Excellent article on OpenEXR
February 21st, 2007
Ok, first of all, you’re probably wondering, what is OpenEXR? Well, in the most raw explanation, it’s a file format. Imagine a frame of a movie or a video saved as a picture. Now take 24 of those per second (film runs at 24 frames per second). You’ve got a lot of files. You move these files through what’s called a “pipeline.” For example, you create an animated character in a 3D program, film a live action sequence on HD, then combine the two in a compositing program. Finally this is saved out either a movie or another series of images. That’s a pipeline.
Now imagine being able to add information to those files that tell you a lot of information and allow you to change certain things in the file. That’s a VERY basic idea of what goes into OpenEXR.
There’s a GREAT article at FXGuide about OpenEXR here where they interview Industrial Light & Magic, who created the OpenEXR format.
Now, why am I so interested in this format? Well, over the last half year, we’ve been switching Reels in Motion over to using OpenEXR as the core file format in our pipeline.
There are several benefits to this. First, our images have much more color information in them since OpenEXR can hold several times the information as a typical file format. Next, it gives us the ability to change many aspects of animations or composites to match a mood you might be trying to create.
All in all, it’s very exciting from a technical and creative point of view. We can do more technically with it and allow more creativity to flow. Which is a good thing. 
