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follow-up to Vegasvs FCP (wondering about QUALITY)
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Apple makes some nice… and pricey… monitors.
They’re pretty much all IPS (in-plane switching) panels, which have excellent color and a very wide viewing angle. Some are a little sketchy for video, though… they’re also one of the slower LCD types, and may have weird motion artifacts.
The typical LCD panel is the TN (twisted nematic), which are great for gaming and general PC use. You can recognize these easily.. they fade when viewed much off-center. They typically only support 6-bits per pixel in real color, so not at all ideal for video. Nearly every laptop uses this sort, as they’re lower power than other types. Apple and perhaps other expensive laptops my offer IPS or MVS.
I have two MVA (multi-domain vertical alignment) panels here. MVA and PVA seems to have fallen out of favor lately, squeezed between low-end TN and high-end IPS, but some years ago, it was probably the best overall type for video (mine, in fact, also have video inputs in addition to the HDMI). You get good color (not quite as good as IPS), excellent contract, and wide viewing angle on MVA.
Anyway, that might well be the reason you see a nicer picture on the Mac … nicer monitor. They’re digital displays, and in fact, Apple uses the same video chips as everyone else, so there’s nothing fundamental about the Mac PCs themselves that deliver better looking video. I’m no Apple fan, but I do admit those 30″ Cinema Displays are lustworthy… and do work on regular PCs, too. Well, you probably need a video card with DisplayPort, but other than that…
-Dave
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For my work I’m planning to get an HP Z series for my next show – it will be an Avid qualified workstation so I know it will run Vegas, CS5 and Avis with no problems. I’m currently working on 2 workstations that I built – one QuadCore Extreme Edition and one i7 machine – they’re fine but I want pro built from now on so I can narrow any potential capability probs in the future.
FCP can handle just about all the industry standard codecs including ProRES, DVCPROHD, DnxHD, Cineform, uncompressed and many more. Don’t know where the one or two codecs thing got started but just not true.
Yeah you could actually run a dual boot Quad i7 27″ iMac and run Vegas and FCP! Love that machine…
Lance Bachelder
Southern California -
FCP can handle just about all the industry standard codecs including ProRES, DVCPROHD, DnxHD, Cineform, uncompressed and many more. Don’t know where the one or two codecs thing got started but just not true.
Correct. The only thing FCP doesn’t like is using some formats native container. That is for example .MXF och .MTS where Apple will re-wrap these into QuickTime files. I would almost go as far as saying Final Cut Pro has some of the best format support in the industry.
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Erik Lindahl
Freecloud Post Production Services
http://www.freecloud.se -
[Lance Bachelder] “FCP can handle just about all the industry standard codecs including ProRES, DVCPROHD, DnxHD, Cineform, uncompressed and many more. Don’t know where the one or two codecs thing got started but just not true.”
I don’t know where it got started… but it is proliferated by post houses all across America that will only accept Apple ProRes422 or Uncompressed. So while your statement may be technically true… you can’t tell from all the FCP post houses out there. They only accept 2 formats! (and we called a boat load of them and it the same story over, and over, and over again)
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
I don’t know where it got started… but it is proliferated by post houses all across America that will only accept Apple ProRes422 or Uncompressed. So while your statement may be technically true… you can’t tell from all the FCP post houses out there. They only accept 2 formats! (and we called a boat load of them and it the same story over, and over, and over again)
…and there is a good reason for this. Quality-controll. We only accept Uncompressed (8- or 10-bit), Animation or ProRes as master-files aside from tapes (Digibeta or HDCAM SR normally). Yes, can take image sequences also but that’s un-favourable as a “master format” as FCP nor QuickTime can’t read image-sequences very smoothly (and for storage it’s not very practical). If we say we accept “any digital format” who know’s what we’ll get. And even with our set standards we ger odd-ball files anyway. You can run into a lot of issues with mixed formats and post-houses want to avoid this.
With the above said, sure, sometimes clients come in with footage from a 5D, HDV och DVCPRO HD-camera. We don’t reject them because of that. It’s however important to see this is a recording format – not a master / deliver format (normally). Most of these other formats FCP supports fine. You run into issues when clients send you a 320×240 MPEG1 file and wonder “why can’t we re-edit this and send it to the TV-station?”.
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Erik Lindahl
Freecloud Post Production Services
http://www.freecloud.se -
[Erik Lindahl] “That is for example .MXF och .MTS where Apple will re-wrap these into QuickTime files.”
Erik, You have to understand how this sounds to a Vegas Pro PC user. Every HDV camera shoots M2T, every AVCHD camera shoots, MTS, every XDCAM HD camera shoots MXF. So what you are saying is FCP can’t handle any HD camera formats that an independent shooter might want to give to an FCP editor… but other than that, it’s great!
