Can I import DNxHD MXF files into Vegas?

[John Rofrano]

I’m glad that CineForm looks like it might be the solution for you.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Don Cobble]

Sir John,

[I don’t use Windows anymore so my only experience with Catalyst Prepare is on a Mac. Vegas Pro is a Video for Windows application and as such it’s native Windows format is the AVI container.]

Do you not use Vegas any longer?
What is you program of preference now? If I may ask?
Don

PC 1
I7 2.8 Ghz 16GB Ram
SSD 850 Pro OS drive
2x 850 EVO Raid 1TB
Win 7 Pro 64bit OS
GeForce GTX 960

PC 2
I7 3930K 3.2Ghz
32 GB Ram
SSD 850 Pro OS drive
2x 850 EVO Raid 1TB
3-4 TB HD
Win 7 Pro 64bit OS
XFX Radeon R9 290

Vegas 13 & Adobe Production Premium CS6 & -Edius 7.5 Pro -Sony Catalyst Production Suite

Camera
Sony EX1 shoot in 1920×1080 30P

[John Rofrano]

[Don Cobble] “Do you not use Vegas any longer? What is you program of preference now? If I may ask?”

I still use Vegas Pro for photo montages with my VASST Ultimate S Pro plug-in but I haven’t done one of those in quite a while. I use Final Cut Pro X to do all of my editing these days. I just needed something that was native to the Mac. Nothing against Vegas Pro but rebooting into Windows just to use it got tiresome. As Catalyst Edit gets more robust I’ll definitely keep an eye on it.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Don Cobble]

Sir John
I have now tried everything except Final Cut Pro X. I have an old MAC pro with Final Cut 7 suite. When Apple threw everyone under the bus I said I would not upgrade.

Then Adobe went for the strangle hold via the subscription black hole. I stopped at CS 6 Production Premium Suite.

I even have Edius Pro 8 Work Group, it is very awkward but robust.

Vegas is making me nervous – I have Catalyst Production Suite – for me it is practically useless, but I thought it might be Vegas future?

So, I know you know more, of the behind the scene video world, So knowing what you hear through the Video Grapevine world, I am willing to make almost any leap what would you recommend for future proofing – ride it out with Vegas or do what you did and switch to FCP X. We do a weekly television broadcast and are putting a new suite in our church. What do you think? Just an opinion?
Thank You
Don

PC 1
I7 2.8 Ghz 16GB Ram
SSD 850 Pro OS drive
2x 850 EVO Raid 1TB
Win 7 Pro 64bit OS
GeForce GTX 960

PC 2
I7 3930K 3.2Ghz
32 GB Ram
SSD 850 Pro OS drive
2x 850 EVO Raid 1TB
3-4 TB HD
Win 7 Pro 64bit OS
XFX Radeon R9 290

Vegas 13 & Adobe Production Premium CS6 & -Edius 7.5 Pro -Sony Catalyst Production Suite

Camera
Sony EX1 shoot in 1920×1080 30P

[John Rofrano]

[Don Cobble] “So, I know you know more, of the behind the scene video world, So knowing what you hear through the Video Grapevine world, I am willing to make almost any leap what would you recommend for future proofing”

Well… I don’t have any “insider” info as to what is going on at Sony. Of course if I did, I couldn’t repeat it anyway because of NDA’s, but I only know what’s been talked about in public. It’s impossible to predict what any company will do in the future so “future proofing” doesn’t exist. Who would have predicted that Adobe would abandon customers who couldn’t afford to pay them a monthly random? So the future will always be unpredictable.

[Don Cobble] ” – ride it out with Vegas or do what you did and switch to FCP X.”

My switching had nothing to do with Vegas Pro. I switched to FCP X back in January before any of the talk about Vegas Pro not having another release started. I switched because I’m using a Mac and wanted to find a Mac-based NLE and Avid is an antique workflow with razor blades and bins, and Adobe is an unacceptable life-time contract, so Final Cut Pro X was the only reasonable choice to try and I found that I really like it a lot. I have to admit, the 12 year old media generators in Vegas Pro are pretty tired looking and when I dropped a media generator from FCP X on the timeline that had animated motion and floating dust particles like you see in all of the latest commercial spots on TV, a light bulb just went off in my head as to why am I building everything from scratch in Vegas Pro when it’s all pre-made drag and drop production quality in FCP X. There are also features like automatically syncing external audio to video and treating it as a single clip (something Vegas Pro editors have been asking for since the DSLR craze started) that FCP X just does natural. It’s an incredibly robust editing environment.

