[Dan Nocera]

After Effects will always be my favorite piece of software because it is the one piece of software that has vividly shown me the effects of Moore’s law through a simple render test. . .

I have been using After Effects since 1998. I think I started using version 3.1 and I rendered on a Powermac which I had over-clocked to a whopping 333Mhz!
I was also a big fan of Brian Maffitt’s Total AE Training Series in those early years! Thank God for his training series on VHS!! Still got them somewhere.

Since the late nineties to this day a few of my production buddies and I (Jeff, Keith, & Pete) have been performing a “Render Test” every time one of us upgraded our computers or got a new mac. The render test consists of standard def comp with a 800×1042 JPEG that slides across the screen for ten seconds with frame blending turned on.

In 1999 it took my feeble Powermac 26 Minutes and 44 seconds to render this simple 10 second comp.
That same year after upgrading to a $3K Blue Ice Board it rendered in a blazing 20 Minutes 39 Seconds!
In 2001 on a Blue and White G3 it rendered in 17 Minutes
In 2002 on a G4 it rendered in 8 Minutes
In 2006 on a dual core G5 it rendered in 1 minute
In 2009 on a quad core Intel Xeon in 10 Seconds

Over the years I’ve often wondered when computers would be fast enough to do our simple render test in real time.

In 2012 it rendered on a Quad Core iMac in 5 Seconds. Finally faster than real time.

Happy Birthday AE! Maybe someday we won’t need to render. . .

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

If you’re shooting with a Z1u -HDV Codec (25Mbps) and a GH1- AVCHD Codec (17Mbps) then you don’t need to transcode to the full pro res codec, especially the HQ version – unless you plan on doing heavy compositing or multiple layer passes on the video.

You should be using Pro Res LT(102Mbps) or Pro Res Proxy(45Mbps).

You won’t gain any perceptible quality by transcoding Standard ProRES(146Mbps) or ProRES(HQ) 220Mbps since your original material was 25Mbps and 17Mbp. You’ll just get massive file sizes.

Also FCP can handle HDV natively and if you go into your sequence settings and change the render codec to pro res then you’ll get acceptable render times – instead of the dreaded Conforming HDV render messages.

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

If you’re shooting sports the higher the framerate, the smoother the motion will look. Most video clips on the web are either 30P(Actually 29.97), 25p or 24P(Actually 23.98). High end HD cameras can also shoot 50i, 60i, 60P and even higher for slow-motion. I’ve personally yet to see a website deliver streaming video in 60P. . . Most do 30P or less.

As far as what frame rate your FCP sequence should – you said you’ll ultimately be making an NTSC DVD so that means either 29.97 or 23.98. Since its sports I’d go with the higher frame rate 29.97.

However, you left out one important piece of information- you never said whether they shot progressive or interlaced. So that would be the first thing to find out. If its progressive then you’re all set. If it’s interlaced then you’re H.264 clip was actually shot in 60i. Which has a frame rate of 29.97 but gives you 60 interlaced frames per second through the magic of interlacing. Great if you’ll be broadcasting the video but not so great for the web. The web is a Progressive medium. Television has been and still is an interlaced medium for the most part think (Live sports and News) The other clip that’s 25fps could also either be interlaced (50i) or Progressive (25P). So find that out too.

Sascha is also correct in that the avi file will give you problems in FCP. The other MOV file might also give you problems since it was captured with iMovie.

If the shooters can’t recapture and give you files FCP is happy with (MOV) then you could always convert them both NTSC ProRes Mov’s.

The 25Fps clip is Pal so you’ll have to look up how to convert PAL to NTSC using compressor.

Frame size in FCP should be clip based on the clip with the largest size. Then when you transcode the other clips in compressor just scale them up to the proper frame size and frame rate and pro-res codec.

I always work at the highest quality that way when you output for DVD or the web it ultimately looks better. . .

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

I’ve had to replace /library/quicktime/DesktopVideoOut.component (updated version 1.2.6) on both an OCTO mac and my Macbook Pro after running the Pro Applications Update 2009-01.

Just know that after you downgrade to the FCP 7 “DesktopVideoOut.component” version 1.2.5 your software update will want to reinstall the Pro Applications Update 2009-01 again – breaking desktop playback again – so you’ll have to ignore that update until Apple fixes the problem.

