Cinema DNG to Premier in 2020

[RUSSJGARNER]

Hello,

I'm new to the Inspire 2 and am having to learn all the codec & container information from scratch.

I filmed a few scenes in CinemaDNG with the X5S and am loving the output, but it's pretty confusing and I'm not sure of the exact settings or workflow for Premiere. Is it really this hard?

What are you all doing for CinemaDNG workflow? Specifically when ingesting & editing in Premiere?

Thank you in advance!

 

[Brett8883]

Hello,

I'm new to the Inspire 2 and am having to learn all the codec & container information from scratch.

I filmed a few scenes in CinemaDNG with the X5S and am loving the output, but it's pretty confusing and I'm not sure of the exact settings or workflow for Premiere. Is it really this hard?

What are you all doing for CinemaDNG workflow? Specifically when ingesting & editing in Premiere?

Thank you in advance!

It’s much easier with DaVinci Resolve. It’s just like any other media in Resolve.

 

[atmosphericarts]

Drag the first DNG frame from the folder into your project and it will behave like any other video.

 

[Brett8883]

Drag the first DNG frame from the folder into your project and it will behave like any other video.

I tried it and that works, thanks.

However, it’s extremely poor playback and rendering performance compared to DaVinci Resolve. In Resolve I can playback full resolution 5k cDNG 30p smoothly in real time and export at about 60fps (so render time is half playback time) but I couldn’t even play 1/16 resolution in Premier. I had to export the video just to ensure it was in fact a moving picture and not a still frame played over and over again.

My computer is somewhat modest compared to what’s out there but I can’t imagine what the benefit of using Premier over Resolve is even if you have the hardware for smooth playback which I imagine would need to be substantial.

I realize this wasn’t the question being asked but I think it’s relevant

 

[atmosphericarts]

I tried it and that works, thanks.

However, it’s extremely poor playback and rendering performance compared to DaVinci Resolve. In Resolve I can playback full resolution 5k cDNG 30p smoothly in real time and export at about 60fps (so render time is half playback time) but I couldn’t even play 1/16 resolution in Premier. I had to export the video just to ensure it was in fact a moving picture and not a still frame played over and over again.

My computer is somewhat modest compared to what’s out there but I can’t imagine what the benefit of using Premier over Resolve is even if you have the hardware for smooth playback which I imagine would need to be substantial.

I realize this wasn’t the question being asked but I think it’s relevant

You’ll definitely need to make proxies if you want to use CDNG in PP.

 

[vertrider1]

I am processing CinemaDNG of the X5s and X7 on a 2017 iMac Pro 10 Core and works very well either in Premiere Pro CC or Resolve.

Resolve is of course faster on the DNG folders etc with Premiere CC a tad slower in comparison when you drag the folders into the timeline, but still good.

However I do shoot ProresRAW on my Z6 as well and sometimes on the X7, so I am using Premiere now more than Resolve as well for editing (which I used to do in FCPX a lot, but I am tired of how FCPX handles ProRes RAW).

The Lumetri tools in Premiere CC do work very well regardless if Cinema DNG or ProresRAW footage, so that is an advantage for Premiere CC here over Resolve.

As for your PC‘s performance, I am not so familiar with current PC designs or prices, but a faster Graphics card might help?

BTW, Adobe Bridge is quite fast to sift trough the CinemaDNG folders firsthand these days. Good luck!

 

[Brett8883]

I am processing CinemaDNG of the X5s and X7 on a 2017 iMac Pro 10 Core and works very well either in Premiere Pro CC or Resolve.

Resolve is of course faster on the DNG folders etc with Premiere CC a tad slower in comparison when you drag the folders into the timeline, but still good.

However I do shoot ProresRAW on my Z6 as well and sometimes on the X7, so I am using Premiere now more than Resolve as well for editing (which I used to do in FCPX a lot, but I am tired of how FCPX handles ProRes RAW).

The Lumetri tools in Premiere CC do work very well regardless if Cinema DNG or ProresRAW footage, so that is an advantage for Premiere CC here over Resolve.

As for your PC‘s performance, I am not so familiar with current PC designs or prices, but a faster Graphics card might help?

BTW, Adobe Bridge is quite fast to sift trough the CinemaDNG folders firsthand these days. Good luck!

Yea not being able to handle ProResRAW in Resolve is a black mark for sure.

How do you like ProResRAW compared to cDNG as far as how it edits? Can you change absolute white balance?

 

[vertrider1]

Yea not being able to handle ProResRAW in Resolve is a black mark for sure.

How do you like ProResRAW compared to cDNG as far as how it edits? Can you change absolute white balance?

