Converting HDV to DVCPRO?

[Walter Biscardi]

[Katterfelto] “Working against the clock, and need to know the quickest way to convert HDV source clips into DVCPRO.”

Capture via an AJA Kona board and do this in realtime.

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

[Katterfelto]

Thanks for the reply!

The problem is, I have about 60 hours’ worth of HDV clips that have already been captured and organized into bins in Final Cut. Took about a week. Aside from having to start from scratch and recapture all of the original media through the Kona card, is there any workable way to convert the HDV clips to DVCPRO, in-program?

Thanks much,

Jack

[Walter Biscardi]

[Katterfelto] “Aside from having to start from scratch and recapture all of the original media through the Kona card, is there any workable way to convert the HDV clips to DVCPRO, in-program?”

nothing that will be nearly as fast or as clean. If you have it all captured in HDV, just go ahead and edit in HDV.

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

[Katterfelto]

Lord, I wish I could, Walter. That would make it so much simpler.

The problem is that we’re trying to use two different kinds of source material in the same project: HDV and Digibeta. We used a camera and firewire to capture the HDV material; we’ll be using a Kona 3 card to capture the Digibeta clips in 1080i.

Tech support suggested the best way to resolve the two-format problem would be to capture or convert both sets of source material to DVCPro. Seemed like a logical solution. Had I known this at the outset, I would have originally captured all of the HDV material in DVCPro format, as you suggested. Still, I didn’t think there’d be a problem converting the HDV to DVCPro in-program. According to the manuals, Media Manager is supposed to be able to do the recompression without altering the frame ratio. (Unfortunately, it did alter the ratio: the recompressed clips look like one of those Cinemascope title sequences, squeezed for TV.)

So, that’s my dilemma. We can’t use HDV because we’re incorporating Digibeta, so we have to convert both formats to something that’s mutually compatible.

If I have to recapture all of the orginal HDV clips I will, but please tell me there’s another way..?

Kindest thanks for your help,

– Jack –

[Andy Mees]

Could you not capture the Digibeta as HDV? Sorry, doesn’t answer your actual question, but just seems like a possible solution.

[Andy Mees]

You might also investigate using Compressor to transcode … you’ll have far more control over the process within that application.
Select a small example clip and test with that until you get the results you like, then make that a preset to use on the remaining clips.

[Aaronowen]

I’d say that re-loading is going to be your best bet because the transcode will happen in realtime. But I’d say that if you want to transcode your files without re-loading (which will definately take much longer than realtime) then you should run your HDV files through after effects…it won’t mess with your frame size and you’ll get the codec and framerate you need. Then you can capture the digibeta stuff as you like…

[Uli Plank]

Since FCP can control a machine via FireWire while ingesting over another input, like the Kona card, I’d also suggest capturing fresh from the tapes right into DVCProHD. Everything else, like Compressor or AEFX will take much longer.

Regards,

Uli

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

[Walter Biscardi]

[Katterfelto] “The problem is that we’re trying to use two different kinds of source material in the same project: HDV and Digibeta. We used a camera and firewire to capture the HDV material; we’ll be using a Kona 3 card to capture the Digibeta clips in 1080i.”

You have the Kona 3 on site and you didn’t capture to DVCPro HD during ingest?

My best guess is that whatever you try to use after ingest to convert HDV to DVCPro HD would take approx. 2 – 3 times the length of your material. So if you really have 60 hours of HDV material on your system, my guess it will take 120 – 180 hours for a software only conversion of all that material to DVCPro HD and the quality will not be nearly as good as the AJA hardware conversion in realtime.

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

[Katterfelto]

Thanks for all the suggestions. Still having no luck at 4:45 a.m. Tried Compressor, but the same thing happened: the frame ratio kept switching from 1440 to 1280.

Have spent the last two days (and numerous phone calls) trying to get the Kona 3 card to capture SDI into 1080i, but no cigar.

I am so not having fun.

Thx,

Jack