[John Pale]

[clctech] “do modify the preset a little bit to increase the VBR to 6.7 and the max bitrate to around 7.2.”

This is not a good setting. For projects under an hour, use CBR with a bit rate of no higher than 7. Above that, you might get artifacts on some DVD players…(with burned discs –not discs manufactured at a plant using replication)

You dont need VBR for this….VBR is best used for longer projects. It uses a higher bit rate for complex images and a low bit rate for simpler areas of your video. The first pass analyzes your video for this. VBR also works much better with a wider spread. 6.7 -7.2 is way too close…there is almost no difference there. Normally, you would set it to something like 4.5-7. But you dont need to have have anything encoded at less than a bit rate of 7, since your 36 minute project will easily fit on a disc….so don’t use VBR.

[John Pale]

[Robert Longwell] “I’ve opened this QT file on G5s that do not have FCP installed. Isn’t Uncompressed essentially a codec free format?”

No. It is not. It was written specifically for FCP.

If you install the software codecs for Blackmagic Decklink or AJA Kona, available on their websites, you should be able to read these files.

[John Pale]

This is normal for HDV.

Because of the nature of the compression it uses, it is necessary to make a new clip each time the camera is stopped.

[John Pale]

You didn’t say what codec you were Compressing to? It makes a big difference.

Also….if you use the Send to Compressor Command within FCP, Compressor does not use your FCP render files, but rather re-renders everything directly to your target codec…this can take a VERY long time with many target codecs. Especially with all your layers. It can give you a slightly cleaner result, but may not be worth the time in many instances.

If you want a more reasonable encoding time…render everything in FCP…then export a Quicktime reference movie. Drag that into Compressor and encode away…this will be much faster, and will probably yield acceptable results.

[John Pale]

The best way…. Take your footage to a dub house and have it upconverted on a Terenex.

Next best way…purchase a Kona card (or Blackmagic Decklink) and upconvert on ingest.

The software solutions, such as Compressor, After Effects, and various plugins are not practical if you have lots of footage, as the render time is very lengthy. Blowing it up within FCP will not yield good results without use of plugins (Boris and Digital Anarchy make plugs for this purpose)

[John Pale]

[walter biscardi] “So I’m assuming there’s no constant to the render issue? As in it’s always a type of shot or something in the timeline that seems to trigger bad renders?”

There is no pattern and there is nothing unusual. The only constant is duplicated sequences.
Why its affecting some people and not others is pretty bizarre. I have been pretty blessed over the years and never experienced a lot of the weird bugs people have reported, but I am experiencing this. My workaround (detailed elsewhere in the thread) seems to solve things, thankfully.
Apple has acknowledged the existence of the problem, so hopefully they figure it out in short order.

[John Pale]

I’ve posted this in other threads as a workaround…

Instead of duplicating sequences, try copying and pasting the entire sequence into a new empty sequence. Seems to have solved the problem for me.

Until I tried this, it was happening a great deal with one of my projects that has many duplicated sequences.

[John Pale]

Your system/storage is not up to it.

You can try switching to low quality playback and see if that helps

[John Pale]

Yes. Instead of duplicating it, select its entire contents and paste it into the new empty sequence.

Havent had a problem since I started doing this. Your milage may vary.

[John Pale]

Its worked for me on at least a dozen sequences within one project.

I don’t think that qualifies as extensive testing, but I am think it says something.

J