Hi Brett,

ProRes Raw is nice to edit of course. Although I have upgraded the Z6 to the latest FW I still can't change White Balance or ISO in the latest Final Cut Pro Version, which is weird as the latest Nikon FW should enable both ProresRAW and Blackmagic RAW to do so. As for the CinemaDNG of the X7, ISO/WB change is not supported in FCPX.

With Premiere CC however I can change WB (but not ISO) with CinemaDNG of the X7 and Prores RAW of the Z6 within the Lumetri Tools. Exposure adjustments and everything else feels as smooth as it would normally do in Resolve. Good work from Adobe here. Works nicely!

On RAW stuff I use Neatvideo in it's various host dev states too, that is stil fastest in Resolve however. In Premiere it takes it's time and a bit longer, but manageable. Just let it render over night.

I guess it might be just a matter of time maybe until Summer unless Resolve supports Prores RAW too... But who knows...

So all in all, CinemaDNG and Prores RAW are quite nicely to work with these days on current Mac's. Curious to see how the new Mac Mini with M1 would handle this, and looking forward to the new M1 iMac Pro's - these should be very fast silicon!

Cheers

 

[Dobmatt]

Hi Brett,

ProRes Raw is nice to edit of course. Although I have upgraded the Z6 to the latest FW I still can't change White Balance or ISO in the latest Final Cut Pro Version, which is weird as the latest Nikon FW should enable both ProresRAW and Blackmagic RAW to do so. As for the CinemaDNG of the X7, ISO/WB change is not supported in FCPX.

With Premiere CC however I can change WB (but not ISO) with CinemaDNG of the X7 and Prores RAW of the Z6 within the Lumetri Tools. Exposure adjustments and everything else feels as smooth as it would normally do in Resolve. Good work from Adobe here. Works nicely!

On RAW stuff I use Neatvideo in it's various host dev states too, that is stil fastest in Resolve however. In Premiere it takes it's time and a bit longer, but manageable. Just let it render over night.

I guess it might be just a matter of time maybe until Summer unless Resolve supports Prores RAW too... But who knows...

So all in all, CinemaDNG and Prores RAW are quite nicely to work with these days on current Mac's. Curious to see how the new Mac Mini with M1 would handle this, and looking forward to the new M1 iMac Pro's - these should be very fast silicon!

Cheers

I may be wrong (I've been wrong before ), but there's a major misconception about handling CineDNG footage files, I'm afraid. Considering the fact that each CineDNG clip basically contains a sequence of DNG stills, the only logical approach to take full advantages of this image format is to edit/grade each of them in a dedicated application. To my knowledge the Adobe Camera Raw is one of the best tools to do just that. There you can tweak virtually all aspects of digital RAW image in a way no other editing environment is even close to offer. In other words, simply dropping a CineDNG sequence into either Premiere or Resolve timeline will allow for grading only with basic parameters, just like any other non-RAW footage. The concept is to grade RAW frames one by one and render a given sequence into a clip in some better manageable format for further editing. On Adobe territory one way is to bath render CineDNG footages in After Effects, archiving the output with some lossless intermediate codec into a separate folder. ProRes 422 HQ is seemingly the choice of many these days. Rendering process is painfully long, but the quality is unbeatable ...

 

[Brett8883]

I may be wrong (I've been wrong before ), but there's a major misconception about handling CineDNG footage files, I'm afraid. Considering the fact that each CineDNG clip basically contains a sequence of DNG stills, the only logical approach to take full advantages of this image format is to edit/grade each of them in a dedicated application. To my knowledge the Adobe Camera Raw is one of the best tools to do just that. There you can tweak virtually all aspects of digital RAW image in a way no other editing environment is even close to offer. In other words, simply dropping a CineDNG sequence into either Premiere or Resolve timeline will allow for grading only with basic parameters, just like any other non-RAW footage. The concept is to grade RAW frames one by one and render a given sequence into a clip in some better manageable format for further editing. On Adobe territory one way is to bath render CineDNG footages in After Effects, archiving the output with some lossless intermediate codec into a separate folder. ProRes 422 HQ is seemingly the choice of many these days. Rendering process is painfully long, but the quality is unbeatable ...

I would certainly say there are some unique benefits to using ACR in After Effects such as the upright tool, using DNG profiles, and lens profiles. My gripe with it is you can’t go back and change the ACR adjustments once you close the ACR dialogue and you can only use the first frame as your reference frame.

However, Resolve does have a Camera Raw panel that is only available on RAW video clips that allows you to make adjustments during the demosaic process before it is output to the timeline much like ACR. Unlike AE these edits are non-destructive and can be adjusted at any time during the editing process. Additionally, having the source footage remain on the timeline in its original uncompressed RAW form is quite a benefit vs having a prerendered source footage from another program since you can always make adjustments right up to the final render.

