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FCP Project backup and Media Management
Hello everyone, this is my first post on the site and I’m happy to be a new member of the community! I’ve been trolling the site for a long time and have always found it quite useful.
So I have been banging my head against the wall for sometime now trying to figure out the best management practices for backing up FCP projects and the original P2 media the projects were shot on. Right now our system is two pronged: Original P2 media lives on one set of drives as a backup, and FCP projects live on another set of Drives. This was all fine and dandy the first year or so of the P2 era but now we are entering the fourth year of shooting entirely on P2 and the hard drives are starting to stack up. The longer this practice gos on the more expensive and less efficient it gets. I realize this is mostly a personal opinion but what are some better options for media management?
One thought I have had is eliminating the long term storage of P2 media and only keeping it while the project is active. Then once the show is over delete the p2 media and do a proper fcp media manager backup of the project. Then duplicate that onto a second drive. This would leave us with the long term storage solution of having the fcp project backed up on 2 drives while also eliminating unused “junk” footage that in some cases could add an additional 60% to the size of the project.
So, thank you for reading my novel and I hope there are some ideas/thoughts out there!
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4 Replies
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Let me be the first to say… Welcome to the COW, Jon!
As for backup needs with P2, I would suggest getting a BluRay writer (external or internal) and backing up to BluRay. We use the 50 gig discs to backup all of our show masters (and P2 footage, when shot by a freelance shooter). I also use this to backup very large projects that are larger than dual layer DVD’s.
BluRay drives are getting cheaper and discs are becoming more affordable. Its completely reliable for up to 50 years, from what I hear.
We use XDCAM HD as our primary format and XDCAM discs are about $30 each for 23 gig. At the moment, I can purchase 50 gig BD-R discs for about $17.50. So, if you do the math, I can get about 6 XDCAM HD 1080p30 shows on one 50 gig BD-R, as compared to 2 30 minutes shows on an XDCAM HD disc (at 35 mbit HQ setting).
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Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com -
Thanks for the welcome Wayne!
We have looked at the blue ray in the past and it isn’t quite cost efficient enough right now to make the move. We’re paying around 250 for 2tb drives right now. last time I checked on Blue Ray 25 discs(minimum buy)cost you around 450 and you get around 1250gb of disc storage(at least that was the priceing when I last checked last summer.)
On top of that most of the projects we work on are larger than 50gb and we would like to keep the project files backed up as well. Although, burning the P2 to BR could eliminate all P2 hard drive storage…. Hmmm. Now I’m thinking. Thanks for the Idea!
Jon
Jonathan Bothun
Media Director
Parthe, Inc.
Superior, Wi -
[Jon Bothun] “We’re paying around 250 for 2tb drives right now. last time I checked on Blue Ray 25 discs(minimum buy)cost you around 450 and you get around 1250gb of disc storage(at least that was the priceing when I last checked last summer.) “
Bud… Look again. You’ll be very surprised. The VideoGuys has an internal 12x BluRay drive for $229, external is $299. TapeOnline has BluRay disc in bundles of 25 for $87. Do the math.
Hard drives fail all of the time. I have a bunch of door stops, nice door stops at that. BluRay has a shelf life of approximately 50 years, as long as you don’t scratch them.
We shoot on XDCAM HD. XDCAM discs are less than $22 for 23 gig. That’s two thirty minutes shows per disc. I can purchase 50 gig BluRays for $18 a disc and can hold 6 shows per disc. Look at the math on that. Its silly to use XDCAM for archiving purposes. I can still take my XDCAM HD 1080p30 shows and put 6 of them on a 50 gig BluRay. That’s a huge yearly saving for us., AND permanent reliable storage.
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Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
https://web.mac.com/schazamproductions
schazamproductions@mac.com -
Hi guys glad you raised the topic as I’m new to HD and P2 and am trying to find out the best way of doing things from experienced users. My worry is I want to back up my material and not the show. We are not shooting for a show but are shooting for Documentary and need to store footage over long periods of time in a library before it might be used. If I’m shooting on a 64 gig card my 1 hour of card wont fit on a Blu ray disc and I’m nervous of a drive failing, in the past a damaged tape could mean 30 – 40 minutes of material lost, a drive failure can mean a couple hours of material lost. Is there a better way of storing on drives or should I just double up on Drives which could become bulky and expensive.
Secondly if I managed my project out of FCP must I always keep the mov files or can I delete these to help on storage space can I at a later stage if the media is needed retransfer them from the original data I don’t know If you know what I mean but it would be the same as keeping your project file deleting your scratch discs and re digitising the material when its needed.
Lastly how do I delete certain MXF files from out the folder I stored them in the camera I could delete the thumbnail and the audio text etc would also be deleted but once its on the computer its split up into different folders etc I also cant see the clip so have to view it in FCP take down its name go back to the folder find it delete it and then do the same with the audio file (in theory, I have not done this yet) Is there a better way of doing this, I don’t know if I’m missing something
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