4K was the definitive buzzword at NAB this year, as well as CES, with a number of manufacturers releasing 4K televisions, 4K game systems, and 4K cameras. With the consumer demand for 4K content just around the corner, one of the most often asked questions is “How much is this gonna cost us?!” After polling a number of industry sources, I decided to try and break down the production costs of shooting, data management, dailies creation and archiving in 4K to show that it isn’t as intimidating as you might think.

Let’s use a typical multi-camera one-hour television drama (such as Game of Thrones) shooting six hours of footage per day with nine cameras. And let’s assume that everything is shot in ProRes 4444 at 24fps, just to make it a little easier to get some figures. Additionally, let’s say they’re using a camera that can shoot both formats, so the production equipment is the same, but the amount of media and storage will differ. This isn’t a magical camera, by the way, there are plenty of cameras that offer 4K and 1080 recording options in the same codec, as well as external recorders like AJA’s Ki Pro Quad or the new Odyssey 7Q from Convergent Design.

Shooting

An hour of ProRes 4444 1080/24p can average around 119GB; an hour of ProRes 4444 4K/24p will average 509GB. Assuming your recording media can hold 512GB, then each card will hold either 4 hours and 15 minutes of 1080 or 1 hour of 4K (I’m leaving space because a 512GB card almost never has 512GBs available to fill).  So let’s figure out how many cards we need. Nine cameras shooting six hours of footage total, means each camera is shooting 40 minutes of footage. You usually want to have at least one card per camera as a back up. So for this show, regardless of 1080 or 4K, the card count would remain the same: two cards per camera. However, you probably won’t want to clear your cards until you hear from post that everything looks ok, so for safety let’s say four cards per camera for a total of thirty-six 512GB cards.

Downloading

Using Thunderbolt to download your footage, one card at a time, it would take roughly 35 minutes per card for the 4K footage and roughly 8 minutes per card for the 1080 footage. With all cameras handing in their cards at the end of the day, it would take about 5 hours and 15 minutes to download the 4K footage and 1 hour and 12 minutes to download the 1080 footage.

The 4K footage will take up 3TB of space and the 1080 footage will take up 690GB of space (these figures are rounded up slightly for safety). For a multi-day 4K job you’ll want a 6TB housing with two 3TB modular shuttle drives (one master and one backup), while both your DIT and dailies colorist will have housings which already come with the drives, so you’ll have four drives in rotation from the start. For a multi-day 1080 job you’ll want a 2TB housing with two 1GB modular shuttle drives.

Two 6TB housings with drives will cost roughly $1,600 total and two 2TB housings with drives will cost roughly $1,000.

Dailies Creation

Typical rates for dailies will run you about $750/hour of content for 4K footage and $500/hour for 1080 footage (according to a reputable post services facility in Los Angeles). That’s $4,500/day for the 4K and $3,000/day for the 1080. This includes transcoding for offline editing as well as DVD burning services.

Archiving

Assuming that you are archiving to LTO-6, each LTO-6 tape holds 2.5TB of uncompressed data. You will need two tapes per day for the 4K footage and one tape for three days of 1080 footage. If an episode takes 8 days to shoot, that will mean sixteen tapes per 4K episode and three tapes per 1080 episode. At roughly $96/tape, the 4K episode costs $1,536 to archive and the 1080 episode costs $288 to archive.

Breakdown Per Episode: 

This is just one method of comparing your production’s costs between 4K and HD. We understand that many other factors will contribute to the overall cost differential.  But given our analysis above, we estimate that it costs about 55% more to produce 4K content over HD. Not quite the 400% you were probably expecting, is it? Hopefully, by breaking down the costs like this, I hope that I’ve managed to pull the curtain back on 4K and clear up some of the myths around its workflow. 

Special thanks to Peter Price (Director of Post Production, Revolt TV) and Lewis Rothenberg (Digital Imaging Technician, Royal Pains) for their input on typical footage count and workflow.

Now that products announced at NAB 2013 are starting to ship, we thought it was time for a recap of some of the gear that made an impression at the show. I’ve put together a Post-NAB Equipment Roadmap that outlines what’s available now, and what to expect in the coming months.

Let us know in the comments what products you’re most excited about.

Photo Credit: Eli Tawil

A cinematographer and lighting designer by trade, Rick Siegel has worked on feature length and short films in the narrative and documentary genres. He photographs episodic television series as well – in music, comedy, fashion, home style, reality and magazine formats. In this blog, he tells us all about his Sony PMW-F3 rig.

When it comes to choosing a camera rig to purchase or to rent, what are your biggest considerations?

RS: I apply several criteria to determine and visualize my choices: what are the scripted elements to be photographed, who is going to see this project, what are the deliverables, what is the best equipment to frame the story elements, and last, but not least, what’s my budget. It’s a balance between artistic options, communication skills, dollars and sense. 

So your choice depends a lot on the audience and genre of the project you’re shooting?

RS: That’s right. When it comes to camera and lens selection, each genre has its own requirements and factors to be considered. Also, how this camera selection will fit into both single-camera as well as multiple camera setups.

Can you give us more specifics of what you look for in the camera itself?

RS: Ease of use and a built-in toolset of options is important; the camera must be able to fit into many shooting situations. I like to be able to manipulate the black, white and gamma areas of my images so a menu structure that’s simple in design, while offering a wide range of control, is ideal. Other attributes I look for include internal recording to media cards, higher bit-depth output for off-board recorders and monitors, and the ability to produce REC709 or Log style imaging.

I prefer to have a large single sensor (super 35mm or larger) that has at least 2K (1920×1080) in resolution and will permit some degree of slow motion capture. I would also choose to have a PL mount.

