[John Rofrano]

I love my iRig Pro. It’s my goto audio interface for my MacBook Pro and my iPad Pro. I mostly use it with my Audio-Technica AT899 Subminiature Omnidirectional Condenser Lavalier Microphone which works really well while I’m recording tutorials.

Let us know how you like the Duo.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Jeff Kirkland] “I’ve heard good things about the Shure, Swamp Industries, and Blue Icicle ones.”

If you just want an interface, I own a Blue Icicle and it gets the job done but it’s made of cheap plastic and feels very flimsy which I don’t like. I use the iRig Pro from IK Multimedia on a lot of my tutorials that I do for Boris FX. They also have a cheaper iRig HD 2. The nice thing about the iRig is that they work with both Mac and iPad/iPhone which I use for recording as well. Finally, I also have an M-Audio Fast Track Pro USB which does an excellent job but I can no longer recommend M-Audio in good conscience because they seem to abandon their hardware quire regularly by not supply drivers for newer OS’s. I have a perfectly good M-Audio Firewire 410 that is still in great operating condition but M-Audio doesn’t supply drivers for anything newer than OS X Snow Leopard! So do not buy M-Audio! They will abandon you.

BTW, if the mic you intent to use is a condenser mic that requires 48v phantom power (and why wouldn’t you?) be sure that whatever interface you buy can supply 48v phantom. All of the interfaces that I mentioned above do.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Kelly Griffin] “Right now she’s got a Katrina and the Waves and a Beatles tune in a thing I’m working on. Who would I even contact to talk her off the ledge on this?”

I would contact a lawyer who deals in sync licenses. She should not be asking you… she should be asking a lawyer but it is my understanding that it is not legal without paying for a sync license.

The problem is not internal vs external, it is public vs private. For example, you can use a copyrighted song on your personal video of your son’s boy scout moving up ceremony and it’s perfectly legal to view in your home. If, however, you take the same video to the next boy scout meeting and show it to the troop, you are breaking the law because that is a public performance. Internal corporate videos are considered public performances and require a sync license. I believe that you can use 30 seconds or less of copyrighted music so as not to infringe on copyright. Maybe that would work.

…but I’m no lawyer and I don’t play one on TV and this is not legal advice, so please consult a lawyer just to be safe. ????

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Manish Dattani] “when i use exporting Sony AVC/MVC 1280X720p using intel quic sync Encode get
ERROR Intel quick sync video not avalable “

Does your CPU support QuickSync?

Check here:
https://ark.intel.com/Search/FeatureFilter?productType=processors&QuickSyncVideo=true

If not, that’s why it doesn’t work.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Hal Beery] “My concern was whether a previous OS would successfuly operate the new iMac (purchased two months ago).”

It depends on how much new hardware is in the new iMac. Usually, new OS’s have drivers for the new hardware whereas older OS’s will not. If, for example, your iMac uses a new GPU for which there are no drivers in the older OS, you will get poorer performance.

The good news is that it’s very easy to try this out without affecting your existing iMac. 😉

Simply plug in an external USB or Thunderbolt drive and format it for Mac OS Extended (Journaled). Then start the installation for the older macOS that you want to use and point it to this disk as the target. You can install any version of macOS that you want on the external disk. Finally, reboot your Mac and hold down the Option key when you hear the chime and after a while you should see all of the available boot disks displayed on your screen. Just select the external drive and your iMac will boot that OS. Then see if everything works.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Dirk Wellekens] “it feels a bit odd that the preferred way to film with a modern camcorder (for this particular case) is based on a method (interlaced) that is actually obsolete and no longer used in modern playback (tv’s, computer screens,…).”

Most people shoot progressive these days because there is no reason to shoot interlaced now that modern TV sets support progressive display (as long as you own a modern TV and are sure that everyone who wants to watch your video has a modern TV). So I wouldn’t say that interlaced is the preferred way. It’s just very popular because it’s been around a long time and is widely supported. (kind of… if it ain’t broke, why fix it?)

As I said, 50i is smoother than 25p even though they are both 25 fps. If you want to shoot progressive and get the same smoothness, shoot 50p.

