P2 clip time code layback to tape

[Shane Ross]

You can’t. Not unless you make a sequence for each clip and adjust the sequence time to match the clips timecode.

It is best if you use this method to output to tape FIRST, then capture and edit so that you are referencing the tape TC.

Shane

Littlefrog Post
http://www.lfhd.net

[Jeff Carson]

Thanks Shane… I was afraid of that. Archiving P2 clips has been a dilemma and we decided the best thing for us was buy a 1400 HD deck and lay clips back to HD. It would seem to be a pretty useful feature. Using the method you suggested, would FCP treat these as if they came from tape in the first place when you try to recapture?

[Jeremy Garchow]

The purpose of p2 is to get away from tape. You need to archive on to disk or DVD and I know it seems like an unusual way to backup media, but it’s what needs to be done. For the amount you spend on a 1400 you can have years and years of archiving p2 media on hard drive or DVD. You cannot have the tc match exactly without some careful frame by frame surgery.

If you try and recapture P2 media that was imported with FCP 5.1.2 the p2 import window usually pops up. You then point it to your MXF files and the reimport process is relatively automatic. I can’t wait until we can transcode P2 media upon import to go uncompressed for onlines.

Jeremy

[Jeff Carson]

We are buying an HDX-900 camera, so the deck was inevitable for us. The time consuming disk archival process is not as attractive for our shop. DVD’s are slow to write, difficult to manage and not 100% reliable, if a DVD drive refuses to recognize an entire data DVD, you’re hosed. Same goes for Firewire drives. With tape, you have a real-time, more durable solution that is not too costly (aside from the deck cost).

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Jeff Carson] “We are buying an HDX-900 camera, so the deck was inevitable for us.”

Got ya, that makes more sense. I was refusing the disk archiving solution myself. I have since bought in to it and I really really like it. I buy bare SATA drives from newegg, a FW800 to SATA converter from weibetech and I have been backing up religiously with no problems. If you are really nervous about backing up to disk, make 2 copies. Drives with lots of storage are ridiculously cheap these days. Also, project restoration is a snap. The other day I had to dig out an old project and make a quick change for a DVD and I edited straight from the backup SATA disk. Couldn’t have been easier.

Now, all that being said, you can make tc tape backups of your p2 media if you match the tc by hand. If you have continuous tc you shouldn’t have too many problems. The only problems you might run into are that the DP or someone on set deleted a clip from the P2 cards because it was no good and the tc in now not consistent across the cards which will cause disruption when trying to recapture/rebuild your projects. Perhaps you want to start bring the 1400 on set to record directly to it through firewire. It will save you the hassle of recording to tape later.

The thing about the P2 workflow is that you have to embrace the media as regular old computer data. It’s not a tape based solution. Once you start to treat it as data, you will see that it’s not so bad and you don’t have to waste time making tape backups. You can also look at a DLT based backup solution from Quantum that will archive your P2 material natively as well.

Jeremy

[Bob Flood]

Jeff

there is a way to lay off media to a videotape (any media to any videotape) ie make a video archive, so that the tc on the tape does not have to match.

Larry Jordan has a methodology that use XML to change your media references from individual sources to a single tape or file.

you lay off all your clips to single tape, do the XML process, and when you need to recapture material you just load one tape.

it may require the purchase of an XML program, but it sounds real slick! and may be the way to go for now (until blu ray becomes viable)

http://www.larryjordan.biz

hopt this helps

bee eph