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MrSmith

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #20 on: July 24, 2012, 01:30:21 pm »

i'm also after a reasonable cost grading option that's better then FCP-x unfortunately the free resolve lite will not run on my MBP. i tried some colour adjustments in photoshop CS-6 (non-extended) and loved the way i could use filters and adjustments that are so familiar after using photoshop, playback was slow but that doesn't matter for colour adjustments (playback of native 5dIII footage is fine in fcp-x) not tried exporting anything though.
why can't apple do 'colour' as a standalone £250 app?
speedgade is £800, would rather put that towards hardware to run resolve lite.
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stewarthemley

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #21 on: July 24, 2012, 03:05:23 pm »

Totally agree that a better way, i.e. simpler, of colour grading would be welcome.

Like LR/etc with controls we know and love. Am I right in thinking it's only an interface problem? I mean, we make it darker/lighter, change the colours, etc, and it's easy in any of the raw converters and PS, so why do Resolve, et al, have to be so bloody complicated? I can't see any difference in changing a single still image compared with a single movie frame. Ok, I worked out that there are more movie frames but that should just take longer, not be massively more complex. Maybe I'm just dense.
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Morgan_Moore

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #22 on: July 24, 2012, 03:39:41 pm »

You should try grading a stream in Capture One - its marvelous

But I then have to put it back to FCP to get my sound back which causes shifts

Maybe Ill try again!

S
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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

stewarthemley

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #23 on: July 24, 2012, 03:56:24 pm »

You should try grading a stream in Capture One - its marvelous


S

I will, thanks. Always looking for the best way.

By the way, fcpx (jesus, I have to stop promoting this effin program - Apple have more dosh than I can dream of)  does a really effective automatic sound sync. I think it has incorporated Plural Eyes, or something. Whatever, it works.
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Morgan_Moore

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #24 on: July 24, 2012, 03:59:05 pm »

My sound is synched, until I export a stream of stills which have no sound!

Indeed PE is very good if you are shooting dual

S
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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

fredjeang

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #25 on: July 24, 2012, 06:21:38 pm »

You should try grading a stream in Capture One - its marvelous

But I then have to put it back to FCP to get my sound back which causes shifts

Maybe Ill try again!

S

This shouldn't happen indeed.

Please could you give a brief description of the steps your using with C1 ? (if you have time)
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mmurph

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #26 on: July 25, 2012, 01:22:19 am »

Folks,

I have shut my studio and an winding down, going fom professional -> consumer, just shpooting snaps & etc. for myself because of disability.

I have 3 extra retail copies of Adobe CS6 Production Premium that I bought for the studio that I am going to sell to recover my cost.  Two are Mac, 1 is Windows (I am keeping the 4th copy for myself.)

Net price is about $1,000 for a full, retail license of CS6 Prodution Premium - that includes Premiere Pro, After Effects, Speed Grade, Photoshop Extended, Media Encoder, Audition, Prelude, Bridge, Illustrator, Flash Professional, and Encore (Blu-ray, etc authoring.).  

Photoshop CS6 Extended alone is $599. Retail list for the package is $1,899. I think it is $1,785 at Amazon.

It is registered under my name at Adobe. I have not installed CS6 on any machines.  

I would request a transfer to you through Adobe. You would be the legal owner of a retail version (two installations, non-exiring), with the ability to upgrade in the future in the same way as if you bought CS6 off the shelf.

I wouldn't normally post here, but I know most of you, and it seemed pertinent to the discussion.

Please e-mail or PM from the site and we can chat.  Absolutely, 100% guarenteed by me.  I will share my eBay history and we can chat via e-mail - 124 positive, no negatives, registered since 1998.  We could start with a deposit, with the balance paid after it is legally transferred, registered to you, downloaded, and activated on your computer.

Cheers!
Michael
« Last Edit: July 25, 2012, 01:44:52 am by mmurph »
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mmurph

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #27 on: July 25, 2012, 01:40:06 am »

That I know, there is no direct link from PP to PS like there is from PP to AE or Speedgrade. That's the problem.


Fred,

There are links between Premiere Pro and Photoshop using dynamic links, just as there are between Premiere and After Effects.  That also includes Speed Grade and Illustrator within the same group.

You might find you are quite happy doing Color Correction in Premiere itself without going into another program.

Premiere can now use Adjustment Layers, just like Photoshop, that sit on top of a Sequence of clips, even with multiple clips stacked on tracks. It will affect all of the clips that are "under" the adjustment layer.  You can use diffent tools, like Fast Color Corrector, or the revised Three Way Color Corrector, including secondary color correction.

