Apple Releases ProRes QuickTime Decoder 1.0

[MacRumors]

Apple today released ProRes QuickTime Decoder 1.0, which allows Mac and PC users to view Apple ProRes files through QuickTime. ProRes, released as part of Final Cut Pro 6 in April 2007, is a post-production format targeted at video editors and offering uncompressed high-definition quality at standard-definition file sizes.

The Apple ProRes QuickTime Decoder software allows both Mac and Windows users to play Apple ProRes files through QuickTime. Apple ProRes is a visually lossless format that provides uncompressed HD quality at SD data rates.

It is an excellent choice for mastering and can easily be transcoded to distribution formats like H.264. With new support for playback on both Mac and Windows computers, Apple ProRes can also be used for review and approval of Final Cut Studio sequences.

Apple previously published a white paper (PDF) detailing the features and benefits of the format.

The update is available in a Mac version weighing in at 369 KB and requiring OS X 10.4 or 10.5 and a Windows version weighing in at 273 KB and requiring Windows XP (SP2) or later. Both versions also require QuickTime 7.5 or later.

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[tingly]

I like that "visually lossless".

[ZiggyPastorius]

Small updates. I wish I could just create my own file formats.

[Rocketman]

I would like to see a player for each of several proprietary camera video formats, starting with Sony.

I already posted Apple should provide file format standardization guidelines and SDK and services for camera vendors so essentially every image ever captured can be ingested seamlessly into Apple.

Rocketman

[Doodledoo]

PREDICTION!

Apple ends up using this format to provide HD downloads through iTunes for Apple TV and eventually everything else, obviously with DRM. Very exciting if you ask me!

[DaftUnion]

Yay. Seriously though, if they use this format for HD downloads in iTunes come September, that would be awesome.

[macshill]

Maybe that's the ace card up Steve's sleeve. That'd rock!

[sam10685]

Well this obviously means Apple is going to refresh every hardware product they make.

[Lordillingworth]

Originally Posted by sam10685

Well this obviously means Apple is going to refresh every hardware product they make.

Brilliant comment! I think it also explains those weird fingers we have seen coming out of apple recently.

[skellener]

Originally Posted by Doodledoo

PREDICTION!Apple ends up using this format to provide HD downloads through iTunes for Apple TV and eventually everything else, obviously with DRM. Very exciting if you ask me!

Nope. This is first and foremost a production format. It is much larger than h.264 and not practical to deliver files with. It's is 6-10 times smaller than uncompressed (we use it at work) but h.264 is much smaller. I don't see Apple moving away from h.264 anytime soon. It is great news for mixed environment studios though. Now Pro-Res can be used on ALL machines even if they are Windows.

[macshill]

Originally Posted by Lordillingworth

Brilliant comment! I think it also explains those weird fingers we have seen coming out of apple recently.

Aw, you're just jealous 'cause you can't do the Vulcan symbol as well as Steve can.

"Dup dor a'az Mubster."

[rhett7660]

I would like to see a player for each of several proprietary camera video formats, starting with Sony.

And JVC.............

[MaynardJames]

Originally Posted by skellener

Nope. This is first and foremost a production format. It is much larger than h.264 and not practical to deliver files with. It's is 6-10 times smaller than uncompressed (we use it at work) but h.264 is much smaller. I don't see Apple moving away from h.264 anytime soon. It is great news for mixed environment studios though. Now Pro-Res can be used on ALL machines even if they are Windows.

Exactly. ProRes is an Intermediate Codec. For HD it uses bitrates in the 100's to 200's of Mbits/s. Using ProRes for downloadable HD content would be completely impractical.

[LethalWolfe]

Finally. Apple not making decoders of all it's codecs available as part of QT Player is just irritating.

Originally Posted by Doodledoo

PREDICTION!

Apple ends up using this format to provide HD downloads through iTunes for Apple TV and eventually everything else, obviously with DRM. Very exciting if you ask me!

Not likely. 40gig/hr for a 720p24 file. That would go over well.


Lethal

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by Doodledoo

PREDICTION!

Apple ends up using this format to provide HD downloads through iTunes for Apple TV and eventually everything else, obviously with DRM. Very exciting if you ask me!

I very seriously doubt this will happen. Prores is large. Do you want to wait 6 hours for a movie to down load. This is for mastering shows prior to transcoding to some distribution format.

OK it you like this, then you are likely already sending your video email attachments in DV format and your still photos as 16-bit per channel uncompressed TIFF.

