Compositing Category: Digital Rebellion Blog

Shake error: Disk cache locked

Thu, 20 Mar 08 16:36:02 -0600

When Shake restarts after a crash, you may be familiar with this message:

But what does it mean and which option should you choose?

Shake has two caches - one that stores whole frames and another that stores tiles (segments of frames). These two caches work together to speed up rendering and the responsiveness of the interface. These caches operate both in memory and on the disk. Although they are not quite the same, think of them as a similar concept to Final Cut Pro's render files.

When you quit Shake, it copies the memory cache to the disk cache (if you've ever wondered why there's a delay when you quit Shake, that's the reason) and leaves it on disk so that it is there the next time you open Shake.

If your machine crashes or you force-quit the application, this process does not take place and the disk cache becomes invalid. You are given the choice of moving the old cache to a temporary location and creating a new one (recommended) or disabling caching altogether (recommended only if you are running two copies of Shake on the same machine). Copying the cache to a temporary location allows you to salvage any required information from it before trashing it.

Speaking of which, if Shake crashes a lot, you will end up with lots of temporary caches cluttering up space (mine took up over 1 GB). Every so often, you should go to /var/tmp/Shake and delete all of the folders marked TempCache. Do not delete the one marked cache, as that is your current cache. Note that you will probably not be able to browse to the /var folder because it is hidden so it is recommended to go to the Go menu in the Finder and select Go to Folder and type the path in.

So in summary, when you get that message, you are recommended to click Ok and delete the temporary cache later. You might experience a loss of speed and responsiveness (most likely not noticeable) but Shake will gradually speed up as the cache is refilled with data over time.

P.S. I really should write more Shake articles. If you have any suggestions as to what you'd like to see, please let me know.

Does Application X work with Application Y?

Thu, 20 Mar 08 00:43:00 -0600

Does Shake work with Final Cut Pro 4.5?
Does Motion work with Final Cut Express?
Does Compressor work with iMovie?

These are very common questions and I get these questions so often that I'm going to type the reply here to save me time in the future. The answer is very simple. Some applications have workflows between each other, such as round-tripping from Final Cut Pro > Color > Final Cut Pro. Obviously such workflows would not be possible with the above-mentioned scenarios but at its core, each application has the ability to import and export media files and it is just the simple case of exporting a QuickTime from one to the other and back. The "Send To" option is doing exactly the same thing in some cases, just automatically.

How to banish the Final Cut Pro registration screen forever

Sat, 15 Mar 08 16:26:47 -0600

Everyone hates it - the annoying "please register" screen that pops up every 5 or 6 launches of Final Cut Pro and Apple's other ProApps. Of course, the easiest way to get rid of it is to just register but that may not always be practical or advisable. Many companies do not connect their editing machines to the internet (quite rightly) and some of the tinfoil hat-wearers among us might not be keen on giving their personal data out to Apple.

Whatever the reason, here is a method of stopping the Final Cut Pro registration screen from appearing again without having to register.

1. Make sure all Final Cut Studio applications are closed.

2. Go to /Library/Application Support/ProApps and open the file Final Cut Studio System ID.

3. In Property List Editor, click the arrow next to Root and you will see some details about the unique ID that FCS has created for your machine. On this machine, I upgraded from Final Cut Studio 1 to Final Cut Studio 2, so I have two IDs listed under 100-1 and 100-6. If you look under fullKey1, it tells me that the original ID is marked 100-1 so the new one (FCS 2) must be 100-6.

Yours may differ a little but if one doesn't work, try the other.

Update: As noted by Steve in the comments, Property List Editor is only installed if you have the optional OS X developer tools installed - an issue I was not aware of when I wrote this article. However, it would be quite simple to open these files up in TextEdit or, as Steve recommends, PListEdit Pro (free trial available).

4. On the 100-6 option (or whatever yours says), double-click the data under the Value tab to select it and then copy it to the clipboard.

5. Go to /Library/Preferences and open com.apple.RegFinalCutStudio.plist.

6. Click the arrow next to Root and delete all of the entries in the list.

7. Now select Root and click New Child. Enter the name AECoreTechRegInfo, select Data as Class and paste the value you copied earlier into the Value column.

8. With the entry you just created still selected, click New Sibling up the top and type AECoreTechRegSent, keep the Class as String and enter a value of YES. Your final plist should look like this:

9. Save the file and enjoy a nag-free Final Cut Studio experience. It works for all applications in the Studio, not just FCP.

It is worth noting that this works for all of Apple's ProApps including Shake, Aperture and Logic. For Shake, use /Library/Application Support/ProApps/Shake System ID and /Library/Preferences/com.apple.RegShake.plist. The issue is especially annoying with Shake because if the registration screen appears, Shake will "forget" the project or file you wanted to open, so you have to open it again.

Also, if you do want to register but don't want to keep opening and closing the application until the registration dialog appears, just delete the com.apple.RegFinalCutStudio.plist file, launch FCP and it will appear immediately.

List of video formats supporting alpha channels

Sat, 02 Feb 08 09:14:52 -0700

I had a request for this list, so here it is. It is a list of popular video formats that support alpha (transparency) channels. It also includes a few image formats that are used for video work, like TIFF.

I may have missed a couple, so let me know in the comments.

File Format	Maximum Alpha Bit-Depth
Apple Animation	8-bit
Avid Meridien Compressed	8-bit
Avid Meridien Uncompressed	8-bit
Cineon	16-bit
DPX	16-bit
Maya IFF	32-bit
OpenEXR	32-bit
PNG	16-bit
RLA	32-bit
RPF	32-bit
SGI	16-bit
SGI RAW	16-bit
Targa (TGA)	8-bit
TIFF	32-bit

Cinital Previzion Advanced 3D Virtual Set System

Wed, 09 Jan 08 16:24:18 -0700

CinemaTech has an article about a startup company called Cinital that has developed a 3D keying system for virtual sets. This part is not new, as I have used Serious Magic Ultra 2 (now owned by Adobe) in the past for previewing the key on-set using virtual sets and images. I would not use Ultra 2 for compositing the final image as it did not offer nearly enough control over the final image, but this system looks like it offers plenty in that department.

Where this system really shines, however, is in the tracking system. I have not seen this anywhere else. You can move the camera about and rack focus from the foreground subject to the background and the virtual set will change accordingly. That is very time-consuming to perform in post production but this system does it in (almost) real-time. This is best illustrated by the video at the bottom of the CinemaTech link.

There are no pricing details on their web site but unconfirmed sources state that it is around $85,000.

[via HDForIndies]