[Andy Mees]

i’m biased towards method 2:

use a Letterbox Matte generator, add it to a new video track, adjust the framing of each clip using the standard motion tools (turn on Image + Wireframe and then just drag the clip in the canvas)

i’ve not seen any quality issues with this, and for my workflow have found it by far the quickest method.
essentially, items 3 and 4 in your list are a longer way around of doing the same thing.
you could also create a letterbox matte in Photoshop and use that.

you’re very welcome to use the Letterbox Matte generator i’ve been using, open up the FXBuilder [Tools>FXBuilder], then cut and paste the text below… create it [FXBuilder>Create Plugin…] give it a name, and save it into your /Library/Application Support/Final Cut Pro System Support/Plugins folder.

if you’d prefer i’ll just email it to you

cheers
Andy

// —————-
// Plugin Text below
// —————-

scriptid “Andy’s Letterbox” //DO NOT LOCALIZE
generator “Andy’s Letterbox”, 120;
group “Matte”;
AlphaType(kblack);

input fillcolor, “Color”, color, 0, 0, 0, 0;
input letterboxWidth, “Size”, slider, 25, 0, 100 detent 25;
input letterboxOffset, “Offset”, slider, 0, -100, 100 detent 0;
input invertAlpha, “Invert”, checkbox, 0;

InformationFlag(“dontEraseDest”)

code
exposedbackground=1;

float width, height;
point poly[4], centerpoint;

boundsOf(Dest, poly);
centerOf(poly, centerpoint);
dimensionsof(dest, width, height);

scale(poly, centerpoint, 1, (100-letterboxWidth)/100);
offset(poly, 0, (height * letterboxWidth * letterboxOffset) / 20000);

image matteBars[width][height];
channelfill(matteBars, fillcolor.a, fillcolor.r, fillcolor.g, fillcolor.b);

fillpoly(poly, Dest, kwhite);
channelCopy(Dest, Dest, KAlpha, KNone, KNone, KNone);

if !invertAlpha
InvertChannel(Dest, Dest, 1, 0, 0, 0);
end if;

channelCopy(matteBars, Dest, KNone, KRed, KGreen, KBlue);

[Andy Mees]

modern high-end RAID controllers have a feature called online capacity expansion (OCE) …. that sounds like what you’d like to do. unfortunately, the Sonnet card isn’t a RAID controller, just an SATA host bus adapter (HBA) and so doesn’t have this feature.

I think Guy’s suggestion is your best bet, unless you want/need for your media drive to appear as a single volume. If thats the case then you’ll have to backup, rebuild and restore.

Hope it helps

Andy Mees

[Andy Mees]

Hey Bret

thanks for the reply … (sadly though) i use that audio ouput assignment all the time, its not quite the ‘virtual patch bay’ i was bemoaning, and perhaps ‘patch bay’ is the wrong term

i guess what I’d like to see is a beefed up audio audio mixer tool which can let me assign audio inputs (from the timeline) to any number of audio outputs (to the deck in PTV/ETT) …. if I’m doing a four track output then I could, for example, patch A1 to A1,A3,A4 patch A2 to A2,A3,A4, patch A3 to A3 and patch A4 to A4

its not whether i could do this in an avid but just what i was looking for in FCP

perhaps i’ll add it to the fcp 6 wish list when it comes around 🙂
cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

all thigs seem to possible if you’re willing to duplicate your audio tracks in order to direct them to multiple output channels … a virtual audio patchbay seems to be missing.

of course you might also consider throwing a real mixer between FCP and your deck and doing it there
funny how these things seem to crop up in parallel eh?

cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

I can help with the encouragement … we’ve been using Apple’s Xserve RAID systems and G-TECH’s 500GB G-RAID’s since January with zero issues and no complaints so far.

wishing you luck with your purcahses
Andy

[Andy Mees]

well, the ‘scrubber’ is what i call the playhead … but that might not be what everyone else calls it.
as far as inserting a clip and getting the playhead to snap to the in-point rather than out-point i’m afraid i don’t know

best
Andy

[Andy Mees]

it sounds like either an inconsistent timecode or an unstable signal from the deck. have you tried changing cables?
have you tried capturing using just LTC or VITC or CNTRL track only

Andy

[Andy Mees]

Hi Doug

the match frame ‘F’ will match to the lowest ‘targeted’ video track (or if no video then lowest targeted audio track)
(i’m assuming you haven’t, BUT, if you have FCP 5.0 you should take a moment to review the new multiclip feature)

cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

2. probably misunderstanding despite the detailed thread, but what about scaling the canvas to acheive that ? would that work …. probably not enough control over the zoom value, but maybe woth a shot.

cheers
Andy

[Andy Mees]

hi Steve

do you have the “Abort ETT/PTV on dropped frames” setting checked?
if not it could be that you’re dropping frames … perhaps you need to force the audio to render first
try choosing Sequence > Render Only > Mixdown

hope it helps
Andy