DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic

Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic

its incredible..
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic

Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic

I tried it out last night and I really liked it except for one thing. There is a terrible latency between the time the camera captures something and when it's displayed on the virtual monitor--something like one second for me. Anyone else have this issue? My laptop is not that old that the processor should be a big issue.
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic

Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic

the latency is because the program actually prerolls before your camera does, you can set it at 1sec, 2sec, 5 sec ext.

And hold on to your hats guys we are working on a fantastic discount for DVXuser members.
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Serious Magic was already offering $100 of the $495 list price if you purchased before the end of the month - do we get an additional $100 off? :o
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Any chance of a review Jarred? Before the end of the month? ;)
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Chuck,

That was a pre-order special that expired at the end of July. It was for those willing to purchase sight unseen (before the downloadable demo was available).

--- Mark
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

yeah.. its basically an extension, but now you can actually play with it to make sure you like it :)

And as soon as I get my copy I will be doing a review :)
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

So let me get this straight. With this thing you no longer would need a field monitor. Just a laptop with mega memory so you can just bypass the tape totally? Would you use an external hard drive? Then take it to your NLE or could you do everything in the laptop?
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Jaime,

Unfortunately, DV Rack makes extensive use of the DirectShow functions built into Windows. A Mac port is not something that will appear any time soon.

Elvis,

Correct, the field monitor is a detailed emulation of conventional field monitors. You can set it up to bars and get an accurate reproduction of your video image on a laptop screen.

You can bypass tape completely, although you don't need mega memory to do so. DV Rack requires 256 MB of RAM. DV storage is about 13 GB an hour. Many DV Rack users don't abandon tape completely. By default DV Rack "slaves" to your camera's record button (you can turn that off too). So just shoot as you normally do, except when you're done, your laptop already has each shot as a ready-to-edit clip. The tape just becomes a backup that you'll most likely never look at. Another bonus is that the clips on DV Rack's disk recorder will have more header on them than the ones on tape because of DV Rack's auto pre-roll. It always starts recording every clip *before* you hit record (by the number of seconds you set, up to 30 (default is 5)).  


Most laptop HDs sold these days are between 60 - 100 GB. For instance, my Dell Inspiron (over two years old) has a 60 GB HD. Until I started using DV Rack, I'd only used about 20 GB of it. If you need to you can use external drives, however if you plan to use a Firewire external drive, I suggest that you connect it on a different Firewire controller so it doesn't interfere with the data stream from your camera. I use the native Firewire port on my laptop for my DVX. I picked up a PC Card Firewire interface at the local clone shop to connect an external drive, but I haven't had a reason to use it yet.

BTW, I work at Serious Magic. I'll visit here from time-to-time to answer any questions that I can, although I mostly visit DVXUser because I shoot with the DVX 100 and am prepping for shooting a personal short subject soon.
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Damn damn damn damn damn. You guys don't play fair. I still have to get a WA adapter, a tripod, some lights, an engagement ring, an oil change...

Why couldn't this have been released in say November or December?

Not fair!

Dan
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

MAC USERS ALWAYS GET SHAFTED!!! >:( Here is a quote from their website regarding DV Rack coming out for Mac....

"Will Visual Communicator be available for Macintosh or Linux? "
"While Visual Communicator output videos may be viewed on other platforms including Macintosh and Linux, the Visual Communicator program itself relies on Microsoft's DirectX and DirectShow libraries to create videos. Unfortunately, these libraries are not currently available on other platforms. Because of this we do not expect to be able to offer Visual Communicator on other platforms in the foreseeable future."

Mac really needs to be more innovative. These WIndows based applications are very appealing, even to the most avid Mac users. Now I have to buy a regular PC to get the best of both worlds.
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

How many features are in that aren't in FCP for your PowerBook?
Most of the scopes already seem to be covered.
Recording to disk based on camera record mode?
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

there is the shot quality monitor, audio monitoring, zebras on video, actually the only thing FCP{does have is the Monitors, which dont work very well.
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Audio monitoring works fine on FCP and I haven't had problems with the vector scopes.
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

Scott,

If you have a chance download and play with the DV Rack trial version. Once you've tried it out I think you'll see why it's uniquely suited for this application over any NLE.

FCP is an awesome NLE but it wasn't designed to be field production-assist software (actually nothing was until DV Rack). There are a variety of features that DV Rack offers the shooter that nothing else does:

- The DV Quality Monitor module brings sophisticated automated quality monitoring to DV shooters for the first time. This module monitors your video and audio and alerts you if user-set thresholds for acceptable quality are exceeded. This is done in real-time and markers are inserted on the clip so you can see where potential problems lie. You can immediately jump between quality markers at the press of a key.

In addition to watching your video for levels and your audio for clipping, it has some trick digital signal processing that detects troublesome plosives in audio (such as the infamous popping "P"). Even if the popped "P" doesn't clip it will still be detected. DV Rack actually learns the ambient background noise and then automatically determines a primary signal level. If that signal has an anomalous spike within a given window, it'll mark it.  

- The field monitor in DV Rack can really be set up to bars. Yes you can load bars in other tools but those are RGB bars. DV Rack's field monitor has special bars stored in a custom internal format. They are full-spectrum YUV and actually have super-black (and super-white) in them. So the Pluge setup finally really works like true bars from a signal generator into an analog field monitor.

- The SureShot camera setup module uses calibration charts printed on cards that come with DV Rack. It walks you through a simple four step wizard-like process to objectively set up your camera best quality. For example there is a meter that tells you at a glance how correct your white balance is. There is another meter that tells you objectively how in focus your shot is.

- DV Rack has dual zebra stripe patterns that can be set in 1% increments. Either zebra can be set to alternative mode called dark zebra which is the inverse of the bright zebras on many cameras. Dark zebras are as useful as the light zebras in the DVX, for example using dark zebra you can finally see how much of a dark area is being crushed to full black. This is really valuable when trying to choose different parameters in the DVX to optimize a particular scene.

- The split screen mode lets you instantly compare a live feed with a pre-recorded clip which is ideal for matching camera setups or continuity.

- The real-time interactive zoom mode on live video is very handy for checking details in a shot. The "underscan/normal scan" switch works like a real field monitor. NLEs typically only show the full active picture area.

- The monitor has adjustable grid marker overlays that are ideal for shot framing.

- The Spectra 60 module gives real-time pixel info in five color spaces.

There is more, but the point is that DV Rack was specificially designed to meet the unique workflow needs of shooting. NLEs weren't. For instance, I don't know of any NLE that slaves to your camera (NLEs do the opposite, they control the camera). In DV Rack when you hit your camera's record button, DV Rack starts recording (with the pre-record buffer).

There are also more subtle differences. While you're in shooting mode with DV Rack you won't need to access a pull-down or pop-up menu to do anything. All the stuff in your worklow is on immediately clickable buttons and knobs. Also, the typical NLE interface is designed for an operator sitting at an editing desk. DV Rack's interface was designed for an operator who is standing, and possibly, a bit of distance from the screen.

Conversely, DV Rack isn't a non-linear video editor. It's a really different animal. I only wish that the Wintel / Apple hegemony didn't make it so difficult to port products between platforms (and both sides are equally guilty in that).

--- Mark
 
Re: DV Rack by Serious Magic == Member Discount

That's a ***** about a Mac not being supported!
 
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