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avid codec
Running Macbook Pro 2.66 i7, 4GB 1067 MHz DDR3
Final Cut Studio 3I’m cutting a project (a DVD of a comedy night) with a mix of formats. It was shot on 3 cameras, Digi Beta, Eos 5D and Sony Z1 (HDV)
Digi Beta was digitised at a post production house using Avid DV codec
HDV was digitized straight in using Apple Pro Res
EOS 5D was imported from SD card in H.264Am I right to be using an Apple Pro Res (HQ) Timeline?
I’ve tried converting the Digi Beta footage into Pro Res with compressor but it is v lossy. Is it best to redigitise at the post house using apple pro res?
The project will ultimately be for DVD output. I’m not planning on going back to source tapes but it needs to best possible quality (ie ideally I want to have all the material on my drive at full res).
Is it possible to digitise in footage uncompressed? Also, is the H.264 file from the Canon 5D the highest quality file you can import from the camera/sd card? (its academic as the SD card has long since been wiped and all I have are H.264s. They seem pretty good quality but I would have thought there was an uncompressed file you could get from the camera?)
Thanks
Simon
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2 Replies
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[Simon Muriel] “I’ve tried converting the Digi Beta footage into Pro Res with compressor but it is v lossy. Is it best to redigitise at the post house using apple pro res?”
Sure. Capturing DigiBeta as DV was a big mistake.
You should convert the H264 to Prores too.
rafael -
>Digi Beta was digitised at a post production house using Avid DV codec
Horrid … as Rafa says, for better quality get that recaptured (preferably as ProRes). As all your other sources are at HD resolution then (if its an option) you might want to consider having it unconverted during capture, to a match your other footage.
>EOS 5D was imported from SD card in H.264
FCP may accept it in the timeline but nonetheless it doesn’t really like H264 as an edit source format (its not optimized to cope with it). Better to follow Rafa’s advice and transcode this to ProRes … it won’t magically make the footage higher quality (the camera’s native capture format is the best that it will ever be) but it won’t make it worse and it will make working with it much easier.
>Am I right to be using an Apple Pro Res (HQ) Timeline?
No. You’ll get no benefit from editing this footage in an HQ timeline. I appreciate you are looking to create the highest quality HD edit master before eventual SD DVD distribution, but given your source formats then Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) will gain you absolutely nothing but file size … just use standard Apple ProRes 422 (not HQ).
Hope it helps
Andy
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