When we talk to potential customers about SGO Mistika we usually find ourselves answering the same basic questions before getting onto the more complex topics. Here we aim to answer some of those common questions that arise.
Q. I hear a lot of talk about Mistika, what does it do?
SGO Mistika is a complete, high-end finishing post production system featuring editing, compositing and colour grading. Each area is seamlessly integrated into a single timeline-based interface, allowing live interaction between all functions. Mistika accepts almost any image resolution from SD to 5K and beyond, in 2D and Stereoscopic 3D. It has what is widely regarded as the best stereoscopic 3D toolset on the market making it the tool of choice for many television and film companies around the world.
Q. Which companies are using it?
Mistika is a global product so you may not recognise their customers from outside your region. In the UK the most well known would probably be Sky who have used Mistika at the heart of their 3D channel operations. There are many other post production houses using it and countless productions being put through Mistika systems.
“We had extremely difficult challenges to overcome leading up to the beginning of The Hobbit principal photography…we decided to go down a path of using Mistika as the hub for our new digital rushes workflow. There was no other system that could deal with turning around stereoscopic RED EPIC high frame rate material in the time-frame, and with the quality that we needed.”
David Hollingsworth – Head of Picture, Park Road Post, Wellington, New Zealand
Q. So why all the hype about Mistika right now?
SGO Mistika is taking the world by storm as a one-stop shop for your production needs – although its Stereoscopic toolset is what is really catching headlines.
“Mistika is a truly unique system – SGO’s optical flow-based 3D toolset is years ahead of its time and continues to be more advanced than any other product in the industry today.
There’s no disputing that Mistika has the best Stereo 3D toolset on the planet, bar none, but this is complimented by equally capable conform and grading tools, all of which run faster than we ever thought possible on a stock workstation.”
Phil Oatley – Head of Technology, Park Road Post Production, New Zealand
Recent additions to the Stereoscopic toolset allow for previously impossible corrections to 3D material which would previously had to be re-shot. Mistika combines any-resolution editing, grading and compositing in one system with no rendering needed whatsoever for many features. Being capable of advanced stereoscopic and data workflows, including real-time RED file handling, it gives post companies more ability, increased efficiency and a competitive advantage that sets them apart from their rivals.
Q. But what sets it apart from other systems out there?
No other single system has the breadth of features that Mistika has. Not only that, it has strength in depth. Each feature, like colour grading, stands in comparison with the best dedicated system on the market and each feature seamlessly integrates with another without time consuming or destructive importing and exporting. The other great strength is SPEED. Everyone who sees it in operation is wowed by its ability and the fact that for so many, even complex, operations no rendering is required. On top of this, the system is open, allowing storage to be accessed and shared by other applications and customer scripts to be incorporated.
“I am 100% confident that no other post production system could have dealt with that much work, to that level of quality within the time-scale available, as Mistika had. And that’s before we even considered the project was going to be in Stereo 3D!”
David Cox, Stereographer & Post Production Supervisor, Sharp Cookies
SGO Mistika has been programmed to make maximum use of the GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) for some years. The result of this is unrivalled speed with many effects not requiring any processing (rendering) whatsoever.
Speed benchmarks include: –
– Full colour grading on 4K DPX files without any rendering required.
– Motion estimated slow motion running in real time at up to 2K resolution.
– Real time, full resolution colour grading and convergence operations on stereoscopic material.
– Many other real time functions including RED camera based workflows.
Unlike many of its competitors, Mistika employs an open storage policy. Mistika can provide storage for any other product that allows connection to generic file systems. This allows Mistika to be easily integrated into an existing facility, because files of many different formats can be easily exchanged. With Mistika, it is also possible to develop custom scripts to aid integration and automate common functions.
Q. What about Stereoscopic 3D – every system seems to do that these days.
Many systems claim to support stereo 3D workflows now, but for most that simply means being able to work on and play out two streams of video. Mistika goes far beyond this with dedicated tools for helping with the specific problems that occur in stereoscopic production. It goes without saying it can grade two streams, either individually or together or both, but then things like being able to alter the interocular distance using advanced optical flow technology take it to another level. Currently this is one of the most active areas of development in Mistika.
“We are fanatically excited about moving our 3D finishing pipeline to Mistika 4K for stereo productions shot on RED3 EPIC camera system. We’ve evaluated every tool in the marketplace and there is nothing even close to Mistika’s 3D toolset.”
Mark L. Pederson – CTO & Co-Founder, OFFHOLLYWOOD, NY, USA
Mistika has arguably the most advanced and developed 3D post production tools in the market, which has lead to Sky employing it as their only 3D finishing tool and for facilities companies such as The Framestore to base their 3D strategy upon it. Mistika’s advanced features include optical recognition between left and right cameras to aid the rapid correction of inherent stereo problems, such as camera pairs that are not exactly aligned. Mistika also allows its very strong colour grading functions to be applied to both image streams at the same time, or to just the left or right as needs be. Compositing can also be carried out in 3D. Mistika’s real-time stereo tools including colour grading, convergence adjustments and camera error correction, as well as some very advanced features such as retrospective adjustment of the cameras interocular distance have left the market stunned by its ability.
“Mistika ‘s Equalize is the first automated geometry and colour fix solution that actually delivers beyond what it promises — and it works brilliantly too.“
Steve Shaw – CEO, Light Illusion, UK
Q. And what about RED workflow? – lots of systems do that too.
Sure – many systems can import the r3d files. But Mistika works directly with RED camera files without any importing or rendering. It has native support for RED EPIC & ARRI ALEXA 5K. Working directly on the r3d file preserves all 12 bits of information right through the post process. It can take or conform from the original 4K camera files, rescale them to many desired delivery resolutions and colour grade the result in real time in a single process. Mistika also allows access and alterations to the decisions made by the camera operator on a shot-by-shot basis. As Mistika is so fast it remains responsive and usable even when working with 5k files.
Mistika can decompress and grade from RED camera files in real-time without any importing or cross conversion processes. By working directly from the RED files, Mistika retains access to RED specific meta-data such as exposure, white balance and gamma curve settings, whilst also benefiting from more efficient usage of image storage space. Many other products that claim to support RED files do so by first converting the RED files to their own convenient format. This requires time for cross conversion, more disk space to hold larger files and looses access to the RED meta-data. One of the strongest points of Mistika is its colour correction function that can compete with any stand-alone grading system. Combining this grading power with direct and real-time access to RED files creates an extremely capable and efficient RED based workflow.
Q. What about its history and the company behind it?
Mistika is developed by SGO in Madrid . It has over 15 years of development behind it, having evolved from a previously successful system – Jaleo. It is therefore extremely robust and production proven. SGO, unlike some of its competitors whose development has stagnated in the current climate, is aggressively pushing development forward with new tools and workflows, especially in the areas of data workflow (e.g. with r3d files) and stereoscopic 3D.
Q. OK, so how much does it cost, what’s the price?
SGO Misitka is a high-end finishing tool and is priced accordingly -it is not competing against products like Final Cut or Premiere. The complete Mistika Suite does provide excellent value when you consider the number of tasks it is capable of and the speed at which is does them. The software options are modular so if needed you could start out with a basic HD editing system and then add DI and Stereoscopic options when required. The initial investment can be rapidly recovered in terms of time saved and increase in production. This alone is why many sites have multiple Mistika seats. Once you see how easily Mistika can become the central hub to your productions the only way to improve is to expand…
If you are interested in seeing what Mistika can really do then why not contact us and arrange a personal demonstration.
Call us on +44 1462 433558.
