Doom9's Forum - View Single Post - Recomended resolutions for 3D production rendering

Blue_MiSfit · 28th July 2013, 00:09

Think about the workflow. Not how much resolution you think you need to make something look "good" or make it "future proof".

Do you really have the budget to manage 8k files? If you're here asking this question, I don't think you do. Let's do some math.

10 bit 8k dpx files are something like 100 to 120 MB each. If you want to just play the sequence, you'll need to be able to read 24 of these per second, which is something on the order of 2.4 gigabytes per second. I imagine playing the sequence is required for doing compositing?

You will _not_ be able to work with this on anything less than a purpose-built SAN. Plan to spend several hundred thousand dollars just to get started. You could maybe do this on the cheap with a stack of SSDs, but you would need several controllers since they usually bottleneck after just a few SSDs. Also, SSDs are small, and you'll run out of space so fast it will make your head spin. If you want to have more than one person working on the files at the same time, you need a SAN file system like StorNext, which is where things start to get really complicated and expensive.

Do it in ProRes 422 HQ, and do it in 1080p. You can do all this on a little desktop RAID. If you're all that worried about the compositing looking nice, use ProRes 4444. Your real-life footage will likely be in HD anyway and there's no point in upscaling. Will you even have 4:4:4 source media?

28th July 2013, 00:09	#3 \| Link
Blue_MiSfit Derek Prestegard IRL Join Date: Nov 2003 Location: Los Angeles Posts: 5,989	Think about the workflow. Not how much resolution you think you need to make something look "good" or make it "future proof". Do you really have the budget to manage 8k files? If you're here asking this question, I don't think you do. Let's do some math. 10 bit 8k dpx files are something like 100 to 120 MB each. If you want to just play the sequence, you'll need to be able to read 24 of these per second, which is something on the order of 2.4 gigabytes per second. I imagine playing the sequence is required for doing compositing? You will _not_ be able to work with this on anything less than a purpose-built SAN. Plan to spend several hundred thousand dollars just to get started. You could maybe do this on the cheap with a stack of SSDs, but you would need several controllers since they usually bottleneck after just a few SSDs. Also, SSDs are small, and you'll run out of space so fast it will make your head spin. If you want to have more than one person working on the files at the same time, you need a SAN file system like StorNext, which is where things start to get really complicated and expensive. Do it in ProRes 422 HQ, and do it in 1080p. You can do all this on a little desktop RAID. If you're all that worried about the compositing looking nice, use ProRes 4444. Your real-life footage will likely be in HD anyway and there's no point in upscaling. Will you even have 4:4:4 source media? __________________ These are all my personal statements, not those of my employer :)