Studio 2’s Color: No Firewire Output to Monitor

[Mark Raudonis]

Color is positioned as a PROFESSIONAL tool. As such, it makes some basic assumptions about the type of peripheral equipment present in a professional color grading suite.

I’m sorry to say the monitoring through firewire as you’ve described is NOT the typical signal flow path in most high end suites.

There’s no substitute for being an informed consumer. The release notes were posted on Apple’s site well before the software hit the stores.

Mark

[Arnie Schlissel]

[audiovideo] “BTW, none of those cards are approved by Apple”

Umm, yes, they are. You can look up the list here: https://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/resources/devicelist.php

I don’t think they’ve updated the list for FC Studio 2, yet, but you’ll see that all of AJA’s current lineup is approved up through FC Studio 1.

[audiovideo] “nice trick, but how do I read the user manual before buying it?”

Apple often posts manuals in there support area. It may take some searching to find it, and they don’t usually post manuals long before a product ships, but you can usually find the manual there once a product starts shipping.

Arnie
Now in post: Peristroika, a film by Slava Tsukerman
https://www.arniepix.com/blog

[Audiovideo]

[Mark Raudonis] “I’m sorry to say the monitoring through firewire as you’ve described is NOT the typical signal flow path in most high end suites.

This is true. And I do admit that my work is not high end, per se.

[Mark Raudonis] There’s no substitute for being an informed consumer. The release notes were posted on Apple’s site well before the software hit the stores.”

Again, this is true. I may be mistaken, but according what Apple Support told me, that particular info was in the user manual, only.

[Walter Biscardi]

[audiovideo] “Did you realize that COLOR will not allow you to monitor your color correction with a broadcast monitor via firewire?!”

Of course not. It’s a pro tool designed to work with a third party capture card, preferrably the AJA Kona boards. If you want to color using Firewire, you’ll need to use the tools within FCP.

If Apple dumbs it down in a future release, then it might support Firewire in the future, but generally you would never grade for broadcast using a Firewire video signal.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Broadcast and independent productions.

All Things Apple Podcast! https://cowcast.creativecow.net/all_things_apple/index.html

Read my blog! https://blogs.creativecow.net/WalterBiscardi

[Audiovideo]

[walter biscardi] “If Apple dumbs it down in a future release, then it might support Firewire in the future, but generally you would never grade for broadcast using a Firewire video signal.”

I don’t disagree with any of the comments, especially the above one. My intent for my post was to let other dumb downers like myself know that in a less than perfect configuration, the firewire option that is listed in Color will not work. This was a surprise to me, and would probably surprise others with smaller budgets. I thought users like me would want to take all this into consideration before upgrading to FCP 2.

[Walter Biscardi]

[audiovideo] “My intent for my post was to let other dumb downers like myself know that in a less than perfect configuration, the firewire option that is listed in Color will not work.”

From page 106 of the manual:

Note: Currently, Digital Cinema Desktop previews and Apple FireWire output are not available for monitoring the output from Color.

Color was not designed for video editors. It was designed to replace a daVinci colorist workstation and be operated by skilled colorists in very high end rooms. Apple has done nothing to app to make it work any easier for video editors because they’ve only had it for a few months. Why they included it in Studio 2 in it’s current form, I’ll never know, but they did.

The application is not designed for “plug and play” type of work in any way shape or form. Everything else in Studio has 100 and 1 presets to make your life easy , but Color is something you have to fully immerse yourself in to and start from the ground up. And you need a very high end workstation to really work effectively with Color.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Broadcast and independent productions.

All Things Apple Podcast! https://cowcast.creativecow.net/all_things_apple/index.html

Read my blog! https://blogs.creativecow.net/WalterBiscardi

[Audiovideo]

[walter biscardi] “From page 106 of the manual:

Note: Currently, Digital Cinema Desktop previews and Apple FireWire output are not available for monitoring the output from Color.”

Yes, indeed, it states this in the manual. And you’ll find that I pointed this same fact out in my initial post. Perhaps you’ve misunderstood my reason for my original post. I am not arguing the fact that high-end users, like yourself, would never color-correct via firewire. I am only saying that, as you put it, [walter biscardi] “If Apple dumbs it down in a future release,” it would be nice to know that fact upfront. Speaking as one, I guess, who needs things dumbed down, I would have preferred to have known that before I had purchased it.

[Walter Biscardi]

[audiovideo] “Speaking as one, I guess, who needs things dumbed down, I would have preferred to have known that before I had purchased it.”

Gotcha. So you didn’t need the Studio 2 upgrade, you just bought it for Color. It’s not something that plays well with a firewire only workflow.

Walter Biscardi, Jr.
https://www.biscardicreative.com
HD Editorial & Animation for Broadcast and independent productions.

All Things Apple Podcast! https://cowcast.creativecow.net/all_things_apple/index.html

Read my blog! https://blogs.creativecow.net/WalterBiscardi

[Audiovideo]

Yes, it does not play well with firewire.

[Dave Jenkins]

I guess the NEW AJA IO is not going to work with color!!!! That is a real shame.