LCD (lowest common denominator) for editing HDV sources

[Kevin Monahan]

Here’s your cheaper alternative: Edit HDV over FireWire, drop it off at a dub house for SD out. DONE.

Kevin Monahan
Take My FCP Master’s Workshop!
fcpworld.com
Pres. SF Cutters

[Bob Cole]

[Kevin Monahan] “Edit HDV over FireWire”

Thanks Kevin. That works, but my understanding from posts on this forum is that editing HDV in FCP is problematic.

[Kevin Monahan]

Rendering FX in HDV is the main problem because it takes more time than DV. That’s the main bitch anyway. It’s a pretty lame excuse if you ask me. If you don’t mind a small rant straight out of my book, here’s why I think it’s lame.

You know, most editors are pretty dumb creatures when it comes to dealing with time managing renders. Admit it guys. Is this you?

“NO, I MUST see my final quality and NOW”. (As you again press CMD + R…ZZZZZZZ)

My reply would be, “No you don’t, you’re wasting time, move on to the next task ya lazy dog – render later when you are at lunch or yer done for the day”.

If you compare an editor’s bone headed workflow (edit-render-edit-render, etc.) with how motion graphics pros work: with proxies, carefully previewing at low res, at lower frame rates, etc. you realize how stupid we editors can be. In fact, Apple gets it: they give us RT Extreme – but most people don’t know how to or maybe just do not want to maximize previews and merely check quality of an effect (by parking on an unrendered frame, going to QuickView, Opt + P etc.). The attitude is more like “Let’s render it first, then we’ll see how it really looks.” And you sit there and watch the little blue bar, sipping coffee.

I’d say. “Hey Mr. TIME WASTER, you have work to do. Why are you rendering NOW instead of at lunch, break or overnight? The ONLY time that you should be rendering.”

Editors and graphics guys work in two different ways, and to be honest, graphics guys work smarter in most cases when it comes to time managing renders and doing careful previews. We, as editors, must strive to be more like them. 😉

Editing HDV is not a problem at all. You can edit HDV all day and all night and it should flow as easily as a DV project. Just do careful previews and never render until you walk away for a break or at the end of the evening.

My 2 cents anyway.

Kevin Monahan
Take My FCP Master’s Workshop!
fcpworld.com
Pres. SF Cutters

[Bob Cole]

[Kevin Monahan] “to be honest, graphics guys work smarter”

Thanks. That’s not a rant, it’s very informative. Trish Meyers, After Effects expert, advocates the same approach, even to the point of scaling her originals no bigger than they need to be when animating stills.

Your original advice was that the cheapest alternative is to edit HDV, & take it to a dub house for SD out.

In what form would you take it to the dub house? And, if that isn’t usually an option for time reasons, what is the next-cheapest alternative, for in-house SD out? I’m thinking of buying the M15 or possibly the M25 deck anyway.

Speaking of which, if anybody out there knows the ballistics of these decks I’d like to hear whether they are easy to control, cue up, etc.

[Bob Flood]

hey bob

we own the HDV camera and m10u. i edited one job in hdv native. I found it underwhelming at best.
if you are going to be cutting only on a laptop or all by yourself, and you can finish yur show with enough time to render and export before fed ex then great, more power to you, go for it!

however i work in the real world, where one or 2 producers have to see all the effects in real video on an NTSC monitor at any given time, and insist on making edits up to the very last second ie 5 minute to fedex.

On my next job i digitized analog component through a Kona LH to dvcproHD and found it better. However i was not happy with the exporting of the footage for dvd as it got soft (my kona diod do an excellent job of downconverting in real time however)

On the third job I digitized analog component through the kona LH to DVCPRO50 at 16×9. Best so far. accurate previews, quick export, efficient use of drive space. I have made this my workflow of choice.

look at it this way, all the real time stuff is handled by the CPU. By capturing the stuff at the rez i want to output (I do not have a lot of call for HD masters etc) the card has done the “heavy lifting” and makes the RT previews a little faster.

as for differences in the VTR’s? i think the extra mony is worth it for the M25, as it allows you to make HDV clones from a camera WITH MATCHING TIME CODE, something the m10u does not. And man the m10u is a lot slower than a real DVCAM Machine, like a dsr
so if the M25u has a better transport, definitle go for it!

hope this helps

bee eph

[Jim Martin]

Bob,
what are you doing re: deck contol with the m10 when using the compoment analog outs?

Jim