Getting Started with - Home | Pomfort

Getting Started with

POMFORT fn

Introducing Silverstack 3.3:

Backup, organize and playback your camera media and prepare it for post-production.

Document Version 11

Silverstack

Table of Contents

Introduction 3

Whats New! 3

What you need 4

The Management and Backup Process 5

The Silverstack Interface 6

Offload and Backup Media with Silverstack 10

Manage your Project 11

Organize your Material 12

Versions, Clips and File Resources 13

Edit and Add Metadata Information 14

Transfer and Report 15

Transcoding 17

Create Individual Reporting types 18

Transferring Metadata to Final Cut Pro X 19

Keyboard Overview 21

Introduction

Dear Customer,

Thank you for purchasing or testing Silverstack. We value your trust in our company and products, and we will do our best to meet your expectations. Be assured, with Silverstack’s great features like fast and secure backup creation and advanced reporting, your own copy of Silverstack will help to increase the productivity of your film production workflow.

Whats New!

If you are already familiar with Silverstack from previous versions then you will experience a major change in handling data, the so-called Assets.

An Asset can be a Clip (e.g. an Alexa or RED media file), a sidecar file accompanying clips (for example XML or RDM files), or any other Document such as photos, a sound file from the sound department or even a PDF.

Silverstack always operates in a certain mode - you can switch this mode and view either all Assets or only Clips.

Not all media files are recognized as Clips by Silverstack, but common digital cinema camera formats such as of ARRI Alexa, RED cameras, Sony F5 / F55 XAVC, Canon DSLR and C300/500, CinemaDNG sequences and other cameras are supported natively. Silverstack provides advanced features for Clips of these cameras that maximize the efficiency of relevant on-set tasks such as quality check, playback and metadata management.

For all Assets verified and secured backups can be created with Silverstack’s proven copy features. You can preview Clips and Documents with OSX’s “Quicklook” preview feature and you can annotate, comment and rate all Assets in Silverstack’s Library.

What you needOur software Silverstack requires a Mac OS X 10.7 or higher operating system. Since we are using the latest of Mac OS X technologies, we are not planning to support earlier versions of Mac OS X, neither will we port Silverstack to another operating systems in the near future.So to run Silverstack you need an Intel Mac with Mac OS X 10.7 or higher (such as any current Mac available in the MacStore).

If your MacBook Pro is equipped with an ExpressCard/34-, CompactFlash- or SD card-slot, you can directly offload clips and set data from any SxS, CompactFlash or SD card otherwise you need a suitable card reader.

Advanced Supported media formats

For selected cameras, Silverstack provides advanced features that maximize the efficiency of relevant on-set tasks such as quality check, playback and metadata management. Following formats are supported:

• ProRes Quicktime files from the ARRI Alexa• ARRIRAW• AJA Ki Pro and Atomos Ninja & Samurai• RED R3D• CinemaDNG• H.264 MOV• Canon C300, c500 MXF• MPEG-4 AVC/ AVC-IntraTM• Sony F5 / F55 XAVC

General Supported media formats

Silverstack offers a more flexible way of data handling by supporting all kinds of file formats - including sound files, photos, any camera media and all other production documents. With Silverstack, all files are copied and managed in the same, secure way, which simplifies the daily tasks for DITs and streamlines subsequent post-production work. Note:For a realtime playback of your offloaded video files the usage of a fast hard drive as a SSD card is recommended.

If you have further question about supported hardware please let us know. If you would like to know more about data performance. You might be interested in this article for improving your performance.

http://kb.pomfort.com/?p=1596




The Management and Backup Process

The Silverstack clip management and backup process

Silverstack offers secure and reliable data backup of set data files directly on the film set. The source media coming from the camera is your most valuable asset in the movie production process, so it is crucial to have a managed and secure backup and perform quality check and movie data preparation for post-production as soon as possible after shooting.

Silverstack is your digital library. It allows you to organize, search and filter your media resources like, clips and metadata. Silverstack extracts and stores all metadata embedded in clips such as timecode, color information, etc. and makes them available for offline use.

Silverstack allows you to perform multiple, verified copies at once. It remembers all copy and backup activities, so that you have a complete overview of your production's source clips.

