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FCS 2 Installed
After cloning the hard drive I installed FCS 2 on my laptop (MacBook Pro) and so far all is well. I think I will give it a couple of weeks of testing before I upgrade the main G5s.
BTW, Color runs perfectly fine on the laptop. I assembled a test sequence and roundtripped it through Color and it worked perfectly- and pretty damn fast, too. The footage was DVCPro HD 720p. For those of you who are former Final Touch users like myself I think you are going to be very happy to see this program finally work as it was originally intended.
OK- off for more testing.
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14 Replies
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[Bullet] “BTW, Color runs perfectly fine on the laptop.”
What laptop do you have? Can you render from DVCPROHD to ProRes?
Thanks,
-Russ
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Russell,
The laptop is a 1st generation 2.16 Ghz Intel Core Duo with 1 gig of RAM. So, basically a vanilla MacBook Pro.
I just rendered to the ProRes422 HQ codec- no problem. I cannot tell much about the quality of the codec until I can view it on a broadcast monitor- on the laptop and another attached monitor it looks great.
BTW- a 2 1/2 minute sequence with secondaries and masks on each clip took Color about 4-5 minutes to render. I didn’t actually time it ’cause I won’t be using Color very much on the laptop.
So far, so good.
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Pro Res is very clean as far as I can see… it’s 10 bit color space makes it interesting. You could just edit in DVCPROHD, but it’s only 8 bit. DVCPROHD wouldn’t look better, but everything else should in theory… it will be 10 bit (graphics, stills, any CGI)… Pro res will be about twice the file size of DVCPROHD, but still small enough to play from the less expensive scratch disks. Course faster disks will give you more streams at once. It renders pretty fast too. Did a bunch of it for a client just the other day, and was impressed with the speed even on my old dual 2 gig machine.
You can transcode any video to it too HDV, whatever…
THe more I think about it, Pro Res represents the lowest data rate you can do in FCP that’s 10 bit maybe? I think it is… and it’s extemely optimized for RT Extreme… very friendly codec.
Jerry
Apple Certified Trainer
Author: “Jerry Hofmann on Final Cut Pro 4” Click here
Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D
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Boy, that just sounds like a a missing link has been found and welded together for FCP. I wanted to add that while capturing to 10 bit won’t necessarily make DVCPro HD footage “better” I will say that I have great great luck with capturing DVCPro HD (and DV50) from tape to 10 bit. I am not sure what the deck outputs do (as I know it’s 4:2:2 going to 4:2:2) but the colors clean up better after effects, the picture is more crisp after effecting it and of course the footage holds up better to all the stuff that we as editors throw at it. I cannot remember the last time I did a cuts only project without throwing at least a levels filter on the clips, and that’s usually just the beginning. I am hoping ProRes will still give me this boost as much as 10 bit uncompressed does. I got the upgrade in the mail today but no chance to install. Can’t throw an upgrade monkey wrench into the cog right now.
On a more pressing topic…any chance we can get a 10bit MPeg2 codec for our pretty little DVDs? 😀
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Regarding the 8-bit vs. 10-bit thing. Converting 8-bit footage to 10-bit will make it look better while you are editing. But as far as the quality of the final output, it’s meaningless unless the tape format you output to is 10-bit. So if the master plan is to finish back to DVCProHD or HDCam, your footage won’t look any better.
In fact, going from 8-bit to 10-bit then back to 8-bit might even be a lossy process. Don’t quote me on that, I don’t know for sure. But it seems very possible.
Working with 10-bit can help with chroma keying and compositing. And if you are mastering to D5 or HDCam SR, those formats will record 10-bit. But if none of that applies to you, 10-bit might not be a good idea
Sean
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[Sean ONeil] “10-bit might not be a good idea”
I beg to differ, but it always gets me in trouble so this time I won’t beg but I will slowly go into my doggie carpet in the corner while the rest of the family eats people food.
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I don’t think DVCPROHD will look better in 10 bit, because you simply can’t improve that 8 bit shot material when you transcode it up to another format, but anything else you add to the project will… gradients especially.
Jerry
Apple Certified Trainer
Author: “Jerry Hofmann on Final Cut Pro 4” Click here
Dual 2 gig G5, AJA Kona SD, AJA Kona 2, Huge Systems Array UL3D
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I’m in the corner, eating dog food….like I said.
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Are you saying you got Color installed on a first generation MacBook Pro?
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[Jerry Hofmann] “I don’t think DVCPROHD will look better in 10 bit, because you simply can’t improve that 8 bit shot material when you transcode it up to another format, but anything else you add to the project will… gradients especially.”
You know what, I believe you are correct. It won’t LOOK any better. Maybe I should be the one eating dog food.
But… you still get advantages as far as chroma keying and such.
Sean
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