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FCP Capturing from Camcorder issue
I capture from my camcorder to FCP at home and never have any issues.
At work, we capture through AJA because we have several decks (DV, Beta, etc.) I had to use my camcorder today (my personal camcorder) to capture a tape that wasn’t working properly in the deck. I set everything up the same way I do at home, and it wouldn’t capture. FCP wouldn’t even OPEN if the camera was turned on! And when I had the log and capture window open, it would say that it couldn’t find a device, or I’d get the spinning pinwheel and would have to turn off the camera. As soon as I turned off the camera, the pinwheel disappeared.
I tried Capture Now, but it wouldn’t capture that way, either.
I tried to capture in iMovie, and it said that there was no device. So maybe it’s the computer? I know the FireWire port works because it’s the same port that AJA is connected to.
I unplugged the FireWire from the AJA, I changed every setting from AJA to FireWire NTSC. When I tried to restart the computer, it wouldn’t even restart until I turned the camera off!
What the heck is going on? I just used this camera and FireWire cord two days ago at home with no issues, so I’m pretty sure that there’s nothing wrong with either of those. I know I chose all of the settings on the camcorder, so I know that this is an issue with either the computer or with FCP. I’m incredibly frustrated because I think it’s ridiculous that I now have to take it home and use my own equipment when I have the same darn program right here.
Any suggestions?!?!?
Info: Dual 2.3 GHz Power PC G 5
OS X version 10.4.11
FCP version 5.1.4Original capture settings for AJA
Device Control: AJA to LA RS-422 NTSC
Capture/Input: AJA to LA: S-Video 8-bit NTSC US 48-kHzCapture settings to capture via camcorder (I tried several other configurations as well)
Device Control: FireWire NTSC
Capture/Input: DV NTSC 48kHz -
2 Replies
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Lynette- Are there any other firewire devices plugged into the computer? If so shut down the computer and unplug ALL firewire devices. Then boot up, plug in the camera’s firewire cable and then turn on the camera. Go to the Apple Icon> about this mac> more info> firewire. Your camera should be there. If not then you have issues with your camera settings or cable. I know we had to install an inexpensive ($20) second firewire bus (pci card) to get our ioLA system to work with FCP.
HTH,
JerryG5 Dual 3GB Ram
FCP Studio 6.02
External 1 TB SATA Raid 0
Kona LH, Second system w AJA ioLA
Sony Z-1
GV-HD700 -
Hi, thanks for your advice. I followed your directions and yes, the camera DOES show up. And you won’t believe it – it WORKS now. I swear to you I restarted this computer a dozen times, I had all the FireWire unplugged, etc.
However, I will tell you that this time I also unplugged the external hard drive, which is not connected with a FireWire cable – it’s a G-drive, and I’m not sure what kind of cable it uses. But the bad part is that that’s the drive I have to capture all this footage to! So I tried plugging the drive back in, and guess what? Doesn’t work.
Oh well. I really appreciate your advice, though, I probably wouldn’t have thought to unplug the drive otherwise. At least I’ll know what to do if I need a small amount of footage captured, but the space I have on the internal hard drive isn’t enough for this project.
Guess I’ll be shlepping it home anyway. But I’m glad I figured out why it wasn’t working. I was ready to pull my hair out!
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