[Analog Kid]

Originally Posted by tingly

I like that "visually lossless".

I'm sure this was all gone over when ProRes was announced, but I'm glad I'm not the only one noticing the weasel words...

Lossless means I can decode an encoded stream and retrieve the original-- if that's not true here then the word lossless shouldn't be anywhere in the description unless preceded by a negative.

[137489]

Originally Posted by Rocketman

I would like to see a player for each of several proprietary camera video formats, starting with Sony.

I already posted Apple should provide file format standardization guidelines and SDK and services for camera vendors so essentially every image ever captured can be ingested seamlessly into Apple.

Rocketman

I have yet to hit a format that VLC player cannot handle.

[quadgirl]

Originally Posted by shervieux

I have yet to hit a format that VLC player cannot handle.

You're completely missing the point. This is a production codec to natively plug in to OS X and for windows editing software that can use the quicktime handler. Where exactly does VLC come into this?

[samh004]

Originally Posted by quadgirl

You're completely missing the point. This is a production codec to natively plug in to OS X and for windows editing software that can use the quicktime handler. Where exactly does VLC come into this?

I presume he meant that ProRes already works in VLC on windows, so the new codec wasn't needed. Of course I am just assuming, I don't actually know anything, it just seemed the likely point.

[alphaod]

I found the Final Cut update in System Updater; is this included in said update?

[happydude]

Originally Posted by Doodledoo

PREDICTION!

Apple ends up using this format to provide HD downloads through iTunes for Apple TV and eventually everything else, obviously with DRM. Very exciting if you ask me!

isn't this too large to send over the internets?

[LethalWolfe]

Originally Posted by Analog Kid

I'm sure this was all gone over when ProRes was announced, but I'm glad I'm not the only one noticing the weasel words...

Lossless means I can decode an encoded stream and retrieve the original-- if that's not true here then the word lossless shouldn't be anywhere in the description unless preceded by a negative.

Visually lossless isn't a weasel word. It's a term to describe a codec that, as the name implies, generates a visually indistinguishable copy of the original but at a relatively small file size because the codec is compressed. A mathematically lossless codec creates and exact, bit-for-bit copy of the original but the file sizes tend to be very large.


Lethal

[maproduction]

The reason for this, much needed, release is only for a production workflow. If you edit with ProRes and have windows AfterEffect workstations you could not just send over the footage nor could the AE render out to ProRes unless it was on a Mac system with FCP6 installed.

This has been asked for since ProRes came out.

Virtually Lossless is also a commonly used term and production people know how to take it. Anytime you compress you loss something but this codec gives a lot of space and bandwidth savings with very loss in quality it also holds up very well from one generation to another.

[Tosser]

Originally Posted by LethalWolfe

Visually lossless isn't a weasel word. It's a term to describe a codec that, as the name implies, generates a visually indistinguishable copy of the original but at a relatively small file size because the codec is compressed. A mathematically lossless codec creates and exact, bit-for-bit copy of the original but the file sizes tend to be very large.


Lethal

So, as the Analog Kid said, it is a weasel term, since in audio*, what you just described receives the monicker "lossy format" (i.e. "cd-quality" 128kbps MP3s and the sort where 10/11ths of the audio information is tossed away), as opposed to "lossless", which describes how a the file can be made into a bit-for-bit copy for the original (again).

Edit:

* and still photography (i.e. jpegs are lossy, raw is lossless).

Originally Posted by maproduction

.

Virtually Lossless is also a commonly used term and production people know how to take it.

So does everyone else. The problem is, of course, Apple doesn't use the term "virtually lossless", but rather "visually lossless"

[gnasher729]

Originally Posted by Doodledoo

PREDICTION!

Apple ends up using this format to provide HD downloads through iTunes for Apple TV and eventually everything else, obviously with DRM. Very exciting if you ask me!

I think you don't quite understand what this is about. This is a file format that is used by professional film editors during the editing process. You can't edit a file in h.264 format, because the decoding/encoding is much too expensive and you cannot edit single frames in h.264 without having to re-encode all the surrounding frames. ProRes is about five times smaller than raw, uncompressed files. That makes it about 18 MByte per second or 144 MBit per second for 1080p at 30 fps. About 24 times bigger than current Apple TV HD movies.

The only people needing this are film editing professionals who want to see what their movie will look like when played by QuickTime without having to go through a long encoding process.