[Luke Maslen]

Hi TK,

We support 720p to 1080i cross conversion. While 23.98 is not one of the frame rates we officially support, we did find that 720p/23.98 to 1080i/59.94 worked fine when we tested it yesterday. We don’t have an easy setup for 1080p/23.98.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Craig,

Which Blackmagic easy setup have you chosen in FCP5?

Does the same problem occur if you quit FCP5 and use Blackmagic Deck Control instead?

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Ian,

No, that won’t work. Amongst other things, the format of easy setups has changed in FCP. So if you install DeckLink 5.0 drivers, the Blackmagic easy setups will not appear in FCP 4.5.

You could try the DeckLink 4.8.1r2 drivers as their easy setups will appear in FCP 4.5. However I’m not aware of Apple supporting FCP 4.5 on Tiger and we haven’t performed any verification testing of DeckLink 4.8 drivers with Tiger and QuickTime 7.0.x and so we don’t recommend this system.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi William,

Yes, this is possible but there are caveats and it will depend upon whether the frame rate you are using is NTSC or PAL compatible.

HD material for down conversion must have a compatible frame rate with standard definition video. You can use HDTV 1080/59.94i or 720/59.94p for use with 29.97fps NTSC. Alternatively use HDTV 1080/50i for use with 50fps PAL.

HDTV720/50p down conversion to PAL is not currently implemented as there are currently no decks which support the rare HDTV720/50p standard.

If playing out HDTV 1080/23.98p material and down conversion is desired, choose a Blackmagic HDTV 1080 23.98 -> 59.94 easy setup. This will enable 3:2 pulldown and convert the video to an NTSC-compatible frame rate so that down conversion can be used.

Might this explain your problem?

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi,

Yes, we have just released the DeckLink Extreme PCIe card at IBC 2005 and first shipments will be in about two weeks.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Shane,

Good question and I have just added Certified PCIe Systems for Standard Definition only to the support note DeckLink Minimum System Requirements for Windows

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Trixter,

Thank you for posting your message and it is exciting to read that you call yourself a “hobbyist”. Who would have ever thought that a hobbyist could be involved in uncompressed video just a few years ago! It makes us very happy to be able to deliver broadcast quality products at low prices which are even within range of hobbyists. Thanks for your kind words which I will most definitely pass on to Grant and the engineers when they return from IBC.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Chris,

Thank you so much for your post. I am thrilled to read about what you have done and also your later posts in this thread with the details of the technical hurdles you had to overcome in your film. It’s fascinating to read what people do with Blackmagic Design products and it’s wonderful to read about your good experiences with the DeckLink HD card and Multibridge.

Mostly people post there problems in this forum so it is really great to hear about good experiences and I’ll most definitely pass your message on to Grant and the engineers here when they return from IBC.

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Chris,

Which version of Mac OS X and FCP are you using?

Regards,

Luke Maslen
Blackmagic Design

[Luke Maslen]

Hi Mark,

We do recommend against using Mac OS X 10.3.9 and suggest using Mac OS X 10.3.8. Having said that, I will be surprised if that is the explanation to your problems.