m2t format using NR (the stitching process would add an unacceptable generation loss)... and so what format would you render HDV projects to using NR? Can you even do it?

This sort of brings up a wider question/observation I have made about NR and the need for all computers in the NR to have the same plugins/features as all the others. That includes all plug-ins like Cineform, Graffiti, Pixelan etc etc etc. But... Vegas is the only part that truly allows you to have multiple installs for the purposes of NR.

Am I missing something here? Will V6 have something to make HDV resolution rendering possible with NR (possibly a built-in Cineform-like capability)? I truly hope so.. as otherwise some of my renders are going to take an immense amount of time*.

*Remember that video loop I posted about the other day... where NR reduced the render times from 8 hours down to 2.5? I decided to see what would happen to the base (single CPU) render times by switching the project over to HDV 1080i - and rendering to the MPEG2 HDV 1080i template. The same project looks like it will take 24 hours to render. Without network rendering... that is going to be a bear to have to deal with.

I can only assume that Vegas has to do some extra work to make the 480 up to 1080. Yea?

Maybe - maybe not.

Dave

I can only assume that Vegas has to do some extra work to make the 480 up to 1080. Yea?

Dave... maybe I misunderstood your post... but are you thinking that somehow I didn't know this? My post above is purely about how NR fits into the HDV workflow based upon the understanding (utterly obvious of course) that it will take longer to render HDV projects.

Have I misunderstood the point of your post?

Those are good points Liam, I have yet to try the NR, but the one thing that makes even working on the same project dificult, is the fact that without cineform on my laptop, Vegas cannot obviously open up the DI avi files. Everything must be done with the M2t's. And yeah slllloooow....

I didnt even think about the NR end of it. Excelent point!
More questions hopefully to be answered withthe release of V6. That is if they have even gonne down that road.

The main thing for me is that I want to be able to show my project to my client in Vegas with it stored on a FW drive I swap between my main editing computer and the laptop I take with me.Most of my work with the HDV stuff is done on the main computer. So I dont want to move the Con HD to my laptop, but it woould be nice to be able to show the project on my laptop and do some minor changes on scene.I wonder if they have looked at the possibilty of making the codec avail seperatly.Or if that gets too complicated.

I guess patience is what is needed until the release of V6 before I can make a decision.

That workflow makes perfect sense. I do the same myself sometimes.

This HDV thing is definitely causing me to re-think how to do things. I hope there is a solution to the NR side in particular... as without that I may find it pretty difficult to work in HDV mode at all.

I do hope Vegas 6 has something in the works that would help this but if it does not... I think we should all take the proposal to Cineform for them to either a) allow us to install the codec on multiple machines (with purchase of the regular connect-HD license) or b) allow us to buy extra licenses to allow us to install the codec on multiple machines. Obviously I would prefer a)... but b) would be acceptable to me as long as the price was much lower than retail for the full connect-HD for Vegas.

I might be deluding myself to think we.. Vegas Editors... will have any influence here.. but one can always dream!

Perhaps a bigger question is does the CF codec make use of HT?
I'm knid of doubting it doesn't for the same reason that the DV codec cannot, if that's the case then we really do need NR. However you can run NR with the one licence on a dual CPU system I assume. That's one effecient way to get NR, avoids the overhead of shifting data over a network. I suspect even with a 1Gb network you may not get much speedup, in fact you may go backwards given the amount of data to be moved.
Bob.

Very good point Bob.... NR on dual-processor box would at least go some way to helping out.

My guess (although I have not tried this) is the Cinceform Intermediate codec is likely the best(?) render format for NR - as that will hold up well to the segmented render followed by the "stitching". Have you tried any of this yet yourself?

I wrote to Cineform asking to be able to occasionally use their software on my laptop at Client's offices, just as I do with Vegas, and they've provided me with additional activation for this.

I said the idea of having to deactivate my desktop first, then apply for activation on laptop, then reverse the procedure later was somewhat cumbersome, and they agreed.

NOW THAT IS VERY useful to know! Thanks for sharing.

From what I've seen.. the Cineform folks seem to be pretty responsive to legitimate ideas/suggestions/questions so hopefully that is a good sign related to this current question.

Yeah perhaps a note to Cineform with a link to this thread would be in order.
I thought of that but I had some trouble when I got my new computer, and transfered it from my old computer. bottom line is i needed to reinstall it like two orr three times. each time needing to contact Thad at Cineform. He was quite helpful a patient with me. But after tht I didnt think it would be good to ask when I got the new laptop.
But seeing as there are others interested plus the NR deal maybe they would consider it.

HDV shooters, we'd like to know: in what format(s) are you planning on delivering your finished HDV-sourced master in the near-term (next 3-6 months)? Back to HDV? WM? HD-SDI? DV? DVD?

for me WM 720p, DVD, and the some DV, near future speaking.
Also the WM 1080 HDDVD like Pmasters posted info on looks interesting if there is a way to author easy like DVDA2 HD? hmmm?

Most common so far is (widescreen) DVD

Then DV master for VHS dubs

Well... I don't (yet) have an HDV camera (soon)... but I am producing projects for HD display.

In my case I'm producing HD material that plays on an Avel Linkplayer 2 - and so far my best results have been with HD-1080i MPEG2. This player does not yet support playback of the audio stream within the WMVHD files.

Undoubtedly some of my projects end up on SD-DVD.