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Cooke Optics and The Foundry collaborate to incorporate /i Technology into Nuke compositing application (29/10/2009)

Cooke Optics Ltd., the premier manufacturer of precision lenses for the motion picture industry, today announced that it is working with The Foundry to incorporate /i Technology into Nuke, the powerful compositing application. /i ‘Intelligent’ Technology enables the recording of extremely accurate, frame-by-frame lens and camera data, saving visual effects artists hours of time in post production by eliminating the need to guess lens parameters and camera information.

The Foundry recently carried out a test shoot at Blenheim Palace using the new Sony F35 camera, which supports /i.

“We wanted to test how the /i data would help us to solve issues of lens distortion when shooting with a zoom lens,” said Ben Minall, Demo and Training Manager, The Foundry. “We shot lens distortion grids with different focal lengths, and the /i data gave us an accurate focal length. We then used a lens tool to un-distort the plate, then used the camera tracker within Nuke to reapply this to the footage. Having the /i data makes the tracking process much simpler, particularly since lens distortion changes with the zoom.”

Minall continues: “Having /i data is an excellent sanity check – you know exactly what you’ve got, from frame rates to focus to aperture. You don’t have to rely on on-set notes, the metadata provides a failsafe backup.”

The Foundry introduced the concept of metadata support into Nuke 5.2 because it realised that metadata was becoming a major asset to post production teams.

The forthcoming Nuke 6 release will have an in-built 3D camera tracker, to which the user can provide additional hints and constraints about the shoot to recreate the camera – for example, which lens was used. Incorporating Cooke’s /i Technology to capture lens metadata is a huge step forward in The Foundry’s aims to provide more accurate information for post work.

“The buzz about Cooke lenses is phenomenal, they have a great reputation so it’s a great fit for us to work with them,” said Richard Shackleton, Nuke Product Manager, The Foundry. “Cooke is one of the first manufacturers to really embrace metadata and understand its power. A lot of time is spent in the post process getting information from pictures in order to do a better job, but often that information might be very basic or even guesswork. Cooke /i lenses provide real and accurate data which is invaluable.”

Les Zellan, Chairman and Owner, Cooke Optics, said, “The use and support of metadata is becoming increasingly prevalent in post circles. As budgets and timeframes continue to shrink, providing post teams with metadata from /i enabled lenses saves time and money while allowing them to focus on their creativity.”

www.cookeoptics.com  
www.thefoundry.co.uk

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