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Activity Forums Apple Final Cut Pro Legacy Audio out starts going out of sync on captures over 30 min

  • Audio out starts going out of sync on captures over 30 min

    Posted by Stinky Grinch on August 14, 2006 at 4:36 am

    We are editing in FCP5 we have dual core G5’s and an xsan/xraid/xserve for storage. Things work great most of the time but we have seem to have this one problem with long captures over 30 min.

    About 30 min in to a capture on playback of the clip we will start to notice the audio going out of sync. It seems to get worse over time. As far as I know the bit rate the video was shot in matches the bit rate of the project so I don’t think thats the problem. Maybe I’m missing some other setting someplace that someone can point out to me.

    I did read once someplace that this is a quick time flaw that has not been addressed but I can’t seem to find where I saw that. It seems to me that this would be a major problem if in fact it was a quick time issue. I would think there would be some kind of a fix for this.

    Anyone have any thoughts or experience with this?

    Kevin Monahan replied 19 years, 8 months ago 4 Members · 4 Replies
  • 4 Replies
  • Thaxter Clavemarlton

    August 14, 2006 at 4:52 am

    “Sync-slippage” can happen during some longer captures.

    Tapes recorded on certain camcorders from Canon have been somewhat more problematic but it also can happen with other brands of cameras as well.

    To reduce the problem on capture, break your captures into sections no longer than about 10 minutes each.

    You can then “reconstruct” the full tape’s recording (or any longer takes) quickly if you need to.
    Mark (and log) your first clip to End (Out-point) about 10 minutes or less from its In-point.
    Continue to mark (and log) your clips this way throughout the rest of the tape.
    Just make sure the In-points of the subsequent clips are EXACTLY ONE FRAME LATER than the Out-points of the previous clips.

    You can do all this while actually scanning the tape(s) or just by inputting arbitrary TC numbers, logging them… then use Batch Capture to bring in all of your clips.

    Its very easy to then “reconstruct” the shorter clips back to any “continuous” length you want on the timeline by just “clicking” them on in order.
    EVEN FASTER… select ALL successive clips at once in the browser (with the browser column-order set to “Media Start” highlight all clips) and drop them, all at once, on the timeline… they’ll all pop up in continuous order.

    Also read this link:
    https://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=58640
    It contains more “sync-loss” info.

  • Stinky Grinch

    August 14, 2006 at 2:59 pm

    Thanks for the info. Thats what we already do to work around the audio Sync-slippage problem. We shoot with a bunch of different cameras, I find it happens with both DV and DVCAM the two fromats we use. We also shoot with a SONY DSR-250 and a Canon XL2 the most.

    Its just seems to me that if this is a problem and captureing clips in 10 min chunks is the only way around it should apple not be working on a fix for this?

  • Arnie Schlissel

    August 15, 2006 at 1:35 am

    Are you using Capture Now, or are you logging these clips? Capture now should be avoided for any material that has timecode. If you do want to capture whole tape rolls, simply mark an out at the end & an in at the beginning, hit F2 to name & log the clip, then click the Batch Capture button. I capture 3 hour DVCam tapes this way, & I have never seen audio synch slip from them. The only audio synch slippage I’ve ever seen has been with Cannon XL1 cameras.

    And scroll down a few threads & read my “Timecode trainwreck” story.

    Arnie
    Now in preproduction: Peristroika (Cosmological Congress), a film by Slava Tsukerman
    https://www.arniepix.com

  • Kevin Monahan

    August 16, 2006 at 12:12 am

    It’s likely the Canon footage causing the problem. Better to log and capture individual clips in that case. No one seems to want to take the time to properly log and capture these days, but that’s the way FCP likes clips: short and discrete.

    I think that 30 minute captures is not good protocol for the hard-cores among us. If you actually log the 30 minute clip rather than use capture now (ugh), you’ll have the best chance of sucess. When you throw a canon cam into the mix, especially when not actually capturing FROM the camera (and say, using your sony dv deck), you’ll have even more problems. I think it’s a Canon thing, not an Apple thing when all other footage seems to work just fine.

    Kevin Monahan
    Take My FCP Master’s Workshop!
    fcpworld.com
    Pres. SF Cutters

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