After stereoscopic 3D one of the hot topics at last months National Association of Broadcasters convention in Las Vegas was the concept of shooting at higher frame rates. But there was a third topic brewing just below the surface namely higher dynamic rates. A growing number of industry leaders including IRIDAS CEO Lin Kayser believes that within the next two years by combining those three elements in one production filmmakers will be able to virtually recreate reality. “Doug Trumbull experimented with 60 frames-per-second 70mm film projection in the 70s and 80s ” Kayser says a process that became Showscan. He goes on to say that “Recent research confirms [Trumbull’s] observations: Once you move beyond 50fps 60fps our brain switches from one mode of processing movies to another. This ‘other’ method is the same one that we use when we just ‘experience’ reality i.e. look around. Higher frame rates are the coming thing right now. [Peter] Jackson is shooting The Hobbit at 48fps already and I am pretty sure Cameron will use 60 for Avatar. We are working with Doug Trumbull on making 120fps (real time) a reality. Higher frame rates and stereo go very well together and bring us another step closer to recreating reality.” “The last element in this chain is the move to higher dynamic ranges in acquisition HDR post and HDR presentation ” Kayser says. “When I look outside the window on this wonderful sunny day I am blinded. I cannot recreate this in my theatre experience yet. Quite the contrary most 3D movies are really dark because we are halving the amount of light that reaches the eye at a time. We need to significantly update our projectors and cinemas to get there. HDR displays for the home are not that far off since we already have locally dimming LED backlights. We are already seeing HDR-capable displays like the Dolby monitor which so far are under-used since no HDR data reaches it. Once we have the post in place we are a step further. HDR means I can have something in my image that is significantly brighter say the sun than something else giving me a real window to the world.” At NAB IRIDAS featured several new products. SpeedGrade NX brings refined stereo tools a breakthrough in support for the latest RAW cameras increased render speed and improved color management. SpeedGrade NX includes a major update to the award-winning DualStream stereo toolset native ARRI ALEXA RAW workflows and beta support for the EPIC camera from RED Digital Cinema. IRIDAS’ Universal RAW architecture which supports virtually all RAW cameras used in production today has been updated to include native support for the ARRI ALEXA V3 color science. V3 RAW files can be reviewed and graded instantly in real time and high fidelity. This is especially important for stereo workflows where 3K-review in render quality previously required lengthy transcoding processes. In addition to systems from RED and ARRI IRIDAS continues to support virtually all other RAW-based cameras in the market including cameras from Phantom Weisscam Silicon Imaging Ikonoskop Indiecam and others. SpeedGrade NX is available for Windows Mac and LINUX platforms. SpeedGrade NX is available immediately and starts at USD $19 999. Upgrade pricing for existing SpeedGrade DI and FrameCycler DI customers is available. IRIDAS also showed FrameCycler DDS 2011 a new playback conform and review system that significantly extends existing stereoscopic capabilities. FrameCycler DDS 2011 adds parallax adjustments mirroring and many automatic and manual setup options as well as extensive Python scripting options simple integration with production pipeline management systems. But the centerpiece of the company’s exhibit was technology demonstrations of a compelling new 3D and 2D finishing system called Lumetri. The result of more than two years of work Lumetri is a fresh take on movie finishing with a specific focus on HDR and Stereo 3D but also introducing new effective tools for traditional color grading tasks. Lumetri is based on a radically new architecture that is completely floating point multi-channel based. The new architecture brings a new dimension of versatility to the colorist and forms the basis of a new HDR grading toolset. For example Lumetri adds tools to help spot problems that will cause viewer discomfort and introduces new image processing tools to eliminate them. Lumetri was built from the ground up with tablet and control panel users in mind for maximum productivity. Lumetri entered limited beta testing in May and will be available in the fall. In the end says Kayser ‘HDR and higher frame rates do not by themselves require each other but HDR is the last element that we need to put in place to completely recreate reality. But it is also maybe the least important one. General brightness in the cinema is more important than dynamic range in the final display device. Dynamic range is of course very important during acquisition and camera manufacturers are moving there. I believe 3D and higher frame rates are the more important aspect as we easily suffer from disorientation when there’s fast movement in 3D in low frame rates. Suspension of disbelief will be much easier if we switch to the part of our brain that processes reality as opposed to the one that watches moving images.” IRIDAS www.iridas.com
