Gavin Dunt
Forum Replies Created
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First, select your screen as the main display by going to:
View > Video Playback > main display (full screen)
Then, select by using keyboard shortcut Apple F12, or manually by going:
View > External Video > All Frames
Gav
video for corporate and broadcast
Gavin Dunt
Managing director
Beaucroft Ltd -
Wouldn’t open on mine either – got to 50% and then quit out. It’s a big file, 22MB. How much RAM have you got on your machine? Can you open a previous version from your auto back ups?
Good luck.
Gav
Gavin Dunt
Managing director
Beaucroft Ltd -
Use the Final Cut Pro/XDCAM Transfer software from Sony – it’s free (link below)
https://www.sony.co.uk/biz/view/ShowContent.action?site=biz_en_GB&contentId=1193315656825
As for converting footage, I don’t see the advantage in recompressing. You will lose the work-flow benefit of XDCAM, make huge files, slow down playback and see little benefit.
Gav
Creative video services in the UK
Gavin Dunt
Managing director
Beaucroft Ltd -
A second internal drive is handy and wireless, but if your comp gets nicked you lose everything.
External drives such as LaCie Extreme or G-Tech are very reliable (make sure you get Firewire 800 if you are doing anything higher than DV).
Or why not go for both. Drives are so cheap these days. Keep all your media on your second internal, and then back up to the external. Then you are covered.
Gavin Dunt
Managing director
Beaucroft Ltd -
Which Codec are you using? As far as I am aware, the only high quality codec that supports alphas (millions of colours+) is the Animation codec.
This will work, but if you have a lot of footage, will be very render intensive. There may be another codec that will support alphas.
Cheers,
GavGavin Dunt
Managing director
Beaucroft Ltd -
Which to buy … such a big question.
We have just upgraded to HD from a Canon XL2, and also looked at all the options. In the end, we pushed the boat out and opted for a Sony XDCAM 330 with Canon lens.
For your choice, I would consider the following pros and cons which will depend on how you work.
1. LENS
The Canon has the better lens. It is a true ‘L’ Canon pro lens. very high quality. The only annoying thing is the lack of focus markings. It is also interchangeable, although there is limited choice for 1/3 chip lenses.
2. QUALITY
Canon uses standard HDV, whereas the Sony EX uses much higher quality VBR MPEG HD. The quality of the our XDCAM is outstanding, so the EX should, in theory, be the same.
3. WORK FLOW
And this is probably the biggest consideration. How much do you shoot, do you keep all your rushes reels.
The work flow is very fast on the EX, but the media has limited capacity and is very expensive (this should come down once Sandisk are licenced to make the express cards).
DV tape is cheap, and easy to store … but you have to digitize it in real time.
If you are planning on 10 hour day shoots, you need your laptop handy to dump media, or you need a hell of a lot of media. You then have to archive your rushes, so you either dump back to tape (which defeats the object of tapeless workflow), buy a stack of 500Gb drives (all eggs in one basket analogy springs to mind), or dump your rushes after the edit.
CONCLUSION
These were the factors that influenced our decision, and in the end, our conclusion was that neither camera was right, particularly as the Canon is getting old now and is very pricey. So we went for the disk based XDCAM.
If can handle the workflow of the EX, and if Genlock is not a problem, then I would go for this solution. The quality is far better.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Gav