Silverstack lets you transfer all relevant information such as camera metadata, comments, captions, cue points and markers and scene/shot and take names to post production and editing tools. Thus all your annotations and quality check information find their way into your existing post-production workflow.

shoot

manage

backup

edit

The Silverstack Interface

User Interface Overview

1 Main Window & VideoPreview

2 Library Panel

3 Info Display: it provides the most important information of the selected clip and cannot be edited. It contains two different view parameters one for the Digital Image Technician and one view that show relevant information for the Data Wrangler.

4 Clip information panel. It’s possible to switch between clip metadata, user metadata, clip location and file header. Here you can modify metadata from the clips or add your comments, labels, ratings and flags.

5 Switch between Views modes like Summary, Table, Collection, playback.

Pomfort Silverstack – Getting Started,

[6 of 24]

Table view (figure 2 #1): useful for sorting and grouping clips by certain criteria. It is also a great way to get an overview of the various metadata of a set of clips. Some of the fields are editable and you can jump from field to field by pressing the TAB key. Here you also can load and save custom view presets which are the foundation of your clip reports

Collection view (figure 2 #2): it gives you a visual overview over the clips in your library.

figure 2: View modes in Silverstack

6 Navigation through your Projects, Jobs, Volumes. Folders and Bins with bread crumbs. This feature is specially useful when you hide your library view and clip information view.

7 Action wizards in Toolbar are Projects, Offload, File, Import, Transfer, and Report

Projects: Browse between existing projects and add a New Project

Offload: Choose a source to offload it in your library

File: Backup or Relink files from your library

Import: xxxxx

Transfer: xxxx

Report: Create or print various report types in the Report Center

8 Switch between All Files and Advanced clip library and playback.All files: An ordinary browsing view thru all your metadata and sidecars as well as other production files like sound or storyboards even images and notes from Script/Continuity

Advanced playback: The preview for your advanced supported clips inside Silverstack and the Quicklook model that allows you to browse and quick view all your clips.


[7 of 24]









9 JobInfo HUD gives you information about your Job or Copy Status like successful or failed copy jobs, duration and file destination

10 Toggle View Controls to hide or show the Library and Clip Info View to have more workspace for example on small laptop screens

11 Visual Control Functionalities in Playback View

figure 3: Visual controls in Silverstack

figure 4: playback controls e.g. for ProRes ALEXA files and for most other video files.

For video files in Red format you have additional functionality, being able to select various resolutions, choosing between full, 1/2, 1/4 and 1/8.


[8 of 24]

Collection View – Icon explanations

figure 6: Videoclip icon

1 Indicates the number of connected storage devices concerning this clip’s storage locations.

2 The number of this clip’s file storage locations.

3 The number of duplicates of this clip in the respective bin/ camera roll.

4 Indicates that this clip is marked with a flag and can be searched and filtered for this criterion.

5 This icon tells you that this is the source version of the clip.If there is a little color circle in the place of the yellow cube it indicates that this version has been color graded.

6 The color shows the chosen label if there is a label set.


[9 of 24]

Offload and Backup Media with Silverstack

Backing up movie data from one or several camera or field recorder devices requires the following steps:

1. Open Silverstack.

2. Attach the camera storage cards or drives to your computer.

3. Click on the “Offload” button in the tool bar at the Silverstack window and choose the attached camera device.

4. See the overview of files you want to copy / backup.Choose the destination folders where the multiple copies should be copied to.

5. To start the copy, click on the “Backup clips” button. In case you want to register your clips in the Silverstack library without copying them onto any device, simply mark the “Skip” button in the lower left corner of the offloading wizard. You can create a custom folder structure for your clips using the path wildcards feature.

6.Now the copy process should start and can be reviewed in the “Jobs” panel. Colored badges (figure 1 #1) indicate the progress of the copies.

figure 1: “Jobs” panel and information about copying progress

Don’t quit the application during the copy process, as this will execute and kill the copy task.In addition to importing clips from camera devices, you also can import clips from internal or external hard drives and other storage media as well as attached network drives. Make sure that these files were created with one of the supported cameras or field records. Other files – even if they exhibit the correct file format – may not be recognized!


