Red Liquid homepage

 

Purpose

This tool is aimed to transfer Red One camera material meta data from RedCine to Avid Chrome Xe or Pinnacle Liquid editing software and and back.
It does also create job list for Virtual Dub to render Red One files into avi files.
I sincerely hope that it will save some grey hair as it does in our edit suites. Drop me an e-mail if you find it useful.

Warning:
I'm not a programmer. The tool is in beta stage (as most software in this world), has a lot of  choices "hard coded" and may work the way you don't expect.

 

Installation

Install it from our web site. Link is below.
You need also Microsoft .NET Framework ver 3.5 to be installed.
If you don't have it the installation from Microsoft should start automatically. This is huge 55MB file and it might take up to 10 min to download it. Please be patient.

The tool generates also a job list for Virtual Dub. VirtualDub homepage.
To have Virtual Dub to open Red One *.r3d files you need this awesome plug-in from Gabor Kertai.

 

Versions

Version in work
Just discovered that we open R3D files with default input filter parameters ( debayer from 2K, all settings as they were in camera etc). Ups....

Version 0.1.5
Added Quality Rankings for Liquid. To my knowledge you may have the same material in Liquid with different quality. I have to figure out how exactly but should be usefull for offline-online scenarios. 

Version 0.1.4
Added Handles in conversion from Liquid to RedCine

Version 0.1.3
Fixed bug that only every odd clip was processed from RedCine to Liquid/VirtualDub.

Version 0.1.2
It was impossible to find how drop-frame works for all 3 cases.
Now I hope it is solved.
Supported framerates: 23.976,  24,  25,  29.970,  30,  59.94,  60 fps.

Version 0.1.1
First public release.

 

Usage

RedCine to Liquid

  1. Open one Red One clip in VirtualDub, modify conversion settings and in File menu save VirtualDub processing settings into *.vcf file.
    It is quite complicated first time. Here is a sample file to convert from 2K to PAL 720x576 16-9 uncompressed video and embedded ch1 & ch2 audio. Sample.
    As for PAL/NTSC the Matrox AXIO 50Mb I-Frame MPEG codec works without any rerender.
  2. Load Red One clips into RedCine.
  3. Set correct project frame rate in RedCine.
  4. Save project as *.xml file. (You have to manually add xml extension)
  5. Open this *.xml file in Red Liquid.
  6. Red Liquid will ask for folder where the Liquid media files will be placed.
  7. Red Liquid will ask for VirtualDub processing settings file *.vcf.
  8. Now there will be two files generated into the same folder where *.xml file from RedCine was.
    *.xce file is Liquid Clip Exchange file and *.jobs file is Virtual Dub job list.
  9. Open Virtual Dub, chose File -> Job control and in new window chose File -> Load job list  and start render.
  10. Import the *.xce file into Liquid (it's in the same Tools menu where ALE and XML import is.)
    It is suggested to have "Ignore insufficient media duration" checked.
    In a case clips don't have 2 channels of audio or audio render will fail the clip icons will appear and you can uncheck in clip properties the missing channels.
    As the resolution and aspect are not carried at current version you probably should select all imported clips and change aspect in Clip Properties.

 

Liquid to RedCine

  1. When you have finished your offline, please remove all Timewarps, and prolong clips to the transitions duration

  2. Copy all used Red One clips from timeline into a rack, select ONLY those and export *.xce file.
    The export is located in Tools menu under ALE / XLM export.
    On export dialog please check also "Export Selected Clip(s) on Projects Racks Tab". It is the lowest option in window.
    Liquid has very powerful meta data export and only this way we will get the *.xce file that Red Liquid does understand.

  3. Open *.xce file in Red Liquid and the new *.xml file will be stored into the same folder where *.xce file was.

  4. Load all needed clips into Red Cine and in Project tab open the *.xml file.

  5. If everything matches you will have new sequence in Red Cine. Clips on RedCine timeline are not in same order as they are in Liquid but in order they are in RedCine construct.
    If different parts of clip is used it will result into several instances of the same clip with different start and end times on the timeline.

  6. If RedCine "Failed to load construct" check the log file. Usually: "C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\RedCine\Log".
    In the end of file is usually pointed what part of the *.xml file was faulty and you can use Notepad to fix that.

  7. You can now render out the media in RedCine, convert it into files that Liquid can use, export *.xml file, convert it into *.xce file in Red Liquid and import the new clips into Liquid.
    Don't render the Red One files in Virtual Dub any more as in current version of Red Liquid the clip handles must match clip physical start and end.

 

Known shortcomings

  1. Current RedCine can open files from folder names which do have national characters outside us-ascii but RedCine will reject on xml import all filenames with non us-ascii charactres.br /> Also clip names do not support non us-ascii characters.

  2. Generated files will overwrite the files with the same name without asking or noting.

  3. Only 2 channels of audio are supported.
    Also it seems better way to have audio and video in separate folders and files.
    I intend to add choices here.

  4. Some meta data needed later by RedCine is kept on Comments field in Liquid . Please do not change it.
    Clip name holds original Red One clip name but you can change it and hopefully it will show up even in Red Cine.

  5. We have used/tested it only on WindowsXP SP3 with .NET Framework ver 3.5, RedCine ver 3.1.8 and Chrome Xe ver7.2 with SP1 installed.
    All material was shot and edited in 25fps timebase.

  6. No resolution or aspect ratio is carried from one program to another.

 

 

Download

Disclaimer:
You can use the Application at your own risk. This Application is provided to you "as is" and Author expressly disclaims all warranties of any kind, either implied or express, including but not limited to warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, and non-infringement. Author makes no warranty, either implied or express, that any part of this Application will be error-free, virus-free, secure, accurate, reliable, or of any quality.

This funny disclaimer is loaned from Gabor Kertai.

I have read and understood the Disclaimer and would like to install Red Liquid

 

Contact

You can contact me: priit at joosti dot ee

Priit Põldmaa