[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Raymond,

Although on a FCPX project at the time, I had similar problems on an old Mac-Book Pro. To a point where I was playing digital-Russian-r0ulette up to a late transmission dead-line, with no engineering support at hand.
When the MacBook had gone black screen 6 times, with only a “cold-start” to bring it back to life. I stopped the edit, gave producer an exported master and suggested that any minor imperfections should be ignored or we might lose the project all together (I did have a back-up plan, but we had a deadline).

Obviously both Apple and Adobe will want you to run on the latest working version of their software, which may not possible because of hardware limitations.

You are not sharing any details about your hardware.

But I would suggest that you check following:
How much RAM do you have? (Less than 16GB is IMHO not good – 32GB or 64GB is better)
How much space do you have on your main drive? (And is it SSD or Hard-disk?)
Where is your media, on a SSD or Hard-Drive and what is the connection? (USB 2 or)
Then there is the size of the project and media – you may want to consider breaking it down to smaller projects, and certainly trash the preferences to see if that helps.

If possible, it might even be worth swapping it for a Mac Mini or similar – Mac Mini will need a monitor, but the cost and performance of that up against an old MacBook means that in productivity it will be paid off in no time.

Hopefully this was helpful.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Mohamed,

You are very welcome.
Sadly in your scenario, and I have been there, so I feel your pain:
If you want to work on the original camera files, and they come in big sizes, you will need either time, or a couriered hard-drive/SSD. There is no other way, unless your client is happy to compress the files, or you are happy to work on proxies and let someone else do the final export. That this can be done in its native format without improvement in digital infrastructure.

1) Short of moving, you should have a contingency plan in place in case your current internet breaks down.
As part of that research, you may find a solution that both you, and more importantly your client is happy with. Keep in mind that most of your clients will hire you, for you, as you can deliver quality, and not necessarily because of expensive internet speed only used in moving files around.
Do check wireless options (5G / Space delivered internet) and if there are co-working spaces near by with high-speed internet.

2) If your internet speed is equal to that of a horse pulled wagon, you will not be able to compete in a F1 race. No matter how you dress it up. With all due respect to your client, if they are shooting on an A7, then they are on a lower-budget camera – nothing wrong with that, as it is an excellent camera for specific jobs.
But does not change the nature of your business where you either need to charge for speed in delivery of master, or be given the time to deliver at a lower “file transport” cost.

3) Your article does not show on my browser. But, I am sure that you can control your own internet connection – although some may argue that we have all been hacked in one way or another.
There are still large scale companies, including broadcasters, where the editing suites are not connected to the internet (a pain when updating software and installing new plugins).
My comment about security is the involvement of a local 3rd party with a potential open wifi, that might be fast enough, but not deemed secure.

4) “VPS and RDP” will not change your base problem of working with large files. And, unless you have an established relationship with a host + the necessary technical skills, you may be wasting more time and money than what it will cost to dig a direct 10 Gbps cable from provider to your location.
There are firms offering remote software hosting and files. A quick search got me to https://www.qvest.com/en/cloud-editing – “The enterprise solution for cloud-based editing”.
The key-word is enterprise.
They do offer a demo, which I would encourage you to do.

And, notwithstanding that Egypt in my younger days (maybe still is) was the 2nd biggest, after India, hub for film production. So it would not be unthinkable that any RDP virtual Post-Production supplier would like someone local, with language skills, that can support and demonstrate their goods + do editing work for their clients.

Go fetch – might solve several of your problems 😉

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Adelynne,

How bad are the shadows?
And how long are the clips?

Best solution is likely to be to jump over to After Effects and rotoscope the people there, without their shadows.
After Effects will do a decent job for you, without you having to spend a lot of time on it.
You can also be adventurous and use Mocha.

Alternative is to do a key, and make the shadows work on the new background.
Worse case is that you go back and shoot, and make sure the back-drop is fully evenly lit and performers are either lit from front above or distanced further out from the backdrop.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Matt,

Out of interest, where did your clip originate from?

