[J. Tad newberry]

Hi Two Toms!

actually, i found a good workaround. i only needed the border to appear on one side of the cropped image, so i added a shadow via the motion tab. made it opaque, black, and no softness. it looks like a border!

: )

but thanks for the other options as well…

[J. Tad newberry]

this almost sounds too good to be true. have you had any problems with XDcam transfer? (it’s just a plug-in codec for FCP, right?) no HD capture card needed at all? do you get the full XDCam picture quality via firewire (or i.Link) cable? and you can even master back to the camcorder via firewire as well? no other external decks really needed, unless you’re needing the camera for another shoot, eh?

so i wonder why i just shot HDCam and HDV???

: )

sounds like XDCam might be my solution.

thanks for your input.

[J. Tad newberry]

tick tock tick tock…

(any BlackMagic factory people here???)

[J. Tad newberry]

thanks Noah. that’s what i ended up doing, but just hoping there might have been something that i wasn’t doing right…

i wonder if Motion 3 works a little better with psd’s? actually, Motion 2 is pretty good with psd’s, save for that little issue of editing text…but easy enough to work around without buying Photoshop…

[J. Tad newberry]

thanks Noah. that’s what i ended up doing, but just hoping there might have been something that i wasn’t doing right…

i wonder if Motion 3 works a little better with psd’s? actually, Motion 2 is pretty good with psd’s, save for that little issue of editing text…but easy enough to work around without buying Photoshop…

[J. Tad newberry]

hmmm…i was referring to the Panasonic HDX-900, maybe you thought i meant the Sony HDW 900?

does that make a difference? it would seem then that the DVCPro HD codec is the “native” format and i might not need the other card(s) since it is coming in via Firewire???

just trying to clarify…

[J. Tad newberry]

so, the 900 comes with a FW400 output connection…will that be fast enough for me to download the “full quality” directly from the camcorder into my G5? another dumb question: i won’t need an HD card (from AJA or Blackmagic) to capture in its native DVCPro HD (100) codec, will i? i had tried capturing some HDV in the DVCPro HD codec but my system would not do it. . . so just trying to have my system up to snuff to capture from the camcorder…

i’m a little confused since i would be capturing via the Mac’s FW port why i would need an upgrade on my capture card…which wouldn’t even be utilized in this process, right???

[J. Tad newberry]

Hi Shane,

Thanks for your thoughts. Yes, i should’ve clarified my “negative” comment on tape load time with DVCPro HD. Of course, i’m totally used to half hour loads with my ol’ trusty BetaSP camera, so a 33 minute load is actually a 10% improvement! : )

I only see it as a negative thinking that in this world of high tech innovations, there would be something much longer available…thus the hopes of gigantically huge (and eventually, CHEAP) P2 cards on the horizon. So really, DVCPro HD doesn’t really have too many negatives (at least that i can see).

Any thoughts on getting P2 material into a G5?

[J. Tad newberry]

hi callan,

i’m sort of in the same boat with you, and not finding many good or quick answers. i have a G5 with a Blackmagic Decklink SP card (i’ve only been capturing SD material from my BetaSP deck), but now need to move up to something bigger and better. i’ll keep checking back here and see what answers you get as well.

i don’t think i’ll need the HD component breakout cables as i won’t ever be capturing from an HDCam deck, but should mostly just be capturing from cameras/camcorders or maybe small decks, so probably will mostly be just using firewire or maybe HDMI inputs to my computer. i’m looking at shooting and capturing DVCPro HD and P2 cards in the near future, and just need the card that will handle that.

[J. Tad newberry]

voila! thanks a bunch. u b a jeen-yus!