[Kevin Reiner]

I feel for you. I lost an entire trip to Germany because of a light leak in the camera (pre-digital age – I’m old.) Then I lost footage of the first 4 months of my son’s life because I used the wrong power adapter on my camera. Both losses were heartbreaking.

Maybe try a data recovery service. I did a quick search and found https://datarecoverysystems.com/

I in no way endorse them, it was just from a quick search, so I would check into anything before trying it. Just a thought though. Hope you find a way to salvage it.

-Kevin

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

Hello Hector (and David)

I have been given some .avi and .ewc2 files to use in a FCP project. As David suggests, I googled to find a way to convert the files for FCP. Unfortunately, the only useful link I can find happens to be this thread. 🙂

Did you happen to figure it out Hector? I’ve tried VLC, MPEG Streamclip, Wondershare Video Converter. Perian. Nothing seems to work.

Thanks,
Kevin

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

Thanks Ty,

Would I need anything else to interface between the Aja breakout box and the Mackie 824s? Is it as simple as an XLR connection? Would I need any other audio gear? I’m putting together a budget and just don’t want any surprises.

Thanks for your help,
Kevin

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

must convert to .aif or .wav
AE hates mp3 like poison.

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

After sending them a new file that I knew was exactly what they needed:

station: It’s still looking weird.
me: explain weird
station: weird horizontal blurry lines
me: thats due to the field rendering
station: I tried getting rid of that by deinterlacing.
me: no, don’t do that. It is supposed to be that way.
station: well it doesn’t look right.
me: have you looked at it on another monitor?
station: just on mine
me: is yours a broadcast monitor
station: I’m on my laptop
me: You have to view it on a broadcast monitor.

20 mins later:

station: yeah, its looking better now.

————

ARGH. I love HD, but there are times that I really miss the simplicity of the BetaSP standard.

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

Hey Dave,

The footage was shot at 29.97. I just started another render with all videos interpreted upper field. Rendering out upper field with slight motion blur. We’ll see how it goes. I’ve also scaled the text up slightly to avoid it getting too muddy.

I use Episode for exporting final files. I have no idea what happens to those files once they get to the stations. Really what I’m looking for are some peers telling me that I’m on the correct track and that the stations need to look at their workflow. Do I need to tell them that the spots were rendered with fields?

Thanks again for your time,
-Kevin

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

One note. I just checked my settings and it seems like when AE auto interprets footage, it is random on whether the clips are upper or lower. It has most of them set to lower and about 1/4 set to upper. I’m going to change all of them to upper and see if that helps at all. Is it worth clicking “preserve edges”?

The thing is, it was usually the text that was most noticable, so I don’t know if this is the fix I’m looking for.

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

Thanks Dave and Walter,

You guys are great benefits to this forum.

Let me clarify:

1. All the video is 29.97 ProRes 422 (1920×1080) shot on Sony HDW f900
2. I didn’t touch interpret footage.
3. Comp is also 29.97 ProRes 422 (1920×1080)
4. Videos are scaled and cropped randomly.
5. I rendered with fields (upper field first).
6. Also rendered a sidecropped 480i29.97 with fields (lower field first)for SD delivery.
7. For delivery I have to provide:
a. DVC Pro HD 1920 X 1080i
b. mpeg2 both 1080i29.97 & 486i29.97
c. .h264 both 1080i29.97 & 486i29.97

The client has told me that the commercial looks bad on TV, but when I ask what channel? was it HD or SD? etc. they just say it looks bad. They don’t realize how many variables are involved here.

And yes Dave, it judders. I always say shudders for some reason. I’ve killed judder before on similar moves, so its nothing new to me, but this one I can’t get past.

Thanks for your help,
Kevin

PS Here’s a snippet of the video –

judder problems

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

Without seeing the shot, its hard to say what would be the best way to fix it. Just taking a stab at it:

1. Try to track the shot using a stationary element located near the window or the widow itself.
2. Either mask out the window use the above tracking info to keep in masked, or use that tracking info in conjunction with the luma key feature and key out brights. Use the mask to isolate just the window or else you’ll key out brights throughout the image.
3. Find some background footage and place behind your footage. Make it move with your image using the tracking info.

I wrote quickly, so hope all that made sense.

Have you tried the shadow/highlight effect first?

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig

[Kevin Reiner]

Thanks Walter. Just curious, why not just the DoubleHead? I guess 3 heads are better than 2. 🙂

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig