Shoot Straight to FCP

[Andrew Commiskey]

Try recording the firewire signal out of the DV deck. Make sure that the deck is rolling before capture (so the timecodes will match)
Drew

Chaos is the beginning of everything.

[Shelby Stephens]

Thanks! So just log and capture like normal?

[Chris Poisson]

Shelby,

There are several programs that do this, the one I have is called DVmonitor Pro. It works very well with a Mackbook, I use it for casting, saves a boatload of time as it allows you to name clips as you shoot them and stuffs them in a hard drive. Not sure how it will work with your switcher, but it should. Another is VeeScope Live, which also can handle HDV. I have the demo, it’s pretty cool.

Have a wonderful day.

[Chris Poisson]

Shelby,

I would advise against direct recording to the deck without some kind of interface beyond the log and capture tool. That’s why those products I mentioned were invented. Direct to deck is possibly likely to be problematic.

Have a wonderful day.

[Jeremy Garchow]

An ioHD would be prefect for this. If your switcher and cameras are SDI compliant, then you can even capture time code. You have to use AJA VTR Exchange for this (it’s free from AJA).

Jeremy

[Jeffrey Di lullo]

Hello,

we do a similar workflow with good success. We create Graduate School classes on DVD. On a 3 credit class we can generate over 20 hrs. of video. In 2 years of capturing direct to FCP via capture now we have never had a glitch (cross fingers).

Here is our workflow:

We send the program-out of our switcher to a DA. From the DA, one ouput goes to our AJ-d250 dvcpro deck and the other goes to our AJA io La which is connected to an OLD (1st gen Ti power book) powerbook running FCP. We are using the built in FW port on the mac (very important,) to connect to the io. Then we use the PCMCIA slot to connect to a Firmtek eSATA raid 0 drive array. Make sure that all your computer related components are attached to a good UPC, this includes the computer, raid and io. Audio is route via a mixer to both the deck and the aja io. You can set up the aja io La to capture to whatever codec you need, we use DV25 since the dvcpro deck is dv25 (we want everything to match in case we had to go to the tape for some reason) and because of file size.

The only catch to this process is you can’t slave the TC on the VTR with aja io LA so we use a slate or a cut at the beginning of the class as a sync mark. When we get back to the studio, we find the sync point on the tape and the clip in FCP and then use the modify timecode command in FCP to sync each clip file with the tape. This process does take some time, but can be done by an intern or post production assistant (wink, wink). We use the tape as a backup only and edit from the FCP originated clips.

Good luck,

Jeffrey Di Lullo
BBC&S Video Communicaitons

[Shelby Stephens]

1. If my deck ends up having a Firewire out, would I need to have VeeScope live to record? Why wouldn’t i be able to log as per usual?

2. If my deck ends up having a Firewire out, what is the ioHD providing me? i.e., what’s the benefit of going through the ioHD instead of straight into the Mbook?

[Andrew Commiskey]

It is not elegant but it is simple, just set it up with your DV deck as master (I am assuming that your switcher is either analog or SDI) and use the firewire out of the deck to go to Final Cut Pro. The deck has to be in record and rolling before you hit capture now. You also have to activate the AV to DV option. This mirrors the signal on tape to match what is captured in FCP. There is no log and capture you only have capture now so you name the clips after you hit esc at the end of the take. This is a down and dirty approach but it works. The settings vary between Decks but I have used it with a Sony DSR-1500, vx2000 and a Panasonic HDX 900. Obviously it is advised to try it out before the shoot.

Drew

Chaos is the beginning of everything.