ProRes

ProRes is a video compression method created by Apple, used to store footage in a state that's well-suited for editing and color grading work. It goes in the opposite direction from compression that shrinks file size as much as possible, like videos uploaded to YouTube. Its goal is to preserve image quality and color information as much as possible while keeping file size manageable.

To put it in a metaphor, YouTube-style compression is like a fully cooked, frozen ready-made meal, while ProRes is like fresh ingredients that have only been prepped. A ready-made meal is easy to heat up and eat, but hard to rework into a different dish. Footage saved in ProRes, on the other hand, rarely breaks down or gets patchy even when brightness or color is pushed hard, so it can be treated almost like the original footage in editing rooms and broadcast production.

That's why in broadcast and film production, whether the source is footage shot with a camera or video generated by computer, it's often converted to a format like ProRes before final editing and color grading.

In the article, ProRes appears as one of the "target formats" that conversion tools like Runway Ruby need to reach. In an expression like "a workflow built around ProRes and EXR," the context is that even AI-generated video needs to be converted into professional formats like this to actually be used in broadcast and editing work. A common misunderstanding: ProRes itself doesn't mean HDR. It only provides the headroom to store video at 10-bit or 12-bit depth—achieving actual HDR requires changes to color gamut and brightness representation as well.