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Setting up colorbars
I recently rented a BetaSP camera and am bringing in the footage into FCP. I’d like to set up the colorbars to make sure that the video levels are correct before i digitize. I’m new to FCP and I dont see any settings where i can adjust video levels. Anyone have any advice?
Thanks!
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3 Replies
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You can’t adjust levels from within FCP during capture, however if you have a proc amp or betacam machine with the controls, you can set up the capture to match the camera bars… there are scopes in the log and capture window used exactly for this purpose.
Jerry
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There is a proc-amp built in if you have black magic hardware, I think Aja Hardware may have this as well.
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In ‘ Log & Capture’, under ‘Clip Settings’ tab, there is a button at the top labelled ‘Video Scopes’ – these are for monitoring the video input levels.
You should turn these on and adjust your levels on the VTR (assuming your model allows that.)
One problem with adjusting the levels at the input stage, is that you can simply be compensating for incorrect levels out of the VTR. If the VTR levels were set too high, you would compensate by pulling down the input level on FCP and think that all is well, but this cause you to lose valuable video information. Here, 2 wrongs don’t make a right!
Check the BARS, but also check the program levels, too. Sometimes, the color bars don’t match the levels of the recorded media.
You may want to consider, after you’ve set the levels, recording a portion of the bars as a clip, for later reference, say in the case of grading.
Also, especially for grading purposes, remember that once the input clips the video with its proc-amp, you lose the ability to fix some of your highlights (skies, etc) This is especially so if the camera’s clip levels are set higher than the input’s proc-amps.Hope this helps.
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Neil Ryan
Post Production
The Pod Multimedia
http://www.the-pod.com.au
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