Eric Johnson
Forum Replies Created
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Unless I’m doing something wrong (probably am), that calculator gives me an almost 9 minute discrepancy. I’ve done a number of History Channels shows, unfortunately I always forget the difference, and I know that it’s more like, but not quite 3 seconds per hour.
I’m going to check the blog now though.
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It is actually much worse, the clips losing timecode are either DVC Pro HD 720p60, which is being shot for a slo-mo effect (the timecode is being lost before the conversion to 720p24), bad but not the end of the world since those clips are basically ONLINE. The clips that are the real issue are the clips that are our OFFLINE codec, Offline Photo Jpeg.
It is happening to our 1080PsF 23.98 variant as well as the 720p 23.98 variant. Very lame.
Footage is comimng off of DVC Pro HD stock shot on both Vaicam and HDX-900 as well as HDCAM from a F-900 series 1.
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Both systems this is happening on recently trashed pref’s, within the last week. Some instances are before and some are after…
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No big deal with the GOP thing, in the future, after exporting you master timeline, you can go through and set chapter & compression markers in FCP and sent to compressor. This will kind of meet half way between your plugin and the GOP settings. The compression markers force a new I Frame. They can be tricky though, if you add too many you will get something that looks like crap. But if you put them with your chapter markers and some other really cutty spots, you can get some good results. Definitely a trial and error thing.
That last bit sounds oh so familiar. Post, from my experience, is not taught well in a class room and can really only be learned outside of the class room. You will learn more about post in the first month of your first job in post than you will have learned in school, and that may even include what you teach yourself. I know that was the case for me.
I went into my first job feeling very confident about what I knew about FCP, which was quite a lot, but that is such a small piece of what post is that you may as well know nothing.
Good luck.
You’re not going to school in Ventura, are you? That would be too funny.
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Not to be mean, but frustrating trial and error will teach you more than most anyone here. Also, let me assure you that the head bashing was much more vigorous and painful 4.5 years ago. Things have changed dramatically.
To start, the Better: Best statement for the frame controls, is true for every aspect of compressor. You will find these options all over these windows. Only use Best, when you have loads of time. Like days/ hour of content.
For geometry: No need to touch, it is hard set by the preset. Frame controls has an option that covers the scaling quality.
Encoder tab: the info before the tabs is correct.
Video Format: NTSC, 29.97, what ever your aspect is (probably 16:9), progressive is a solid option (especially if 23.98 original)
Quality: the only thing to check is Motion Estimation, if Best (as it should based on preset) then you are good. This is the one place you should always set to Best, unless it’s a screener and won’t be displayed.
DO not change GOP.
Extras: make sure DVD SP…. is checked. not required, but speeds things up later.Depending on where you see yourself going out of school I would suggest you start looking through the manuals whenever you get a chance. Just looking through the index until you see something you want to know more about and skipping through will help you quite a bit.
Hope this gets you where you need to be.
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It will do whichever you ask it to.
I’m also pretty sure that if you put a 23.98 file into DVD SP, you will get a DVD that will play on 99% of players on the market today. And most anything newer than 2005 (approximately)
As far as Compressor goes:
DL for reference.
RED: Go to the Frame controls
Green: Turn on Frame controls, click on Gear to right to do so
Yellow: If set to 100% of source, on both audio and video, you will be in sync. I have done many 23.98>29.97 DVD’s like this, never lost sync. If your rate conversion is set to Better all should look good, the difference between Better and Best is a whole lot of render time. Best is definitely better, but only when you have loads of time.
Blue: As long as these don’t get put to Best you should be fine. the default will yield decent results, but if decent isn’t good enough (when is it?) then you can bump as needed.
The other parts of this panel are more self explanatory, but if you need more clarification please ask.
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First step: Export your master sequence at current settings.
Step two: bring into compressor. Use the best quality 90 min setting. This in and of itself will do a pretty decent job. Make any tweaks you feel comfortable with, but small changes have big results in final output times.
When you bring it into DVD Studio Pro, iDVD is not the way to go if you can avoid it, make sure your timeline is set to 16:9, it should detect automatically but not always.
If you don’t have time for Compressor, you can bring your 23.98 video you exported into DVDSP.
When it’s in, cntl-click the clip in the assets screen, and select encoder settings. select 16:9, and set the quality to multi-pass VBR (something like that) and motion estimation to best.
That should get you in the right direction.
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When you are trying to adjust the PSD duration, are you adjusting the duration of the individual layers of the PSD or the PSD nest that you are cutting into you master timeline?
If that is the case, hold down option in you r master timeline and double click the nest to open it in the viewer. After this adjust the duration in the upper left hand corner of the viewer.
this may not work, because you have the PSD’s in the timeline with in and out points (this may be your current hang up) if that is the case, just move the nest to a layer without any content and make there duration arbitrarily long.
For the future, when you bring your PSD’s into FCP, before you do anything, change the duration in the browser’s duration column.
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When in FCP look at your timeline settings (cmnd-0) is your timeline Anamorphic?
What are your export settings? Timeline settings?
On the ones that are 4:3, if everything is correct minus the aspect, then you can open in Quicktime, and view the Movie properties (cmnd-J) if you then select the video track you change what the playback dimensions are.
If you are working in SD, then you can set it to 854×480 and it will look correct.
But a lot depends on your timeline and export settings.
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open it in Quicktime, show the movie inspector (CMND-I) depending on what format it is will depend on if you can open it in FCP.
.mov does not mean FCP friendly. Any Mpeg-2 or Mpeg-4 format should be converted before going into your project. In many cases Mpeg files (2&4) will go in FCP, but will almost always cause you headaches, nightmares and unpleasantness when you can least afford it.
Mpeg Streamclip is a great tool for format conversion, that paired with Perian will conquer most any format. But you can use Quicktime also, whichever you prefer.
Most anything from iStock will be an Mpeg format, the one giving you problems may be something strange like motion jpeg A or something.
Good luck.