convert HDV to DVCPROHD w/Powerbook G4 & FCP 5.1.2

[Walter Biscardi]

[Brian Lindstrom] “Can anyone tell me if my current set up of Powerbook G4, Firewire drives and FCP 5.1.2 can convert HDV to DVCPROHD and edit a long documentary? I’m trying to avoid buying a MacPro (but know I may have to).”

By re-rendering all the footage in a DVCPro HD timeline, sure. But you cannot connect an HDV deck via Firewire and try to capture in the DVCPro HD codec.

You need an AJA Kona card to do that. That’s exactly what we’re doing here with a series being shot in HDV, but the Kona 3 is converting it to DVCPro HD on the way in.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Mark Maness]

You’re only option is to do a conversion in Compressor on all of your footage. Yeah…. That is tme comsuming but its your only option on your Powerbook. I’m sure that you hate to hear that but its not easy to deal with codec changes.

_______________________________

Wayne Carey
Schazam Productions
http://www.schazamproductions.com

[Mischmaschine]

Okay, codec changes will take a long time, but the real bad thing an that is the lose of the source timcode information. Any online conforming, e.g. with the flame, are impossible without handmaded edl corrections.

Or: Can anyone tell me a way to handle codec changes without losing timecode information??

I hope I’m to mistaken with my statement.
regards, markus

[Mike Parfit]

Hi,

I am not sure I’m following this correctly, but here is my 1.5 cents worth. We converted a timeline from HDV to DVCProHD by using media manager to recompress in the DVCProHD codec. The timecode went with it, and shows up in the item properties of each clip. As an exercise, we also made a small offline project using the DVCproHD timeline, then used the original disk with the HDV on it to reconnect media, and the timeline reconnected to the HDV just fine.

To test this, I just moved one of DVCProHD clips to an HDV timeline and asked FCP to recapture. It captured perfectly and put the HDV clip in exactly the right place.

I don’t know if this applies to what you’re doing, but it might. It is no doubt better to capture the HDV directly into DVCProHD using a capture card, but this is a way of doing it that has worked for us.

Best wishes,

Mike

[Walter Biscardi]

[mischmaschine] “Okay, codec changes will take a long time, but the real bad thing an that is the lose of the source timcode information. Any online conforming, e.g. with the flame, are impossible without handmaded edl corrections.

Or: Can anyone tell me a way to handle codec changes without losing timecode information??

I hope I’m to mistaken with my statement.”

With Compressor, I have no idea if you maintain TC, but if you use the Media Manager as described above, you will retain it and be able to make fully accurate re-captures. We were just able to recapture HDV with surprising accuracy here. We started a project in native HDV while we worked out an issue with the AJA converter box. Fixed that issue and re-captured over 5 hours of HDV material to DVCPro HD via the AJA Kona 3 and everything appears to have come back frame accurate. Our 6 minute current timeline is back in perfect shape.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Uli Plank]

While I’d also recommend using the media manager, I’d not recommend doing it at all except for a project with lots of original footage in DVCProHD.

While both are great aquisition codecs, they do both pretty heavy compression. You’ll add up artefacts by introducing an extra recompression stage unless you really need it. Sure it’s impractical for editing to have two different codecs in the timeline, that’ll justify it.

But you don’t gain much going from HDV to DVCProHD for all your footage, unless you have to deliver in DVCProHD.

BTW, you internal drive may be a tad too weak for reliable DVCProHD playback, you’ll need one of the MBPs with FW800 and a small RAID attached to it or a SATA RAID attached via an Express card.

Regards,

Uli

Author of “DVDs gestalten und produzieren”, a book on professional DVD-authoring in German.

[Walter Biscardi]

[Uli Plank] “While both are great aquisition codecs, they do both pretty heavy compression. You’ll add up artefacts by introducing an extra recompression stage unless you really need it. Sure it’s impractical for editing to have two different codecs in the timeline, that’ll justify it.

But you don’t gain much going from HDV to DVCProHD for all your footage, unless you have to deliver in DVCProHD.”

Capturing through a Kona card, the difference between HDV and DVCPro HD is not noticeable, if there is any difference. We did a few split screen tests a few days ago when we got our AJA HD10AVA converter box working and we could not see the split between original HDV footage and the converted DVCPro HD footage.

Our reasons for going to DVCPro HD was the added realtime benefits as FCP works much better with that format than HDV. And the fact that Final Touch HD does not accept HDV for color correction and our Producer really wants to use that CC tool for this show.

In general, I always recommend converting HDV to DVCPro HD as FCP just works with it much better and I do see a difference when it comes to Color Correcting. DVCPro HD has more latitude in color grading than HDV. Not by a whole lot when the footage is HDV originated, but there is a bit more “wiggle room” to play with.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Uli Plank]

Sure, DVCProHD (being an intra-frame codec) is easier to handle and keeps the CPU free for other things, even if a current MacPro 3 GHz can handle six HDV streams PIP in RT. I agree as well that 4:2:2 can handle CC better.

But

[Sterling Noren]

Walter,

Correct me if I am wrong here but Im led to believe from your post that it is possible to capture HDV material as DVCPROHD, on the fly, via firewire only. I did not know that this was possible and believe I misinterpreted what you are saying. If it is possible (with a Kona 3 card) can you let me know?

Right now Im assuming that you need to use some kind of a convertor like the one from Convergent Design to turn the HDV signal into an HDSDI signal first.

Thank You.

Sterling Noren
WideWorld HD Productions

[Walter Biscardi]

[WideWorld HD] ”
Correct me if I am wrong here but Im led to believe from your post that it is possible to capture HDV material as DVCPROHD, on the fly, via firewire only. I did not know that this was possible and believe I misinterpreted what you are saying. If it is possible (with a Kona 3 card) can you let me know?”

Not possible via Firewire. Only possible via something like the AJA Kona series. Any one of the AJA HD cards can do this (LH, LHe, Kona 2, Kona 3).

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
HD Editorial for “Assignment Earth”

“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters