[David Eaks]

A correction to my post-

Thumbnails and Quicklook in Finder still work with Motion 4 project files. It’s just Motion 5 project files that show as “media missing” in finder, even though the project is in fact OK.

[David Eaks]

Down convert with hardware, I’m very happy with the results from both my Matrox MXO2 boxes and AJA Ki Pro.

Or

Down convert to SD before compressing to Mpeg. Doing both down conversion and compression at the same time is too much at once.

[David Eaks]

[emily martiny] ” I used current settings”

Good 🙂

[emily martiny] “Hitachi HTS545025B9SA02, should I search for a computer that has a higher serial ATA?”

It looks like that is a 250GB 1.5Gb/s 5400 rpm drive, not ideal for video work. FWIW, last year I installed the OWC Data doubler in my MBP. One drive for the OS and apps, the other for media (both drives are WD Scorpio Black, WD5000BEKT). I’m very happy with it.

[emily martiny] “I have about 70 GB free on my hard drive”

The closer the drive gets to full capacity, the slower the performance. A typical rule of thumb is don’t go above 80% capacity.

[emily martiny] “I also have a G raid I can play from and will test the file there tonight.”

I’m hoping the Prores will play smoothly from your G.

[David Eaks]

Excellent, I’d be very interested in hearing people’s experience with FCPX 10.0.4 and the updated Matrox drivers. I skipped out on even trying the the first round of “Broadcast Monitoring”. Hopefully it useable now.

[David Eaks]

Thanks for the reply, they look nice but don’t fit my needs. I record events with a two camera setup. I always have a table for my equipment, consisting of a video switcher, audio mixer, two ~20″ TVs (a record and a preview/mulitview) and now, my new Ki Pro to record.

My main problem is that the cheap Vizio TVs I’m using now look washed out when viewing the HDMI output of the Ki Pro but the same tv looks fine from the switchers output. Being that the Ki Pro out is my main record monitor, I need it to look “normal”. I’m not doing ultra-color-critical type work and just need a “good enough” solution to judge framing, focus and iris.

All advice is much appreciated.

[David Eaks]

What great timing, I just finished a clean install of Lion and all my apps, plugins etc. then came to browse the COW afterward. I didn’t even notice that it was 10.0.4 during installation and I don’t have any unfinished projects in FCPX to worry about updating. Perfect!

I installed both FCPX and 7 (with my preferred method of X, Motion 5 & Compressor 4 first. Move them to a new folder in Applications, then install FCS 3 to the default location). I noticed that Motion 4 project file thumbnails are showing up in Finder and that quick look works as well. Motion 5 project files still show “Media Missing” as before. Was this always the case? I didn’t think either Motion 4 or 5 projects files were showing thumbnails or quick look before (when both versions are installed, of course). If this is something that was “fixed” in the Motion 5 update, I would have thought that it would fix Motion 5 projects not Motion 4…

[David Eaks]

Was the original media and the project file copied to a new drive, which was then given to you to work with on your computer? If so, the FCP project “expects” the media to be on the original drive, which is not connected. You then have to “tell” FCP that the media is now located on a different drive. If the drives both have the same name, and the file path to the media is the same, the media should say connected… I’m pretty sure.

You can select multiple files that need to be reconnected. After reconnecting one, all others in the same location will automatically reconnect as well. Which can save you a lot of time if your doing them one at a time right now.

*EDIT*

Because I quickly skimmed your post I failed to notice the whole point of the question, regarding “unspecified path”. Don’t think I’ve ever seen that before and I have no idea why it happened. Sorry.

[David Eaks]

I agree with the high bitrate YouTube settings, only because you say that your MacBook Pro can’t playback the Prores file smoothly. Some questions-

1) Was the export from FCP using: File> Export with “current settings”?
2) What is the MacBooks internal hard drive model (open Utilities> System Information> Hardware> Serial-ATA)?
3) Is the drive near full capacity?
4) Do you have a FW800 external drive that you could play the Prores file from?

If an HDDVD plays fine in your MacBook Pro and looks great when projected during the event, well, I guess it gets the job done but it is a dead format and should just be disregarded IMO.

When doing lots of tests like this, just use a short piece of the video. This way encodes, conversions, burns etc. don’t take very long and therefore you can find the method that works best for your situation, much more quickly.

[David Eaks]

As Sean said, try exporting with “current settings”, forget QT conversion. Choose File> Export and use “current settings”. If time/filesize are an issue uncheck “self-contained” to export a Reference movie, which is not itself a video file but it references your original media. It exports a tiny file very fast (I treat reference movies as disposable, one time use files just for opening in compressor and making files for Youtube, Blu-ray etc. Reference movies are NOT suitable for archiving or sharing).

Open the resulting file in compressor and apply the appropriate setting for YouTube/Vimeo in the “Video Sharing Services” folder. If you will be doing this often, especially if it is longer form video, I highly recommend Matrox MAX/Compress HD to accelerate creating the H.264.

[David Eaks]

Before installing FCP 7, create a new folder in Applications and name it Final Cut Pro X. Move FCP X into this folder (also move Motion 5 and Compressor 4 if you have installed them).

In my experience, installing X before 7 has been more stable than installing FCP 7 first, then FCP X (during installation of FCP X, it will automatically move FCP 7 into a new folder within Applications).

Of course, you can’t run both 7 & X at the same time.

Be aware that with two versions of Motion installed, the thumbnail image for all Motion project files will show “media missing”, instead of an image of the project. Also you cannot quicklook to preview a Motion project file before opening. I think using the “Open in Editor” function in FCP 7 to open a Motion 4 project will open Motion 5, prompting you to update the project file (if I do update the project, I always choose to open as a new project instead of altering the original project file). Things like this can be irritating, but are not completely detrimental and Motion still functions as expected otherwise.

Your other option is to install to a separate partition, you will have to reboot to switch between FCP 7 and FCP X installations. While this is the recommended method, I much prefer having both installed on the same drive/partition.

Here is a link to the guide by David Roth Weiss, for installing each on their own partitions-
https://podcasts.creativecow.net/final-cut-studio-podcast/get-ready-to-rumble-perfect-setup-for-a-seamless-transition-to-fcp-x-and-os-x-lion