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Pro Tools Mix Not Syncing in PAL video project.
I cut a 20 minute long PAL project. The sound mix came back and when it is laid in to the timeline (on Final Cut Pro) the end 2-pop is a second and a half earlier than the visual 2-pop. The sync drifts during the show and by the end of it, it’s that second and a half off.
When checking the duration from 2-pop to 2-pop, both on the timeline and on the mix file when viewed in the viewer window – the duration is precisely the same. But when I lay it in to the timeline, it’s off. Very very strange.
The timecode of the mix has a semicolon. But I don’t understand why it would since this is a PAL project and there is no drop frame supposed to be happening.
Another thing: the mixer returned a 44.1 mix, the project is 48. I tried to convert the mix to 48 but the problem is the same.
Any thoughts?
“We’ll fix it in post”
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3 Replies
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Hey David,
sounds like something went amiss with the format of the mix, I would suggest to try to add the soundtrack in plain old Quicktime 7 to see if it happens there too. Opening the mix in a sound editing app like Soundtrack Pro, Amadeus, Audacity or whatever you might have on hand have a look at the exact time and see if it matches. If nothing else helps you could always stretch the mix (bad fix but a fix …) to be in perfect sync by slowing it down 1/2 sec over the total duration of your cut. It will depend on the material wether this is feasible or not but if you’re in a rush it might be better than having everything out of sync in the last third of the cut.
Good luck!
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Audio Engineer, Sound Designer
Video- and Photographer
http://www.andreengelhardt.net -
Hello David,
Sounds like you have a tricky one on your hands. I will suggest first to check the settings of the Pro Tools session. I suspect your sound mixer will not see any problem in his session but if you can have him or her align the video playback framerate in Pro Tools with your original export, that may solve the problem. I had the same issue a year ago and this was the fix. I hope this helps.
Alain Koffi Sessi
Sound Designer -
Thank you gentlemen,
Actually figured out the problem. When you “import” an audio track into Final Cut Pro, if your project is PAL you must first change all the Easy Setup settings to PAL related settings, then turn off and restart the program, then import the audio – that way, the audio clip will be created in FCP with a 25fps rate. I find that annoying because Final Cut’s whole thing is that the clips you use are not project based, in other words they come in to the program as is, and then you adjust them or render if need be – but when putting a piece of 29.97 fps audio into a 25fps timeline, FCP does not tell you there is a mismatch, and does not require a render, so you think everything is fine.
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