Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Adobe Encoder Problems

This is topic Adobe Encoder Problems in forum Digital Cinema Forum at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Phil Ranucci (Member # 3820) on 01-23-2015, 09:30 PM:

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival is coming up. We're getting lots of CRU drives from Deluxe/Technicolor, etc..
These load fine, just like a studio release. Also lots of USB3 drives from Staples and Amazon. 90% of the problems are with these drives.

Problem 1-Cinedigm LMS doesn't support USB3 so ingest is glacial.
Real difficult to load ~100 movies that way. GDC server ingest is just as bad.

Problem 2- We're getting USB drives that filmmakers used Adobe Media Encoder to output the DCP and it isn't working. The image consists of about 1/4 of the movie image, and the actual picture on the screen fills about 10% of the screen. We have USB drives that contain the same content encoded by Open DCP and the picture contains the full image and fills the screen. Barco and GDC feel the problem is with the encoding, and that seems sensible. Adobe doesn't seem to understand the problem and we haven't gotten ant response yet.
Any ideas?

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 01-24-2015, 04:06 AM:

I side with Barco and GDC on this...if encoded properly, it doesn't manner the method of transfer or server you put it on...it will work properly.

Yes, USB2 is slow...twice as long as going via CRU or FTP. Only the more recently conceived servers are going to have USB 3 ingest at this time. I would think that a Cinedigm TMS system could be upgraded to USB3 though...it is just a Windows based TMS system.

I wonder if some entrepreneuring fellow could "invent" a CRU caddy with a USB3 port. That is, it has a USB3 to SATA converter in it such that when you plug the dummy CRU in, it has a USB3 port on it. Would be a nice update to all elder servers with CRU ports for when those pesky USB drives show up. I know that going from SATA to USB 3 converters exist (cheaply too) to allow connecting external drives to a computer...I wonder how it would work going the other direction.

Posted by Frank B. McLaughlin (Member # 6683) on 01-24-2015, 07:13 AM:

I think the media encoder is dependent upon a plug-in. In Premiere Pro I use Total Concept and JPEG2000 encoding an add-on.

Posted by Antonio Casado (Member # 7592) on 01-24-2015, 07:24 AM:

The last version of Adobe CC 2014 can export to DCP via the Wraptor plugin (limited). It´s a crap. Don´t use it.

I do a lot of DCPs that I copy to USB drives and none of them have problems in any server worldwide. Is not the drive, but the DCP itself and the format used (EXT3 is the best).

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 01-24-2015, 08:35 AM:

Yup - Wraptor, also the old standalone versions, have always been problematic. Poor Choice from Adobe to include this into Premiere CC now. What a mess for festivals...
But maybe that'll generate enough negative feedback to fix it.

Maybe rewrapping is a possible solution, if it's only formal issues. Better then to reencode all the material.

About USB3 vs. USB2 - a practical solution would be to transfer all incoming USB-drives to a NAS or bare hds or CRU caddies, then ingest into Cinedigm through CRU or SATA/ESATA or Network. I guess a good NAS should be able to do that quickly enough.

Steve - USB to SATA works because USB is multiprotocol and has an explizit block-device transport layer. SATA on the other hand is ONLY block-transfer, and lacks options to initialize and serve the overlying USB protocol layer. You simply can not send USB commands over SATA links. That's why there will never be a SATA->USB3.0 converter. If it would be possible, it would already exist.

The only option is to use a USB3.0 capable NAS-Adapter, going from ext2/NTFS filesystems to FTP protocol.

I wrote about it here:

http://www.film-tech.com/ubb/f16/t002151.html

The Addonics NAS 4.0 may be worth a try. I don't know anything about the Cinedigm TMS server hardware. But I guess chances are high that at least that server could be retrofitted with a USB3.0 card.

- Carsten

Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 01-24-2015, 10:46 AM:

The Cinedigm TMS is a windows based program and runs on Windows. As such, it will have the ingest capabilities that a PC would have plus the CRU ports. That is, USB ingest is already there...you don't need to use the CRU for everything. Depending on the vintage of the server/computer running the TCC, you would have USB 3 already. If not, one should be able to put in a USB card. The size/capabilities of the Cinedigm system normally depends on screen count. The higher the screen count the greater the storage capacity and typically the greater the number of ingest points (4 CRU versus 2 or possibly even 1 for a mini). They all have USB and DVD drives too.

Unlike many other TMS systems, Cinedigm systems are complete clones so as to not introduce variables...That way, when Cinedigm makes an update, they can effectively test it on every system since they are all the same. That said, we have some based on an IBM server and most are based on DELL servers. For the most part, they are quite reliable for us.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-25-2015, 05:45 PM:

quote: Carsten Kurz
Yup - Wraptor, also the old standalone versions, have always been problematic. Poor Choice from Adobe to include this into Premiere CC now. What a mess for festivals...
But maybe that'll generate enough negative feedback to fix it.

I'm pretty surprised and disappointed Adobe is not more on the ball with fixing problems and/or incorporating new features and improvements in its Creative Cloud applications. The whole idea behind this subscription thing is getting bugs fixed much faster and seeing improvements and new features frequently rather than having to wait a year or more for the next boxed version of the software.

Maybe Adobe has such a monopoly in the graphics software industry that it feels like it can get away with dragging its feet rather than making a paid CC subscription a better value.

Posted by Phil Ranucci (Member # 3820) on 01-26-2015, 12:44 PM:

Thanks for the replies. It looks like Adobe knows about it.
This is how it looks.
https://forums.adobe.com/thread/1687980

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-26-2015, 02:56 PM:

Hopefully Adobe will respond to this promptly, but I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for the update.

