Settings – footage dv cam

[Charlie Austin]

If your project timecode is set to an interlaced setting (i), try changing it to progressive (p)

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~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Morten Slemdal]

Ok, I`ll check when I`m back at my mac.

Does it make sense that the DV setting is fine, while the proress has nasty blurry horizontal lines?

I thought fcpx understood if I should have (i) or (p), from the first Clip added to the timeline.

anyway, I hope this is the case, and that everything will be great in the end.

[Charlie Austin]

[Morten Slemdal] “I thought fcpx understood if I should have (i) or (p), from the first Clip added to the timeline.

anyway, I hope this is the case, and that everything will be great in the end.”

It does, but DV is interlaced and I’ve found that changing the project timebase to progressive (if it’s available) can help with this issue. Worth a shot. 🙂

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~ My FCPX Babbling blog ~
~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~

[Robin S. kurz]

[Charlie Austin] “DV is interlaced and I’ve found that changing the project timebase to progressive (if it’s available) can help with this issue.”

Sorry, but that is clearly NOT something you want to be doing (and has nothing to do with your timebase). With that you are not solving anything, you’re only making things worse if anything. Since by doing that you are telling FCP to effectively misinterpret your footage and toss out one of the fields, which obviously is not of any benefit in terms of quality. Those “blurry lines” are simply the visible fields of the interlace, which is absolutely normal, since DV footage is always interlaced. I just have to wonder why you’re even seeing them though, since by default FCP does not show both fields in the viewer. So you must have changed it. You can turn that off by simply going into the viewer display menu and unchecking that option, if it bothers you so much.

There’s also no need to transcode, since FCP can edit DV natively which is fine quality-wise and of course MUCH smaller in size, too.

Once you export the clip(s) the fields will either be maintained (which they SHOULD be for e.g. DVD output!) or tossed if you export in any given progressive format such as Apple Devices, YouTube etc.

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[Morten Slemdal]

Ok – I really don’t care about the preview. My problem is when exporting/sharing. I tried to make a master, with prores 422, and that came out crappy. I redid it with DV, and that came out fine. So, in a way I’m happy. Does this make sense, that prores is flickery, dv is not?

When it comes to the blurry slow mo, I guess I have to fi it under retiming

[Robin S. kurz]

[Morten Slemdal] “I tried to make a master, with prores 422, and that came out crappy. I redid it with DV, and that came out fine.”

Technically they’re both the exact same. So the question is what are you using to look at your exports? If e.g. with the QT 7 Player, DV is also shown with just one field and a “low quality” setting on playback, but in fact has both. A setting in the respective clip properties. ProRes will always show both fields if it has them, but it certainly won’t in fact look worse, assuming you turned on both fields in the DV clip also.

The only relevant question is where will the clip end up?? If going back to DV or DVD or any other source for playback ON A TV, then having fields is A GOOD THING. If going to e.g. Youtube or just your computer, simply export as PROGRESSIVE in any given codec and it will look that same in each and every one. Since yes, interlaced material will look “crappy” on a progressive monitor.

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[Morten Slemdal]

Oh, gosh. I’m trying to get a grip… My main output will be tv. When I tested this I did it in QT. So for best performance on tv, directly from my mac, what is that?

So, if I understand you right; when I share to dv, it will be one field only, if I don’t change to two fields. That’s why this option is ok on my tv. When sharing to prores I always get 2 fields, and that will be flickery on my tv.

Thanx for helping me out; I hope you can guide me so I can get a good quality film on my tv from my mac. What player should I use, and what settings?

[Robin S. kurz]

[Morten Slemdal] “My main output will be tv.”

Via WHAT exactly?

[Morten Slemdal] “when I share to dv, it will be one field only”

No. If you are viewing it with the QT Player it is only DISPLAYING one field unless you change it. That’s simply a legacy, codec specific “feature” from waaaaay back when computers even had a hard time playing back DV (and to keep people from complaining about supposed crappy quality because of the fields).

[Morten Slemdal] “guide me so I can get a good quality film on my tv from my mac.”

Again… that’s complete dependent on HOW you are getting it on your TV. Apple TV? DVD? Bluray? USB stick? What? But again… both a DV as well as a ProRes export will generally be just fine for further processing.

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[Morten Slemdal]

I will just plug my mac to the tv, via hdmi. Probably I miss the point here.. Sorry about that. My prores alternative is as said crappy on my tv – I need to know how I can fix this. Is it because I play it from QT via hdmi to my tv? Should I use another player on my mac for better tv result? Should I do something with my project settings?

[Charlie Austin]

[Robin S. Kurz] “The only relevant question is where will the clip end up?? If going back to DV or DVD or any other source for playback ON A TV, then having fields is A GOOD THING. If going to e.g. Youtube or just your computer, simply export as PROGRESSIVE in any given codec and it will look that same in each and every one. Since yes, interlaced material will look “crappy” on a progressive monitor.”

Which was why I suggested he change the project setting, even if I got the terminology wrong. 😉 I guess I just assume that these days everything will be viewed on computer screen… Also, in my case, we get DV footage occasionally, but it’s for offline and will eventually be redone from the HD master. So I always run a progressive project to get rid of the interlacing for presentations etc. I suppose I shouldn’t assume that this is always the case…

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~ My FCPX Babbling blog ~
~”It is a poor craftsman who blames his tools.”~
~”The function you just attempted is not yet implemented”~