Audio sequence settings locked at 32 bit floating point?

[Jgallaghereditor]

Hi Jonny

When I was messing around with audio settings a while ago I noticed this. It seems to me that it isn’t a problem with the audio settings – your sequence will be at whatever sample rate and depth you choose in the sequence settings (you can access this dialogue box by highlighting the sequence in the browser and pressing Apple-Zero).

It simply seems to be that FCP always displays a sequence as being 32 bit Floating Point in the audio format column of the browser, irrelevant of what bit depth it actually is. Therefore, rather bizarrely, the browser isn’t displaying the information it claims to be doing, which is a tad misleading if you ask me. However, have faith. The sequence should be at the bit depth set in the settings and this should become apparent when the sequence is exported. I just tested this out now and it seems to hold true.

Thank goodness this only applies to sequences and not to clips otherwise we’d all be properly confused.

John

[Johnny The canuck]

John,

I just did the same with the same results. Thanks. It saves me a long time of doubting the validity of my workflow.

All the best.

Johnny

[Michael Gissing]

Sequence settings are merely showing that FCP is using 32 bit floating point to process multiple tracks of 16/48. Digital mixing, EQ and other such processing needs to be done at a greater bit depth than the original files to prevent the signal degrading with rounding errors. All digital mixers work at bit depths usually double the individual bit rate of a file.

By using floating point and 32 bit it can mix multiple 24 bit files without errors in subtraction, addition, division and multiplication creeping in.

[Jgallaghereditor]

Michael

I forgot to mention in my original post that this is what I suspected. However, surely the point of the column in the Browser is to display the audio format of the sequence? Apple can tell us about what internal bit depth the program works to in it’s promotional literature or in the manual – but not in the browser, surely?!

On the other hand, maybe I’ve got a bit too much time on my hands if I’m replying to posts like this… 🙂

John