Duplicate First Frame on Edit to Tape

[Gary Adcock]

[Thomas McNamara] “We’ve spoken to AJA tech support (who are excellent, by the way) and a few others, and they aren’t sure, but apparently this is an issue that may be caused by certain versions of FCP, Quicktime and Kona drivers. “

so if there support is so good, did you follow their recommendations to correct the problem?

I know of 2 issues with the machine config you list, both of which can be fixed by updating to the latest version of the OS / QT / FCP none of which would be a big jump with the config you are showing.

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows
Inside look at the IoHD

[Thomas Mcnamara]

The AJA tech we spoke to told us that our current configuration was fine as far as he knows, that he has clients with our exact configuration laying back to HDCAMSR all the time. I wouldn’t have listened to them tell us to update and then not update and then come on here to wonder why it still isn’t working.

If you know of 2 issues with this current config, (I am more than willing to do an update at this point.) what are the two issues, and I’m guessing that you mean OSX 10.5.4 with FCP 6.0.4, right?

We do try to follow what AJA recommends. If you know of 2 issues, and can tell me, that’ll be a more compelling reason to do the update now because we’re technically still in the middle of the project. We have a few days to test, so I can clone the existing drives and run what updates we need to.

Your help is greatly appreciated….as far as I’m concerned, this is the most useful aspect of creative cow – we can see what is actually working out there in the field on a regular basis, because each company can’t account for the variables on every end. Thanks.

[Gary Adcock]

[Thomas McNamara] “If you know of 2 issues with this current config, (I am more than willing to do an update at this point.) what are the two issues, and I’m guessing that you mean OSX 10.5.4 with FCP 6.0.4, right? “

They are not directly related to your problem so why go off on a tangent course, and YES I am talking about getting up to the most current versions of the OS/ QT / FCP.

[Thomas McNamara] “The AJA tech we spoke to told us that our current configuration was fine as far as he knows, that he has clients with our exact configuration laying back to HDCAMSR all the time.”

Laying back to tape is not the same as an insert and is not the same as an assemble- not all HDCam decks are the same- Am I to guess that you are on an SRW5000 and not one of the later models?

Have you tried to adjust the Sync point in the deck or FCP software?
Does it only happen with the 720 > 1080 cross conversion?
Which setting are you using for the conversion process.

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows
Inside look at the IoHD

[Thomas Mcnamara]

Thanks for getting back. Yes, I should have clarified; AJA said that clients are doing both frame accurate insert edits and assemble edits on the SRW5000, using our settings and configuration, and that updating would likely have no effect on our issue.

It only happens on crossconversion, and is repeatable. The settings are 720p23.98 8bit crossconverted to 1080psf23.98 10bit. This happens on both an insert edit as well as an assemble edit.

I would’ve thought that changing the offset in FCP or the deck would’ve alleviated this, but changing offset on either end has had no effect, it just moves where the frames are duplicated. This happens also with different shots, with different in points.

The only reason I’m opening this up to the forum is because we work with someone who told us that there was a specific workaround for this very issue, but that he couldn’t recall how they got around it. Otherwise this is just an unfortunate anomaly with the possibility that there isn’t a simple fix, that its something with our system setup. Even though we’re tackling that aspect, if there is a known workaround that would be useful.

As far as the tangent course, I’m interested because if you know of two specific issues, there are always anomalies in the editing process and knowing these issues might explain some of them…if nothing else, it is to satisfy my curiosity. The only issue I’ve heard of is with 10.5.2 leaving tiny gaps of time when switching processing over to other cores, opening up the possibility of dropped frames. I’d be happy to open another discussion here if you want to keep this post on topic. Thanks Gary.

[Gary Adcock]

tom

have not heard anymore from you,

I was wondering which deck protocol you are using- since sony and panny have different triggering methodology. Sony decks need sony device drivers

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows
Inside look at the IoHD

[Joey Burnham]

Hopping in here. I’ve had the same problem with both D5 and our HDSR deck going on for almost 2 years now. Luckily all of our content is short form, so no big deal. Usually just dupes first frame of bars, but if I need to insert or assemble edit I always mark in a sec or 2 in black before picture. We tried forever to fix this awhile back but just gave up.
Joey

[Ramona Howard]

Rave uses the AJA boards and this is not an issue today (to both D5 and SR). We did have this same problem occurring for a short time (some time ago) but we reworked some deck ballistics code and it is dead on accurate everytime now for both print to tape (assembles and inserts) and inserts and assembles to Rave from other sources.

I make this point only to show that the hardware is excellent and that not all applications are equal. Accuracy is very possible, although quite complicated to get right 🙂

*Rave is a Linux based product that uses the AJA boards and is written entirely in house (drivers , machine control, the whole shabang).

Cheers,
Ramona

[Gary Adcock]

[Joey Burnham] “I’ve had the same problem with both D5 and our HDSR deck going on for almost 2 years now. “

when dubbing across deck formats there always seem to be some issue if the conversion is being done on the fly- my issues with this problem stemmed from not remembering that Sony and Panasonic decks use different RS422 command protocols and they seem to change from model to model ( AJA at one time supplied me with specific D5 setups for the older Kona 2 card)

Usually it is in the user setup where the errors happen. I and hundreds of other users do not see the dupe frame issue you have, but the first place to look is not just the card, but the deck updates, deck setup and how your FCP is setup.

gary adcock
Studio37
HD & Film Consultation
Post and Production Workflows
Inside look at the IoHD

[Piers Mcdonald]

We’re experiencing the same problem on two different Mac Pro Quad Cores, one with an LHe, one with a KONA 3. Assembling and inserting to Digibeta is rock solid, but HDCAM is a different story. It is almost impossible to do inserts without duplicating the first frame.

This is with 10.4.11, QT 7.5, FCP 6.0.3, Prores 422 and AJA v5.1

The LHe card has been taken from a G5 Quad that did not have the same problem over it’s several years of service. But it was never updated beyond AJA v4.0.

[Thomas Mcnamara]

I was recently speaking to a tech about this, and he said that it’s a well-known quicktime issue that comes and goes with different updates. Thoughts? My system specs are above…