Reading ARRIRAW Files

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‌Reading ARRIRAW Files

SynthEyes can directly read these files, as recorded by ARRI’s cameras. Sequences of .ari image files can be read like any other image sequence. ARRI cameras can also store ARRIRAW or ProRes image data into a single MXF movie file, which SynthEyes can read.

Warning : MXF is a container file format that can contain various types of coded image data. SynthEyes can directly read only ARRIRAW or ProRes™ data in MXFs.

Warning : ARRI periodically updates their cameras and software with new features and data formats. New cameras may require sufficiently new SDKs. You can see SynthEyes’s current ARRI SDK version in the Library Versions section of this manual.

The ARRIRAW reader can produce images in either of two different color systems:

 LogC (Wide gamut), if 8- or 16-bits/channel Process Depth is selected on the Shot Settings.

 ACES Scene-referenced Linear (wide gamut), if Half or Float Process Depth is selected.

The color systems are appropriate for those data formats. Neither image format

is going to appear “correct” immediately in the SynthEyes camera view, however.

Instead, you can run it through a lookup table (LUT) appropriate to your monitor, using the Color tab of SynthEyes’s image preprocessor. Some standard LUTs are included with SynthEyes; others may be obtained from ARRI’s lookup table generator (which generated the included ones), or from other generators or monitor calibration systems.

SynthEyes includes LUTs for ACES and LogC to R.709 and R.2020 (4 total), which encompasses both ARRI output types and both common video standards. There are also LUTs for ACES to LogC and LogC to ACES, but note that the definition of LogC is dependent on the ExposureIndex (EI, ~ISO) setting of the camera during filming. (Use File/Export/Metadata/Export Single Frame to determine this.) SynthEyes provides LogC 800EI to ACES and ACES to LogC 800EI LUTs. For additional EI values, see ARRI’s LUT generator, which will provide all the tables. We do not know what EI value is used for ARRI’s LogC to R709 and R2020 conversions, but apparently not 800!

Especially for ACES data, you may want to take advantage of the “F.P. Range Adjust” control on the shot setup panel. Although it acts like an exposure control, it does not affect floating or half data in the image pipe, only the conversion when it needs to be converted to integer values for display or tracking. This can be useful to track shots with over- or under-exposure, without changing the image data, if it will be output from SynthEyes.

After you’ve set up any color corrections, you can have SynthEyes store the corrected images in a more compact format such as 8-bit or half for tracking. If you later want to output a version of the shot with lens distortion removed, you probably want to turn OFF the color correction, so that the outgoing revised images match the color space of the original imagery.

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