[Dirk Wellekens] “If the interlaced mode can be considered as such an intelligent/efficient compression mode, why was it abandoned and is it no longer an option”

Interlacing is not compatible with digital computer screens where “computer” includes cell phones, tablets, and just about any display that isn’t a TV. If you are shooting for delivery on YouTube then you should be shooting progressive. If you’re shooting for broadcast TV then interlaced is more widely compatible.

[Dirk Wellekens] “… while it nevertheless remains one of the options in state-of-the-art camcorders. Any comments about that?”

Two words:

Backward compatibility!

Cameras still support it for the same reason that all cable TV providers still support SD stations even though the same station is broadcast in HD. There are lots of old TV sets still in use and the broadcast industry is very proud of backward compatibility. Color TV was 100% comparable with Black & White TV. No one had to buy new equipment. Compromises were made to ensure backward compatibility and we are still paying for those trade-offs today. Why did HDV use standard DV tape? Backward compatibility. They had to compromise the bit rate to fit on SD tape but no one wants to through out everything they have to move to something new.

I don’t own a 4K TV, I don’t own a 4K camera, and I could care less about 4K because my family still watches SD channels on our HD TV! (which are reduced to a postage stamp in the middle of the screen because they are both letter boxed and pillar boxed but that doesn’t seem to bother them ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) I bought a few Blu-ray discs until I realized that the kids can’t watch them in the car on our DVD player so I went back to buying DVD’s again and it’s really hard to tell the difference between Blu-ray and DVD on anything smaller than a 32″ TV. Now everyone is watching movies on a 6″ phone! Quality no longer matters at that point.

Every new TV must support interlacing but the reverse is not true… old TV’s do not support progressing and there is plenty of interlaced equipment still out there and camera manufacturers and broadcasters will be supporting it for many years to come. Just like the NTSC frame rate is 29.976 instead of 30 fps because of technology limitations from the 1920’s (almost 100 years ago!!!). Outdated compromises that will be with us forever because of the strong desire for backward compatibility.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Graham Bernard] “And if your holiday included an excursion to Le Man or the INDY500?”

Actually I was referring to IMSA racing which include the 24 Hrs of Le Mans but specifically I was referring to the GT Le Mans (GTLM) class of cars which race only 1.5 hrs from my house at Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, CT USA where the Northeast Grand Prix takes place each year. So I have shot these cars and they go by fast!. 😉

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Dirk Wellekens] “So, if I understand correctly: for, let’s say holiday movies, landscapes,…, 25fps is to be preferred over 50fps (because of more or less equal quality, but lower bandwith) and 25fps means 50i rather than 25p. Is that a correct conclusion?”

Yes, that is how I would make best use of the various frame rates.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

I see no one has answered and I was waiting because I have no personal experience with MP4 files having problems on 10.6.5 but your assumption about the codec is most likely correct. MPEG4 is a large and ever changing specification with multiple profiles and new ones being created all of the time. I’m guessing that the video uses an MPEG4 Profile that was not supported by the version of Quicktime from 10.6.5.

There is a utility called MediaInfo that will give you information about video files. You might want to use it with a video that works correctly with one that doesn’t and see what’s different about the encoding. Here is a sample from my iPhone just to show you what Media Info can tell you:

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com

[John Rofrano]

[Graham Bernard] “Mr Peter “Hobbit” Jackson did shoot in 2x24fps ie 48fps and you’ve all seen the difference. “

That is true. Going from 24 to 48fps is definitely a difference; the smoother motion is noticeable. Going from 25 to 50fps is probably noticeable too. I’m in NTSC land and 30 fps is already soother than 24 or 25 so going from 30 to 60fps is not as noticeable which is why I still shoot at 30 and only use 60 when I’m shooting fast moving scenes like motor sports. Following a LeMans race car at 200MPH @ 60fps vs 30fps is a big difference in smoothness. Shooting talking heads using 60fps vs 30fps is imperceptible. I’ve seen people shoot interviews at 60fps and IMHO it’s a waste of frames and bandwidth.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasstsoftware.com