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HDV confusion, please help
Oh, where to begin? I normally work in HD using D5 and I’ve got that area pretty much cornered. I was recently hired to online a feature that was shot in HDV, which is a new format to me. So they gave me all the HDV tapes, and the Sony HDV deck (the HVR-M10U) along with this Miranda Bridge thing. The computer I’m working on (which they also provided) has this AJA breakout box that allows me to connect to an HD monitor, which I can also digitize through.
But here’s the real question, I guess: Do I need all of this stuff (the breakout box, the Miranda bridge, etc) or should I just online via the firewire cable? Is HDV resolution as good as it’s going to get via firewire, or is it worthwhile trying to figure out how to get deck control and an uncompressed 8bit HD signal through the bridge and breakout box? Would it be any different than dropping the HDV footage into an 8bit timeline? Have I asked enough questions?
Any and all help would be very appreciated.
Thanks,
Michael Black -
20 Replies
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Michael,
So long as you have the storage capability, capturing to an i-frame format such as 8-bit uncompressed will make your job considerably faster and easier. Depending on the number of layers, it could even be better, as HDV can be degraded each time you render the same material.
DRW
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Ok, so I should go ahead and capture at 8bit uncompressed?
Now, here’s the second part of that question: I have deck control, but when I try to capture, it goes to the spot, starts playing, but then doesn’t digitize and says, “Unable to lock deck servo. Tape possibly still threading.” while the deck is playing fine. Any ideas?
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That one is a mystery…
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From the workflow point of view HDV is the crappiest of things that happened to us in a long time. Betacam SX was heavily compressed MPEG but at list the decks’ gears and brains were good. Digital-S had flimsy mechanics but the codec was great. HDV is just pain in the ass. There is a very slim chance it is possible to batch recapture with device control but I’m afraid you will need to reconstruct the whole program manually.
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That’s really not what I wanted to hear. This is a feature with lots of cuts. The deck I’m using is rented to and there’s no way I’ll be able to do all that by tomorrow night, even working non-stop.
Can anyone else corroborate this? Would I be better off just doing it all in HDV or should I not sleep for the next 36 hours and digitize each cut manually?
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Do it all HDV, and bump to uncompressed before final render and output. Works, is easy, and will be just as good quality as capturing uncompressed.
Graeme
– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects and Standards Conversion for FCP
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Eh, “as HDV can be degraded each time you render the same material.” FCP renders the entire stack from top to bottom and doesn’t base the render upon previous renders, but re-calculates everything, so you don’t get render on top of render on top of render degredation. That’s the way FCP has always worked. Or are you getting at some other issue?
Graeme
– http://www.nattress.com – Film Effects and Standards Conversion for FCP
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Graeme,
I only suggested he go 8-bit uncompressed because he had the tools to do it. If he hadn’t been given the Miranda hardware I’d have suggested HDV all the way too.
DRW
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Yeah, right. But the real question is will it recapture correctly either way?
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When using the Sony HDV deck and the Kona LH card, I always capture uncompressed 10 bit HD from the analog component out, using the Tao L-Port for machine control(and Time-code). It has always worked flawlessly for me.
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