[Austin Reedy]

we have a second drive, so backing up the digital files is the best bet there.

the problem is that since they were shooting two cameras without shared audio, the time of day TC was used so that syncing would be easier. the thought was that no matter how many times each of them turned off the camera, the next time it came on, the time of day TC would have kept running, so it would be easy to find (within a couple seconds) where everything was supposed to go. Also it would have allowed the tapes as back up.

the method i’ve started using (thanks to apple fcp forum genius meg the dog) is using the DV start/stop function to create markers of where the TC breaks. making subclips from those, then using pluraleyes to sync the bulk of everything. my only issue so far is the dv start/stop seems to be creating more segments than are actually there….something i havent figured out yet.

any ideas regarding this new thing i’m trying?

Thanks!

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

Yes and Yes. I was told that having overlapping in and out points for the subclips (by overlapping i mean shared) may effect it, but i changed them and had no luck.

Austin

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

Yes, that’s the impression i get from a lot of people. unfortunately at this point in the project we’ve got too much stuff to go back and standardize everything (i just started a month ago, its been a work in progress for 3+ years). so since most of the stuff ISNT ProRes I’m just trying to make everything we get from this point on the standard, so at least that stuff is easier to work with. Too much time to go back and convert everything, so it’ll just be a situation we have to deal with when we lock later.

thanks for all the answers!

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

Correct me if i’m wrong, but we’re working in FCP 6.0.6 and i think proxy and lt and the variations were developed for fcp 7 right? in any case, the other reason we’re wanting to convert stuff to prores is simply to reduce render time and create a little more fluidity when we’re editing. with so many formats as we have, any chance we have to standardize things in the most remote way is something we like. if we get compressed sample files from a source we’ll often just compress them to prores to save on render time, even though they’re larger files than the originals we’ve received.

however, once we start getting some more source material (like the beta sp we just received) is it worth our while to capture it prores as opposed to uncompressed? will this have any effect on how easily we finish the movie? what i mean by that is if we have beta sp tape captured prores will we be able to apply something to it to take it back to its highest resolution? or does that only work if we capture uncompressed, then apply the prores codec through compressor? does that make sense?

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

Thanks for the response.

We do have higher res stuff in the project. It basically consists of a bit of HD footage and some 3d animations (also in HD). We’re editing in ProRes to retain a good look from that stuff, and everything else is a myriad of formats and sizes and frame rates that’s totally complicated, but we’re basically just stretching the SD varieties to fit the ProRes sequences.

As to Uncompressed 10 bit SD vs. ProRes:

We’re told (by someone I don’t know, a while ago) that ProRes would stand up to color correction better than uncompressed would, and I’ve recently been told on the apple forums this is false. As for the difference between HQ and normal ProRes, since we have no footage bigger than HD it seems that there is no point in using it. We want this to play on a movie screen however, does that make a difference? My gut tells me no because its more for editing huge formats as opposed to outputting them.

Sorry if this is confusing, I’m learning ProRes as I go and feeling that I’m failing to grasp its purpose.
Thanks for the insights!

Austin

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

Hi Jason,

I’m actually currently dealing with a similar issue, only we have about 8 more formats to juggle, however the question we’re still trying to answer is the best way to take multiple formats and make them co-exist peacefully. While I don’t have an answer for you in that respect, I can give you a little info on how I’ve been working with organizing within FCP so hopefully you can find a good method for yourself.

Basically, everything is divided in FCP currently by source. While some sources are the same format, we’re divided by source mainly to retain the integrity of our sources. In other words, a: we dont want to leave something out since we’re referencing so many things, it’d be unfortunate to lose credibility by misquoting our source material, and b: because much of our footage currently is sample footage (meaning we have low res, timecode burned versions that we are editing with, only to online with the purchased footage later) so we need to know exactly what we’re editing with so we can order the right stuff later.

