[Kevin Dooley]

John and Matt –

I’ve been looking at both of your products, and it does seem like they would handle our current workflow. The thing I’m not wrapping my mind around is how does something like Final Cut Server tie in with a system like this? Is it installed on the same server? Is it run on a separate “server” and just tied into the switch? Do I think interface with the storage only through FCS – or do I mount the storage like a drive and have access to it that way as well? Sorry if this seems painfully obvious to most, but I haven’t worked in with a system like this before and am having some trouble visualizing it.

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

I found this in the AE CS3 help file… I think it does what you’re looking for. If you just want it set at the first frame and then to behave normally either convert the expression to keyframes and delete all but the first keyframe or put the expression on, place the item, remember the scale value, remove the expression and then put the scale value back in…

cam = thisComp.activeCamera;
distance = length(sub(position, cam.position));
scale * distance / cam.zoom;

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

After playing with Particular, I ended up using Paul’s script. It allowed me to make sure every piece of text was displayed and displayed only once. Unfortunately with Particular you can only choose Random when you use a still frame of the source comp. This left me with a lot of repeats of certain text strings and none of others. Though in the future, where specfic text is not needed, particular allows easier random motion and velocity of particles, etc.

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

Ah! That works… why didn’t I think of that? I forgot you could set the particle to randomly take a still frame.

Thanks!

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

Should have mentioned:

I’ve seen the CoreMelt effect, but it doesn’t integrate with the comp camera, or allow full control over the “in effect” camera. For instance (unless I’m doing it wrong) I can’t start a camera behind the text cloud or even dolly it too far back from it as there seem to be pretty small and hard limits on the effect’s camera.

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

I have not tried it because the whole animation codec thing fixed it on the project I was working on and I haven’t started anything new since that I’ve had the problem on.

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

Probably should have mentioned that the DVCPROHD footage came straight off of P2 cards for the import (via Import P2 in FCP 5.1.4

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

I am on a mac, using Final Cut 5.1.4. The footage originated as DVCPROHD and AVCHD. The AVCHD footage was transcoded to ProRes (Log and Import on the one FCP 6 machine we have). I did a basic content edit in Final Cut and exported the sequences in their native format. It happens with either format. For the most part the Gamma seems to look like the original footage, except for the blinks…

Kevin Dooley
Video Director
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

Just a couple quick questions… is there a way to have this not use decimal places and also to use punctuation (appropriate commas)?

Kevin Dooley
Senior Content Creator
Lake Pointe Church

[Kevin Dooley]

I’m kinda a clueless when it comes to writing expressions… how do you actually write out 2 and 3?

Kevin Dooley
Senior Content Creator
Lake Pointe Church