Was it from a tape-deck where the sync/tracking was out?
That could give you that kind of play-back – same with old audio-reel editing solutions.
Rare, but possible.

Although not a “pure” solution. If there isn’t a plug-in that can repair it. You could consider re-generation the voice using one of the many “text to speech” engines on the internet – some will also match the actual voice.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey All,

I feel passionately for those who have had a bad experience with COVID Vaccines, but when discussing it, it must be balanced. And, there are many who are alive today because of getting vaccinated – I am not passing judgement, just making an observation on this thread.
(Yes, I am vaccinated, and have had the boosters. And, yes I know of a couple of people who did not survive. But many did.)

More importantly, adding to Mike’s point:

A part from being vaccinated, there are also employers that demand you have a suitable education with high grades, turn up sober for work, have a valid driving licence, and will not allow you to have a criminal record – so asking for proof of COVID vaccine and/or negative test is not unreasonable if that is what the employer wants.

As harsh as these demands might seem like, there is other jobs and employers out there. It is both a sellers and a buyers market, and those two sides of the job, for the individual concerned, might not always make a good fit.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Mohamed,

Depending on your definition of “high cameras”, type of content, and your editing turn-around, there are not much that you can do, apart from either:

1) Get a faster internet connection (1 GPPS, maybe 10 GBPS) – your profile does not show where you are based(?). But do check if you can not get high-speed fibre to the door, or if within reach use a space based system like Starlink.

2) Modify how you do it, and how fast you can turn jobs around. If working in 4K, 6K or 12K, long-form, multi-cam on a quick turn-around doing the final master – then you should consider not accepting the job.

3) However, if you are friends with the DIT, they may be able to send you proxies to start working with. Whilst the full-res is downloading. Just keep in mind that the upload of full-resolution master back to client will kill your business model on your current connection. Maybe check the neighbourhood and see if someone would be willing to let you “hire” time on a faster connection. Though you should be aware that larger media and corporate operations will not let their data be transmitted on a third-party unsecured network.

4) There are firms offering remote/virtual models, where your editing software is hosted on a remote server, with your footage. That could work, but it is unlikely that this solution will give you the original footage to work on remotely, without some kind of compression, which could impact your grade/graphics delivery.
Adding, that the virtual solutions that I have seen, the supplier will charge you a lot of money for software, host-server/computer, software, storing files on high-speed drives, and their internet connection – anything from £ 600 upwards, a week, in some cases.

Sorry, I know this is not what you were hoping for.
In short, on large file projects either work with clients who can hand-deliver a SSD drive, or who is happy to wait…

Hope that this was helpful.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Laurie,

You would normally describe it as 23.97, which accurately is 23.976 fps.

It all goes back to the olden days of converting to NTSC.
https://osgamers.com/frequently-asked-questions/why-23-976-fps-and-not-24

If both your media has the same frame-rate, there should not be noticeable out-of-sync problems.
There are smarter people here on FCPX that might be able to identify the problem.

I would investigate 2 immediate issues:
Did the footage arrive in the same frame-rate (and as it as separate files, or “locked” together in one media file)?

And, what frame-rate is your time-line set at?
Is it 23.97 or 24 fps?

Keep in mind that FCPX likes to lock your import into a specific codec standard, rather than let it run free like other NLE’s – this can be a hindrance, or saviour…

There is an old CreativeCow thread here – it is nearly 10 years old and hopefully FCPX has moved on, or not. But might be worth a read:
https://creativecow.net/forums/thread/audio-tc-frame-rate/

Atb
Mads

Audio TC frame rate

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Tom,

My initial thought is that there may be an issue with your screen drivers or media-drives (Should add that I am mainly PC based, but…).

For starters I would trash all of the preferences.
Don’t forget to save your keyboard layout, if you haven’t already done that!

Adobe has got instructions here:
https://community.adobe.com/t5/premiere-pro-discussions/faq-how-to-reset-trash-preferences-in-premiere-pro/td-p/8236158

If that doesn’t work, I would suggest setting up a new project and import the latest timeline into that project, to see how it behaves there.

Finally, sounds silly, but this is Adobe and Apple trying to play nicely together, where either at times goes out of the way to be difficult. And, a recent Mac upgrade killed off a lot of functionality in 3rd party plug-ins in FCPX, so one should not be surprised that they have done the same to PPro.
Having said that, it may just be a question of using a timeline with a different base-codec (sequence settings are the right terminology), and you could try to take your Quality down to 1/4 on the master screen, which might help too on playback.

If none of that works, there will be smarter people around here to make suggestions.

Good Luck – please do let us know the solution, if you find it.

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Grayson,

No, you should not work for free, but as a freelancer it is a tough call whether to ask for more money, or just swallow the changes.

If you agreed that you “would spend one day editing a commercial video
for a media company for $500”. And, that you have done that. Then there is nothing wrong with asking for more money.

If you can do the job in a couple of hours, make it an hourly rate (Divide your $500 by hours in a day, and mark up with respectable increase for working hourly – say 20%-30% on top, or what-ever you feel comfortable with).

Client may come back and suggest that you had promised the job done in a day, which you can rightfully say that you did as no changes were forthcoming within that day.

However, where it gets complicated, is if it is a good client, or worse if they tell you “Do this, and there will be much more work you + we’ll both look good”. The latter is often used, and the client would have told their previous supplier the same story and so forth.

Where the option of helping your client develop a market today, where they do the selling and are good at it, and you get all of the editing, might be more attractive in the long run.

Just be aware of that if there is no contract, or chain of emails, you should not expect loyalty.

On this one, ask for the money, but do let client know what the changes will cost extra money.

Good Luck!

Atb
Mads

[Mads Nybo jørgensen]

Hey Ismael,

No problem, I feel for you, and it’s a tough one.
I have in the past worked on features, mainly shot HD-CAM (8-bit), some partly shot on DV-Cam. I auto-conformed and did some invisible vfx to before mastering to HD-CAM master for the grade, before ending up on 35mm for cinema. One of those films got nominated for an Academy Award + an American re-make.
Just suggesting that not using the original DPX does not necessarily mean the end of the world.

And, there are only soo many places left where there is an actual film projector and projectionist that can show it for you (should add that I started out as a projectionist, and totally loved my time with 35mm reels and rolls). But you may consider the need for a digital version, and what is most important for you?

Also, I got to ask whether you have any graphics, vfx and/or transitions in your edit?
In which case, you may be back to using a separate file format for export.

I see three possible options for you in addition to try the renaming the originals (WARNING: DO NOT RENAME ANYTHING WITHOUT BACKUP COPIES OF BOTH FOOTAGE AND PROJECT – sorry for shouting):

1) Export Final Cut Pro XML via PPro file menu, and find out whether the DaVinci at the film-lab will import it and place source footage in the right place. If you need help to convert it via CC to X, I’m happy to do that for you. Please, Please, also export an MP4 or ProRes in the right frame-rate so you can do a full split-check at the film facility between that and the master.

2) Get pen and paper out, or a Google/Excel spread-sheet, and start manually finding the first DPX frame in each clip, and the clip point. You may need to download Resolve and do the job of lining up all the clips yourself. Not sure whether you’ll have to buy the Studio version, but you’ll soon find out. Do consult your facility about this before spending a lot of time on it – depending on the amount of cuts, it could easily cost upwards of 2 days alone, even with your manual edl.

3) Find the highest resolution time-line in PPro, pop your edit into that, and hit export to DPX…
😱😱😱
I know, feel free to scream, but you are not going to have the greatest ever short-film if only no-one get to see it. And, as soon as the grade gets going, you are no longer shooting out the original frames to film, as they will have been manipulated. In which case you have to weigh up what is most important.

Hope this helps.

Atb
Mads