[10 of 24]







Manage your Project

After you have successfully offloaded and registered your clip files in the Silverstack library you can begin to edit, manage and organize your video material. Let’s start with some core managing tasks:

1. Select a project, folder or bin in the “Library” panel located at the left side of the Silverstack window. The small number behind the elements in the project tree indicates how many clips are contained within them.

2. Choose between four different view modes. You find them at the upper row of the Silverstack window. For the best overview choose either the table or collection view.

3. Sorting clips:

• Sort the clips you currently see by different variables as shooting date, rating, duration, clip name and more. You can find this function beneath the view modes when you have selected the collection view.

• In the table view you can sort clips according to any of their attributes. Therefore just click in the top of the column with the relevant criteria. By right-clicking into the upmost row you can select which attributes you want to see in the table view.

4. By double-clicking on a clip the view changes to the player mode and you can preview the selected clip.

Tip: To filter clips for certain clip metadata, use Silverstack’s smart folders which you find in the library tree beneath the camera rolls. Add smart folders yourself by right-clicking into the library panel and selecting “New Smart Folder..”.

5. There you can set the attributes for which this smart folder shall search the library.


[11 of 24]









Organize your Material

You have offloaded and registered your clips in the Silverstack library? You know the basic ways to manage clips in Silverstack? So now you are ready to start organizing your footage…

1. To get a structure into your footage, create folders and bins in your project and fill them with your clips. All this happens in the “Library” panel:

• Right-click on your project and choose “New Folder”.• Right-click on the folder and choose “New Bin” to create a bin

contained by that folder.• Go to the camera rolls, activate the table view and drag&drop all the

clips you want inside the bin (not folder) you just created. You can add a clip to an unlimited count of bins, but please keep in mind that you just create new versions of this clip instead of multiplying the clip itself.

• Note: The explained way is just one of several possibilities to do that, go to this article for further information like using Smart Folders or simply discover your preferred workflow by yourself.

2. To see where a clip is located on the storage device(s) go to the “Information” panel and “File” tab. There you can find an overview of all storage locations of the selected clip.

3. A small number in the lower right corner of a clip icon is shown, please keep in mind that you have to be in the collection view. The number indicates the numbers of versions of the clip in this selected bin. You can edit every one separately for example like grading, but they all link to the same source file on your storage device(s).


[12 of 24]





















Versions, Clips and File Resources

Silverstack is aimed to treat clips with high caution, which means it ensures that no original data will be subject to any changes. Therefore it has its own workflow of handling once offloaded videoclips.

! Camera Roll ! ! Custom Bin

figure 1: Silverstack’s system of working with clips and versions and file resources

VersionThe main element of the Silverstack library is the videoclip version. A version is linked to a clip and might add information to it without affecting the original clip though. For example a clip might have several versions that have different grades.Silverstack creates two versions for all the clips you have offloaded from your camera. An “original” version that is stored in the camera roll and another in a newly created bin (or the bin that has been selected for offload).

ClipEverything that seems to be a clip in Silverstack is in fact a version referencing the given clip and therefore just a virtual object. With that implementation Silverstack allows you to work in a non-destructive workflow so you can create and organize several graded versions of one clip, without altering its original version.

File ResourceFile resources are representations of a clip on disk. For every destination of each clip a file resource is created that stores the location path. This enables Silverstack to show the current usage of disks for a given clip.For getting a better insight in Silverstack’s library structure, proceed to the online article Library Structure.


[13 of 24]

http://kb.pomfort.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/LibStructure_transparent.png

http://kb.pomfort.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/LibStructure_transparent.png



Edit and Add Metadata Information

Silverstack enables you to edit metadata information of your clips and files. Except some non-editable technical information as format, duration etc. you can change and add a lot of metadata.

Metadata information

You can find all metadata information in the “Information” panel in Silverstack.

Note: Silverstack saves all the changes you perform not in the original file on the storage devices(s) but in a separate file and therefore provides a very protecting working environment.

