• Apple Final Cut Pro Legacy

  Very Mysterious – Video Playback Setting Affecting Audio

  Posted by Joni Church on January 13, 2006 at 3:50 pm

  I’m wondering if anyone has ever encountered a similar situation:

  I’m working in an HD FCP project (720p).

  I have 2 timelines, one HD, which I view on my plasma monitor full-screen, and one 4:3 SD that I use to add graphics which were provided to me in standard def size, that I also view on my plasma monitor, letterboxed. Everyday I switch my Video Playback Ouput Settings back and forth many times between “AJA Kona 720p 59.94 8 bit 1280×720” to view the HD timeline, and “AJA Kona 525i29.97 8 bit (720×486)” to view the letterboxed timeline. (I can also view both on my 13″ Sony CRT playback monitor as well).

  Yesterday, Everything was going fine, as it has been for weeks, until the director came in and wanted to watch the project full-screen HD (without the graphics) on the plasma monitor. I had been working in the SD timeline so I switched my Video Playback Ouput Setting back to “AJA Kona 720p 59.94 8 bit 1280×720,” and the video played fine, but I couldn’t get audio. This was odd. Here are some details:

  1. The FCP audio meters were indeed showing audio playback
  2. I checked my Kona and IO control panel settings and everything was as it should be
  3. An Audio Mixdown had been done
  4. “All Frames” was selected in the “View…External Video” menu.
  5. The faders on my mixer were up, both my Kona faders and the Main Mix fader, no Mute buttons were depressed
  6. My Audio Playback Ouput Setting in FCP was set to “Kona2” all the while
  7. “Fit to Window” was selected in the canvas
  8. My Log & Capture window was not open
  9. I trashed the prefs, repaired my permissions, restarted, and repaired permissions again

  The funny thing is, as soon as I switched the Video Playback menu back to my SD setting (“AJA Kona 525i29.97 8 bit (720×486)”), I could hear audio again. The FCP meters were going, and it was sending audio through to my mixer. Everything was fine. I wouldn’t change a thing, only switch back to the HD video playback setting, and no audio would get through to my board. Hmmm.

  So as I sat puzzled, looking through past notes and double-checking the Kona2 and IO control panels, without touching anything (I was holding a book), I heard “Boop!” and I hit the space bar and what-do-you-know the sound was getting through to the board. This is the weirdest thing that’s ever occured in any of my edit suites…and let me tell you some weird things have happened.

  So it’s working now, but I just can’t apply any logic to the situation and it’s driving me crazy. Also driving me crazy is the weight of the fact that this could occur again at any time and I won’t know how to fix it. Waiting for a magical “Boop!” sound doesn’t seem very atractive.

  My Troubleshooting Summary:

  – FCP WAS comunicating with my audio board fine. I could get audio on the SD playback setting
  – The Kona card WAS comunicating with FCP and my audio board fine. I could get audio on the SD playback setting
  – FCP DID know that there was audio on the timeline because the meters were going when I had the PB settings set to view HD

  Once again, Hmmm.

  My details are:
  – AJA Kona 2 card
  – AJA io
  – FCP 5.0.4
  – G5 Dual 2 GHz
  – 5.5 GB DDR SDRAM
  – Eurorack MX 3242X (16-channel audio mixer)

  Could this have something to do with electronics or wiring in the board? I don’t see how because the input is the same regardless of what my video playback setting is set to…but I’m totally stumped. Also since my setup has been fine for weeks and nothing has changed, it’s extra puzzling.

  Any thoughts would be great. I’m too curious to let it go just because it fixed itself.

  Thanks!
  Joni

  (sorry the post is so lonnnnnnnng)

  Joni Church replied 20 years, 4 months ago 1 Member · 0 Replies
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