What’s a good conversion tool for HDV mpeg to editable Final Cut Pro MOV?

[Cg Coffyn]

I’d use ProRes or ProRes HQ. We’ve worked in HDV in FCP for years (now switching to shooting AVCHD and editing in Premiere Pro 5.5) and we always do our masters, stereo and split trk in ProRes. We also do all our Motion graphics in ProRes. If you have any FCP software on your system you can access ProRes from within Premiere, but you have to set up your own preset I think. I stumbled across a great blog on Adobes site about using a ProRes workflow in Premiere Pro. Sorry I can’t find the link at the moment.

[Mikkell Khan]

Thanks for the response Christopher.

However, I should be more specific, I wanted to take video captured in HDV from Premiere Pro CS5 on a PC and put it into a format that can be edited properly and without issues on Final Cut Pro on a MAC. I suspect that the best format would be .mov but here is what I’d want to know would be a good conversion tool for this.

Right now I’m trying out Adobe Media encoder, using the quicktime encoder and the bitrate DVCPRO HD 1080i60. Has anyone tried this?

Mikkell Khan
Director
Diamond Films Ltd. (Trinidad and Tobago)

[Alex Udell]

Cineform should be availble on both platforms.

Alex

[Tom Daigon]

I have had nothing but hard crashes trying to use the newest Cineform codec when trying to encode using it with Mac CS5 (PrP / AA / AME). Developer had same experience when we worked over the phone on this issue.FYI.

Tom Daigon
Avid DS / PrP / After Effects Editor
http://www.hdshotsandcuts.com
Mac Pro 3,1
8 core
10.6.8
Nvidia Quadro 4000
24 gigs ram
Maxx Digital / Areca 8tb. raid
Kona 3

[Cg Coffyn]

I’m guessing you don’t have access to the original source tapes to just recapture in FCP. That would sure be a lot easier. I’ve only tested Media Encoder (ME) as we will be shifting from, I hope, Compressor to ME. so I’m no help there.

I have always heard that going from HDV to DVCPro HD is not a good idea. We were looking at that option when we first got our Kona LHe card, because it is ideally suited to those with a DVCPro HD workflows. Although a few people thought it would be fine, most felt it wasn’t. You probably want to stay as close to the 1080 x 1440 aspect ratio of HDV, so your not compressing and recompressing.

As you probably know mov is just a wrapper for all kinds of codecs, but again the less fiddling you do with the pixels the better. My 2 cents worth anyway.

[Alex Udell]

I don’t know how it is on FCP…

but based on recapture….I could never get a frame accurate source match…even when timecodes did match with HDV….

My guess was that it had something to do with the GOP structure of the media….

How about Avid DNXHD?

Codec is high quality and free on both platforms….

Alex

[Cg Coffyn]

Hey Alex,
I’ve heard the Avid DNXHD is a very nice codec. Does it play well with FCP and Premiere? Are there any comparisons with ProRes?

[Alex Udell]

DNXHD is Avid’s pro mastering codec so the quality is quite good.

I know ppl are using it with PPro.

I’m not sure about how well it plays with FCP….but at least you can get your material to the Mac in a good quality and reasonable size where, if you had to, you could make a ProRez set you could.

Alex