[Dunwoody Lampton]

I receive this warning every now and then, and have found that merely closing the project, closing FCE, and sometimes even restarting my computer, have been adequate in dealing with this occurrence without having to change any of my settings. I sometimes notice this occurrence when I am playing back video and after I hit the play/pause buttons too quickly.

Good luck.

[Dunwoody Lampton]

I don’t have Pro, but Express shows the following dropdown menu option that may help you:

TOOLS > VOICEOVER

This opens an audio recording window that should work with your computer-connected microphone.

However, every time you capture video from the camera, Final Cut will also capture the simultaneous audio, whether you have recorded any audio or not.

Which brings the obvious question, why are you recording audio separate from the video that you capture? Are you trying to substitute the camera-mic audio with the computer-mic audio? Are you recording the computer-mic audio at the same time as your video is recorded in the camera? I don’t believe you can record audio through a computer-connected mic and have it “attach” itself to a video file being recorded simultaneously. I think that the Voiceover function creates totally separate audio files that can be edited as you wish later, but I’m not 100%.

[Dunwoody Lampton]

What exactly are you posting to the web for podcast downloads? What kind of video and what kind of audio are you acquiring? Will it be posted raw or edited? If it needs to be edited before posting, why don’t you just acquire all audio and video elements via the camera, edit with Final Cut Pro, then post the finished products to the web?

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Sony Trinitron PVM 1343-MD

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Where does it look “jagged,” etc.?

On an NTSC monitor?
On a plasma/computer monitor?
On a CRT/computer monitor?
On a laptop/computer monitor?
On a DV camera viewfinder?

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Thanks again, Tom!

I kind of had a feeling before I read your answer that what you said was reality.
I informed my producer of the items you brought up, so she can hash it out with the client.

Have a good week.

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Client requested an uncompressed, full-resolution Quicktime file on a DVD.

My only tools were FCE HD 3.5.1 and iDVD.

One month after mailing the DVD, the client (public relations expertise, not video production) said the DVD wasn’t QT and was very low resolution.

I re-checked my project and files and found them to be unchanged – 13gb movie which looked great with QT player, great in iDVD, and great on NTSC.

My only guess was that the client confused the DVD with an earlier approval file which was (clearly) a low-res, WMV file.

When I rendered the QT movie, I chose QT conversion and selected “none” in the settings menu, as well as 720×480 in the size menu. As I said, the file was over 13gb when finished rendering. I’m now wondering if I should have checked 8- or 10-bit uncompressed instead of “none,” if that would have made any difference?

I also advised the client that using one of my company’s FTP sites might be a better choice for delivering the file instead of a DVD.

Thanks again, Tom.

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Thanks Russ!

Yes, one of my contractors DOES have several FTP sites that I have been able to use in the past. With no practical e-mail options available, this was the last option. I actually ended up just mailing a DVD to this client and all was well. But the important thing I learned was that Quicktime files do have a compression limit, and I was able to discover what the limit is.

Thanks again for your input.

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Just LAST NIGHT my XL2 was feeding F.C.E. 3.5 HD with timecoded tape.

However, every time it hit a break in timecode – due to tape shifting between powering down and powering up with the same tape in the camera – capture would halt and show the “searching for timecode break” message.

I went into Easy Setup and selected DV Converter instead of Firewire Basic, operated the XL2 manually instead of through F.C.E., and had no problems during the remainder of a 48 minute capture session.

Good luck.

[Dunwoody Lampton]

Performing an archive search of this site using the keyword Spotlight should give you some insight.

Adding a second Firewire bus gives another option of spreading out the use of two, external Firewire devices simultaneously (a DV camera and an external drive, or an A/D converter and an external drive).