Let me give you the practical scenario. At least once a month, some poor shooter comes to the Sony Vegas forum hwre at the COW to post that they did a shoot with their HDV, AVCHD, or XDCAM camera and they have to give it to an FCP editor to edit. So they ask the question, “How do I get him the footage”. The answer should be, “send it to him on a hard drive” but FCP can’t handle it. So the answer is, “you can’t unless you want to render all your footage to an uncompressed MOV file.” That is how ridiculous it is to work with FCP editors and why it’s so painful.
Why is it that Vegas Pro PC editors can accept everything, AVI, MTS. MXF, and yes Quicktime MOV files but Mac FCP editors will only accept MOV?
So… from our (PC user) perspective, the Mac is a closed proprietary platform that doesn’t play well with others and FCP is impossible to get footage into unless you own a Mac so that you can capture and wrapper and whatever a Mac must do in order to work with native video from a camera.
I’m just trying to give the view from our side of the fence. Go back and look at the post history on the forums. It’s next to impossible for PC shoots to collaborate with FCP editors. So I disagree that FCP has great format support.
If you have a recommendation for me to give the next PC shooter on how they can get their footage to an FCP editor, please tell me the workflow. I’d love to hear it, and pass it on to others.
[Erik Lindahl] “I would almost go as far as saying Final Cut Pro has some of the best format support in the industry.”
Not if your a shooter that doesn’t own a Mac. 😉 By contrast Vegas Pro can accept more formats and IMHO is a better recommendation if you need to be format agnostic.
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
I’m not sure what experience you’ve had but I’ve never encountered a scenario where I couldn’t edit the source material a client gave me. Be it DV, DVCPRO, DVCRPOHD, HDV, AVCINTRA, IMX, XDCAM, DigiBeta, HDCAM or HDCAM SR.
So the answer is, “you can’t unless you want to render all your footage to an uncompressed MOV file.”
I don’t know where you get this from.. Scrubbing through my codec-list:
– ProRes
– DV
– DVCPRO
– HDV
– MPEG IMX
– XDCAM (EX / HD / HD422)
– REDCODE
– Uncompressed (8- / 10-bit)Past half year I’ve work with everything from RED to 5D to AVCINTRA footage so I’m not sure where you get “you need to deliver uncompressed QuickTime”. That’s bull.
You also got it wrong that there isn’t a ProRes codec for Windows. As it is becoming a more wide-spread recording format editing systems like AVID can use these natively on MacOS and Windows.
…the Mac is a closed proprietary platform that doesn’t play well with others and FCP is impossible to get footage into unless you own a Mac so that you can capture and wrapper and whatever a Mac must do in order to work with native video from a camera.
You got it backwards again. Even if it was the way you described things above, which it isn’t, but imagine it was the issue is Final Cut Pro and NOT the Mac. Look at Premier Pro – works EXACTLY the same on Windows and MacOS and they also went the “use native format road” (given they lack a ProRes-like road). Look at AVID – works EXACTLY the same on Windows and MacOS. If anything Vega’s is a closed for not being on MacOS and only on Windows.
It’s next to impossible for PC shoots to collaborate with FCP editors
No it’s not but yes it’s hard to work with different editors in general. Adobe is “briding the gap” a bit by trying to “play nice” with both AVID and FCP but it’s not optimal to have editors spread out across different editing systems on any platform if you ask me. This isn’t an FCP-issue per say.
If you have a recommendation for me to give the next PC shooter on how they can get their footage to an FCP editor, please tell me the workflow. I’d love to hear it, and pass it on to others.
I know to little about how Vega’s works but I’d presume handing over the source media + an EDL or XML of the final edit would import fine in FCP. I know some versions of for example AVID does very odd things with their media when working with RED which brakes compatibility with other editing systems more or less. It could be I’ve just worked with “idiot” editors but yeah, it hasn’t been smooth (the AVID regenerated new timecode for all the clips, thank you very much :-))
Not if your a shooter that doesn’t own a Mac. 😉 By contrast Vegas Pro can accept more formats and IMHO is a better recommendation if you need to be format agnostic.
Like Vega that only can be run on Windows, Final Cut Pro can only be run on MacOS. If you own a Mac you have the option of both systems. If you own a generic PC, you don’t. If this is something you value – buy a Mac. If you want to use FCP, buy a Mac. If MacOS is your preferred platform, buy a Mac. If you’re happy with Windows and Vegas – don’t look at the Apple’s in the food court.
A question for reflection:
– How well does it work to stay “native format” all the way through a post workflow that will involve editing, grading, composting / effects and later online / final edit? You can’t possibly say everything can be done in Vegas can you? What grading software would you use? How does it handle native HDV or AVCINTRA media?For my perspective, again, looking at my day to day work I use Final Cut Pro and QuickTime as a central “hub”. When grading I jump into Color or Resolve, not which are even available on Windows but I guess you have other options. When the grade is set I’d jump into After Effects and Mocha for effects / retouch if needed (most projects end up needing some fixing). After that everything is finalized again in FCP.
