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Transcoding/ Recompress 1.6TB+ of DVCProHD
Hullo there
i’d like to compress about 1.6TB of DVCProHD rushes to something far less chunky
so that I can work from home on the laptop if needs be then bring that project
back into work with me and re-link it to the DVCProHD rushes.Also – if the main mac pro has down time for any reason i can keep working till
it’s back up. Time’s super tight on this one….I’m thinking there are 2 basic ways for me to do this – Media Manager or Compressor.
Which do you think would be the best way forward? I was thinking maybe a couple of
nights transcoding might do the trick… Am i way out?I don’t need super high quality – just something rough and ready with low file sizes – maybe
so i can edit from my little 232GB FW400 portable drive. Is that possible??
If not a G-raid is an option if going that small would take for ever.Firstly – Is this just a dumb idea?
Secondly – Can anyone suggest a good compression codec/data rate to set it to
given the above? Currently it’s all DVCProHD 25fps and i don’t know quite where to
start – trancoding to standard PAL would only cut it down to about 35% of it’s original size.Oh – i’m using FCP 6.04 OSX 10.4.11 etc on a 4 x 2,5 G5
thanks muchly!
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5 Replies
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[Christian Hart] “i’d like to compress about 1.6TB of DVCProHD rushes to something far less chunky
so that I can work from home on the laptop if needs be then bring that project
back into work with me and re-link it to the DVCProHD rushes. “DVCPro HD easily cuts on a laptop with a FW800 drive. No need to drop it to anything else really.
[Christian Hart] “Currently it’s all DVCProHD 25fps and i don’t know quite where to
start – trancoding to standard PAL would only cut it down to about 35% of it’s original size. “That’s a REALLY small data rate. No reason to waste anytime converting anything. Just dump the entire project to a FW800 drive. MAKE SURE to name that FW drive the EXACT SAME NAME as your main media drive. Then FCP will not have to keep reconnecting media on both systems.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media
HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.STOP STARING AND START GRADING WITH APPLE COLOR Apple Color Training DVD available now!
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First, i would not worry about size. Drives are cheap, so pick a codec that works fast for you, no matter the size. Drives peed is hardly an issue anymore for FW disks, unless you want more than a few streams RT.
Next, if you keep the name, tracks and TC intact, FCP does not care about the codec nor resolution, it will just use whatever is there. Only thing you have to do is switch the sequence settings. (of course parameters involving position can become incorrect if you switch from HD to SD or vice versa
Dunno about Media Manager, but i’ve not been able to get Compressor to work on more than 80 files at the same time. Compressor is however able to maintain the TC track (and that is a must have!), so i would start a few tests with Media Manager,
I’m not sure what you mean with the file sizes.
DVCproHD is 100 Mb /s or 50 Mb /s for 720? So if you go to DV you’ll cut down the size to a quarter (or half in case of 720) of it’s original, small enough to fit a cheap disk.If quality is not an issue, and you have (if my 100 Mb is correct) about 36 or 72 hours of material, i would use the SD DV codec.
(I could write something that ‘clones’ one drive to another, while transoding 2 times faster than RT, but that would set you back a couple of hundred bucks…)
Bouke
https://www.videotoolshed.com/
smart tools for video pro’s -
You can use the Media Manager to recompress to Offline RT. I have a workflow for this outlined in this magazine…
https://www.lafcpug.org/nab_supermag_08.html
Still, Walter is right. A simple FW800 drive will handle this fine.
Shane
GETTING ORGANIZED WITH FINAL CUT PRO DVD…don’t miss it.
Read my blog, Little Frog in High Def -
[Christian Hart] “Can anyone suggest a good compression codec/data rate to set it to
given the above?”Christian,
Have you ever used the “Off-line RT” codec? It was specifically designed for the workflow you’re describing.
We’ve been using “Off-line RT” for over five years now… not because we like the “crappy looking” pictures, but because it offers a low bandwidth, low file size alternative. I know that many people on this list simply don’t understand why anyone would ever use an “off-line” codec is this day an age of terrabyte drives for $100 bucks. My answer is that we simply have too much material and too many editors working to support the bandwidth or storage needed. The happy by product of this workflow is that editors can take a project and it’s associated media away from the office and work on it.
Our standard procedure has been to either digitize the original material at Off-line RT or use the compressor in it’s “Distributed rendering” capability to transcode the original high rez media to a more workable low rez form. While the Sony XDCAM proxy workflow is promising, there are still quite a few hurdles to overcome before it is an effective “off-line to online” candidate.
Mark
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thanks guys –
yes the only drawback of just copying the media is i dont have a single G-raid big enough
which would mean lugging two around with me (oof!)but walter i totally get your point that fw800 is plenty fast enough for dvcproHD – have used
them many times for this (although i always seem to get the odd dropped frame even when no
filters etc are being used)thanks walter also for the tip about naming the drive the same – i wouldn’t have thought to have done that so would have been constantly re-linking
will have a look at that supermag article with the offline RT workflow also – i really should know about this already but usually just straight copying the media turns out to be easier
and bouke – thanks for the 80 file limit warning in compressor – i don’t know that. however my tests going to dv pal suggest 35% of the original size.
anyway – good to know all of the above. perhaps i will end up lugging 2 graids around with me after all? will see how long the g5 is going to take to recompress 1.6tb or files to offlineRT….
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