[Ben Insler]

Two things.

If you’re using Apple’s recent interconnectivity and hot swap features (like importing a LiveType file directly into FCP rather than exporting a quicktime) and compositing graphics you’ve made in FCP, you have to remember that the production software bundle was designed to understand the specifics of each application’s project settings. For example, FCP and read motion’s project (it doesn’t just look at it as a quicktime movie), so it can tell where motion was assigning alpha values. This is very different from just importing a motion graphics with embedded alphas.

Second, Noah is right – of you’re just importing a graphic (motion or still) with an alpha, you have to tell your software that the alpha is there AND tell it what kind of compositing mode was used in creating this alpha this alpha (straight or premultiplied). Many packages will try to take a guess, but frequently the guess is not correct. Also, as Noah said, be sure you’re exporting your quicktime with an alpha-compatable. If including an alpha is a greyed out option in your export options, then your clip cannot have an embedded alpha.

Don’t forget that most video editing software allows you to composite fill and matte channels together, so you could always export separate fill and matte channels.

Best,

Ben

[Ben Insler]

Thanks Noah. Good advice. Any particularities about integration with Final Cut Pro?

[Ben Insler]

Probably changed your Kona Settings, or more accurately your capture settings in FCP (which controls the Kona when FCP is open). Make sure the Capture/Input in your Log and Capture settings is set to a DigiBeta-compatable input (as in “AJA Kona3: 525 29.97 8 Bit)

[Ben Insler]

Does the clip play in the canvas window but not on your external monitor, or not at all? If you open the clip in the viewer (From the timeline) does it play in the viewer. My first reaction – trash your prefs… but that’s not necessarily the answer yet.

-Ben

[Ben Insler]

[Jarko Romanesko] “When a clip is inserted in the timeline and I change the sequence settings, the changes are not applied until I re-inserted that clip in the time line. (first I have to delete that clip)”

Yes, sometimes you do have to change sequence settings, and there’s a quick fix for you… but first, I’ll explain for a second – I always find it’s easier to troubleshoot later if you know what FCP is doing, so here goes…

When your clip and sequence settings don’t match (as in aspect ratio, resolution, pixel aspect, etc.), FCP has procedural functions that fit mismatched footage into sequences. For example, if you put a DV Anamorphic clip into a DV 4:3 sequence, FCP detects that the clip is anamorphic and automatically scales the clip vertically (but not horizontally) so that the anamorphic clip is displayed in its proper aspect ratio within the 4:3 sequence (thus letterboxing). This happens with any media, so if you put DVCPRO HD in a DV sequence, it scales the DVCPRO HD down, and then squashes it vertically so that the entire 16:9 HD clip is displayed, in 16:9, in the 4:3 sequence…yada yada yada. All of this information is contained in the Motion tab when a clip from the timeline is opened in the viewer, and so here is where your problem lies: When you place media in a not-corresponding timeline, the motion attributes of that clip are change for the affiliate clip in the timeline. If you change the Sequence settings, FCP does not change the motion tab attributes of clips in the timeline. It leaves your clips the way they are (and this is a GOOD thing, I promise).

Ok, enough backgorund. Here’s your fix. Let’s use a DV 4:3 sequence with DVCPRO HD footage place into it, thus scaled down and distorted to be letterbox with the full image displayed in the smaller screen space. If you change the sequence settings to DV Anamorphic, our footage will not be affected, but the sequence display will, so now we get what appears to be a letterboxed image inside a pilliarbox (because the DVCPRO HD footage is formatted to fit in the DV 4:3 canvas. To fix this, Take an original master DVCPRO HD clip from your browser (can be any clip…even the master clip of the same clip in your sequence), and drop it in your sequence in the timeline (with the now changed sequence settings). This clip will now scale/distort properly for your new settings. Copy the clip you just dropped into the sequence(command+C), then select the old clip in the timeline. “Remove Attributes” (command+option+V) and choose to remove the “Basic Motion” and “Distort” attributes. This will alter the clip to display at its native settings in the canvas/sequence. Then “Paste Attributes” on this clip (option+V) and paste “Basic Motion” and “Distort,” thus pasting the attributes from the new, correctly formatted clip onto the old clip. You can select, remove, and paste attributes from multiple clips at a time, just select all similar clips at once and you should be all set. NOTE HOWEVER, that this will affect any keys that have been placed in the “Basic Motion” and “Distort” parameters.

Hope this helps.

Ben

[Ben Insler]

First, be sure that all your render flags (if that’s what they’re actually called) are checked. Go to you sequence menu and put a check mark next to EVERYTHING in the “Render Selection” and “Render All” fields. If there is something here that is not checked, FCP will not render it when you render the timeline. But, when you ETT or PTV, it will render everything to Full/Best quality – it renders these non-rendered files to a temp location and does not save them, so they must be rendered every time. Once you’ve checked all your render flags, go into each sequence and press option+R (Render all), rather than selecting your clips and pressing command+R. This will ensure that everything that you have placed in a sequence will be rendered. Do this first for the deepest sequences in your nese(s) and work outwords (so if Seq. A and Seq. B are nested in Seq. C, be sure to render A and B independently first before rendering C).

Also, if you’re using the PTV options (like slate, bars and tone, etc.) those will always render to the temp render location. This is unavlidable, so you sort of just have to deal with that or work those options into your timeline… but that render shouldn’t take 20 min.

Best,

Ben

[Ben Insler]

Sounds to me like your mac got confused when you shifted around all those cables while everything was running. Go to View::Refresh AV Devices. That should clean everything up. If not, shot down and restart with only the hardware connected that you want to use.

Best,
Ben

[Ben Insler]

Richard,

You can post an image on your website and link to it here if you want others to take a look. What was the footage shot with? PD-150 in progressive mode? It sounds to me like the footage was shot in progressive, but not TRUE progressive. Some cameras (like the pd150 I believe) duplicate fields to create an artificial frame mode, thus droping your vertical resolution in half and creating jagged edges. Unfortunately, the only real fix is a reshoot unless you have a REALLY good way to do field interpolation.

-Ben

[Ben Insler]

You can definately do this in the media manager. I can’t look into the specifics right now as I have a render running, but I’ll look into it and get back to you. If you haven’t used the media manager, read up on it in the FCP manual – You might figure the problem out quickly.

Best,

Ben

[Ben Insler]

[Alexander] “You may cancel out all the sound (sine wave on cosine wave)”

Good warning, but I’m assuming we’re either talking about captured audio that was recorded by the camera, or a professionally mixed music track. Panning the tracks wouldn’t push audio out of phase, and if the audio was out of phase I’m pretty sure it would cancel itself out whether it was panned LR or dual mono. If you’ve been running into phase/sound issues, you might want to make sure that your audio monitors are in phase.

Best,

Ben