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Michael Cioni + frame io
Met him at NAB 2011.
Super nice and helpful. -
68 Replies
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One of the disappointing things I have found about Frame IO is that you can’t take full advantage of the FCP X h.264 multitrack share function.
One of the cool feature that X has is the ability to send multi audio tracks in a h.264 file so that another editor can have control over those tracks. Many people want that h.264 file for the ease of import and it looks darn good anyway.
Currently Frame iO mixes those tracks together and takes away that cool advantage that X has.
I contacted them about it and they are aware of it.
Hopefully Cioni can make that happen.
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[Tony West] “One of the cool feature that X has is the ability to send multi audio tracks in a h.264 file so that another editor can have control over those tracks. Many people want that h.264 file for the ease of import and it looks darn good anyway.”
Why H.264 and not ProRes? Seems like this type of file is a split-track submaster of an edited project. Wouldn’t you want the highest quality possible since it’s going through further post. What am I missing?
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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[Oliver Peters] “Why H.264 and not ProRes? Seems like this type of file is a split-track submaster of an edited project. Wouldn’t you want the highest quality possible since it’s going through further post. What am I missing?”
They might not necessarily do farther post on it. They might not touch it at all, but I want them to have the option down the line if they ever want to drop a music track out or turn a mic off or whatever.
Since FCP X has that feature I want to take advantage of it.
H.264 isn’t really the point. Frame IO can’t split tracks in ProRes either. They should be able to do either.
I was surprised that it couldn’t do it since the platform is used by so many “high end” projects producers.
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[Tony West] “H.264 isn’t really the point. Frame IO can’t split tracks in ProRes either. They should be able to do either.”
When you say it ‘can’t split tracks,’ do you mean that split-track masters (like DME stereo stems) are muxed into mono or stereo when the client downloads the file from Frame? I would think Frame leaves the original untouched, but I haven’t tested it. I know 5.1 surround is OK.
[Tony West] “the platform is used by so many “high end” projects producers”
I think that’s more marketing than anything else. Depends on whether you mean for workflow or simply review & approval and/or delivery.
Personally I wish they’d simply clean up all of their UI and platform inconsistencies.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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[Oliver Peters] ” I would think Frame leaves the original untouched”
I thought that also, but not true. It takes multiple audio tracks down to just one track.
[Oliver Peters] “I think that’s more marketing than anything else. Depends on whether you mean for workflow or simply review & approval and/or delivery.”
I don’t know if it’s marketing are not. I haven’t seen any hard numbers on who is using it and for what.
They didn’t argue with me about it to their credit, and said multiple editors have raised the same concern. They said it was “on their radar” so we will see what happens.
[Oliver Peters] “Personally I wish they’d simply clean up all of their UI and platform inconsistencies.
“I made some suggestions to them about their UI and they made the changes I suggested, so if they agree with you it might happen. At least they did it for me.
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[Tony West] “I thought that also, but not true. It takes multiple audio tracks down to just one track.”
Hmm… Somethings odd. I just ran a test round-tripping split-track masters through Frame without any issue. I exported a split of VO + music out of FCPX as a master file. Once as ProResProxy, then again as H264. Both as Multitrack Quicktime file. I also exported a ProRes Proxy split track from Premiere Pro. Uploaded all three to FrameIO. Then downloaded them. They came back exactly as I sent them up. No change in audio configuration. I was using the web portal to Frame, not the extension app.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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I came straight out of the timeline in FCP X to Frame.io from the Share menu.
Two mics with two different tracks went up.
One track of audio on the download.
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[Tony West] “I came straight out of the timeline in FCP X to Frame.io from the Share menu.”
Try it direct instead. The FrameIO extension is pretty mediocre at best. Sounds like a bug in that.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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[Oliver Peters] “Try it direct instead. The FrameIO extension is pretty mediocre at best. Sounds like a bug in that.
“The extension is the most direct way isn’t it? I know I can send it as a zip file as they suggested through them but that’s not what I want. They didn’t say it was a bug, they said it wasn’t set up to send it that way at this time.
I prefer not to work around the app. I prefer them to fix the app so that it works more efficiently.
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[Tony West] “The extension is the most direct way isn’t it? “
The extension is too simplistic for any sort of real workflows. It should only be used for review and approval on the very simplest of jobs.
Export a master file from the FCPX Share menu set as a multitrack Quicktime. Open a web browser and log into Frame. Find your project and upload. Share that from Frame as a Presentation with download enabled. Works like a charm. That’s how Frame was intended to work.
This is why I say Frame needs to fix their inconsistencies across their versions. Only by using the browser interface do you get the full experience. Don’t expect these things to get fixed.
– Oliver
Oliver Peters – oliverpeters.com
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