As for FCP X, you either love or hate the trackless magnetic storyline. I happen to love it. Others can’t stand it and would rather fight with tracks. I’ll never edit on a track based NLE again if I can help it. Having no tracks is liberating. You never have to worry about things getting out of sync from where you originally wanted them because they are connected and move together and out of each others way. You never have to worry about clips sliding under other clips and getting lost as they do with Vegas Pro’s ripple edit. Once you’ve used Compound Clips you’ll never want to go back to use Nested Projects. Having said that, Sony’s Catalyst Edit is moving in a similar direction. They have nested timelines which Vegas Pro doesn’t. So I’m confident that Sony is working on creating the next generation NLE that will make Vegas Pro editors happy. It’s just a matter of timing.

[Don Cobble] “We do a weekly television broadcast and are putting a new suite in our church. What do you think? Just an opinion?”

I think you should keep using Vegas Pro until it stops working 10 years from now. That’s what I would be doing if I still owned a PC. Honestly, there are people still editing with Vegas Pro 8. That’s 5 years old but it still works for their purpose. Obviously there was nothing in future versions that they needed. These people could care less if there is ever a Vegas Pro 14 and why should they… Vegas Pro 8 does everything they need.

So the best “future proof” advice I can give is to keep using what you have until it breaks because no one knows what the future will bring or if it has any benefit over what you are using now. Heck, lots of editors are still using the now 5 year old FCP 7 and they have no plans of moving anywhere. IMHO, they are very smart. if it ain’t broke… why look for a fix?

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Don Cobble]

Ok – Sir John as usual you are blessing to the video world of learners! I thank You. Just do one thing for us, as Catalyst does become the New Vegas so to speak. Make some training videos! please. I think I might also go ahead and grab another MAC seeing as Catalyst if it becomes the New Vegas will run on a MAC and I have CS6 for a MAC that will run FCX and I will try it, My MAC is to old to run FCX.
Thank You again!
Favor from the King be with You!
Don

PC 1
I7 2.8 Ghz 16GB Ram
SSD 850 Pro OS drive
2x 850 EVO Raid 1TB
Win 7 Pro 64bit OS
GeForce GTX 960

PC 2
I7 3930K 3.2Ghz
32 GB Ram
SSD 850 Pro OS drive
2x 850 EVO Raid 1TB
3-4 TB HD
Win 7 Pro 64bit OS
XFX Radeon R9 290

Vegas 13 & Adobe Production Premium CS6 & -Edius 7.5 Pro -Sony Catalyst Production Suite

Camera
Sony EX1 shoot in 1920×1080 30P

[John Rofrano]

Thanks for the kind words Don. I’m watching Catalyst Edit closely. We’ll see about the training. 😉

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[Damien Lobb]

“Your whole problem is that Wndows doesn’t have a good Digital Intermediary format like the Mac does. This is another reason I moved to the Mac. I just use ProRes and every Mac applications reads and writes it just fine so I’m not wasting my time fighting formats like so many Windows editors do. Trust me… it’s a strong argument to move to the Mac. ;-)”

Hi John! I’ve been a fan of your tips and tutorials. You have some amazing knowledge.
It’s really not Microsoft’s fault that Apple refuses to license ProRes at a reasonable price.
Quite genius really. People need to work with it, so they switch. More money in Apple’s pocket.
I personally still use Vegas and occasionally FCP 7. I’m trying out Resolve. I asked Blackmagic why DaVinci Resolve can’t export ProRes on Windows and they basically said the licensing fee that Apple has for ProRes decoding in Windows is too high and would increase the price of the software. Which is especially unrealistic in the free-to-use copy. It seems like only Apple has such a licensing fee in place on their format for an arguably less efficient intermediate format.

DNxHD/DNxHR should be the standard. As it is free to license and is very efficient, easy to work with (like ProRes) and is cross-platform friendly. Magix really should consider supporting it.

~Damien

[John Rofrano]

[Damien Lobb] “DNxHD/DNxHR should be the standard. As it is free to license and is very efficient, easy to work with (like ProRes) and is cross-platform friendly. “

What should be the standard and what is the standard are two different things. When almost the entire industry is using a Mac the argument is really moot. Apple ProRes is the digital intermediary format of choice. All Apple software products (Final Cut Pro X, Motion, Compressor, of course FCP 7) manipulate it like butter even on a modest Core i5 iMac. Since Apple upset so many people with FCP X workflow changes driving them to Adobe, and then Apple upsetting them again by not keeping their Mac Pro hardware refresh up to date and driving more professionals to Windows, they have exacerbated the cross-platform problem all by themselves. Having said that, ProRes is still the industry standard and more and more cameras are now showing ProRes and the new ProRes RAW format so I don’t think DNxHD/DNxHR is going to become a standard any time soon. As I said, the solution is quite simple… buy a Mac and stop wasting time on formats. ???? (that’s what I did… don’t regret it one bit)

[Damien Lobb] “Magix really should consider supporting it.”

Actually MAGIX Vegas Pro 15 now supports the reading and writing of Apple ProRes files so MAGIX solved the problem by supporting the industry standard.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com