MacWorld on the A16 of the iPhone 14 Pro is really an A15+

Jason Cross at Macworld has a really interesting article on the new A16 for the iPhone 14 Pro.

It seems it isn’t even really a 4 nanometer process, but an enhanced 5 Nanometer Process, just running faster with faster memory, but with none of what was expected for the A16.

And if the true A16 is delayed, it also might explain why the M2 for the MacPro is delayed and why Apple might not hit the 2 year mark on the Mac Pro moving to Apple Silicon.

9to5Mac on M2 Extreme chip in upcoming Mac Pro could get a 48-core CPU, 160-core GPU and 384GB of RAM

From Ben Lovejoy at 9to5Mac, these rumors could make for a pretty powerful mac, but so expensive I am assuming.

Of course this is just a rumor, but it is likely though higher than the previous rumored 40 core, and 128 core gpu.

And that M2 Extreme could cost many thousands more, and 384 gigs of RAM, I am betting we are talking $7500 more than whatever the machine costs.

Thor Love and Thunder VFX blue screen and PlateLight

So after all the bad press around this one, and the whole Covid thing we stayed away from the theaters for this one. And besides I can wait 45 days to see a movie on a streaming service that I already have, still this would have been fun in the theater, honestly I really enjoyed the film. Sure it was really silly, but I enjoyed, even if Christian Bale’s Gorr the God Butcher needed more screen time, and I honestly could have seen a full film with fat Thor and the Guardians of the Galaxy.

What I really want to talk about though, is a couple of things from the behind the scenes.

The first is the blue screen. It looks like they did all blue screen instead of green screen (the norm for digital, but it reflects less light for spill), but what really blew me away was not just how inconsistent the screen was, with many layers and edges. And even more so was the fact that Thor’s army had blue elements, and they shot it on a blue screen! Now I have seen that done with the blue changed to another color so it can be changed in post, but with the blue on blue and an inconsistent blue screen they must be rotoscoping every frame? ARE THEY INSANE? I mean this be part of the whole Marvel Mistreating VFX artists. Why not use Green Screen, or change the color of the blue?

I wish that CINEFEX still existed!

The next thing was the sequence on the small Asteroid in the shadow realm, with the crazy lighting from it going around it’s sun so quickly. They used this tech PlateLight, which allows for multiple lighting setups to be shot at the same time.

I would love to see an explanation of how this is working. I am assuming it is a special camera and sensor, but how does it then match with other footage (maybe fine because of the B&W nature of this scene).

Arstechnica on Thunderbolt hitting 80Gbps in demo, equaling USB4 Version 2.0 Speeds

Scharon Harding at Ars Technica has this article on Thunderbolt hits 80Gbps in demo, equaling USB4 Version 2.0 Speeds. Good to see thunderbolt catch up to the newly proposed USB spec, but for it to keep going they should be pushing the limits and doubling the USB Speeds.

Honestly it is mostly about keeping compatibility with Thunderbolt devices, for those who have them, and I have a lot of them, and so I need compatiblity and not just with the connector, so lets hope Intel keeps the licensing prices inexpensive, so that machines are both thunderbolt 4 and USB 4.

No Film School Was ‘House of Dragon’ Too Dark, or Is the Problem Your TV?

The Article by Alyssa Miller goes into the issue which is similiar to the one on the big battle at the end of game of thrones. And honestly we didn’t see it too much, but I have my TV properly calibrated or at least as well as it can be, and we have overhead canned lighting and can do it dimmer over us, so likely the room is darker than for the last season of Game of Thrones, but we do see this more and more. They are color correcting way too dark for TV.

And I think the problem is obvious. Color bays are too dark and they use too good screens in the dark. That is absolutely fine for films which are meant to be seen in a darkened room, but homes have light, and most people don’t watch television in the dark.

Honestly there should be a higher level of ambient light in editing bays for TV, to take account people have lights on in their house. And have a consumer display to finish to as well, to check how it looks.

I know on these signature shows they want you to turn off the lights and only pay attention to it, but that isn’t an option for everyone.

And if there are significant complaints, you are doing the grade wrong. You need to remember this is going to be viewed by people at home, not in a darkened theater!

YouTube has added 5.1 Audio on Apple TV and Fire TV

This is pretty exciting, now if only Vimeo would do the same.

Autokrama has fixed the After Effects flashing issues in BRAW Studio with version 2.7.7 and 2.7.8

Autokroma has some great customer support and sent me out beta versions and fixed the issues I had been having with BRAW Studio in After Effects.

This was the glitch I was having that they quickly fixed,

Now I am still having some problems between ProRES RAW 6K, BRAW Studio, and Maxon Primatte Keyer 6. I think my iMac Pro may be having some serious issues, after all it is getting old and is likely full of dust. I also get the feeling that nothing was every optimized for the Radeo Pro Vega 64X 16 GB, as it came out at the end of the lifecycle.