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5D Online workflow for Color?
I just did a search for this topic and came across a similar thread but I am still unclear on best workflow practices. I have some potential problems on a 4 minute piece I was just passed for grading. I have some technical questions about workflow for setting this up correctly before grading in Color (shot on 5D).
I was given the FCP6 project on small lacie drive with all of the RAW footage shot as well as the ProRes(LT) footage it was edited with (100GB total). I have yet to copy it over to my internal RAID since its only a 4 minute piece and obviously only uses a fraction of that footage – i want to copy over only what I need and in the proper format for grading. Since its 5D I would like to make sure I have the best to work with (HQ versions) of a 4 minute media managed edit i assume (w/ a little handles of course). The footage is pretty dark and I already see some loss in the blacks so I want to at least TRY to start with the “best” footage.
I am thinking because it was 5D transcoded to ProRes(LT) in compressor it would make more sense for me to open the project off the drive and media manage only the final locked fcp sequence and make sure its at ProRes HQ from the RAW card folders. I have briefly gotten in touch with the editor thru email but already just looking at the project I see that there is no timecode nor any Reel #’s, also i see a few multi clips in the timeline mixed in so i am beginning to get a little worried about this whole project. The editor has removed the multi clips for me now and replaced with regular clips, and also i believe he added reel #’s (i.e. card 5) in the fcp browser but I am not sure this will help or make things worse.
The editor maybe did not know about the plugin for FCP and used compressor to transcode to ProRes(LT) without timecode or reel #’s. How would you guys recommend uprezzing / media managing the locked edit for correct prepping before sending to Color? I want to copy only the needed media off the drive I was given and also make sure i use HQ trancodes instead of the (LT) it was edited with.
Any help for workflow would be much appreciated.
best
sean -
5 Replies
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Do the names of the source H.264 clips match the names of the ProRes LT versions? If so you could transcode just the H.264 clips you need into ProRes and relink to those files. I think HQ would be way overkill in this situation.
If the names don’t match, and the editor didn’t keep a log of saying which H.264 clips correspond with which ProRes LT clips then you might be stuck converting all the H.264 clips into ProRes and rebuilding the edit by eye.
-Andrew
3.2GHz 8-core, FCP 6.0.4, 10.5.5
Blackmagic Multibridge Eclipse (6.8.1) -
thank you for the response.
to answer your question – it looks like the editor transcoded the LT files with the original file name at the front of the file but then adds at the end of the naming convention for each clip “-apple ProRes LT”. So does that mean a nightmare for me – i know he added reel names in the fcp browser but so what right if the file names themselves are different then it could be a problem?
Ultimately if this will be too much of a nightmare to go to regular ProRes I will stick with using the LT files but I guess I want to also avoid copying over 100GB of material for just one locked 4 minute sequence.
any help would be great
thank you -
You could always do the H.264 to ProRes conversion and the manually append each filename with “-apple ProRes LT”. That wouldn’t be too bad if there weren’t very many shots. Maybe try a quick test between ProRes and ProRes LT in Color to see if one handles your grades better than the other. If there’s no discernible difference then there’s no reason to worry about transcoding.
-Andrew
3.2GHz 8-core, FCP 6.0.4, 10.5.5
Blackmagic Multibridge Eclipse (6.8.1) -
yeah I was thinking I could just in theory add that suffix and have the files in a folder that makes it clear that they are in fact HQ. I guess i will give that a try but the question still remains for me as to how I can avoid copying over all 100GB of this project and instead only create HQ files for that final locked sequence. any ideas?
thank you
s -
Color will take your ProResLT timeline directly and when it renders it will convert to any flavour of ProRes or uncompressed you need.
If the footage was correctly ingested with log & Transfer, then you can follow Shane Ross’s tutorial on offline/online workflows and recapture just what you need.
If not and you don’t have reel numbers correctly sorted, then just prepare your FCP project as usual to send to Color and set the appropriate output render format plus handles in Color. In effect, it is doing the same work as media manager but Color does better rendering.
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