The problem here is not one of the mention softwares would work EFFICIENTLY with native media. After Effects I think is the only one that would accept it but why on earth would I want to work with an extreamly taxing codec like HDV or AVCINTRA here? That’s just madness and will make each generation loss ten-fold to working with ProRes or similar codec.
This is a good reason both AVID and Apple went down this road, this is also a good reason why companies like Adobe and Sony are going the “native format” approach. But just cause FCP doesn’t do all “native formats” doesn’t mean it can’t read the given format. And in a complex post workflow you probably are far better off NOT working in the native format anyway.
I would say if anyone comes to us and says “I’ve edited a project in some editing applciation and I want you to grade it” I’d try to figure out what app they’ve used and so forth. But at the end of the day the easiest, 100% safe way to transfer a project from system A to system B is to lock in down into a QuickTime and making it uncompressed you retain 100% of the quality that system was working with the media in. So I understand WHY this is a common workflow, but I can guarantee you’ll have just as much issues moving a project to Premier or Media Composer (possibly Premier is easier as they’ve adopted a very open-ness to FCP / XML and AVID / AAF).
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Erik Lindahl
Freecloud Post Production Services
http://www.freecloud.se -
Just to add to the “open feel” of a platform. A bare-bone MacOSX installation vs a bare-bone Windows installation the Mac wins hands down. You can’t even open a PDF in Windows with out downloading something. Being used to working in MacOS I just presume one can open anything from jpeg, png, tiff, targa, psd, pdf and so forth. This is NOT the case from my experience with Windows and esp. clients using Windows.
The above has nothing to do with Vegas vs FCP but it has to do with the “open feel” of a platform and imo MacOS is way better there.
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Erik Lindahl
Freecloud Post Production Services
http://www.freecloud.se -
[Erik Lindahl] “Past half year I’ve work with everything from RED to 5D to AVCINTRA footage so I’m not sure where you get “you need to deliver uncompressed QuickTime”. That’s bull.”
The problem is with the editors using FCP that I have encountered. I know that FCP can ingest an MXF file… You know that FCP cad ingest an MXF file… but I believe that you need free a Sony plug-in and as soon as you say that, there is resistant and they pull the “send me uncompressed” card. MXF is a great format for Vegas users to give to FCP editors but we get push-back all the time. Tell me the truth here… what does an FCP editor need to do to ingest MXF so that I can give them the steps the next time they say they can’t load it?
[Erik Lindahl] “You also got it wrong that there isn’t a ProRes codec for Windows. As it is becoming a more wide-spread recording format editing systems like AVID can use these natively on MacOS and Windows.”
Are you saying that I an encode to ProRess on Windows? I don’t beleive so. You can only read / decode ProRes on Windows which doesn’t help getting footage to an FCP user from Windows. If Apple would allow the ProRes encoder on Windows it would solve a lot of these problems. I don’t believe that this exists.
[Erik Lindahl] “But just cause FCP doesn’t do all “native formats” doesn’t mean it can’t read the given format. And in a complex post workflow you probably are far better off NOT working in the native format anyway.”
I agree that working in native formats is not a good workflow if you have a production pipeline of more than just your editor. I use Cineform for going between Vegas Pro, After Effects, and Mocha and I know there is a Cineform codec for the Mac but again, since you have ProRes you are not going to buy Cineform so it’s hard to use Cineform when collaborating with FCP users because of this. What we need is a good digital intermediary that is both on the Mac and PC. ProRes 422 could be that if Apple would make an encoder available on Windows. Cineform could be that if ProRes wasn’t already available in FCP. 🙁
[Erik Lindahl] “Like Vega that only can be run on Windows, Final Cut Pro can only be run on MacOS”
This is the core of the problem. I’m OK that software only runs on one platform or another BUT… there needs to be video format other than uncompressed that they can both read and write.
My impression is still that an HDV shooter cannot give an FCP editor a hard drive full of M2T files from their camera and have them ingest it into FCP. Is that not true? Because if it’s not, what are the steps to do this? I ask because people post here all the time with this problem. i.e., “How can I get my camera footage to an FCP editor when I don’t have a Mac?”
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com -
[Erik Lindahl] “The above has nothing to do with Vegas vs FCP but it has to do with the “open feel” of a platform and imo MacOS is way better there.”
lol… I use Ubuntu Linux as my primary OS so I agree with you 100%. I only use Windows to edit video because I like Vegas Pro. Ubuntu Linux can open a PDF right out of the box and even has the OpenOffice suite for word processing, spreadsheets, and presetations and tools like Gimp for image editing, etc.
So my Ubuntu Linux has even more of an “open feel” than your MacOS. lol. 😉
Note: you are not going to get me to defend Windows… I hate Windows although Windows 7 has gotten a lot better… but not as good as Linux! (which I’ve been using since 1995 with Slackware)
~jr
http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com
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