Log and Transfer AVCHD from Panansonic Lumix

[Tom Wolsky]

Please give specifics of the format you are shooting with this camera. I believe some of its recording formats are in a non-standard AVCHD.

All the best,

Tom

Class on Demand DVDs “Complete Training for FCP6,” “Basic Training for FCS2” and “Final Cut Express Made Easy”
Author: “Final Cut Pro 5 Editing Essentials” and “Final Cut Express 4 Editing Workshop”

[Itamar Kool]

Well, I don’t know what else to mention. I downloaded a trial version of Cineform’s Neoscene and that works. With Neoscene I went to the folder called STREAM and there I opened files with the extension .MTS. The camera is the Lumix DMC-GH 1K. Does that clarify anything?

Kool En De Anderen
MAC Pro 8 core/OS 10.5.7/Kona LHe/Apple FCS 2/Adobe PPCS3/Huge fibrechannel
http://www.koolendeanderen.nl

[Gerry Lawson]

I think you need to specify the root folder (not the STREAM folder) of your AVCHD card or harddisk for FCP to detect your video.

Some applications can read the MTS files directly and transcode them. Many programs (iMovie and FCP included) will read the file structure and use the index information for transferring. It seems a little inane to me but these apps won’t recognize the MTS files as video.

[Itamar Kool]

I am not on my compter now but I did try to open it from alk the folders higher up, like with P2. But iget the sam message all the time

[Ron Craig]

I did a little test with some material from a Lumix camera a couple of weeks ago. I’m not going to be very helpful because it was just an informal test with a friend’s camera and I didn’t take notes. But my recollection is that I downloaded a trial version of some software that would convert the AVCHD into QuickTime files. I tried it and it worked. Very sorry that I can’t remember the name of the software I used (duh!) but I found it by just doing a search on the web for a few minutes.

The video opened in FCP (6) and looked great. Love the lenses you can use with that camera.

[Itamar Kool]

Was it maybe Neoscene from Cineform?

Kool En De Anderen
MAC Pro 8 core/OS 10.5.8/Kona LHe/Apple FCS 3/Adobe PPCS3/Huge fibrechannel
http://www.koolendeanderen.nl

[Ron Craig]

Yes, it was from Cineform.

Good luck.

[Itamar Kool]

Yes the video looks really good. Which special lenses are you referiing to??

Kool En De Anderen
MAC Pro 8 core/OS 10.5.8/Kona LHe/Apple FCS 3/Adobe PPCS3/Huge fibrechannel
http://www.koolendeanderen.nl

[Ron Craig]

All the 35mm SLR lenses. Take your pick.

[William Burke]

L&T has some problems. I have 8 memory cards, 3 of which can be seen by L&T the rest give the error you reported. Of the 8 there are 4 different brands; Kensington(5), Transcend(1), Patriot(1) and Sandisk(1). 2 Kensington and 1 transcend card are functional with L&T.

What I haven’t done yet is format all the non-working cards and then try getting them to work. I have tried copying the contents of a non-working card to a disk image with disk util and then mounting it. Same error.

I bought a FCP7 book that contained a DVD with all kinds of media, including sample avchd. The sample avchd was the same folder structure i see when I look at the contents of one of my cards. L&T can see the files I copied from the DVD which are buried in a directory structure within the DVD.

I have not determined if L&T can’t read the non-working cards because of the card itself or because of a flaw in the directory structure. My next tests will be formatting a non-working card shooting new clips and also just copying a non-working card onto the desktop. I might also try taking the contents of a nonworking card and copying it clip at a time into and over the contents of the test folders included in the DVD if you follow what I’m saying. I’d like to find out of one clip is breaking the whole thing or what.

For some reason L&T has dependencies on the folder contents of the entire AVCHD structure. That must be how you can import a small segment of a full clip (the sole reason I have any interest in L&T).

Currently I am using Neoscene to import clips and it works just fine. My only complaint is it only brings in full clips (not a BIG deal) and that importing into specific folders is a little clumsy.