[John Pale]

Not usually a problem, but you may have to do a lot of rendering in the timeline, depending on your system.
Most will give you the green line (which means it will play at reduced quality until render). If your system is marginal, you might not be able to get any playback without render.

You could convert it all to your SD codec in Compressor first, but it may not be necessary. You should test it out. If after doing a render, you are unhappy with FCP’s downscaling, you may want to use Compressor with the Frame Controls on, set at Better or Best for the resize.

[John Pale]

I take it this is Firewire based machine control?

You haven’t specified what VTR models, formats, and settings you have tried.

If its Firewire, do you have other Firewire devices attached? Which ones?

[John Pale]

What’s the battery level and what kind of batteries are you using?

I wanted to save money and go green, but I found that I had this behavior when I used rechargeable batteries, but never had it with lithium batteries.

[John Pale]

Avid v5 will play Apple ProRes files via AMA. Make these self contained…do not use reference files.

Another option is to download the Avid Quicktime codec from Avid’s website. Install that on your system. Export a reference file from FCP, then take that into Compressor, where you can transcode into an Avid DNX HD Quicktime file. You will need to create your own preset, as installing the codec does not create one for you.

[John Pale]

Here is how to switch between the two kernels

https://support.apple.com/kb/HT3773

[John Pale]

According to this article, 2010 MacPros boot the 64 bit kernel by default. Older Mac Pros don’t.

https://macperformanceguide.com/SnowLeopard-64bit.html

This however, could possibly be the culprit in your case, if you have 32 bit kernel extensions that won’t load properly.

You might want to try switching it back to 32 and seeing if it helps.

[John Pale]

a href=’https://i1.creativecow.net/u/19419/1_decklinkdvcpro1080i.jpg’>

[John Pale]

I have a Decklink as well. For 1080i DVCPRO HD you want Blackmagic 1080i 59.94 DVCPROHD. Note on the right of the screen shot, it is 29.97 fps. There is no 59.94 FPS option with DVCPRO HD 1080i.

With 720p, you have two options. 720p 59.94, which IS 59.94 FRAMES per second and 720p 29.97, which is 29.97 fps. Note that 720p 29.97 is somewhat unconventional, as broadcasters that use 720p (like FOX and ABC) use 59.94.

As others have stated, ProRes is a better codec in most instances, but if you are capturing DVCPRO HD footage or have older hardware or an older version of FCP, there is nothing wrong with using the DVCPRO HD codec.

As Jeremy stated, 1080p 59.94 FRAMES per second exists in some codecs (including ProRes) for some very high end formats, but its not likely thats what you are using.

[John Pale]

1080/59.94i is 29.97fps.

Its 59.94 interlaced fields per second.

[John Pale]

“Take that file and you will need to convert it to PAL. You can do this at the same time you create the mpeg files for the DVD.”

You actually should avoid trying to do that in one step, as Compressor has a hard time properly figuring out the GOP structure that way. It takes forever to encode and it’s prone to artifacts.

Do the conversion to PAL first, encoding to 8 bit Uncompressed. Then take the Uncompressed PAL QuickTime and encode that to MPEG 2. Though there are more steps, it actually ends up faster and cleaner.