To edit any (non-technical) information follow these steps: 1. Select a clip. 2. Go to the “Information” panel. 3. In the “General” tab you can change all the fields that are followed by a small pen symbol. So click on that symbol, enter the new value for that attribute and click on “Apply”. 4. In the “User” tab you can add a rating, flagging, label, comment or cue points to the selected clip.


[14 of 24]







Transfer and Report

Transfer

The clips you organized and edited in Silverstack can be directly transferred into other programs to continue seamlessly with your workflow. To do so please follow these steps:

1. Select the bin/ folder/ project where the clips are located

2. Click on the “Transfer” button of the Silverstack Toolbarwindow and choose the desired program. The transfer wizard opens.

3. Choose all clips that shall be included and upon that selection the attributes for your transfer which differ for each program.Tip: You find a explanation of the settings in the transfer dialog to Final Cut Pro X in this article.

4. Click on “Open in …” to finally transfer the clip(s).

Report

After editing your clips you can generate abstracts/report of the clip’s metadata with Silverstack. The appropriate function for that is called “Report”.


[15 of 24]















http://kb.pomfort.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/ReportCenter.png

http://kb.pomfort.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/ReportCenter.png

You can export a whole project, single or several folders, bins or clips, smart folders and the volumes.

1. Select your project or the folder(s), bin(s), clip(s), smart folder(s) or the “Volumes” item, depending on what you want to have included in the export report.

2. Click on the “Transfer” button which you find in the toolbar of the Silverstack window.

3. Since Silverstack is able to create four different file formats (XML, PDF, HTML, CSV) choose one of them or the fifth option to print the metadata abstract immediately.

4. Enter name and storage location of the file that’s being created and click “Save”.


[16 of 24]





TranscodingNow it’s possible to transcode the clips you have imported with Silverstack from the camera format to a more usable package, such as a QuickTime .mov file. This feature is available for all the supported Advanced Camera formats, meaning that you will be able to watch in many devices your ARRIRAW or CinemaDNG sequences, in addition to the ProRes clips with a Log to Rec.709 filter applied. Anamorphic conversion and image flipping is also applied to the transcoded clips.

In the transcoding wizard you are able to set different options like resolution, compression codec, zoom and different predefined settings. If you want to know more about transcoding with Silverstack, please take a look to the Knowledge Base article Transcoding.


[17 of 24]



Create Individual Reporting types Silverstack includes a new reporting center foundation. Its was recreate from scratch to give you more flexibility. Building on this foundation we release and establish more flexibility in the future for your reports and documentation.

Create customized clip-reports with the new Silverstack - documenting your entire work. Silverstack consolidates it's flexible reporting capabilities in a powerful reporting center, providing customized reports for production and post-production. Silverstack provides shooting reports with thumbnails and metadata as well as comprehensive, statistical summaries in well-arranged and beautiful PDF documents. Reports include all the necessary metadata to document camera media traveling to next workflow steps.

Silverstack can customize clip reports by right click in the table view. The same customized tableview will show up in you clip reports.

“Print Report” functionAdditionally to the “Report” function Silverstack offers you the opportunity to directly print reports for each level of your project tree.

So for printing a report of all clips contained by one folder, select this folder, right-click on it and select “Print Report…” from the drop-down menu.The described steps works for:

1 Projects2 Bins3 Camera rolls4 Smart folders5 “Volumes” item.


[18 of 24]



Transferring Metadata to Final Cut Pro XFor the transfer of metadata via Final Cut Pro XML files (.fcpxml) the clip metadata is mapped accordingly and depending on the user-defined options as you can see in figure 1.

figure 1: “Transfer”-wizard for Final Cut Pro X

Content (figure 1 #1)• Scene, shot and take name can be added to the name of the clip in Final

Cut Pro X• Various color information can also be transmitted. Properties as camera

index, whitepoint, colorspace, lookname, ASA and label from Silverstack are mapped to keywords in Final Cut Pro X

• Single-frame cue points from Silverstack are mapped to markers in Final Cut Pro X

• Multi-frame cue points from Silverstack are mapped to a clip range marked with a keyword in Final Cut Pro X

• Clips marked as flagged in Silverstack are marked entirely as favorite in Final Cut Pro X.

• Clips with rating “★” (one star) in Silverstack are marked as rejected in Final Cut Pro X.


