[Don Greening]

Since everything’s moving to HD I don’t expect Canon is going to offer an XL2 replacement.

– Don

[Don Greening]

[Mark Suszko] “You know the old joke: “Did so-and-so work there?”
“Well, he was here, but I’m not sure I could say he worked …””

I’ve had phone calls from employers asking about previous employees of mine. Up here in the great white north this seems to be the way it’s done instead of sealed letters of recommendation. At least in this industry. I suppose the big corporations would be different. Employers who’ve talked to me never seem to ask the final question though, which is: “Would you ever hire this person again.” The answer speaks volumes.

You’re not alone, Mark. Todd never phones me, either. No phone calls, no cards, no letters. I’m crushed.

– Don

[Don Greening]

[claudio manni] “I just recently download a quicktime plug-in from the apple site called Calibrated{Q} MXF Import 1.2 to support some of the formats. “

If you have FCP v.6.0.4 you don’t need any other XDCAM codecs to edit EX video files. Look in FCP’s capture presets and you should see not only the standard XDCAM HD presets but also the XDCAM EX presets. There are differences between XDCAM HD and XDCAM EX codecs. Without those EX codecs listed in FCP’s capture presets you will not be able to see the clips with the Sony Transfer Tool or edit EX material in FCP.

You can use Sony’s Clip Browser software to view EX clips without having FCP on your machine. But you do need to have the following minimum software requirements:

Mac OS v.10.4.11
QT v.7.3.1
Sony FAM driver v.1.1.1

If your software meets or exceeds the above requirements then see if the Clip Browser displays your native .mp4 EX files. The Clip Browser is not for viewing EX files already converted to the MOV format, which is the codec used for editing in FCP. If it does display your .mp4 clips, but your Transfer Tool will not show your clips then there’s a problem with either the Sony Transfer Tool or with FCP itself. Claud, did you try everything out before you installed “Callibrated Q”?

Some users are reporting problems with Sony’s Transfer Tool v.2.7 depending on the OS and QT versions they’re using. It would seem that the most reliable version that works with most everything on the Mac is v.2.5.1.

– Don

[Don Greening]

[Tony Wash] “So it’s cool if I still copy all of the video files off of the SxS cards onto my hard drive so I can free space on the cards? That way when I do upgrade to FCP 6, I’ll still have the files on my computer???”

Yes, absolutely you can do that. Here’s how to go about it:

It’s highly recommended that you copy the entire folder that resides on an SxS Pro card. Whether or not the card is full doesn’t matter. There’s still only one folder on the card and it’s called the BPAV folder. You don’t have to use any programs to do this. It’s a drag and drop thing.

Insert SxS Pro card into your laptop’s Express 34 slot or connect your camera to your desktop computer via USB, whatever your workflow is. When the card icon appears on your desktop open it and drag the BPAV folder to wherever you’re going to store your transferred clips. Each destination folder should have a unique name such as card 1 > offload 1. Doesn’t matter what you use for a folder name as long as you can keep track of everything. Drag the BPAV folder into that folder. Don’t alter the BPAV folder name in any way, otherwise Sony’s Transfer Tool or Clip Browser software will not see it. Don’t alter anything inside the BPAV folder, either.

Start Sony’s Clip Browser and navigate to the BPAV folder you just copied and view all the clips making sure they’re good. You’ll also be able to hear the clip audio if you turn up the sound on your machine.
Once everything checks out drag the BPAV folder from the SxS Pro card to the trash and then empty the trash.

Each time you copy a card’s BPAV folder you must create a new folder on your destination drive with a unique name. If you try and drag it into the the same folder where you copied the first BPAV folder you will over-write it because they both have the same name. You don’t want that. Afterwards, you can even lock each folder so they don’t unintentionally get overwritten. Highlight each folder icon and hit “Cmd- I” or Get Info from the Finder’s File menu. in the window that appears put a check mark beside the word “locked”.

Now you can navigate to each BPAV folder on your hard drive using either Sony’s Clip Browser or the Transfer Tool the same way you would if the folders were still on SxS Pro cards.

This workflow is rapidly becoming known as practicing “safe SxS.”

– Don

[Don Greening]

Welcome to Creative COW, Claud.

In order to help trouble shoot your problem it would help immensely to know what computer platform and editing software you’re attempting to use. Once you provide that I would be happy to give you a hand.

– Don

[Don Greening]

Hi Tony,

The following list contains the minimum requirements to edit native EX footage with Final Cut Pro:

Mac OS v.10.4.11
Quicktime Pro v.7.3.1
Final Cut Pro v.6.0.2 (part of Final Cut Studio 2)
Sony Clip Browser v.1.0 – not required to import and edit in FCP but still important to have.
Sony Transfer Tool v.2.1
Sony FAM driver

Here’s a basic overview on how it all works:

https://library.creativecow.net/articles/greening_don/ex1.php

– Don

[Don Greening]

[Rafael Amador] “Happy to heard that the picture looks much better. I think will be mi choice. CinemaCraft is a bunch of money. “

Cinema Craft is probably the best software encoder on the market. They make a plugin for Compressor, too. But you’re right in that it’s expensive.

https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/cinema_craft_encoder.html

BitVice is working on an HD version of their encoder now and they’ll be calling it BitVice Pro. The current version is now 2.3 but it just does SD to MPEG2. The current version is Intel only but they’re reporting encoding speeds faster than real time. Good to hear. I should upgrade now but I was waiting for the HD version to come out.

– Don

[Don Greening]

[Rafael Amador] “Which version of BitVice are you working with?”

v.1.8

You caught me. Yes, it’s bit better in the way that it will do a better job on really long form stuff, whereas Compressor used to fall apart on projects longer than two hours when encoding for DVD-5. I’ve put a 3:10 hour movie on a DVD-5 encoded with BitVice that looks considerably better than a 2 hour movie from the same project encoded with Compressor. This is where BitVice really shines. I’m talking 2 pass VBR best here. Short form projects and especially CBR encodings look…….acceptable with Compressor.

– Don

[Don Greening]

The the way that “add to source angle” works is you do the CC as you cut the multiclip e.g. when you cut to the 1st camera that needs CC you double click that piece to load it into the viewer and do your CC. after that, every time you cut to that particular angle the clip attributes will stay applied.

But since you’re already finished your multiclip cutting you’ll have to do it differently. Now anyone else can jump in here and come up with a better way but here’s what to do:

– load your first angle into the viewer by double-clicking it in the sequence and do your CC.
– de-select that first clip in the multiclip.
– then Cmd- select all the other clips from the same angle and paste the CC attributes onto all at once.
– then move on to the next angle and do the same.

– Don

[Don Greening]

My dual 800 Mhz G4 used to take 12 hours to compress a 2 plus hour DV NTSC self contained movie but you’re compressing a 45 min. movie with a much faster machine. Something is amiss. Like Raf suggested, check your processor output during an encode. I can’t see the difference in better or best being that much more of a factor. I used to use the best setting on the G4 all the time. My 2.7 G5 takes around 5 hours give or take to do a VBR 2 pass best encode using BitVice on a 2 hour DV movie. BitVice is slower than Compressor but does a little better job.

– Don