I can post some links to good tutorials on color correction in Premiere if you like.

Of course, you can also do the color correction in Photoshop, After Effects, or Speed Grade, depening on your needs, with Speed Grade being the dedicated grading tool.

There are obviously a lot of ways to accomplish the same goal.  I like CS6 quite a bit so far. I am planning on just sticking with the suite and learning it pretty thouroughly this summer and fall.  It is nice to have all of the tools integrated.

Best,
Michael
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fredjeang

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #28 on: July 25, 2012, 02:23:35 am »

Michael,
Are you sure the dynamic link fully work with ps?
Got a clip in the timeline that will opened in ps
Without transcoding, grade the footage in ps and back
In the timeline with the graded clip in place?

I say that because the adobe's Forum seems to
Point that this is not still the case. But if it
Indeed is, that is a powerfull reason to go pp.


What about the computer requierement for cs6 ?
Thinking of the NVidia card.

About the adjustment layers on the timeline, avid does it too.

Anyway, the adobe suite is a great choice Without doubt.
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bcooter

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #29 on: July 25, 2012, 02:44:56 pm »

I haven't spent much time  with cs6 as we've been to busy to look at any slightly different interfaces.

though CS 4 and 5 extended will grade footage and you don't need to break them into single tiff sequences (unless your retouching each frame on an action).

You can import the footage as a smart object (see google) and adjust each piece of footage with adjustment layers.   You can;t just use photoshop controls, on the frame you are parked at but without using adjustment layers as you'll only work on that one frame, (with the exception of sharpening).

You also to be aware of the ouput settings as there are multiple places on export to place the settings; i.e. codec, file size etc. etc.

One trick is to add a 50% grey layer and set to overlay.   This will cover the whole clip and you can use it for localized color, let's say you have a white background with some yellow tint in a corner.

You can use this grey layer and change color, let's say cyan or blue to neutralize the yellow tint and then erase everything but the corner area.  This works fast, unless you have a subject crossing over the re tinted area.

Anyway  . .

The only downside to grading in photoshop is once finished with a clip the rendering is slow on almost any machine and it's not easy (though possible) to compare the previous and succeeding clip so you have continuity.

If your running a MAC desktop try to read all the specs for all of these programs and find the best and fasted video card you can afford.  For PC, the options are infinite, including laptops.

Honestly, if your going to be grading 30 or 40 clips per video, or just a lot of clips, your better served going to a dedicated program like Di-Vinici, Speed Grade or even the ancient Apple Color.

IMO

BC


P.S.  Interestingly, with as many still photographers adding motion to their repretioire you'd think there would be a grading solution like lightroom, C-1 or Photoshop that worked as seamlessly without adding limitations and options on functionality.

Most still photographers can work photoshop, lightroom or even C-1 in their sleep, but they set down to use Di-Vinci and their head goes blank.

Really the best option, if you can afford it, is to develop a relationship with a good colorist.   You can take frames from each sequence, color the single frames in photoshop to use for a guide, visit your favorite colorists with the instructions, match that.   (obviously there are more instructions than that, but you get the idea.).

The biggest downside in motion whether your doing behind the scenes, or full blown videos with effects, is the do it yourself syndrome.  You CAN do it, anybody can do anything they like and though I admire that attitude, if your a photographer/director/image creator, you'll spend so much time in post, even if your good and fast, when you really should be creating, shooting and getting out new work.

It's a fine balancing act and we've seen it with stills.  With the first Canon 1ds for still photography, I use to laugh at the workflow.  I was zoned in on the in camera jpegs so they looked good, would do a quick edit and drop them in a gallery, burn the gallery and put them online for the clients.  For a three day shoot we could do this in a day or at most 18 hours.  

It was a laugher and fun and much faster than the labs.  In fact in most cities around the world I knew restaurant and club owners that would let me set on the balcony, drink espresso and use their wi-fi to upload.  Big Fun.

Then with stills, everything became raw, the file sizes huge and all of a sudden each day's still shoot took three days to get the images edited, processed, corrected and galleries up on line.  So from a ratio of 3 to 1 we went to 1 to 3.      

That's the way I feel about motion.  Unless you are just shipping raw clips, you'll be many many post days for every shoot day.



« Last Edit: July 25, 2012, 02:50:50 pm by bcooter »
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mmurph

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #30 on: July 25, 2012, 03:21:55 pm »

you'd think there would be a grading solution like lightroom, C-1 or Photoshop that worked as seamlessly without adding limitations and options on functionality.