[19 of 24]



By transferring your clips to Final Cut Pro X you can apply different color plugins in this step:

• for Cinestyle clips: DSLR Log2Video Plugin (#2)• for SLog clips: SLog2Video Plugin (#3)• for clips in LogC: apply Alexa log or looks (#4)

Import options (figure 1 #5)You can either immediately open the selected clips in Final Cut Pro X or save them first as Final Cut Pro XML files.

figure 2: From Silverstack transferred video clip in Final Cut Pro X


[20 of 24]

Keyboard Overview

In the following section you find a glossary including all shortcuts provided by Silverstack. Please be aware that not all of these shortcuts are available in each of the different functional areas within Silverstack. So it may happen that a shortcut won’t work in a certain situation. For example if you don't have a clip selection then you cannot use the Rate selection keyboard short cut.If you want to customize certain shortcuts for your individual usage, go to the following online article for instructions.

For the usage of those shortcuts you have to press the keys for this shortcut altogether at once!

General⌘, Preferences...

⌘ H Hide Silverstack⌥⌘ H Hide Others⌘ Q Quit Silverstack⌥⌘ Q Quit and Keep Windows

View⌘ 1 Library⌘ 2 Clip Info⌘ 3 User Info⌘ 4 File Info⌘ 5 Header Info

⌃⌘ 1 Summary⌃⌘ 2 Table⌃⌘ 3 Collection⌃⌘ 4 Playback⇧⌘ V Global Volumes⇧⌘ F Enter FullScreen Player⌃ ⌘ F Enter FullScreen MacOSX⌘ 0 100%⌥⌘ F Fit To Screen

Window⌘ W Close


[21 of 24]



⌥⌘ W Close All⌘ M Minimize⌥⌘ M Minimize All

Library⌘ N New Bin...⇧⌘ N New Folder...⌥⌘ N New Project...⌘ O Offload ⌥⌘ I MovieSlate (XML)...⌘ B Backup ⌘ E Export Report...⌘ Delete Unregister...

⌥⌘ R Relink Files

Edit⌘ Z Undo⇧⌘ Z Redo⌘ C Copy⌘ V Paste⌘ A Select All⌥⌘ T Special Characters...⌃ F Unflag⇧⌘ A Rating⇧⌘ S Comment⇧⌘ D Label⇧⌘ T Scene/Take/Shot⇧⌘ = Increase rating⌘ - Decrease rating⌃ 0 Clear⌃ 1 1⌃ 2 2⌃ 3 3⌃ 4 4⌃ 5 5⌥⌘ + Increase label⌥⌘ - Decrease label⌥⌘ 0 No Label⌥⌘ 1 Best Take⌥⌘ 2 Average Take⌥⌘ 3 Moderate Take⌥⌘ 4 B Roll⌥⌘ 5 Alternate Shots⌥⌘ 6 Interviews


[22 of 24]

⌥⌘ 7 Pomfortionös⇧⌘ C Add cue pointC Add cue point and continue⌥ C Close cue pointI Set in pointO Set out point⇧⌘ U Mark as Unread⌥F1 Copy to Look Slot 1⌥F2 Copy to Look Slot 2⌥F3 Copy to Look Slot 3⌥F4 Copy to Look Slot 4⌘ G Apply Look to Current Version⌥⌘ G Apply Look to Selected Version⇧⌘ G Apply Look to All Versions in Bin⌘ F1 Paste from Look Slot 1⌘ F2 Paste from Look Slot 2⌘ F3 Paste from Look Slot 3⌘ F4 Paste from Look Slot 4

Playback⌥⌘P Open in Quicktime PlayerSpace Toggle Playback→ Step Forward← Step Backward⌘ → Jump To Next Clip⌘ ↑ Jump To Clip Middle⌘ ← Jump To Previous Clip⌥⌘ C Next cue point⇧⌘ J Jump to Timecode...


[23 of 24]

For more please check out our Knowledge Base:

http://kb.pomfort.com

Resources[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SxS

CopyrightsPomfort GmbH © 2013


[24 of 24]POMFORT fnpomfort.com/silverstack

© 2013 Pomfort GmbH



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SxS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SxS