Adobe has been dragging their feet on fixing some bugs in other programs. The latest update of Photoshop CC has some laggy mouse pointer issues with PCs running Win 8.1 and multiple monitors. I've been hounding them to fix an issue with SVG graphics in Muse CC. The app adds a 2 pixel tall white underline to any SVG image placed into a Muse site.

I'm just wondering what's going on with Adobe and some other "American" software companies. Are they jobbing all the programming work to India and covered with language barrier problems or something? We were sold on CC for it offering more frequent updates and much faster bug fixes. I'm not seeing it at this point.

The tree generator in Photoshop CC is pretty cool though.
[Razz]

Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 01-26-2015, 03:45 PM:

They got your money; all paid up in advance for unspecified future services. Which could equally be nothing at all or something significant. Since providing nothing at all costs them nothing and the other option does, which do you think is more cost-effective for them to give you?

I really don't see where they have any incentive to actually do anything for you. After all, they no no longer have to create a new version to sell to the customers; the customers pay anyway and all they have to do is sit back and collect. Why pay a salary to those pesky programmers?

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 01-26-2015, 04:54 PM:

They bought this Wraptor module, so they do not even have their hands on the code. They can only wait for Q it. Quvis essentially never fixed the wraptor issues in 4 years. Let's see..

- Carsten

Posted by Terrence Meiczinger (Member # 5059) on 01-26-2015, 06:47 PM:

My understanding was that this was more Quvis working a deal for Adobe to include the plugin rather than Adobe approaching Quvis. This would probably be why it is somewhat crippled.

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-26-2015, 06:57 PM:

quote: Frank Cox
They got your money; all paid up in advance for unspecified future services. Which could equally be nothing at all or something significant. Since providing nothing at all costs them nothing and the other option does, which do you think is more cost-effective for them to give you?

Unfortunately in my line of work there is no credible alternative to Adobe. Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator rule the print graphics world with an iron fist. Corel and Quark are way behind in the graphics software market and have their own problems.

We could try toughing it out with older legacy versions of Adobe software, but those older versions run into compatibility issues in newer versions of Windows. Plus, we have to be able to trade CC-based files with other customers. Basically we're stuck.

Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 01-26-2015, 07:35 PM:

Yup. That's what I said. They've got you exactly where they want you.

They have exactly no incentive to provide you with anything at all at this point. They can "farm the mailbox", cash your cheque when it arrives, and sit on the beach in between. Since you have no apparent option, they have no reason to do anything more. Bugs? Crashes? Missing features? Yawn.. pass the margarita.

Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 01-27-2015, 06:55 AM:

Having 'the cash in' doesn't mean they do not have to follow their legal obligations. If product doesn't perform (and in this case with 1/4 cropped content, there is certainly no big discussion about what 'perform' or 'not perform' means), they have to fix it.

- Carsten

Posted by Bobby Henderson (Member # 840) on 01-27-2015, 02:46 PM:

quote: Frank Cox
Yup. That's what I said. They've got you exactly where they want you.

True. As much as Adobe seems to have a monopoly on much of the graphics software market it's also a strong statement of just how badly Adobe's competitors have sucked competing with them.

Adobe has had rivals in every niche of creative software in which they've developed and marketed. Many of those niche markets have been dominated by other applications. In each niche now dominated by Adobe those developers made mistakes to cede the lead to Adobe. This is certainly true with the print-related graphics software field. It could end up happening with the audio/video editing field too.

Adobe has done a very good job of leveraging the industry leading applications it does have to elevate and improve the lesser applications in its collection. They've done it with file compatibilty between applications, even across Mac/Win platforms. Adobe has taken it farther with features like Smart Objects and Dynamic Link which can greatly reduce the need to hop various assets between multiple applications with each change.

Quark Xpress used to be the dominant professional page layout software program. In the 1990's you couldn't get a job in a newspaper or magazine publisher without Quark Xpress experience. At that time Adobe was selling PageMaker, the first DTP app, but one that only drew laughs when compared to Quark Xpress. The publishing world didn't take InDesign seriously when it was first released. But Quark's own mismanagement with customer service and development of Xpress gave InDesign the opening it needed. Today InDesign has an overwhelming lead over Quark Xpress.

Corel had much of the Windows-based graphics software market to itself in the 1990s. But as good as CorelDRAW is as a drawing application it doesn't integrate worth a damn with Photoshop and InDesign. Aldus/Macromedia Freehand grew into a credible rival until Macromedia fumbled the ball with Freehand 10. Adobe bought Macromedia in 2005 and killed Freehand soon after that. Corel tried selling a Mac version of CorelDRAW with version 11, but had very few takers. They haven't released a Mac version since then. So now Adobe Illustrator dominates on both Windows and Mac platforms.

Adobe Premiere (now called Premiere Pro) had been a laughing stock when compared to Final Cut Pro or Avid Media Composer. But the Premiere Pro user base has been growing steadily due to the app's integration with other more industry-leading Adobe applications like Photoshop & After Effects. Apple's radical changes to Final Cut Pro with version X certainly contributed to customers looking for alternatives such as Premiere Pro.

A few weeks ago with New Year's Day looming I read a photography-oriented article making predictions for 2015 (IIRC it was on the Adorama web site). One of those predictions was Adobe would start selling boxed software with perpetual licenses again. I'm not very optimistic that is going to happen.

It's going to take more than customer anger to get Adobe to fix software bugs and incorporate improvements faster. Adobe needs pressure from serious competitors.