[Andrew Rendell]

I’m very pleased with my new(ish – I got it last summer) Macbook Pro, but I would say that the main reason for going for the MBP is portability. I take mine places, so it’s the best compromise for me at the moment. If you don’t need the portability, then the better bang for the buck that you get with the desktops should tip the balance that way. Waiting a little to see what’s coming next on the desktop front might be a good idea, if you’re not in a hurry.

[Andrew Rendell]

I’d do the conversion directly in Compressor rather than using FCP to export with Compressor, then import those versions into FCP.

[Andrew Rendell]

If it’s only one parameter you want to copy, you could just make a note of it’s value then go to the new shot and type it in to the appropriate box.

[Andrew Rendell]

Slight revision my last post – I’ve just found the ITU-R 709 official recommendations here: https://www.itu.int/dms_pubrec/itu-r/rec/bt/R-REC-BT.709-5-200204-I!!PDF-E.pdf

[Andrew Rendell]

Chad So, are the color specs really different between different NLE’s or is rec.709 truly 16-235 across all HD video and FCP has an internal conversion algorithm that maps it out as 0-255 when it’s really 16-235? My scopes tell me that 0x0x0 is 0IRE and 255x255x255 is 100IRE…

It’s nothing to do with different NLEs, although some will modify inputs and outputs differently to others. Black=16 and White=235 is correct. Quick guide to rec.709 here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rec._709
(IIRC the full spec is behind a paywall)

[Andrew Rendell]

I was once freelancing for a company doing some high end corporate editing and at some point I said something along the lines of “this desktop kit is brilliant, a few years ago it would have been outrageously expensive to do this kind of thing” in front of their client. A couple of day later I had the production manager on my back because the client had said to her that I’d said that their kit was cheap! Managed to smooth it over ok (I think), but since then I don’t like to talk about anything to do with price and I’ll only guide someone to a directory where they can find a list of companies (if it’s a company they’re after) or agencies (if they’re looking for freelancers) if they specifically ask me to. Open your mouth and it’s way too easy to get misunderstood or misquoted.

[Andrew Rendell]

The thing to do is set up the effect on one clip, tweaking the filter(s) to your liking, then copy that clip, loop the rest of the clips and Past Attributes onto them (selecting filters in the check box).

[Andrew Rendell]

Last time I did that I used an A57 through an A84 (Abekas kit in a tape suite, does anyone remember those?), so it was dead easy because that’s exactly the kind of thing that those DVEs (ADO, Quantel,Charisma, etc) did routinely. I’m pretty sure that the original was actually stop frame animated on film. I reckon it’s a bit too much for FCP (thinking of the light shading on the curl in particular) – I think you need to use Motion (or AE) for it.

[Andrew Rendell]

I don’t know (interesting thought though).

At the end of last year I had to provide 2 versions of the same items both on tape and electronically, so I made one set (the ones going to tape) normally, i.e., 16-235, then made the electronic versions and encoded them to the specs I was given. As the specs didn’t mention the video levels I didn’t alter them, so they got 16-235, and they passed tech review. So I guess I’ll stick with 16-235 until told otherwise…

[Andrew Rendell]

I vaguely recall that if you uncheck the “Use Logged Clip Settings” and have all the tracks selected in the Log and Capture window it’ll take in all the tracks.