Lightroom 4.0 did add some video editing capability.  Basically, you take a still frame "snapshot" from the clip, "Develop" that snapshot, then "Sync" those changes with the clip.

If Adobe is smart, they will continue to add video functionality to Lightroom. They really need a good video solution at that $80 to $150 price point.

As far as Photoshop & Premiere in CS6:  Apparently Adobe has changed how the programs interact from CS5.5 and previous versions.

Basically, when you work in Photoshop on a clip, you are creating a "Video Layer" taht does not affect the underlying clip.  I went in and worked on a clip. You can easily apply any Photoshop function to affect that layer: Color Adjustment, Sharpening, Levels, Retouching; Masking in particular is recommended in Photoshop (for Keyframing), etc.

Then when you go to Premiere, you can Import that clip just as you would any other. You have a choice of importing with layers, flattening, etc.  

I read through the manual and did some tests.  I haven't had a chance to see the discussion at the Adobe Forums yet on what is or is not working.  I assume that the changes may have caused some confusion also? I don't know if there is more to it than that yet.

I'll continue to look through what I can find. I'll be glad to conduct tests and answer questions if I can. I do have to admit taht one of teh reasons why I "retired" is because of short term memory loss and some cognition issues (from teh chronic pain.)  So I don't always follow all of the details!

Good to chat with you all again here.  :)

Cheers,
Michael
« Last Edit: July 25, 2012, 03:54:57 pm by mmurph »
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Morgan_Moore

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #31 on: July 25, 2012, 04:57:44 pm »

Please could you give a brief description of the steps your using with C1 ? (if you have time)

FCP - Export Tiff Stream - C1 grade a frame, copy to similar frames, export as tiff, QT7 create video from tiffs, import into FCP, reattach sound, export in delivery format.. :(

S
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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #32 on: July 25, 2012, 04:59:41 pm »

Retail list for the package is $1,899.

Ok I have licensed PS CS5.5 - I think I can upgrade to extended for $200 or something

I was thinking that gives me the whole boatload - wrong I guess?

S
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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

mmurph

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #33 on: July 25, 2012, 05:11:27 pm »

Ok I have licensed PS CS5.5 - I think I can upgrade to extended for $200 or something

I was thinking that gives me the whole boatload - wrong I guess?

Unfortunately, I think that is to upgrade for PS only.

Adobe can be tricky going fom a single product to a suite.  But I don't think tehre is a direct upgrade path from PS5.5 stand alone -> CS6 Production Premium suite. 

I actually have an extra copy of PS 5.5 Extended that I have no use for now that I have CS6 Production Premium. I am not quite sure what to do with that.

Michael
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fredjeang

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #34 on: July 25, 2012, 06:24:47 pm »

I haven't spent much time  with cs6 as we've been to busy to look at any slightly different interfaces.

though CS 4 and 5 extended will grade footage and you don't need to break them into single tiff sequences (unless your retouching each frame on an action).

You can import the footage as a smart object (see google) and adjust each piece of footage with adjustment layers.   You can;t just use photoshop controls, on the frame you are parked at but without using adjustment layers as you'll only work on that one frame, (with the exception of sharpening).

You also to be aware of the ouput settings as there are multiple places on export to place the settings; i.e. codec, file size etc. etc.

One trick is to add a 50% grey layer and set to overlay.   This will cover the whole clip and you can use it for localized color, let's say you have a white background with some yellow tint in a corner.

You can use this grey layer and change color, let's say cyan or blue to neutralize the yellow tint and then erase everything but the corner area.  This works fast, unless you have a subject crossing over the re tinted area.

Anyway  . .

The only downside to grading in photoshop is once finished with a clip the rendering is slow on almost any machine and it's not easy (though possible) to compare the previous and succeeding clip so you have continuity.

If your running a MAC desktop try to read all the specs for all of these programs and find the best and fasted video card you can afford.  For PC, the options are infinite, including laptops.

Honestly, if your going to be grading 30 or 40 clips per video, or just a lot of clips, your better served going to a dedicated program like Di-Vinici, Speed Grade or even the ancient Apple Color.

IMO

BC


P.S.  Interestingly, with as many still photographers adding motion to their repretioire you'd think there would be a grading solution like lightroom, C-1 or Photoshop that worked as seamlessly without adding limitations and options on functionality.

Most still photographers can work photoshop, lightroom or even C-1 in their sleep, but they set down to use Di-Vinci and their head goes blank.

Really the best option, if you can afford it, is to develop a relationship with a good colorist.   You can take frames from each sequence, color the single frames in photoshop to use for a guide, visit your favorite colorists with the instructions, match that.   (obviously there are more instructions than that, but you get the idea.).

