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Working with HDV …
Hi guys,
I have some footage to capture from a Sony HDV camera, the HVR-A1U.
I’ve had no problems in capturing straight to FCPX but the software does not transcode it to Prores as it is the best way to work with. I’ve been reading here and there to avoid editing in HDV even if it can be done in FCPX, instead I should transcode it to Prores before ingest the material in FCPX.
The best way to transcode the material would be with Compressor, right ?
But before that I have to capture as pure HDV. How do I do it ?
I could “Log & Capture” with FCP7 but it does a “HDV to Prores” capturing which some people is also writing here and there … lol … that is not a good option….Your opinion guys ???
Thanks in advance.
iMac 2.7 GHz Intel 4 Core i5
16 GB memoryMacBook Pro 17″
2.5 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
6GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAMOWC RAID 5 with 4TB
OS X 10.7.3
FCPX
Final Cut Studio “3” -
7 Replies
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I’m not sure of the best way, but I edit a lot of HDV footage in FCPX so here’s my method.
I prefer to use quicktime 7 pro to capture. It’s very simple and reliable.
Once I capture, I bring into FCPX with the create proxy option on at import.
Once I’ve got the proxies generated from FCPX, I edit away, then set my playback settings back to optimized/original and export.
Hope this helps!
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OutOfFocus.TV – Music videos, docs, entertainment. -
Yea…I’ve avoided doing projects from capture on in X because my two main cams are still HDV/Tape so I’m interested in the answers to this question.
I’ve done a couple where I capture using 7 and naming each file (ie: Exterior A 1) during capture, then right clicking in all of them (after selecting them all) and choosing “remane file to match clip”. I always use a great custom setting I picked up a while ago to do HDV to Rores and it works great so I’ve stuck w/ that. Then go to capture scratch and grab your folders from the scratch drive over to an external (I’m using eSATA). Then I take that over to my FCP X workstation and transfer the folders onto my edit stations media drive and import the folders as keyword collections. Yea, it’s a bit of extra work but I haven’t figured out my workflow directly within X yet.
Just my two cents 🙂
Posted from iPad, please excuse typos!
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Thanks Tony and Loren for your response.
I’m still a little lost about the best way to go with HDV. I will give a try to QT7 Pro as Loren has said just for a test because I’ve never used QT player for capture and I would like to see it.
Like Tony, my 2 cameras are HDV/Tape and I really would like to find a good workflow to put on practice when I have to use them.
When I got a job that needs a better camera I just rent them and usually are the Sony EX family. They are card cameras that have more discussions and solutions over the COW.iMac 2.7 GHz Intel 4 Core i5
16 GB memoryMacBook Pro 17″
2.5 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
6GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAMOS X 10.7.3
FCPX
Final Cut Studio “3” -
A couple of weeks ago I needed to go back and back up some DV tapes from my old Canon GL-1 (just in case it dies at some point in the near future). I also did a final backup for my old DAT player tapes for the same reason (I used an Alesis IO2 audio interface and QuickTime 7 for that).
My choices for capture were: FCP7, QuickTime 7, or FCP X. I first tried QT7 and it worked fine as Loren described. I then thought I’d give FCP X a go. It actually went very nicely and anytime they was a break or pause in a tape, FCP X just created a new clip. The problem I encountered was at the end of a couple of tapes, FCP X would break the end of the tape into 6 seconds clips. I have no idea if the tapes were going bad or if it was a FCP X issue.
For those few tapes where I had difficulty, I manually backed up the tape to where I wanted a new complete clip to begin and then went back to QuickTime 7 to capture. Whew, all done!
As per my usual workflow, I also went back and re-named all the new DV clips to something that made more sense for the material. I do the same for AVCHD clips wrapped in a .MOV via ClipWrap.
Dave
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Great info here! So, when you captured with FCP X, were you able to capture directly to ProRes? That’s one thing I like about FCP 7. And I’ve always actually named every clip and logged only the shots I wanted to keep when capturing from tape. That way I have perfectly named clips in FCP, then I would do that “rename file to match clip” just to make sure that the files had the names I had given them in FCP. Now, if I just copy those folders over to my FCP X machine’s media drive and import using X telling it to import folders as keyword collections, All of the files are already named and good to go.
Yea, it’s a PITA but I haven’t tried doing it with FCP X yet since it is on a newer MBP and not my main workhorse machine. Along with Avid and Adobe CS 6 Production Premium as I’m learning them all now. I want to be NLE agnostic. But I do love me some FCP X! It actually turns out to be pretty cool. But I digress…the MBP has only FW 800 and frankly, I have just been too busy/intimidated/unwilling to try it just yet. I’ve been using X mainly for DSLR projects and GoPro along with a little bit of moving my ProRes from legacy to X if need be.
Tony Brittan
Island Shore Productions -
BTW…I do have the appropriate cable for FW400 to FW800…just haven’t tried it yet 🙂
Tony Brittan
Island Shore Productions -
[Tony Brittan] “So, when you captured with FCP X, were you able to capture directly to ProRes?”
For me, no. Both FCP X and QuickTime 7 defaulted to .dv files.[Tony Brittan] “Now, if I just copy those folders over to my FCP X machine’s media drive and import using X telling it to import folders as keyword collections, All of the files are already named and good to go.”
I do the same with the re-naming scheme, but don’t import to the Event. I just use the aliases. My 2011 MBP i7 seems to be fast enough to handle the footage I throw at FCP X (AVCHD, DV, and AVI) without using the Pro Res or proxies.[Tony Brittan] “the MBP has only FW 800”
I plugged in an older external enclosure that had both FW400 and FW800. I plugged the FW800 cable into my MBP i7 from the enclosure and then connected the GL-1 FW400 into the enclosure. I had an extra drive on my Desktop, but it didn’t make any difference.Dave
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