[John Collucci]

Hi Sandro & Filip, I’m in awe of these posts.

I’ve been using AE for nearly 20 years, and I use pre-saved scripts for certain common tasks, but have no real depth to how to code them myself. I feel that so much untapped capability exists for most of us.

Do you recommend any resources to actually learn the language & syntax to solve one’s own problems without relying on internet searches (& hoping someone else can help)?

[John Collucci]

I am curious about what caused your HDMI output judder. Have you previously used that display as a client monitor without issue?

I ask because, it could simply be a matter of frame-rate compatibility with your monitor. In my experiences using mini display port > HDMI adapter outputs, I have never had a juttering issue from my MacBook Pro. If this is an issue of the hardware, then this is disappointing problem for a MacBook “Pro” to have. Especially since that HDMI output must exist for the exact purpose that you were using it for.

[John Collucci]

I can only share my experiences with the MacBook Pro (2009 Core2 Duo) and an SSD (OWC 3G) as the boot / applications volume.

I have never had the issue that you describe. My typical set up is to use my traditional hard drive for media storage (such as imported media and other assets) while setting my SSD as a scratch disk for quick renders and also faster exporting of files.

I highly doubt that 3G SSD speeds would cause a beachball problem, when even the slower SSDs are much faster than a typical internal drive.

Have you tried the Blackmagic diskspeed utility? I believe it is free on the Mac App Store. You should be able to confirm your read and write speeds are more than sufficient.

The intermittent nature of the problem (every 5 minutes), suggests to me that it is not an overall performance issue with the drive, but perhaps a configuration issue somewhere. I am perplexed though. It is fully possible that your SSD has a hardware issue as well, but I don’t know how to test that other than swapping it.

Good luck!

[John Collucci]

Ben, forgive me if you have mentioned this already, but I’ve been reading about this new option enabled on the rMBP for applications. If you get info on an app file, there is now a checkbox to disable HiDPI mode, or rather “Open in low resolution”.

Have you tried this with FCP7? What is the default setting?

Apparently Apple, selectively, has already enabled/disabled the setting based on whether or not there are known issues with specific software in HiDPI (scaled-retina) modes. If “open in low resolution” isn’t enabled for FCP7 by default, it still doesn’t confirm a lack of issues, since FCP7 is no longer supported anyway….

I don’t fully understand what the option even does… Here’s the official FAQ from Apple, but as usual, they steer clear of getting too technical:
https://support.apple.com/kb/HT5266?viewlocale=en_US&locale=en_US

Any thoughts? Experiments to share?

Thanks for being our test subject!

~j!

[John Collucci]

Ben,

I think the way that I found this issue was due to a screensaver that engaged its own resolutions settings. Definitely not from tinkering with te display settings while editing… Before the retina, I can’t fathom why one would.

[John Collucci]

Awesome review! Thanks for taking the time to write it up for us.

I imagine the HDMI monitoring would be really nice, as I have already been doing that via a thunderbolt adapter, plus you can get a couple extra screens connected, although they will integrate oddly next to the retina display. (as an aside, I have tested my MBP with an iPad 3 as an additional monitor – its amazing, though differing pixel densities between displays is something to get used to)

Ben, that “bug” you mentioned is nothing new, or unique to the retina MBP. FCP has reacted that way for years, across several OSes when you change resolution. Must have something to do with the underlying QuickTime architecture in both OSX and FCP. So I wouldn’t call that out as an issue at all. The crashing seems odd, but that just happens sometimes anyway, as we all know too well. Have to keep on eye on that.

For the record… I am jealous of that full res screen shot. I would push myself to use that full screen that way. I hate scaling my canvas, it’s 100% size or an output monitor only. Too many problems can be missed otherwise.

One more note, I’m really surprised that you don’t see scaling issues in “best for retina” resolution. I’ve seen some terrible samples of Photoshop in this configuration, which make the app unusable in my opinion.

Anyway, this is all exciting stuff. Thanks for sharing.

~j!

[John Collucci]

Hi Paul,

I saw your post on the LAFCPUG and thought I’d reply to you here as well.