The biggest downside in motion whether your doing behind the scenes, or full blown videos with effects, is the do it yourself syndrome.  You CAN do it, anybody can do anything they like and though I admire that attitude, if your a photographer/director/image creator, you'll spend so much time in post, even if your good and fast, when you really should be creating, shooting and getting out new work.

It's a fine balancing act and we've seen it with stills.  With the first Canon 1ds for still photography, I use to laugh at the workflow.  I was zoned in on the in camera jpegs so they looked good, would do a quick edit and drop them in a gallery, burn the gallery and put them online for the clients.  For a three day shoot we could do this in a day or at most 18 hours.  

It was a laugher and fun and much faster than the labs.  In fact in most cities around the world I knew restaurant and club owners that would let me set on the balcony, drink espresso and use their wi-fi to upload.  Big Fun.

Then with stills, everything became raw, the file sizes huge and all of a sudden each day's still shoot took three days to get the images edited, processed, corrected and galleries up on line.  So from a ratio of 3 to 1 we went to 1 to 3.      

That's the way I feel about motion.  Unless you are just shipping raw clips, you'll be many many post days for every shoot day.

James,

If I could, I wouldn't even touch a cam or a keyboard but only direct. I'd got my fav colorist, editor, sound tech and give instructions to them etc...but to be there I (we, for the most part) have to pass by the D.I.Y syndrome first and build a good work from there. I don't really see another option (unless the crew accepts to be unpayed as I saw in some cine prods nowdays).

Also, I think to do it ourselves for a while has its advantage because having been into the "fire" (post-prod etc...) I think that when it's time to outsource we know more what all the process really means and can comunicate much better with colorists and editors.

But it's true that to do something good, there are serious limitations in a D.I.Y config, and the time consumed is such that we can easily end with no life. And here we are: if software manufacturers would pay a little more attention to provide an intuitive and powerfull all-in-one tool, we probably could divide the time spent today in post by 2 and have time to fuck, go to the gym and take some chinese lenguage clases.

A LR or C1 of motion, why not? but then we will want a PS of motion because a LR is in the end too limited.  
What really pisses me of with the Adobe's suite, but that's just me, is that it's in the end the same soup as always: 50.000 separated softwares with one zillion plug-ins...okay, with dynamic links or inteligent object but in the end, zillion interfaces and as much learning curves.  

Have you ever tried to learn bloody After Effects? It's one of the messiest and less intuitive software I've ever seen. Avid, a non intuitive tool indeed, is a sweet joke compared to the AE mess.
Then on some: layers, on others, nodes, and I even have one Autodesk app wich is a combination of both !!...(so you have to master the both techniques to use it properly). No thanks! Where is this striking brunette I saw today at the pub? And the magic word I hear all the time with AE users is: plug-in. So not only is enough to have to deal with different softwares, but above as they are uncomplete we have to chase third-party little apps.

Why bloody RCX doesn't have advanced editing capabilities? That would be the end of the hassles. But all is cutted into peices. A little bit of this here, the complement there, and the complement of the complement over there. And to go from here to there and over there we need XML, EDLs, AAFs and his grandmother.

And then the Speedgrade, or Color apps...when it's not having to leave the editor to grade, we end with those very practical pop-up windows we never know where to place. Instead of the grading being fully part of the app and when we grade the interface would automatically switch to an adapted config, no: export, links dynamics and not dynamics, re-link and it's not called PP anymore but Speedgrade, or super-color, or Da-Vinci...tomorrow Dali or Velazquez.

Now we're going to be on heaven very soon with Raw video, when it will democratized. We'll have to add raw developpers in the suites. And a free ticket for one more gadget. Will it be integrated into the NLE? of course not. Nooo... Hability to set the (raw) source settings? Naaa...dream on. And wait the 4K, when it will be a must requierement, we're going to rock in post prod.

One word that I'd like to eradicate from the motion post jargon is this: suite. Because suite means fragmentation. I'd like to see union and simplification.

I think the wild west was a masonic master plan compared to the motion post. It couldn't be more messy and chaotic. It's not really the wild west but the stone age.


