RED ROCKET - Now That's FAST!

Check out this video of the RED ROCKET in action as it transcodes 20 seconds worth of 4k frames in just 19 seconds! (In other words, faster than real time.)

Red Rocket from Ted Schilowitz on Vimeo.

The ROCKET is RED's new accelerator board for decoding, transcoding, de-Bayering and playback of files shot with the RED ONE camera. What is "de-Bayering?" I'm glad you asked!

The simple explanation is that digital video camcorders and digital cinema cameras such as the RED ONE employ a Bayer filter to optimize image capture and compression and emulate the way the human eye perceives chrominance and luminance. The result is that images shot using this filtering process end up with twice as many green pixels as blue or red pixels, and a "de-Bayer" process is required to ensure proper color balance on playback. What's noteworthy about the RED ROCKET is that it does all of that (and more) at breakneck speeds, for not a lot of money. This bodes well for 4K-capable desktop editing machines at even high performance benchmarks with lower costs in the near future.

100 Websites and Blogs Where You Can Download Free Vector Graphics

The title says it all... Best Design Options has compiled this great list of resources where you can find free vector graphics - great elements for any motion graphics you might be working on. Bookmark this one!

Cool Tool: Footage Calculator

Digital Rebellion has made available this fantastic tool for calculating the size in gigabytes of any length of any digital video codec and format. There are some other neat tools for depth of field, lens angle, pixel aspect and more - but I think the footage calculator is far and away the most useful. Bookmark it!

Lifehacker: Five Best Video-Sharing Sites

Lifehacker has posted a nice round-up of the "Five Best Video-Sharing Sites." Of course the usual suspects YouTube and Vimeo are on there, but a couple of their choices might surprise you. Give it a look!

Free HD Greenscreen Plates

The fine folks at Hollywood Camera Work, makers of the excellent DVD series "Visual Effects for Directors," have posted some of the greenscreen plates and other VFX elements used in that series for educational use. Most are in 720p or 1080p HD and are available for you to experiment with techniques such as basic keying, 2D tracking, 3D matchmoving, and advanced keying with transparencies. Check them out here and get to work!

Inspiration: 100 Years of Special Effects

Technically it should be called "100 Years of VISUAL Effects." But I quibble. Check it out, courtesy of (inexplicably) CollegeHumor.com.

Innovation: Video Ads in Magazines

From CNET:

Broadcast network CBS will be advertising its fall TV season with a video-chip ad embedded in an issue of Entertainment Weekly.

The September 18 issue of the Time Inc.-owned magazine will feature the first video ad to appear in print, George Schweitzer, CBS marketing president, said Wednesday at a press conference at the company's headquarters here.

Read the full article, or watch video-ad manufacturer Americhip's video on YouTube:


This technology represents the start of what will surely be a future filled with digital video applications of all shapes and sizes.

Green Soda VFX Blog - VFX Challenge II

Here's one for you VFX students! Green Soda VFX Blog is co-sponsoring a VFX Challenge in partnership with the folks at Hollywood Camera Work (makers of the excellent "Visual Effects for Directors" DVDs we just added to the UAT Library).

This challenge involves greenscreen compositing and matchmoving. The deadline is Sunday, September 13th. Get started now!

The After Effects Output Module Exposed

Here's a comprehensive (if a bit dull) explanation of every one of those pesky settings in the After Effects Output Module, courtesy of Topher Welsh at AE Tuts+. If you've ever struggled with rendering your comps in AE, this one is for you.

The After Effects Output Module Exposed

Red One, Canon 5D Mk II, and Panasonic Lumix GH1 Footage Comparison

Here's an amazing bit of footage posted by premiere Hollywood equipment rental house Birns and Sawyer on their Vimeo channel.

Red One, Canon 5D Mk II, and Panasonic Lumix GH1 Footage Comparison from Birns and Sawyer on Vimeo.

What's so amazing about it? It compares side-by-side-by side the output of three hype-worthy cameras - the 4k-capable digital cinema RED ONE camera (roughly $20k) and two DSLRs equipped with "movie" modes, the $3500 Canon 5D Mark II and the $2200 Panasonic Lumix GH1. This is the first time I've seen footage from the Panasonic, and the first time I have seen anyone cut together material from a RED with footage from a DSLR. What it shows is that the technology has definitely shifted and this new generation of DSLRs are game-changers in terms of comparing price to image quality.