The camera body should have multiple mounting options for power supply, video display, recording deck, handheld and mattebox controls.

What would you say is your overall goal when together putting a camera rig?

RS: I want to have a camera kit that I’m completely facile with. My own ease with the equipment’s functionality must allow me to stay focused on creating engaging images for our audience to see.

Rick’s Camera Rig

• Sony PMW-F3
• Fujinon Cabrio 19-90 zoom, Nikon 17-35 and 28-70 zooms W/Duclos CineMod
• Alphatron EVF
• Solid Camera EVF Support
• Berkey System Cheese Plate
• Shape BP6000 Shoulder Rig w/Base Plate
• OConnor O-Box Mattebox (4×5.65)
• OConnor O-Grips (15mm)
• Anton Bauer Matrix Cheese Plate (15mm) to mount Batteries and PIX240
• Sound Devices PIX-240
• Sony OLED-1741 Video Monitor
• Marshall V-R70P HD-SDI Video Monitor

Visit Rick’s website for more examples of his wide-ranging work, and view the gallery below to see more photos of Rick’s rig in action, then visit our site to see the special Rick Siegel F3 Bundle! We’ve also teamed up with Rick to present a special How to Light & Frame the Best Interview Ever workshop, which is coming up on May 16th in New York, and it’s not too late to register.

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Do you have a rig you think our readers would love to hear about? If so, drop us a line. We’re considering making this an on-going series based on your feedback.

A few months ago, Andy wrote an article for HDVideoPro called Making 4K Plug & Play about how to use the Canon C500 with AJA’s Ki Pro Quad to easily record and monitor 4K video. Getting these two to play nice isn’t too difficult, but there are a few things to be aware of if you want to get the best results possible. Watch my video above as I take you through the step-by-step process of setting up the C500 and the Ki Pro Quad to record 4K ProRes, and stay tuned for a future blog about using the Thunderbolt passthrough to record the Canon RAW to your computer!

In addition to the clean HDMI output, the Mark III also gains some autofocus updates useful for those using Canon teleconverters. You can read the full release notes and download the free update directly from Canon’s site. Have you already updated your camera with the new firmware? Let us know what you think in the comments

This update also brings remote start/stop trigger via one of the 4-pin Hirose DC power outputs. We’re sure there will be numerous third party triggers available shortly, but this update means you can use the AbelCine HDx35 Mark II and HDx35-F5 cable with your 2/3″ ENG lens for full servo zoom and VTR switch functionality.

To download firmware v1.13 and view the rest of the release notes, visit the Sony Community site.

Recently, I got a chance to spend some time with a few of the newest offerings from OptiTek, including their recently announced Canon EF to Sony FZ adapter. This adapter features electronic aperture control via a simple push button interface. It can also be controlled wirelessly with the optional Optitron, which allows for wireless focusing in addition to iris control. If you’re using the F5 or F55, power can be supplied via the auxiliary Hirose 4 port from the camera, or you can supply power via PTap. For those wanting to use Nikon lenses on their F3, F5 or F55, there is a non-powered locking adaptor available. Watch my video above to learn more.

Many modern cameras offer an Exposure Index (EI) mode for changing exposure, instead of the simple gain that we had in the past. Other cameras offer both ISO and Gain adjustments that relate to one another, but exactly how is not always clear. With all of these options, I often get questions about the differences between ISO, Gain and EI and how they can affect each other. A little while ago, I wrote a help desk article for HD Video Pro magazine in which I talk about all of these modes and how they work in different cameras. You can read the full article over on HD Video Pro’s website – Help Desk: Sense & Sensitivity.

This year’s NAB show was the busiest one ever … on our blog at least. We posted a total of twenty-four videos from the show floor, which you can watch by clicking on our dedicated NAB 2013 category. If you didn’t get a chance to visit our booth this year, check out the videos below (some from the blog and some shot by our friends) to see a few of the highlights! 

	Phantom Flex4K One of the most exciting debuts at this year’s NAB show was that of Vision Research’s newest camera, the Phantom Flex4K. As you can probably guess from the name, the camera’s most notable feature is the ability to shoot up to 1000fps in 4K. Watch this video for a great introduction and overview from Mitch.
	AbelCine Resolution Analysis Chart In this video for StudioDaily, James Mathers of the Digital Cinema Society interviews our own Jesse Rosen about the brand new Resolution Analysis Chart that he originally developed for our LA rental facility.
	Lens Doublers & the 4K Future FreshDV spends a little time with Mitch as he goes over the new adapters (co-designed with IB/E) that we showed off at our booth: the HDx2 Mark II, HDx35 Mark II, and the PLx2. Then Andy joins the conversation to tackle the question “Is 4K here to stay?”
	Schneider Cine-Xenar III & Xenon FF Primes  It wasn’t just cameras that we featured at our booth – we also featured new lenses and optics solutions, such as these new primes from Schneider. Ian gets a closer look at the Cine-Xenars, which are specifically designed for digital cinema, as well as the full-frame Xenon FF primes.
	Convergent Design Odyssey7 & Odyssey7Q We posted about Convergent Design’s new monitor-recorders when they were first announced, and in this video, Jeff gets an up-close look at the Odyssey7Q that we had on display in our booth.

Plus, make sure to check out our NAB 2013 Facebook album for even more photos of the craziness behind the scenes and on the floor of NAB! 

We’ve covered some of Arri’s Pro Camera Accessories before, specifically their kit for the Sony F5/F55. This year at NAB, they’re showing off even more accessories, including a new modular mattebox, as well as some updates to that previously mentioned F5/F55 kit. I got a chance to speak with Arri’s Snehal Patel, so watch the video above to learn more.