I haven’t tried it yet, but one of the developers working on the WineSkin project (they port windows apps to work on a Mac) has a Retina MacbookPro. He wrote a simple script which runs the retina display at native pixel for pixel resolution (a full 2880×1800!). If I could get my hands on a RDMBP I would try this with FCP7 instantly. The resolution can easily be set back to retina defaults by simply opening the display preferences.

I think the only drawback of native pixel will be small text and menu bars. But if you are familiar with a Mac’s accessibility options (magnify/zoom) it shouldn’t be a big deal to hold a key combo to read tiny text. I do wonder how minuscule the timeline, button bars, etc, will look.

Here’s the link:
https://wineskin.urgesoftware.com/tiki-view_blog_post.php?postId=51

If anyone finds this useful, please reply with your experience. I’d love to know how this works in practice.

Thanks,

~j!

[John Collucci]

Hi tehre David. Thanks for the helpful advice. I reply to each directly below.

How full are your drives on this system? Both system and RAID?
–> The System drive is a dedicated 150 GB partition of a larger drive. The remaining partition is used for storage of non-media files (standard office documents and such).

1) Uninstall the Kona drivers using their supplied uninstaller, then re-install. The Kona drivers from time to time become corrupted, and reinstalling them can fix many aberrant behaviors.
–> The Blackmagic (not Kona) drivers have been re-installed multiple times, with no change in performance.

2) Trash Preferences
–> Been there as well. After confirming that the problem is still present, I re-instate my backup prefs of course, but prefs are not apparently the issue.

3) Run Fix Permissions on your system drive from the Disk Utility.
–> Hadn’t thought of that, although this problem existed on my old tower as well.

4) Report back…
–> I had a tech in today to look at the problem, but we are still without a resolution. Basically some time or money needs to be spent on a diagnosis. We noticed however that the Expansion Slot Utility app (found in System Library, Core Services folder) is refusing to run on my machine, which not only makes it difficult to verify that the card is being powered properly (16x for the blackmagic on slot #1), but also raises quastions as to why the OS level utility would refuse to run “on this machine”.

The answer to that little problem is that my machine had it’s OS installed via a clean 10.5.8 disk image (by my IT guy). The original disk image was apparently created on a dual-core Mac Pro tower, while I am running a newer Quad-Core. This is apparently a potential problem, and explanation as to why the core services utilities may not be correct for my tower. HOWEVER, this still does not necessarily affect the overall problem with capturing.

We have decided that the next step is really unavoidable: A complete system install. CLEAN. No user migration. Install the OS, FCS3, and the blackmagic drivers ONLY. PLug everything in, and see if it works. IF not, then we know it’s the card….

*SIGH* Now to find a hole in my 20-hour workdays in which to do this.

[John Collucci]

UPDATE:

Blackmagic support seems to believe that it is NOT a hardware issue, since a system restart sometimes fixes the issue. I am not convinced that it is software, although it may be a driver or firmware thing?

This problem ONLY begins when I attempt to capture media. I can usually capture once clip successfully (if it’s under 2 or 3 minutes), but beyond that the capture seems to lag, drop frames, and then begins stuttering/repeating the audio playback – which sounds like feedback when it happens. My system audio output is through my Blackmagic card.

NOW HERE’S THE KICKER. Once I have a failed capture on my hands, playback of any media on my system has the same audio issue – even with files played from the finder. Again all of my audio is output through the blackmagic audio out. A restart fixes the issue.

I am left hanging. Is this a problem with the hardware itself? Is it something in the software/driver/firmware pipeline? How would someone diagnose the source without purchasing a new Blackmagic card? That would be quite the cost if it turned out that it wasn’t the problem.

[John Collucci]

Thanks for the reply Henry.

My system is a Mac Pro, purchased new from Apple three months ago. Quad core – 8 gigs of RAM. I assure you it normally has no problems capturing to uncompressed 10-bit NTSC. Like I said though, the issue is present even during tape playback through FCP, and not only during an actual capture to file.

I have not yet heard back from Blackmagic, but I’m feeling unsure about what to do now that I have multiple deadlines looming down on me and I can’t bring in my material from tape.