My suggestion for organization is to make sure (either in FCP or in your outside storage) to retain all that information first so that its not lost. From there, I’ve essentially created sequences that correspond to various topics that we’re discussing in the film, and from there I go through the source footage and select portions using in and out points, and then insert these selections into the sequences. This allows me to have specific stuff in sequences (further divided using text slugs) so when editing we can just go look for character b in sequence 2 or whatever, and pull in any footage of that person we want. Its similar to using sub clips, however this process allows us to link back directly to the source clip, so we don’t lose any of the information as to where the stuff came from.

Hopefully this makes sense, good luck on organizing your project, and if you find anything out about how to work with multi format stuff let me know, as we’re still trying to get a handle on all our stuff and how to edit it.

best,

austin

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

You were right to assume so, we’re working in FCP 6.0.6. It does allow multiple formats to be viewed in the timeline, but rendering is required, so I’m not sure if there’s a setting that allows us to deal with that, but as of now when I drop multiple formats into a sequence it requires rendering for anything different.

As for our “majority”, we unfortunately don’t have one, so that’s what’s making the decision regarding standardization more difficult. Ultimately the director wants to output at ProRes, so I’m thinking (since space isn’t really an issue for us) that standardizing the footage to ProRes before a lot of editing starts is a good idea, since it allows us to work without rendering and also gives us a clearer idea of how all the different sizes and aspect ratios look together in the final output setting. However, its just a matter of doing it, which of course is a serious endeavor. If nothing else, like you said, we’re thinking dropping everything down to 24 is going to be a good idea, since we have PAL stuff, NTSC stuff, and some film as well, so 24 is our LCD.

I suppose I’m just trying to get an idea of how others who’ve worked in multi formats would tackle this problem, I’m just assuming that its going to be lengthy but worthwhile to standardize everything before too much editing gets done, just because when everything is said and done we’ll be standardizing what we edited anyways, so it would be less complicated to do it now. Does this make sense? I hope so. I think I’m getting what you’re suggesting, but if you have any other ideas please let me know. Thanks a lot!

Austin

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

My main concern with throwing everything together and rendering later is that I can’t watch the video clips that are different from the sequence settings. This is why I’m trying to find a codec or a format that i can compress everything to, that retains original sizes, changes everything to 24, and doesn’t lose quality. I’m not really sure what the best route is with this. Essentially there isn’t really any predominant footage, so picking one over the other to be the timeline setting isn’t really beneficial.

I’m hoping that either ProRes or another codec (that requires less space since most of our stuff isn’t HD) would work, and then for things that are smaller than HD I can select 4×3 padding to allow them to retain their size with pillarboxes so that they don’t require rendering.

I also have to admit I’m not sure what you’re suggestion is, I think you’re suggesting that I edit without rendering, but I am unaware of how to do that and be able to watch the edit without rendering, because when I have unrendered stuff it says “unrendered when I watch in the timeline. As for the handles in Media Manager, I have to admit I also don’t really know what you’re suggesting with that. Sorry to be ignorant of your help, but if you could maybe give a little more information that’d be great, thanks!

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

Considering recent information I’ve read: Is there any purpose in compressing all my footage to Apple Pro Res 422? I’m wondering if my only real worry is frame rate, but otherwise isn’t ProRes intended only for editing with HD stuff? Most of my footage isn’t HD so it seems using ProRes as the standardizing compression would be pointless…help!?

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX

[Austin Reedy]

I will try this with Cinema Tools. So far I’ve just used Compressor. The strange thing is that when I compress the DV PAL stuff to ProRes 422 leaving the Frame Rate alone, there is no rendering issue in FCP. I don’t know why, I expected it, but since nothing’s there I’m not really sure what FCP thinks is going on. When I check the clip’s information, it says the footage is still 25 fps.

As I said before, my biggest concern is the footage slowing down or speeding up when exporting it from FCP. I guess regardless of what it thinks or says, I should export a test sequence, and see what the footage looks like. I can better describe my problems (if any are left) after doing this. Thanks!

Austin Reedy
Freelance Post
Austin, TX