Here’s the file- You have to unzip it first before dragging it to
/library/quicktime

https://public.me.com/dan_o

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

If Teague shot in HDV isn’t the regular Pro Res codec even over-kill? I thought the new Pro Res LT was the best choice for transcoding from HDV because its just about double the bit rate of HDV – 50Mbits. Of course I’m assuming Teague has FCP 7. . .

Another thought- If you want the 60i footage to look its best you should de-interlace it using compressor instead of de-interlacer in FCP. You can batch convert all of the footage after you have captured it. Just pull the footage into compressor and use the quicktime pro res preset. In the third tab in the inspector turn the frame controls on. Set the OUTPUT FIELDS to progressive and deinterlace to better (or best if you have a few days free for rendering) Un-check adaptive details.

I’ve found that compressor does a better job of deinterlacing(set on better or best) than FCP. Final cut will deinterlace the 60i footage simply by pulling it into a 30P timeline but it will be the equivalent of compressor’s FAST(Line Averaging) setting . . .

There are plugins that you can also use in FCP like Nattress Smart Deinterlace instead- but you have to render to playback.

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

I was experimenting with ichat theater feature last night and found that you need to launch ichat first and connect to your buddy. Then launch FCP and start sharing. I had problems when I tried doing it the other way around. I was using my macbook pro with an external iSight camera because my internal microphone wasn’t working . . .

It worked pretty well – My buddy said the sound cut out a few times during playback. Pausing, rewinding fixed it however. I also liked that when I double clicked a clip to trim and it opened in the viewer he could see the viewer’s output as well! Very neat new feature indeed!

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

I used the new “share” command in Final Cut Studio 3.

Final Cut Studio 3 includes Final Cut 7 and Compressor 3.5. which let you now output blu-ray discs through the “Share” commmand and with Compressor’s new template menu or Job actions tab.

It seems that all share command is really doing is giving you some pre-built compressor templates(Blu-ray, DVD,Youtube, Mobileme etc) that let out output a FCP sequence by rendering IN THE BACKGROUND- So you can keep editing in Final cut while it outputs and in the case of blu-ray – author and burn a simple disc with menu and chapter index!

I think is the best new feature in Final Cut Studio 3.

The “share” command is located in the file menu. The “Export using Compressor” command has been moved to the bottom left of the “share” menu. Anything you can do in the share menu you can also do in compressor 3.5 with the new “Job Actions” tab such as outputting blu-ray disc or AVCHD Discs on DVD-R.

You are pretty limited in how customized the blu-ray disc will look but for most jobs it’s great.

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

I guess they did come out with a driver update. . . I just couldn’t find it

Try here.

https://www.sony.ca/promedia/drivers.htm

At the bottom of this page it says

“The New MacBook Pro released after October 2008 is supported.”

Version 1034300

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

It doesn’t fix it yet. It’s December 2008 but the new driver from Sony hasn’t appeared yet. . .

However, I have figured out a workaround that lets Late 2008 Mac Book Pro users use the ExpressCard/34 expansion slot to ingest from SxS cards.
I get almost 8X transfer rates with a 2.8Ghz MBP with 4Gb RAM so its really worth it if you have extensive media to capture. I get 4X with USB transfers.

Install the SxS driver – and instead of restarting – Force Quit the SxS driver installer. Pop your SxS card into the ExpressCard/34 expansion slot – It will mount now. Then just run the XDCAM Transfer program. When done transferring – Run the SxS driver installer and UN-Install the driver.

At this point you’ll have to restart you MBP, but you just cut your transfer time in half so who cares!

The Slow-down bug only crops up for me when restarting after SxS driver installation.

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie

[Dan Nocera]

Did the transfer house give you the the transfered footage dv on tapes or did you get it on a hard drive as quicktime files?

DV footage should always be 720X480. You said it was listed in a browser as 720X486 which is the size for CCIR 601 uncompressed video.

It sounds like it was captured wrong with the wrong preset.
If that was the case just throw out and recapture using DV NTSC preset

It’s also why you have to render everytime you pull it into a dv sequence.

Try opening one of the clips in quicktim and get info and then get properties and see what it says.
What is the frame rate listed as?
See what it says especially under format.

If it says DV/DVCPRO – NTSC, 720 x 480, Millions under format
and 29.97 for FPS
and 720X486 pixels under normal size (wrong size)

Try going into properties ->video track->visual settings and uncheck preserve aspect box and change scale size to 720X480
then save a self contained copy of the footage, import new footage and see if that fixes the glitching problem

Dan Nocera
CTFCPUG Moderator

If all else fails give it a whack!!
-Anonymous Techie