Dylan Reeve
Forum Replies Created
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The way I do this – which unfortunately requires preparation *before* recutting – is to add a new audio track with a offline clip of audio timecoded to match the sequence.
So if my sequence timecode starts at 01:00:00:00 then I will use the Log/Capture tool to log an 1-channel audio clip that starts at 01:00:00:00 and has enough duration to cover the whole sequence.
I put that logged clip (it’s offline, but timecode works fine) on A20 or whatever then do my edit as usual, making sure I have sync lock enabled on that track and that the edits I’m making take the audio timecode with it.
Another way to do the same thing in a simpler way, if you already have a mixed audio track back, is to duplicate the sequence, put the mixed audio on it, and edit with that. The mixed audio will serve as a timecode reference.
Either way, you end up with audio tracks that have timecode that reflects where they were in the original edit, which you can then use to do a burn-in. Or make an EDL. It’s a very useful reference generally when making changes to a “locked” edit.
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At this stage there is no way at all to hand a project from FCP X to an editor on any other system (including FCP 7).
No one is upset about the professional product being sold to at a consumer price – because the new product is not the same as the old professional FCP.
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Oh sorry – you are exactly correct, I forgot about the differences between 64bit handling in OS X and Windows…
You can run Avid in Windows 7 64bit (even in bootcamp) but OS X does things differently…
Mea culpa
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Right now, and bare in mind I’m a big Avid fan, I’d go the Adobe route. Premiere Pro is good to go for you right now, you have the software, it will work with the hardware and it can open the projects and read the media.
I think Media Composer 6.0 might change the equation, but that’s just as much a future unknown and FCP X upgrades… Although we do know that MC6 will come and it will do the things pros need 🙂
The other issue with Media Composer is that it’s not as simple for shared editing. Not that FCP was simple about it, but Avid has very specific ways to do it and they are not cheap. You can do it with a basic SAN and Media Composer only, but depending on your needs you might want to look at managed collaboration – either Avid’s Unity systems, or perhaps EditShare.
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Personally I doubt that FCP 7 will run more than a few versions into the future on OS X. Almost every major OS update that I can recall doing required FCP/ProApps updates as well, and there won’t be any more of those.
Obviously there’s no reason to think your current hardware and software will just stop working, but upgrading OS and hardware especially does change the playing field.
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[Peter Blumenstock] ” Keep in mind that the current 5.5 release requires a 32 bit Kernel though. 6.0 will be full 64 bit (and it will still have all the features:-).”
Not quite accurate – it is a 32bit app, but will run on a 64bit OS no problem.
6.0 in clearly coming, but release dates are still vague. No harm in trying the 5.5 demo though.
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Overall I believe 3.5.4 has been good, but there is a bug with XDCAM EX footage in AMA where video on any layer other than V1 displays an incorrect ‘Media Offline’ message.
If this is a problem for you then you can contact Avid for a patch (3.5.4.3) which will resolve it. Obviously it will be sorted in the next full release.
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Avid at this stage has no direct support for AVCHD.
The AVCHD format is frustrating. It was jointly developed by Sony and Panasonic, but each company’s implementation is just different enough so as not to be compatible with the other.
For Panasonic AVCHD there is a tool that Panasonic make available that converts the material to P2 media that Avid can work with. But I don’t believe it will work with Sony’s version.
Most people using AVCHD now use some third-party tool to convert the footage into something that Avid will support. I can’t offer any specific suggestions, but I believe that FFMpeg encoders can provide the necessary support.
In the early days of XDCAM EX people were using FFMpeg to create DNxHD footage from EX clips. A similar process may work for AVCHD – check out this post for a starting point perhaps? https://www.bolanski.com/ex/home/ffmpeg-is-your-friend/
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Avid is not going to be able to import a part of a file, it will always import the whole thing. This is probably unavoidable really as various formats are stored in different ways, it would be very hard, programatically, to issolate a smaller part of a video clip from a larger file in a reliable way (what works for Animation QT wouldn’t work for H.264 for example).
If you’re working with this sort of material again in the future, then the best workflow would be to import all the media into the ‘online’ resolution, and then transcode that full resolution to a lower resolution for the edit. In this way you could have one hard drive with the low datarate offline footage on it, and one with the full resolution online footage. If you do it that way, then when it comes to making the online all you have to do is relink the offline sequence to the online media.
Alternatively Avid’s recently introduced AMA feature currently provides very fast access to P2 and all XDCAM variants, and may well be expanded to other formats. It provides a very effective way of working with file-based camera formats.
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FCP will connect to the Unity server, but will only see it as a drive. You can probably figure out a method to convert the Avid media in some way that FCP will read it, but it won’t be efficient, and it will probably be hard to find the clips you want, as Avid organises it’s media very differently to FCP, it’s not going to be easy to locate a clip from simply browsing the file system.
I’m going to third or fourth the ‘use Avid’ suggestion. In the scenario you describe it’s going to be much much more efficient for you. Without knowing the specifics of your work, there’s not really anything in FCP that’s inherantly better for promos than in Media Composer. We produce dozens of on-air promos every week with Avid Xpress Pro and Media Composer.
However I will add this – I’ve had remarkable sucess in taking a AAF from Avid (with embedded media) and importing it into FCP with the media attached.