Raylight, Canopus, questions and more...

Jim Arthurs

Jim Arthurs

Well-known member
Hi all, going through the evaluation period with codecs and programs for working with MXF's on the PC. At some point this week I'll probably throw Cineform ConnectHD into the loop as well, as I see it now has MXF support.

General question... both Raylight and Canopus seem to add setup to the files they create. Is this proper behavior? For instance, export an image sequence from Canopus or bring a Raylight AVI into AE and notice that the blacks start around RGB 15,15,15. My impression was that no set-up is EVER recorded when the camera records to P2. Shouldn't "add-setup" be an option for both programs? I can't say you'd ever want setup embedded into your file until final playback on a display that requires 7.5 setup.

Second, Raylight seems to be the "better" codec when compared to Canopus. By "better" I mean it delivers an image that (analogous to the variations in DV codecs) I've always called "presentation" vrs. "generational". The Canopus codec is steppy in chroma and detail, Raylight is very smooth. I'll soon share the example in another thread that let me see this first hand and why this matters a great deal.

Third, Raylight makes a file, that during AVI conversion via the console is reported to be 23.976 but the AVI imported into either Vegas or AE shows up as a pure 24fps. In Vegas you can simply adjust playback to .999 or in AE "tell" it to be 23.976. But since the file is natively 23.976 I think it should show up as such, right?

Fourth, Raylight has trouble batching when you have a directory of mixed formats, say 720, 1080, and DVCPRO 50. It passes over or quits before converting the whole directory.

Finally, Raylight has trouble with 720 60p files where you've recorded at, say, 30fps (a setting common with time-lapse). The video portion is correct, but it hooks up an audio file that is 2X as long.

In general, I'm currently leaning to getting Raylight vrs. the Canopus Broadcast product for several reasons:

1.) Raylight is fast enough (in Vegas I get full frame-rate from the middle quality setting when using 720 24PN).

2.) Raylight is the better DVCPRO 100 codec (see above).

3.) You can use it universally with any software on the PC. With Canopus you're stuck working only in that NLE.

Just some rambling thoughts and questions...

Jim Arthurs
 
I'm a few steps behind you, on a parallel path, comparing Raylight/Premiere Pro, Edius and Cineform Aspect HD. So far, to me Cineform is the winner. They have a great codec, and it works well with my NLE. Raylight forces me to convert my files and keep them in the same folder with the original- that means double the hard drive space. OUCH. Cineform takes up less space than the original DVCPROHD file (120mb vs 180mb for my sample clip)

I'm interested in Edius, but afraid of another buggy new-comer to the NLE world. I used to use Vegas, but have swtiched mostly to PremierePro as it just works better and more smoothly for me.
 
Jim Arthurs said:
Hi all, going through the evaluation period with codecs and programs for working with MXF's on the PC. At some point this week I'll probably throw Cineform ConnectHD into the loop as well, as I see it now has MXF support.

General question... both Raylight and Canopus seem to add setup to the files they create. Is this proper behavior? For instance, export an image sequence from Canopus or bring a Raylight AVI into AE and notice that the blacks start around RGB 15,15,15. My impression was that no set-up is EVER recorded when the camera records to P2. Shouldn't "add-setup" be an option for both programs? I can't say you'd ever want setup embedded into your file until final playback on a display that requires 7.5 setup.

Second, Raylight seems to be the "better" codec when compared to Canopus. By "better" I mean it delivers an image that (analogous to the variations in DV codecs) I've always called "presentation" vrs. "generational". The Canopus codec is steppy in chroma and detail, Raylight is very smooth. I'll soon share the example in another thread that let me see this first hand and why this matters a great deal.

Third, Raylight makes a file, that during AVI conversion via the console is reported to be 23.976 but the AVI imported into either Vegas or AE shows up as a pure 24fps. In Vegas you can simply adjust playback to .999 or in AE "tell" it to be 23.976. But since the file is natively 23.976 I think it should show up as such, right?