I believe PP has a somewhat similar if less robust feature called the “Master” panel?

One of the primary benefits of shooting RAW is being able to adjust absolute white balance. RAW is also colorspace agnostic so you can assign any colorspace during demosaicing.

 

[Dobmatt]

I would certainly say there are some unique benefits to using ACR in After Effects such as the upright tool, using DNG profiles, and lens profiles. My gripe with it is you can’t go back and change the ACR adjustments once you close the ACR dialogue and you can only use the first frame as your reference frame.

However, Resolve does have a Camera Raw panel that is only available on RAW video clips that allows you to make adjustments during the demosaic process before it is output to the timeline much like ACR. Unlike AE these edits are non-destructive and can be adjusted at any time during the editing process. Additionally, having the source footage remain on the timeline in its original uncompressed RAW form is quite a benefit vs having a prerendered source footage from another program since you can always make adjustments right up to the final render.

I believe PP has a somewhat similar if less robust feature called the “Master” panel?

One of the primary benefits of shooting RAW is being able to adjust absolute white balance. RAW is also colorspace agnostic so you can assign any colorspace during demosaicing.

I must confess that CineDNG territory is a relatively new one for me to explore. I was able to digest the workflow in Adobe environment, having a vast experience there and with ACR in particular. Now is the time to explore what Resolve has to offer. BTW, you can open any frame from a given sequence via Adobe Bridge and save correcting settings without applying them for further use in AE.

 

[Brett8883]

BTW, you can open any frame from a given sequence via Adobe Bridge and save correcting settings without applying them for further use in AE.

Do you have to save it as a preset or will AE/PP pick up the changes you made to the DNGs in Bridge? That’s interesting.

One thing I wish you could do but can’t is use Bridge to apply settings and then open them up in Resolve with the changes you made in AE. That would solve all issues because Resolve handles cDNG so much better.

 

[Dobmatt]

Do you have to save it as a preset or will AE/PP pick up the changes you made to the DNGs in Bridge? That’s interesting.

One thing I wish you could do but can’t is use Bridge to apply settings and then open them up in Resolve with the changes you made in AE. That would solve all issues because Resolve handles cDNG so much better.

No, Bridge is not involved in any changes, it just delegates this job to CR. In Bridge you just picking the most relevant frame to experiment with grading in CR, rather than to be limited to a first frame as AE will do. Yes, you save it as a custom preset and leave CR without applying any changes to graded frame. Later - once you attempt to render a given clip in AE - you load this preset into CR window. I usually render to ProRes 422 HQ, which should play smoothly in timelines of either PP or Resolve without a need for proxies. There I do subtle exposure tweaks if needed, but all colour grading, sharpening, denoiseing etc. is made by Adobe Camera Raw.

 

[Brett8883]

No, Bridge is not involved in any changes, it just delegates this job to CR. In Bridge you just picking the most relevant frame to experiment with grading in CR, rather than to be limited to a first frame as AE will do. Yes, you save it as a custom preset and leave CR without applying any changes to graded frame. Later - once you attempt to render a given clip in AE - you load this preset into CR window. I usually render to ProRes 422 HQ, which should play smoothly in timelines of either PP or Resolve without a need for proxies. There I do subtle exposure tweaks if needed, but all colour grading, sharpening, denoiseing etc. is made by Adobe Camera Raw.

So besides the obvious what tools are you using in ACR? I heard color grading, sharpening, and noise reduction. Any others?

The reason for my question is that one reason AE takes so long is the ACR sharpening and noise reduction takes forever even if you have it set to 2 or something low and it’s not optimized for video. Also I t’s actually better to do noise reduction in AE, PP, or Resolve because you can they use static NR AND temporal noise reduction instead of just static NR. Temporal NR takes looks at the differences between frames which is likely to be noise whereas ACR only looks at the current frame and as I said it takes forever. So heads up there.

I know what you mean about being comfortable in ACR. I’m the same way but I guarantee if you allow yourself to step outside your comfort zone and try Resolve you’ll find that it’s Camera Raw panel has most of the same controls as ACR. Some things are called different things, for example, black level is called “lift”, white level is called “gain”, and clarity is called “midtone detail.”

Resolve is 10000% faster than ACR and I actually think the demosaic program is better. Sometimes I even edit photos in Resolve because i think it’s that much better.

Sorry I don’t mean to be a Resolve fanboy it just truly revolutionized my Raw workflow and saves me hours and hours and hours of time that I feel like anybody who hasn’t at least tried it and given it a fair look is missing out.

 

[Dobmatt]

Resolve is 10000% faster than ACR and I actually think the demosaic program is better. Sometimes I even edit photos in Resolve because i think it’s that much better.

