Don Greening
Forum Replies Created
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Select one of your .dv clips in the Browser window and check the data rate for that clip in the appropriate column. I can’t remember what the rate is for a .dv clip but if it’s more than for a DV NTSC version then you’ve found part of your playback problem. The data rate for DV NTSC is 25 Mbits per sec. That’s pretty well the lowest data rate you’ll find. You can also go back to previous projects where your video playback was smoother and check the data rate and compressor for those clips. That information will help you to get better playback for your current project.
If you’re serious about editing then you need to go out and buy at least a good firewire 800 external drive and put all your media on that. The startup drive has enough to do with accessing the operating system as well as the programs without having to transfer the video data streams as well. In addition, the access times will increase as more and more files get deposited on the drive. If you were getting smooth playback up to this point you’ve just been lucky.
– Don
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Hi Cameron and welcome to Creative COW.
It sounds like the media can’t be accessed fast enough for smooth play back. Is your media on a separate hard drive or do you have it on your startup drive? It’s generally accepted that any media should not be placed on your startup drive but only on a dedicated hard drive or hard drive array for best performance.
You can also lower the playback quality settings within FCP so that you’re not dropping frames. FCP does not, by default, capture clips in .dv format so this might also be part of the problem. Were these clips captured with something like iMovie? You might end up having to transcode the .dv files into .mov files if you want high quality play back without dropping frames.
Providing a bit of info about your system would also help in resolving your issue, since we can’t look over your shoulder.
– Don
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There’s also Captain Mench’s Blowout Fixer. I think it works the same way as Graeme’s, but this one’s a freebie:
https://pistolerapost.com/pluginz/index.html
– Don
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Just to add a few things to Denis’ sage advice:
[Denis O’Keefe] “That prompts a “restore media” command in the camera – hit execute and you are ready to go again.”
This happened to me maybe twice so far but for the vast majority of card transfers I never get that prompt in the camera after using the laptop to delete the card media. Strange, since Denis and I use the same method.
[Denis O’Keefe] “A 16 gig card takes about fifteen to twenty minutes to copy to the laptop, another fifteen to twenty to the hard drive. “
I guess the time it takes to transfer will vary depending on the speed of the external drive and its connection, as well as the processing speed of the CPU (but I would suspect the latter is a minor consideration). I use a 200Gbyte FW800 G-Raid Mini with my Macbook Pro in the field and a full 16 Gbyte card takes around 5 1/2 minutes to transfer. This is when the card is inserted into the laptop’s Express 34 slot. Doing a USB transfer using the camera as a deck will take far longer.
As added insurance consider locking each copied folder on your hard drive. Highlight the folder and hit Command – I or go to the file menu in the finder and choose “Get Info”. in the Get Info window just put a check mark in the locked button. Now you won’t overwrite the contained BPAV folder if you inadvertently drag another one in there by mistake.
Follow Denis’ organizational advice to the letter.
– Don
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Libec controllers work with my XL2. Perhaps start there? ZC-3DV is the current Libec part no. The LANC spec. between the XL2 and the XL-H1 is probably pretty similar.
– Don
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All transitions need extra frames in order to cover the transition length. The number of extra frames you need is determined by the length of the transition. You can, however, create your own handles by changing a clip’s in point and out point in the Viewer. Or you can do it in the timeline by taking the razor tool and cutting X number of frames from the beginning and end of the clip to cover the transition length. There are many ways to create handles in FCP. These are just 2 of them.
But if you’re in the unfortunate position that you need absolutely every last frame of edited audio to be audible then the answer is basically…..no. If you just need to do simple fade in/fade outs, you can do that using key frames and not have to worry about using a preset audio transition.
Hope this helps answer your question.
– Don
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[John Aufderheide] ” tried trashing the preferences and still the same. I only trashed the plist pref. Do I need to trash any other file besides that? “
Yes, there are other preference files, but you can get a free program to trash all the FCP preference files for you. You’ll find it here:
https://fcprescue.andersholck.com/
Other than the unusually large audio file sizes does the audio actually sound okay? Your computer may be giving you a false file size reading. This is just a guess, but if it’s been awhile since you’ve done any system maintenance the false file size idea might be something to consider. Personally I’ve never heard of this problem before.
Let me know.
– Don
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[Zane Barker] “Best thing to do is sign up at your local apple store and let them take a look at it, they can determine for sure what is wrong.”
Agreed.
– Don
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[jabbar thomas] “The CPU doesn’t give me the other clicking and spinning sounds that it usually does as it goes through its routine just before letting me log in. “
That’s the hard drive loading the operating system into RAM. The CPU doesn’t generally make noise. I would try starting up from your Apple Installation CD and see if your problems aren’t hard drive related.
If that doesn’t solve it then take your machine to an authorized Apple repair facility. There’s no use buying new a new video card or hard drive when you don’t know what’s wrong.
– Don
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[Martin Leeuwner] “In FCP how do I “Downconvert a center cut of the HDV to SD” “
You don’t actually do a downconvert with a centre cut during capture. You can drop your native HDV 16:9 stuff directly into a 4:3 SD timeline. When FCP v.6 asks if you want to change the sequence settings to match your footage just say no. FCP will letterbox the footage so all you need to do is scale the first clip so it fills the frame. This will crop the sides in the process, leaving you with a 4:3 centre cut at the proper aspect ratio. You can drag all the rest of your 16:9 footage into the timeline, copy the scale attributes from the first clip and paste those attributes onto all the rest of your clips in one shot.
[Martin Leeuwner] “How do I set my JVC for 4:2:0 I don’t think that’s an option. “
You don’t need to change any camera settings. David was just referring to the HDV codec, which is what your camera uses. The colour space of HDV is 4:2:0.
– Don