FCP fact or fiction — things it can’t do

[Zander]

well as far as converting the to wav for are you wanting to do this per chanel or both as a stereo pair, becaus eif you want to export those audio files, it’s relativly easy, just go to export and fidlle with the settings, (i don’t have fcp open nor am i going to open it because im not sure of exactly what your talking about. but it shouldn’t be hard at all.

as far as avid to tape, i have no experience with avid, id say sure maybe because using a complete avid set jup probably has a more fluid export (un interupted data stream) to the tape.

as for 3, id say go look at the xsereve with raid set ups, is that kinda what your looking at relativly cost effective, work super well in mac houses, and work excently with .mac and other file transfer houses, for instance in jarhead, when dailys came in, they would cut them up and put it on an xserve with raid conected to an extemely secure file transfer website, 5 min after it was cut the director was beigning to watch it on his laptop in the middle of death valley california (the edditors got to sit in nice clmate controled environmetn all day. i love my job, dont you?)

ive never really had any timecode problems once the footage was captured, but thats not to say there aren’t problems

Aaron Zander-Student edditor
If it’s out there and it does somethign to something,
teach me how to use it
Powerbook g4 1.5 GHz (it might not be big, but i can take it on set
fcp 5, ae 6.5pro adobe cs2

[Nic Adlerton]

Hi

You posted this same question back at the Apple FCP forums and I refer you to their replies. You might not get so many guffaws of incredulous laughter here, but the misinformation you have been given is still fascinating.

WAV export from Quicktime is simple. I do it daily. Select your audio format and export as normal.

Avid & Final Cut have given me equal reliability to tape.

Avid Network System = Unity. Final Cut Network System = XSan. They have their own caveats and quirks. FCP is about 1/3 the price for a network setup.

R.E. Timecode. Nonsense.

I think the main difference is that FCP is cheaper, thus can be used by more people, thus can be set up by people without as much experience or technique as Avid, thus is subject to greater instance of user error.

As with all things, if you know what you’re doing, you have won 90% of the battle.

[Ryan]

“I think the main difference is that FCP is cheaper, thus can be used by more people, thus can be set up by people without as much experience or technique as Avid, thus is subject to greater instance of user error.

As with all things, if you know what you’re doing, you have won 90% of the battle.”

I am going to put that on a T-shirt.

I give kudos to you on that observation, and on putting it so poetically into words.

[Neil Sadwelkar]

I’m going to comment on the time code and Quicktime thing.

Take a 35 mm feature film.
Shooting done on 700 rolls of film.
Telecine to DVCam tape with timecode
Telecine logs link DVcam time code to Keycode and make logs.
Capture and edit DVCam tapes in FCP.
Make cut lists and cut neg to finish film.

I’ve done this activity for half a dozen films and have not lost a single frame because QT didn’t handle time code efficiently.

Don’t listen to tall tales.

Neil

[Bret Williams]

All the issues are pretty much equal on both sides. I would say it’s DV that started the confusion, with early FCP setups being DV only. DV has TC problems over firewire on playback to tape. It’s not a frame acurrate deck control. The correct timecode is captured, but you can’t do any frame accurate inserts or assembles or anything. But that’s a fw vs. RS422 thing. Same problem exists on any system. Apple didn’t use to deal with wav, but that was like 10 years ago. Who uses wav anyway? Isn’t aiff the CD standard and mp3 pretty much the compressed standard? Can a PC not open an aiff? Since Avid switched hardware a few years ago to the adrenaline, etc. I’ve heard nothing but compatibility complaints and output problems. I’ve experienced them myself. And Apple’s fibre channel sharing is pretty optimal, with it being much more of a turnkey system than Avid. How many editing systems make the OS, the computer, the software, the sharing software, and the server/storage?

[Donato M. rondinelli]

As far as CD audio, yes Avid is easier, but it shouldn’t be a deal breaker. In FCP you’ll need to do few extra steps. Avid makes it simple because they convert everything to Avid’s codec. FCP does not convert files, it links to them, so you need to prep the CD file. Because of this process I actually like FCP better because I can relink to file in a way Avid cannot, it’s much more open that way.

Mastering to tape… In the 3 years that I had my Symphony & Adrenaline (BTW-I’m selling them if your interested) I had no problem mastering to tape. Once you watch the timeline you could walk away & make master tapes all day long & they all would be the same. In the last 6 months with FCP I had a project that I mastered to 2 tapes (one after another). I watched them both. I made the third master & left the room. I never caught the mistake. Fortunately someone did catch it before it aired & fixed it at the last minute. This was totally my fault & I know I should watch everything as it goes to tape…at least I do now. Could have been a fluke. Might never happen again.

BUT, all that aside I really am selling my Adrenaline & Symphony. FCP does everything that I need it to & where it comes short I’ve been able to make up for it with plug-ins. The 60% savings on a broadcast system far outweighs any minor issues that I have with it. If your only looking for a basic system what about the possibility of upgrading your FCP down the road. Try that with an Avid.

Final note: If you really love Avid, stick with it. Don’t by a FCP based on what were telling you. If you do you’ll find something wrong with it & switch to something else. But I think if you stand back & take a healthy look at both, you’ll see which is the winner.

HTH,
-dMR