[Andy Mees]

shooting DV is not recommended for Chroma Keying work … basically how well its shot / lit can make or break it
still, whats done is done, so moving on, have a look at these:
https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/chroma_key_part_1.html
https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/chroma_key_part_2.html

[Andy Mees]

> for a thirty second commercial, it takes about 5 minutes to conform on my Mac Pro Quad 3.0

wow, just for comparison, it take sme about 7 minutes to conform 2’30” of XDCAM HQ on my MBP 2.16 Core Duo (w/ 1 gig of ram)

[Andy Mees]

exporting directly to AVI only works with NTSC, it does not work in PAL (video stream is corrupted with duplicate frames)
i see that you are working with NTSC … just posting this for reference

[Andy Mees]

very simple if you have some basic programming knowledge:

all you’re doing, potentially, is reading in a tab delimited file, and placing the contents into predefined text generator containers, and saving that back out.

if you ave a basic understanding of applescript (or can use google and are willing to learn) then theres nothing very special about doing this.

the fcp xml manual is here: [developer.apple.com]
there is all you need to know about reading and writing text file’s and using delimiters here: [www.macscripter.net]

there, now you don’t even need google!

[Andy Mees]

>so we get the QTs in h264 with linear pcm audio (non compress) from production/ editors in another place so we get DVDs with the QT and the OMF.

don’t know if my 2c will help here, but it sounds like our audio inclined friend is at a remote location from the video work.
it seems the reason the video guys are spending so much time and energy compressing the video in h.264 (a delivery format) is that they are having to fit on a DVD … DV is probably not an option.

given that you just have to repurpose the the file in multiple formats, and don’t actually need to “edit” anything, then FCP may not be the tool you need.
“Episode” from Telestream, as mentioned below, might be a better bet, given its ability to add BITC (Burnt-In Time Code)

[Andy Mees]

here’s a good place to start the learning: https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/fcp_homepage_index.html#audio

[Andy Mees]

Well you seem to have a handle on the crux of it … as of the time of writing, there is no way within FCP to mix formats in the timeline AND take advantage of the tapeless workflow.
Couple of choices:
1) forget shooting in HQ and instead use SP on your XD’s … you’ll still be getting far superior pictures to the run of the mill HDV, due to the better chips and pro optics with that camera. if you shoot SP then you can mix both footages on a native HDV timeline without any need for transcoding or rendering. this is your all tapeless workflow solution.
2) use a third party capture card to convert one (or both) of the acquisition formats to a common one, for editing.
3) look to an alternate NLE, one that can mix formats.
or
4) you can hope like hell, along with the rest of us, that Apple (or whoever) finally addresses the mixed format issue in FCP, in one way or another, at next month’s NAB shindig.

cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

in addition to DRW’s advice, remember that if you take it to a facilities house to get it arc’d you will likely end up with a center cut or other one size fits all crop of the originla 16:9 … so if the center of focus in the composition of a specific clip is to the right or left of the frame, then that action might be completely lost.

Duplicate your timeline and change remove the anamorphic checkbox flag in the sequence settings of the duplicated …. now you’ll have a 4:3 sequence but every clip will be vertically stretched.
If your edit is relatively straightforward, then you may not have added any “basic motion” or “distortion” to any of the clips (?). If thats the case then double-click the first clip, to load it into the viewer window; switch to the motion tab, and change the Basic Motion > Scale property to 133, and the Distort > Aspect Ratio property to -33. That clip should now look like a center cut 4:3 version of the original 16:9 clip. Now copy that clip (CMD-C) then select all the other clips in the sequence and press OPT-V, thats “Paste Attributes” …. in the Paste Attributes dialog, deslect ALL checkboxes first, then add a checkmark to the Distort checkbox only, and press OK.
Now the whole edit should look like a center cut 4:3 version of the original 16:9 edit.

Thats the easy bit done. Now switch your canvas to View > Image + Wireframe mode, and move through your edit, clip by clip, reframing as necessary by clicking and dragging directly on the image in the Canvas window.
Note: for best results, some clips may need further scaling, or may need to have the framing keyframed throughout the clip.

[Andy Mees]

Time Code Reader can be used on a nested sequence, to show the time code of the original sequence.

[Andy Mees]

soundtrack pro has many preloaded sound effects that you can modify to fit your needs. take at look at this tutorial:
https://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/quicktours/?quicktours/audio/qt_stpro_3_snd_design