Speed ramp better done in AE or Shake?

[Cobaltmax]

I need to do some 300 style speed ramp and I'm wondering if this is a job better done by Shake or AE?
Also, it will be shot with a HD camera and the max frame rate is 60fps. (any rate from 1 to 60fps) Normally speed ramp shots are shot in frame rates multiple of 24fps, like 48fps, 72fps, 96fps and so on. So the max with a 60p capable camera would be 48fs which is just half as slow. It would sure look nicer with a more extreme slow down. So is there a trick to use the whole 60fps and get a slower slow down? Thanks.

[Gentle Fury]

actually if you are shooting 60p oddly enough that equates perfectly to 24p...you can play 60p at 24 with no negative effects...it looks great. If you are working in final cut and shooting with a DVCPro codec you can convert it to 24p using all frames and you will get a 2.5x slowdown with which you could incorporate into your ramp.....its really good for instantly jumping in and out of slowmo.

[Cobaltmax]

Really? Good to know. I just know that in the film world shots destined to speed ramp need to be shot in multiples of 24.
What do you think is the best tool for the job in getting a result as close as possible to a in-camera ramp with the maximum image quality? AE or Shake? Thanks again.

[Gentle Fury]

The Foundry Furnace for Shake has kronos and it is the best time remapper i've ever used. Its only like $30 a day to rent.

[Cobaltmax]

I'm not sure I would be able to rent around here. Small town.
Shake alone can't pull it off? I also heard AE can do a great job but I#m not a big AE fan.

[Gentle Fury]

you dont rent it at a store you go to the foundrys website and you go to the shake plugin section you tell it how many days you need it for, download the software and the license key, install and enjoy :)

[Cobaltmax]

Aha, I thought you would rent time on a workstation.
Just got off the phone with a fella who uses Shake who was telling me Shake's time re-maping tools are great and how it's very simple to go into a nodle-in and change etc. But what I'm worried about is to make the footage look as close to a real speed ramped shot as possible. It shouldn't look like slowed and sped video, it needs to look like it was ramped in camera as done with film cameras.
I will check Furnace.

[Gentle Fury]

furnace actually uses optical flow morphing to create replacement frames...not blending frames. It is as close as you can get to drawing the new frames by hand ;)

[Cobaltmax]

Sounds great.

Although Shake also uses optical flow no? I was just watching an online tutorial (really speeding through it actually) and the guy mentioned optical flow instead of blending. Unless he had Furnace installed. I have to watch it properly.

[Matt P]

Shake 4.1 has some nodes which use Optical Flow - for example if you retime something and set it to 'adaptive' rather than 'nearest' or 'blend'. Though it's not as good as Kronos, which is indeed a brilliant time remapper.

I've found in the past that AE gives me faster previews than Shake, which is handy when doing time remapping that needs to be dynamic and tweaked a lot. Though at the end of the day, both apps can do it pretty well and the Furnace plugins are available for both. It may just come down to which interface you'd rather use.

-Matt

[hevonen]

AE timewarp uses Kronos, I don't know if the interface has been dumbed down though.

edit: gboom was faster :)

[Cobaltmax]

So AE uses Kronos? Since which version? I don't have the newest CS4 yet. But it is good to know.
It's just that AE is timeline based and second can it work and render at the same quality as Shake?

[Matt P]

So AE uses Kronos? Since which version? I don't have the newest CS4 yet. But it is good to know.
It's just that AE is timeline based and second can it work and render at the same quality as Shake?
As far as I'm aware, AE can work in 32-Bit Float the same as Shake can. Problems with the Float workflow only really appear once you start using effects which don't work with floating point. If you're re-timing then you won't experience this problem.

I even think AE is a little more friendly with formats, given it's more recently updated state AE will bring in a few types of files Shake doesn't like - Though this problem doesn't exist if you're converting to, and working with frame sequences.

I didn't know AE's Timewarp *was* Kronos. I seem to learn something new every day. In any case - it's pretty sweet. Having the timeline interface makes it easier to understand and work with than Shake, in my opinion.

-Matt

[Gentle Fury]

As far as I'm aware, AE can work in 32-Bit Float the same as Shake can. Problems with the Float workflow only really appear once you start using effects which don't work with floating point. If you're re-timing then you won't experience this problem.

