Raid question for uncompressed SD/SDI in FCP on Mac Pro.

[Walter Biscardi]

[iMan] “so I figured shooting in 720p/25p and converting to SDI/SD would give me decent quality and I will lose the dreaded GOPs by doing this as the HD-Connect imports into FCP in native uncompressed SD on the fly so editing is easier.”

If your idea is to make editing easier, then bring in your footage as DVCPro HD so you can finish the project in HD and then downconvert to SD for mastering. A Kona board from AJA will allow you to convert the footage to DVCPro HD to get you out of HDV for the edit, and then you can either down-convert in realtime during output to tape or use FCP to rescale / render down to SD. You can also lay off your DVCPro HD master or save the quicktime movie so you have an HD version of the show ready to go.

That’s what we’ll be doing here with a new series that’s being shot in HDV. We’ll be capturing in DVCPro HD for HDCAM delivery of the main show master, then laying off to either DigiBeta or BetaSP with the center punch for SD purposes in realtime off our Kona 3.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Food Network’s “Good Eats”
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“I reject your reality and substitute my own!” – Adam Savage, Mythbusters

[Sean Oneil]

[iMan] “If so, what about HDCAM uncompressed footage for the future?”

I wouldn’t rely on it. I’ve tried uncompressed HD on a 4-drive SATA array. You’ll get dropped frames occassionally. 8-drive SATA is a better idea for that.

Or you could use 4 extra-fast drives, like 10k RPM. That should be fast enough.

[Nigel Cooper]

Walter, I’m a tad confused now.

I am going to buy Mac Pro with a few extra internal 500GB drives with latest FCP Suite.

I shoot on JVC GY-HD100 camcorder, which as you know, is 720p/25p progressive, but HDV so it uses mpeg compression with GoPs.

I was going to buy this:

https://www.convergent-design.com/CD_Products_HDConnectLE.htm

and to go with it a Blackmagic Decklink HD Extreme card.

Okay, footage will be shot on JVC in HDV Progressive 720p/25p mode, the JVC would then be plugged into the HD Connect box via firewire and the footage would be played out natively.

The HD Connect box then converts this footage on the fly as it comes out of either the SDI/HD output socket, or the SDI/SD output socket, then from this into FCP via Blackmagic card.

Purpose: So I can edit uncompressed SD footage which would be better then downconverting from JVC to standard MiniDV format. I also won’t have GoP timeline in FCP. Also in future I can come out of HD Connect box via SDI/HD when the time comes.

You make it sound like the HD-Connect LE box and a Blackmagic card is not necessary? The total for the HD-Connect box is about