Bryson Jones
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That’s exactly the kind of thing I was thinking of.
The translation of the XML might not be too easy, but you could play around with it and see.
If you select a clip with event markers and export as “CatDV XML File”, you will get the XML layout of your metadata, including the event markers.
Take a look at that and you should see what you need to produce the import into your other program.
bryson
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It is totally possible to do this. It depends a bit on how you choose to create the subtitles. I’d almost do them as event markers instead so you’d have individual “bits” to export to your format but I’m assuming you already have your format ready. But I’d probably avoid the “Verbatim Logger” unless you were then creating subclips or something like that. You could end up with a long text file that might, or might not serve your needs depending on how the subtitler imports.
CatDV is based on ths Final Cut Pro XML standard so you can go a million ways with it. If you have someone on your crew who’s decent with XML, they can do all sorts of translations. The Worker node can automate the translation of XML into other formats, or if you don’t have the Worker, that can also be done in various scripting languages, depending on your skill set and the amount of footage you have to do this to. (XML can be manually edited, but of course that gets tedious in about 2 minutes. lol)
If you don’t want to fool around with it, You could also contact Squarebox or JB&A (the distributor) and they could get you a dealer or integrator who could just provide this as a solution for you.
bryson
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First, 10GB ethernet is probably more expensive than fibre at this point. Marketing folks like to let you get into it with the “ethernet is cheap, right?” thought.
The Small Tree 20 port 10Gb is $17,000 and you can get a qlogic 16 port 4Gb fibre switch for under $5k. HBA’s are priced about the same now.
However, that has no bearing on CatDV. The product doesn’t care where the media is, only that the catalog is created on a machine that can see it. Then, unless you want to have it live all the time, you can put the media away or disconnect it. For instance, if you had media on a firewire drive, you’d connect it to a system, catalog it, maybe create a proxy onto a server share or NAS (we’re talking 1Gb ethernet) and then publish that catalog to the server. When a machine connects to the CatDV server, if it doesn’t have the original drive mounted, it shows the proxy, if it has the server share mounted. If it doesn’t have either, it shows you the thumbnails, all the metadata and of course shows you the path to where the file is so you can mount it.
I’ve done CatDV on systems from 2.5″ portable hard drives to 100’s of TB’s of fibre storage. They work the same, it’s just how big and how fast.
Pick your storage to make your editing work, get an idea of what your initial proxy/footage needs are, and then your CatDV integrator should be able to help you pick the expensive stuff (editorial storage) and then the less expensive stuff (proxy storage).
Let Matt on here know if you need a demo, it’s easier to see this than to explain it, but basically, “Storage Independent” is the term to remember.
By the way, If you have less than 4 seats, you can get a small volume based fibre SAN together for less than $20k. (less if you don’t need much room) If you’re working compressed, you can get an ethernet based system for similar money (Final Share etc). Look around on the other boards here for storage solution ideas.
bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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Matt S., the main dude for US distribution, is in your area so I’m sure he can get you hooked up with someone solid. I’ll email him for you.
bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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If you’re looking for experiences, I’m not sure if there are folks on here who’ve used Fork that I know of, but I’m curious too.
Also check over on Xsanity.com, they may have some guys.
If you’re looking for consulting, I have several associates I could refer as well as a former B4M employee who is now freelance.
B4M can also usually give you clients to talk to but I do know it’s a bit more involved than the typical CatDV integration.
bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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Paul, are you asking to print all of the records in like a long listing, one after another?
Matt’s post lays out the single item print and that’s pretty powerful, but if you need to do the whole project as you suggest, it might be worth looking into a more automated output method, depending on the number of clips/records you have.
If so, there’s not specifically a “bulk print” in the program, but you could do a couple of things.
1 – Make a custom view in the “views” preference that would then output as tab separated text, so you could drop it into excel or another program for styling and or printing. (this is good if you need to do a few records in a batch.
2 – Create an XML translation that would give you the text out of your records, either by manual export from client or automated by the Worker. This could then live on the web, or be printed, or brought into another database, if the person wanted to view or print it in another way. We’ve been working with this to generate auto updated reports to the web, as things are marked “completed”, for instance.
If you have the worker, this can be automated, if you don’t you can use a shell script with a drop folder to pick up the XML and publish it.
As in all things in the asset management world, it’s a matter of how much do you need to do and how far do you want to go?
bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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If the script is run in the Worker, there’s a way to deliver the stdout of the command to a field. Check the variables in the “help” button.
Otherwise, you would be writing to the db directly from the CLI through MySQL.
Probably not supported, certainly not blessed by Squarebox, but likely rewarding. 😉
If you’ll run me through that Atempo voodoo you guys are doing I’d be happy to show you some of the stuff that we’re doing down here in Sunny SoCal.
bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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Dude, thank you. I was wanting to test this and just haven’t ever had the time. (common complaint in our world?)
Excellent info.
I’ve been using a mix of mp4 and h.264 for larger installs (and easy ipad/iphone compatability, but photoJPEG is the king for reality TV where I need frame accuracy for stringing out cuts.
Has anyone out there found anything that’s frame accurate but better/smaller than photoJ? I’d love to lose it.
bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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I’ve not heard anything in a while about this. Of course that doesn’t mean it’s not somewhere in the deep corners of the shop. 😉
As it is, if you need geotagging info, just take an iphone pic on set and then merge it into the media when you get home. (catdv picks up the info when you import a tagged item)
But field logging would be nice on the iPad, don’t you think? 😉
bryson
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I’ve not seen it, but it’s an interesting case. Windows importing files so the paths come from that side. My Win shops are mostly either browse only or all windows.
Rolf, can you speak to this one?bryson
bryson “at” hidefcowboy.com
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