« Last Edit: July 25, 2012, 08:36:50 pm by fredjeang »
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troyword

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #35 on: July 25, 2012, 06:48:07 pm »

I was at a presentation last night by Adobe in Boston. Al Mooney the project manager for Premier gave an overview of the CS6 Production Premium suite. It rally blew me away. I have used FCP for the last few years, but have given up on it like a lot of my colleagues. One of the things that was most impressive was the addition of adjustment layers in Premier Pro CS6. I think it is finally approaching a Photoshop level of non-destructive color correction. I'm coming from still photography as well, and I always wished there was a simple but powerful color correct program similar Photoshop. I think they may have finally done it. There is a quick tutorial online. Here is the link.

http://adobe.ly/I5cVsL

 It seems like there is more coming soon development-wise. Adobe has obviously sensed a major opportunity to grab new users after the FCPX fiasco. The whole Adobe Dynamic Link workflow seems very good with a big potential. Not perfect yet but getting there. Plus the fact that you can do a Creative Cloud subscription and get access to all programs in the Master Collection on a monthly or yearly basis is very cool. For me Adobe seems like the future. Troy
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mmurph

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #36 on: July 25, 2012, 08:21:28 pm »


What really pisses me of with the Adobe's suite, but that's just me, is that it's in the end the same soup as always: 50.000 separated softwares with one zillion plug-ins...okay, with dynamic links or so but in the end, zillion interresource, faces and learning curves.  
Have you ever tried to learn bloody After Effects?

I think that for most mid-tier filmmakers, you can accomplish 90%+ of what you need to do in Premiere Pro.

In particular, I think you can do almost all color grading, keying, and basic effects in PP.  It has a nice user interface that is fairly straightforward for most users.  I would definitely recommend working through some formal training - free online videos, or a Classroom in a Book type just to learn all of the little ins & outs of the workflow -the fastest way to trim and add clips to the timeline from the keyboard, etc.

As far as color correction and color grading, CS6 has a lot of Photoshop tools built in now - Auto Color, Auto Levels, setting input and output clipping with sliders, fast color, Adjustment Layers as Troy mentioned (we cross posted, he added while I was typing - I agree with him) etc.

You can also do quite a bit of audio work within PP.

After that, I would follow your suggestion and outsource the advanced effects to a team member or contractor in After Effects, advanced grading in Speedgrade to a professional coulorist, etc.  They can apply their mastery of those tools to your project, and then have the product flow back to your main edit in Premiere without having to create an output render, change formats or codecs, etc.

I agree with you about After Effects in many ways, but that has been a standard tool for most effects editors for many years now - even those working in FCP, Avid, etc commonly use AE as part of their work flow.

As far as video cards: Yes, definitely a decent Nvidia card is a must have with CS6.  Even the most basic $100 card (on a PC) will improve some accelerated functions by a factor of 10. That is, about 1/10 of the time to render with GPU assistance vs. software only.

There is a CS5.5 benchmark database that has over 900 machines in it running the same suite of tests for comparison.  Here are the results using various levels of CUDA support. There is also a lot of interesting information at the site:

http://ppbm5.com/MPE%20Charts.php


Here is a lot of specific detail on CUDA acceleration. You can hack a text file to turn on hardware acceleration with most Nvidia cards with a minimum of 785 MB of RAM:

http://www.studio1productions.com/Articles/PremiereCS5.htm



CS6 will also use OpenCL acceleration with non-Nvidia cards.

For CS6, the importance of hardware is probably: CPU (i7 deginitely best), RAM to 16 GB, then GPU, then the hard drives (RAID &/or SSD cache.)  All three should be there. If they are the performance is great, much faster than previous versions of CS.

I have a total of about $1,000 invested in a very, very good editing workstation.  The core is a 3 year old Dell XPS.  I have an i7 920 (today that would be an i7 3770 or similar), 27 GB of RAM, a GTX 560,  2x 2 GB Seagate Barracuda in RAID 0, a 120 GB OCZ SSD for cache and a 750 watt Gold power supply.
 
Best,
Michael
« Last Edit: July 25, 2012, 08:30:07 pm by mmurph »
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Sareesh Sudhakaran

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #37 on: July 25, 2012, 11:41:09 pm »

Combining CS5.5 and CS6 apps is a bad idea - if you want the round-trip ability.

The prelude - premiere pro - audition - after effects - photoshop - illustrator - encore connectivity is near perfect for any production. It almost behaves like one big monster program.

Speedgrade is a late addition to CS6, and it does not have the round-trip ability. Lightroom, too for that matter.

I've been on the Adobe bandwagon since 2002 and one lesson I've learnt is to never invest in stand-alone apps for video - it's cheaper to buy the production suite, and cheaper to upgrade as well. Now they have the cloud platform, too - but I prefer to 'own' my gear.

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rechchemical

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Re: What is CS !
« Reply #38 on: August 28, 2012, 10:53:24 pm »

have a look and learned something :)
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