So, I've made yet another exploring trip with CineDNG footage into Resolve territory... This program - even in "free" incarnation - is certainly capable to grade and take the advantages of RAW editing, period. The Camera Raw panel, however, doesn't offer options even close to what Adobe Camera Raw does. The immediacy of any adjustments made in ACR is clearly visible on huge dedicated screen, while tweaks made in Resolve aren't that obvious. Perhaps there's a way to tailor Resolve's UI and editing workspace to my liking, but this will require an enormous amount of learning and changes of habits solidified after decades of dealing with Adobe environment ...

 

[vertrider1]

Dear Matt, it all depends on the Workflow. I love CinemaDNG (Sequences) regardless if looked at in Bridge and ACR (great to pick out Frames from Footage); working on it in Premiere CC or as you mention in Resolve.

A neat trick for Resolve btw: On Mac you press CMD + F and the Adjustment Screen goes to Full View (as well for watching a Clip etc (this is since Blackmagic currently allows a 2nd Proof Screen only with their dedicated output Card and a BM Screen). But for us ”normal” users a good workaround.

I’ve worked my fair share with After Effects and ACR the past 10 years (with Lightroom and LRTimelapse as too) producing a lot of Timelapses for International Clients.

What I like about Resolve is it’s insane processing Speed overall and on Rendering Footage / Edits out. I don’t know why Adobe in the year 2020 still is not able to bring Premiere CC up to the speed of Resolve. OK, with the latest Lightroom CC for example Lightroom got faster, and Premiere a bit as well.

But Resolve is the absolute Speed King. Doing Grading, PostPro and Editing on CinemaDNG footage is a blast with Resolve. Also all the FX stuff is so fast. Denoise a CinemaDNG clip with NeatVideo in Resolve, and do the same in Premiere, the time savings benefits are amazing, and it all adds up when working larger projects.

I can however only acknowledge this for Macs, don’t know if Resolve on decent PCs is as fast as well compared to Premiere CC, Bridge etc.

 

[Dobmatt]

... Resolve is the absolute Speed King. Doing Grading, PostPro and Editing on CinemaDNG footage is a blast with Resolve. Also all the FX stuff is so fast. Denoise a CinemaDNG clip with NeatVideo in Resolve, and do the same in Premiere, the time savings benefits are amazing, and it all adds up when working larger projects.

Speed wise yes, Resolve is a champ. It is a production workhorse. Accuracy and quality of grading as compared to Adobe suite remains to be a controversial issue. I just like the plethora of tools ACR is offering and I'm intimately familiar with them, particularly in WB department. All goes down to a time one is willing to spend with fine tweaking in post, I guess ...

 

[Brett8883]

So, I've made yet another exploring trip with CineDNG footage into Resolve territory... This program - even in "free" incarnation - is certainly capable to grade and take the advantages of RAW editing, period. The Camera Raw panel, however, doesn't offer options even close to what Adobe Camera Raw does. The immediacy of any adjustments made in ACR is clearly visible on huge dedicated screen, while tweaks made in Resolve aren't that obvious. Perhaps there's a way to tailor Resolve's UI and editing workspace to my liking, but this will require an enormous amount of learning and changes of habits solidified after decades of dealing with Adobe environment ...

Well you know if Adobe works for you then great. I just don’t know how you can stand such poor performance and slow rendering. Also eventually all those ProRes 422 HQ clips you prerendered are going to be taking up significant amount of space.

But let me ask what are you missing? The number of things that ACR has that Resolve doesn’t have I can really only think of a couple. You probably just didn’t find then or they are called something else. If you tell me what you want to use I can tell you where to find it.

You can go to window and go to dual monitors and find a set up that has the video scope on the monitor you want. It’s true it’s not as flexible as Adobe but it is possible to use multiple monitors.

 

[Dobmatt]

Well you know if Adobe works for you then great. I just don’t know how you can stand such poor performance and slow rendering. Also eventually all those ProRes 422 HQ clips you prerendered are going to be taking up significant amount of space.

But let me ask what are you missing? The number of things that ACR has that Resolve doesn’t have I can really only think of a couple. You probably just didn’t find then or they are called something else. If you tell me what you want to use I can tell you where to find it.

You can go to window and go to dual monitors and find a set up that has the video scope on the monitor you want. It’s true it’s not as flexible as Adobe but it is possible to use multiple monitors.

I can't tell you what and if I'm missing anything in Resolve as compared to Adobe suite. Most likely everything is equally available in both programs, just in different form. I agree that Resolve is faster in rendering department, no doubt. But Adobe environment wasn't created and designed by idiots, useless to say. There must be a reason for such tedious and agonizingly longer CineDNG rendering. That said, I'm not a commercial videographer and not in a hurry ...