RED and Tsecond: Streamlining Multi-Camera Recording and Data

SAN JOSE, Calif. - April 27, 2024 - PRLog -- RED Digital Cinema, a leading manufacturer of professional digital cameras and accessories, and Tsecond Inc., an AEI HorizonX growth stage portfolio storage system company, have developed an integrated workflow that allows producers to leverage the full creative and technical imaging benefits of utilizing RED digital cinema cameras for multi camera production, while eliminating burdensome media and data management. Combining the capabilities of the RED V-RAPTOR 8K cinema camera, the RED Connect module, the RED SDK and Tsecond's BRYCK storage platform, they have devised a system to stream and write R3D files directly to high performance drive, bypassing recording to on-camera media. With up to 40-gigabytes-per-second of available throughput, the BRYCK easily scales to recording ten concurrent 8K 120fps streams, with room for many more. The resulting high-resolution, high-latitude R3D files are then immediately available to the workstations connected to the BRYCK, ready to be processed, edited and transferred. This eliminates the need for regular replacement and management of camera media throughout filming, as well as the ensuing data transfers required to compile, backup and distribute the data they contain. Minimizing these tasks is particularly important for production and emerging advanced imaging crews who film with multiple cameras concurrently.

As a proof of concept, RED and Tsecond tested simultaneous recording of 10 RED V-RAPTOR Cameras, set to capture 8K 17:9 at 120 frames-per-second in MQ R3D quality. These settings yield an 800 MBps stream from each camera, which is output through the built-in RED Connect module's fiber connector and fed to a network switch's 10Gbe port. Either fiber or ethernet cables can be utilized to transmit from the V-Raptor to the switch, which is connected to the BRYCK storage system's server via dual 100Gbe connections.

The NVMe based - BRYCKⓇ Platform is a secure portable storage solution that offers up to 1PB of capacity and very high throughput (up to 40 GB/s) in a rugged, compact and tamper-proof form factor. The NVME drives are contained in a brick-shaped weatherproof 4"x4"x9.5" enclosure that connects via its docking station—or Tray—to a high-performance server through which clients access the storage. This design enables the rapid and safe physical transit of large volumes of data; the high-capacity portable BRYCK storage module can easily be transported and connected to another Tray for data access, with AES 256-bit encryption, failure protection and military grade construction protecting its contents.

The BRYCK system communicates with the V-RAPTORS via SRT over TCP/IP. Stream Receiver, a simple utility within BRYCK's management software, allows users to set cameras as the data streams' sources and to configure the destination folders on the BRYCK for each camera's feed. Stream Receiver leverages the RED Connect library to verify the data and write it to the BRYCK storage as standard R3D files.

Once the cameras and storage system are configured, recording can be triggered by the camera. A single BRYCK system can sustain recording from up to 20 cameras running at 8K/17:9/120fps/MQ, with a 256 TB BRYCK offering about 80 hours of capacity for those settings. All this available bandwidth and capacity also makes it possible to connect workstations to the system for immediate processing, review and transfer of the footage.

Be4Post, a DIT and video equipment rental company based in Paris, France, recently leveraged RED Connect and BRYCK in exactly this manner for a to-be-announced project filming in the Chilean desert. The weeklong production placed high demands on the system, with three V-RAPTORS recording upwards of 12 hours of footage a day each for a week, in challenging heat and dusty conditions.

"We only had a month to set up the project from scratch. We set up a high-speed fiber network system which, together with RED Connect, the BRYCK storage and RED Control app, ensured robust recording in the harsh conditions expected in Chile. The combination of the BRYCK, the RED Connect modules and our existing workstations streamlined our workflow, allowing instant access to R3D files and speeding up rendering and post-production tasks. It was great to see it all working perfectly from the first test," said Mathieu Leclercq, Be4Post workflow specialist.

"BRYCK was built for this kind of workflow: effortlessly enabling capture at the highest possible quality and ensuring immediate access to the resulting data so that productions don't get bottlenecked by limited performance, or bogged down by data and media management," says Manavalan Krishnan, Tsecond's CTO.

Jeff Goodman, VP of Product Management at RED, adds: "BRYCK's integration with RED Connect opens the door to streamlined workflows and configurations for high-resolution and high-frame rate multi camera, live-to-tape, volumetric and immersive video projects in all types of environments. We're always looking to remove limitations that create complexity and compromises, and that's exactly what we've done here."

A white paper detailing the integrated workflow and its capabilities is available on the RED website at https://www.red.com/beyond-cinema-stories/tsecond-multi-cam-data.

About RED

RED Digital Cinema is a leading manufacturer of professional digital cameras and accessories. In 2006, RED began a revolution with the 4K RED ONE digital cinema camera. By 2008, RED had released the DSMC (Digital Stills and Motion Camera) system that allowed the same camera to be used on award-winning features, television, commercials, music videos and magazine covers like "Vogue" and "Harper's Bazaar." Today, RED cameras are being used on some of the most lauded movies and episodics, including award winners "Mank," "Navalny," "Hacks," "100 Foot Wave," "The Last Dance," "The Queen's Gambit," and "Our Planet." RED's latest technology includes the highly advanced V-RAPTOR [X] and V-RAPTOR XL [X] systems, the flagship DSMC3 generation systems and the first available large format global shutter cinema cameras. The RED lineup also includes KOMODO-X and KOMODO, which features a global shutter sensor in a shockingly small and versatile form factor. Also available is RED Connect, a license-enabled feature that unlocks up to 8K 120FPS live cinematic streaming from the V-RAPTOR line of cameras. Find additional information at www.RED.com.

About Tsecond

Founded in 2020, Tsecond specializes in seamless data capture and migration between any location, regardless of data size. The BRYCKⓇ Platform is the world's smallest and lightest All-Flash, 1PB mobile storage solution, enabling data transportation from edge locations to data centers or the cloud. Tsecond serves the evolving data needs of a variety of industries, including media and entertainment, aerospace and aviation, autonomous vehicles, government and defense, and more. Its customers include Boeing, Picture Shop, Be4Post and more. With a robust global presence, Tsecond is at the forefront of revolutionizing data management for enterprises and organizations worldwide. Tsecond is an AEI Horizon X portfolio company, the venture capital investment platform formed between AE Industrial and The Boeing Company.