Monday, November 4, 2013

HD Vs. 4K, 8K - What's really going on?

Ever since RED cameras hit the market and digital video started to take over film, there has been a lot of hype over whether to upgrade to this exciting new technology or if us smaller filmmakers have to make the switch to stay current. EFillF prides itself on being on the cutting edge of new technology, (see Adobe Cloud Blog), and we have seriously looked into 4K cameras. But is this new “depth” of color all it's hyped up to be? Here are three reasons why upgrading to 4 or 8K may not be the magical video genie we've been waiting for all these years.
  1. Most people jumping on the 4K wagon don't know what they're doing.
I've run into more people than I should who have gone out and bought a GoPro or even a RED camera and then turned around and complained that they couldn't edit it properly or that the picture wasn't what they were expecting. DO YOUR RESEARCH! You can't keep that same computer that you were using to edit DSLR or even high def camcorders and expect that the 4K is going to act the same. IT’S NOT!
The amount of information in a picture when you double the pixels doesn't double the RAM power needed; it's an exponential value, so you need at least four times the computing power and that's just to get the picture to play properly. For true RED RAW editing you're going to need 32gigs of RAM; that's just a fact. Also, RAW footage is shot for post-production. The picture you get from the camera looks almost black and white, or extremely desaturated, and needs to be put through a professional editing program such as DaVinci or SpeedGrade. There has been a lot of hype around the BlackMagic Pocket Cinema, but once people looked at the RAW footage it shot they were surprised at the lack of color and depth. The information is there, but it needs some help in post.
  1. There is no delivery system, except for Web
I'm going to preface this section by saying this is strictly a temporary stop. Once we get to the next disc or delivery system above Blu-Ray that can hold 4K information, this isn't going to be an issue. As of right now, though, there is no cheap way to get your 4K video to your client. You could keep giving them your 250 gig flash cards, but you're going to see a serious dent in your budget if every change made to a video had to be delivered that way. Right now it's the model to deliver completed works by DVD or Blu-Ray, because the producers can afford to give up those discs to the clients.
If there's one thing that's true about the video industry is that it's hard to change the current business model. People in this industry like they way things are done and are very slow to adopt new, possibly faulty, technology. If you are delivering by Web, then there's no problem when it comes to cost, but the sheer size of the files means you're going to spend more time uploading than working on projects in order to make deadlines.
  1. We have no way to watch it!
Since you're going to be reading this on your computer, you can easily see the pixels that your laptop or desktop screen have. Go ahead and check, I'll bet you it's 1080p. That means the full size of your screen is 1920x1080 or about 2K. Now go check your television in your living room. If you're lucky enough to have one, and yes it's a privilege, not a right, then it will also be 1080p at best; 720p is what most people have and that's even less. What happens if you watch a larger pixel frame on a smaller screen?
It's in the beginning of every movie ever: “This movie has been formatted to fit your screen.” Formatting means compressing, and compressing means that you're not getting 4K. So unless you're one of the lucky, and rich, people who can afford a 4K TV or computer monitor, then you're watching in 2K or less. So make sure when you're editing 4K footage that it's scaled down so you can see the true look or you're just editing it in 2K and lying to yourself.

All of this nay saying aside, the question still stands: is 4K and higher the future of making movies? The answer is a definitive yes. In the near future it will be commonplace to shoot, edit and watch in 4K and even in the further future to get to 8K, but for the moment our cameras are outracing our delivery system and watchable media. Just have patience and focus on what has always and will always be much more important than what we shoot on, and that's the content that we are shooting.


Written By: Jeremy Hatfield
Associate Producer/Blogger
Edited By: Laura Ettinger
Public Relations
EFillF Productions, LLC

1 comment:

  1. Hmmmm! I do hear pros and cons a lot about this. I shoot most of my work in 2K and only use 4K if the budget calls for it. I don't have a problem with 4K in post, It happens that my current projects are 3D CG animation with millions of polygons @ 1920x1080.

    To make this happen I use a custom built PC rig with dual video cards, 64GB of ram and 8-i7 processors, 32 cores. While it's just enough for CG animation, It's more than enough for 4K post production. When fellow filmmakers drop in to see it work, they are amazed at its speed and stability. (No crashes, sticking or slow downs)

    So I agree with Jeremy, if you're going in this direction, than you better be ready to spend the money for the upgrades.

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