I even think AE is a little more friendly with formats, given it's more recently updated state AE will bring in a few types of files Shake doesn't like - Though this problem doesn't exist if you're converting to, and working with frame sequences.

I didn't know AE's Timewarp *was* Kronos. I seem to learn something new every day. In any case - it's pretty sweet. Having the timeline interface makes it easier to understand and work with than Shake, in my opinion.

-Matt

is CS4 full float? That was always the problem with AE you were restricted to half float.

[Matt P]

I thought that since 7, AE could handle float properly. Give this (http://generalspecialist.com/2006/05/floating-in-32-bit-space-where-no-one.asp) a lookie for more details.

-Matt

[johnc]

is CS4 full float? That was always the problem with AE you were restricted to half float.

I don't believe AE's ever done half float. Perhaps you're thinking of Fusion?

[Matt P]

I don't believe AE's ever done half float. Perhaps you're thinking of Fusion?
Before 7, AE had some trouble with float - Stu Maschwitz released plugins (one called eLIN I think) to get around the issues. Though it's kind of before my time, I wasn't touching high-quality footage prior to CS3. Before that were my studenty DV days. :)

-Matt

[Cobaltmax]

Yeah I have also heard of the float related problems in AE. The reason I like Shake is because it fully supports float and is node based, which I prefer than timeline based. But for the speed ramp I will try doing it in AE if it is supporting float now since it has kronos built in.

[Matt P]

Last Afx I used was 7, but half the tools didnt support float properly. It was a real hurdle to get around.

I mention this in my first post (go look, really I did).

Here's the dealio - as I understand it a fair few of the original effects and a lot of third party plugin effects don't support above 16-bit. Some won't work above 8-bit. You can tell if they're restricted to bit depths by the effect icon, it'll have a number on it of the max bit-depth it can support.

Though all this is completely irrelevant given that cobalt is asking about time remapping/timewarps. Which is oflow/frame based and applies no color operation to the original footage. Because of this he's extremely unlikely to require the use of an effect/plugin which is incompatible with float.

It's still worth mentioning that CS4 saw a few effects updates to work with floating-point. I suppose it's a symptom of the preset-based workflow of AE. Which has it's benefits too.

-Matt

[Cobaltmax]

Though all this is completely irrelevant given that cobalt is asking about time remapping/timewarps. Which is oflow/frame based and applies no color operation to the original footage. Because of this he's extremely unlikely to require the use of an effect/plugin which is incompatible with float.

Yes, that's true. But it also helps to re-affirm I'm right in sticking with Shake over AE for compositing. I have a buddy who swears for AE for compositing and keeps telling me I should drop Shake since it's discontinued and move to AE CS4 etc etc. Don't think so. I will only drop Shake when I can afford Nuke and even then, depending on what I need to do and if i like the way Nuke does it over Shake.

[Matt P]

You didn't ask which was better for compositing, though. I'm a Nuke user and would use Shake over AE for film compositing. Unless you're working in TV or Motion Graphics then your friend isn't giving you very good advice.

Though for this kind of retime. AE will give the results quickest and easiest and at full-float. Much as I love Shake, it's a slow old creature. Plus unless you have Kronos, it can't match AE's retime.

(I'm a firm believer in the know everythings strength and use them mentality).
-Matt

[Cobaltmax]

You didn't ask which was better for compositing, though.

You're right. Reason I said it was true when you said all the float talk was completely irrelevant because I asked about time remapping/timewarps.

I was just saying that it's good to hear Shake is better than AE for compositiing and support full float etc since every now and then somebody tries to get out of Shake and into AE or some other program just because Shake is discontinued.

[Matt P]

We're going to delve into semantics now, though the course of discussion led to say that both AE and Shake can output and work with full float.

Though Shake is still better than AE for full-out comp work simply because of the level of control it gives you through being node based. You know exactly what's happening to your footage and nothing is hidden from you, you're never ignorant due to presets and supplied effects.

Hehe, I worry that I am just talking for the sake of it. In short : I agree. Stick with Shake with Nuke in mind.

[Cobaltmax]

Sure, I see what you're saying. ;)

By the way, thanks everybody for all the replies.