-
Changing 5D footage from LT to HQ in FCP?
We have cut the documentary in pro res LT. It is due to go to an online next monday. The basic problem is the grader wants us to reconnect the media to Pro Res HQ.
The film was shot using a Canon 5D and we used the 5D plugin in FCP to archive the original footage to disc images. We’d then open the disc image with the FCP 5d plugin and log and transfer the footage often changing the reel names, the clip names, setting in and out points for the specific clips and then transcoding into Pro Res LT.
To reconnect the media we thought we could open the archived disc images and then batch capture. This worked for the first disc image that was left on the computer however for the 100 or so others that had been backed up to separate drives FCP doesn’t recognise the disc image mounted. This leaves us having to retranscode and reconnect clips individually which could take weeks – time which i dont have.
Any suggestions would be highly appreciated.
-
32 Replies
-
Read about what i did with FcpReconnect from video tool shed here:
Check the comments too.
-
And also check Shane Ross’s two excellent tutorials on the correct way to manage and capture file based footage with L&T and the offline/online workflow for file based formats.
At this stage you will probably need to follow Jeremy’s lead but for the future watch Shane’s tutorials to avoid problems next time.
-
Unfortunately, as awesome as it is, Shane’s tutorial does not cover the Canon Log and Transfer bug.
[Simon Wood] “This worked for the first disc image that was left on the computer however for the 100 or so others that had been backed up to separate drives FCP doesn’t recognize the disc image mounted. “
Also, you could try moving those disk images back to the exact same file path from which they were originally logged and transferred from. That is, if you originally logged and transferred with the disc images on your raid, then move the disk images back to the raid and try again.
If you read the blog post I linked to earlier and subsequent comments, you’ll find a few work arounds. It’s a huge pain in the a$$.
Jeremy
-
We’ve spent an intensive four days manually transcoding and reconnecting all the media for our 52 minute documentary. Going forward, here are some of the workflow flaws we’ll know to avoid:
Error number 1 was moving the original disk images off to an external drive for storage. The one disk image that had remained on the internal drive (despite that drive being renamed, and all the folders around that DMG moving and changing names) worked like a charm to do a batch capture. The clips were upgraded to HQ and reconnected in minutes.
However, for the other 1.25 TB of DMGs we had, life was not so fun. It was impossible to put them back to the directory they came from because by then, each of our three internal drives had been replaced and renamed – and we hadn’t kept record of how the various project folders within folders had originally been labelled in any case.
Unfortunately, FCP Reconnect only had about a 50% effectivity in matching our LT clips to the re-converted HQ ones, and on top of that, a significant number of clips had their in and out points badly adjusted when we reconnected the media in FCP. This is because we were reconnecting the media to a media managed version of the project with 1 second handles, so where the original media had been one long clip in certain instances, it was broken up into several fragments that needed to relate back to one media source. Moreover, the audio had come from a different source and had been synced using PluralEyes. Where, for example, a shot would start at 12:00:00:00, but the audio extended before that, and the editor had used a section at the beginning of the clip, the media managed clip (with 1 second handles) would have a timecode of 11:59:59:00. Therefore, not only would FCP Reconnect not recognise it as the same clip, but FCP would also slip the clip out of sync when reconnecting to it.
The process we ended up using was to check the timecode of each clip, open the appropriate disk image, select the right shot based on that timecode, copy the name across, and then transfer that clip as pro res HQ. Clip by clip, we then reconnected the media in FCP. There were many instances where FCP referenced the wrong timecode when reconnecting (because of different clip lengths?) so every single shot needs to be checked and slipped into sync.
The final hurdle was Motion and After Effects projects reconnecting, and timelapse that had to be painstakingly redone.
We don’t think that to convert to HQ in the first place would be a viable solution for all future projects: the disk space is just unrealistic, and Compressor seems to take much longer than the canon plug in. Also, having timecode on the clips made it MUCH easier to sync the sound files. We did have some footage that was done in the manual way of dragging H264 files off the card, using Compressor to convert to LT, and then later on to HQ. FCP did not reconnect this easily, particularly when one clip was used multiple times.
The best possible workflow for our company’s circumstances would be to use and store the DMGs on a single RAID; keep all effects in the highest quality possible; and budget time to recapture the media.
-
Man, sorry for your troubles.
Did you try and contact Bouke? He’s a smart guy and would have tried to help you if he could.
Also, you should somehow send this post straight to Canon. This is crazy.
Jeremy
-
[Simon Wood] “We don’t think that to convert to HQ in the first place would be a viable solution for all future projects: the disk space is just unrealistic, and Compressor seems to take much longer than the canon plug in. “
Simon,
Excuse me, but it seems absurd to me that you’d seriously make the same mistake again?
You, and presumably others (you said “we”), just spent four worrisome days on a do-over, to save a completed project that would otherwise have been locked, and now you’re saying you’d do it all again instead of simply buying adequate additional storage?
Sorry, but that just sounds ludicrous to me. I can see doing it once because you you simply didn’t expect to encounter these issues, but telling us you’d do it again seems like pure folly. As Albert Einstein said, “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome.”
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles
https://www.drwfilms.comPOST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™
A forum host of Creative COW’s Business & Marketing and Apple Final Cut Pro forums. Formerly host of the Apple Final Cut Basics, Indie Film & Documentary, and Film History & Appreciations forums.
-
That’s not the point. Once this project goes offline, he’d (they’d) have to do this all over again.
You could have all the storage in the world, and it still won’t help fix the bug.
-
I’m either missing something from Simon’s lengthy posts or just not sure if I understand your point Jeremy. If the project was started as ProRes HQ and maintained throughout, where would any problems arise for Simon?
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles
https://www.drwfilms.comPOST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™
A forum host of Creative COW’s Business & Marketing and Apple Final Cut Pro forums. Formerly host of the Apple Final Cut Basics, Indie Film & Documentary, and Film History & Appreciations forums.
-
[David Roth Weiss] “If the project was started as ProRes HQ and maintained throughout, where would any problems arise for Simon?”
If the project were taken offline and had to be restored (without saving the ProRes files) or moved to a different machine.
The point is, the log and transfer plug in is severely busted and needs to be fixed.
Jeremy
-
[Jeremy Garchow] “The point is, the log and transfer plug in is severely busted and needs to be fixed.”
That part I do comprehend.
However, I still maintain that a do-over necessitated by inadequate storage is false economy. You’ve heard me say it before Jeremy, careers are lost for less. Anyone on a deadline would be out of a job.
David Roth Weiss
Director/Editor/Colorist
David Weiss Productions, Inc.
Los Angeles
https://www.drwfilms.comPOST-PRODUCTION WITHOUT THE USUAL INSANITY ™
A forum host of Creative COW’s Business & Marketing and Apple Final Cut Pro forums. Formerly host of the Apple Final Cut Basics, Indie Film & Documentary, and Film History & Appreciations forums.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up