Fourth, Raylight has trouble batching when you have a directory of mixed formats, say 720, 1080, and DVCPRO 50. It passes over or quits before converting the whole directory.

Finally, Raylight has trouble with 720 60p files where you've recorded at, say, 30fps (a setting common with time-lapse). The video portion is correct, but it hooks up an audio file that is 2X as long.

In general, I'm currently leaning to getting Raylight vrs. the Canopus Broadcast product for several reasons:

1.) Raylight is fast enough (in Vegas I get full frame-rate from the middle quality setting when using 720 24PN).

2.) Raylight is the better DVCPRO 100 codec (see above).

3.) You can use it universally with any software on the PC. With Canopus you're stuck working only in that NLE.

Just some rambling thoughts and questions...

Jim Arthurs
Click to expand...
Jim these sound like old bugs. What does Raymaker report for version?
The latest is 1.05c

See the suport blog at http://dvfilm.com/raylight/raylightHelp.htm#blog
and the download is at http://dvfilm.com/raylight

The "setup" you describe is not setup, it's a more or less a linear conversion
from YUV to RGB that results in the least amount of banding and clipping.
The RGB black level of 16 is what most video encoders expect for black. If you are
presenting your movie on a computer monitor vs. a video monitor, you might
need to raise the contrast and saturation, something that normally happens
in hardware when playing back to video
 
Thanks Marcus, I'm running 1.05, not 1.05c... so I'll recheck with the latest greatest.

It's the participation of great folks like yourself and David Newman that makes it a pleasure to evaluate this stuff.

On the issue of the assignment of black to 16,16,16... I see your point on the why of it, but I'm wondering why CineForm (which I just tested) doesn't do it this way? Their black comes in at 0,0,0.

It seems like there are two sets of perfectly good explanations going to cover both approaches. I will now look at the difference between the two in the issue of banding to eek out more clues. At the moment, I'm completely divided on which way to "jump"... both Raylight and Cineform have advantages and disadvantages over the other...

Regards,

Jim Arthurs
 
Black can be defined either way. Video System RGB sets black to 16,16,16 and we have this as an option within Aspect HD. Yet computer graphic RGB is more common with black at 0,0,0. Standard 709 YUV to RGB uses cgRGB (0,0,0), and most encoders expect cgRGB (so I disagree with Marcus here.) There are advantages to both systems, that why Aspect HD has the option. Sony Vegas is only vsRGB, Adobe Premiere (without Aspect HD) is cgRGB only -- so no one agrees. vsRGB preserves super whites if you are force into RGB processing (YUV processing has no issue) but has some reversibility issues (vsRGB->YUV->vsRGB over and over in an 8bit system causes color shifts.) cgRGB is more "video safe" as it doesn't allow for supers, has better mid-tone sensitivity, and has better multigeneration characteristics. It is good to be about to choose. In Prospect HD we also add vsRGB/cgRGB controls within the AE importer.
 
Jim Arthurs said:
Thanks Marcus, I'm running 1.05, not 1.05c... so I'll recheck with the latest greatest.

It's the participation of great folks like yourself and David Newman that makes it a pleasure to evaluate this stuff.
Click to expand...

Thanks, so I see that you ordered Raylight. I read your posts with interest, can you tell me what were the deciding factors?
 
Hi Marcus, yes I popped for Raylight today... in my particular case I was doing a lot of bluescreen matting, and as good as CineForm is, I didn't want the extra generation and a second compression scheme between the source files and the final composite. Speed of rendering was faster in Vegas with Raylight as well, by maybe 33% or more. I can also see the commitment to revisions and changes based on user requests.

This is by no means a knock on CineForm, a product that also is influenced by the needs of the users, and down the road I can see using both, as each has very good points and features. I enjoy the silky smooth full sized playback with CineForm, for instance.

Regards,

Jim Arthurs
 
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