[Maxwell Federman]

Hi

I have encountered this same problem. Most miniDV devices do not letterbox via firewire output; so you’d have to make an analog pass into the vincent box.
Here’s my trick to keep it digital: pass the 16:9 dv firewire into a DVHS HD/SD deck. In the settings menu of the DVHS, set the system to SD, then set output to letterbox in the 4:3 section of the tv type dialog. You may need 4-pin to 6-pin cables or adapters to pull this off but it works great. Don;t forget to disable device control!
As a longtime Beta user and proponent, I hate to admit I touch DVHS but as a home format I think its in a league of its own. I haven’t used one to record any HD because we got some HDV decks early on, but as a signal converter they work great.
If anyone else knows another way to letterbox within a firewire connection please let me know!

Best wishes,

Max Federman

[Maxwell Federman]

Thanks for your reply.

I am aware that the deck will output 1080, but only via HDMI or Component signal interfaces.

With the AJA card I will be able to capture the HD analog 1080 over Component connection…

But am also considering buying an HDMI capture card to use the HDMI output for capture.

Our camcorder has the “A” upgrade; but after running the online firmware checker the cam (hd-100A) needed an additional update for proper QuickTime functioning. The tapes shot before the update will also need to be captured without Firewire.

I’m hoping that somebody else has had to go through this problem and perhaps tried a HDMI card (such as blackmagic) and can fill me in on the results.

Thank you for taking the time to read this post!

Max

[Maxwell Federman]

Thank you!

This is just what I was looking for.

Thank you very much for responding so quickly!

I posted another question on the “Working within the RED Engine” thread. I came close to answering it myself when I read more about the 3d containers… but I think there may be a shortcut or better way…

If you get a chance please check it out and let me know what you think…

I appreciate your assistance as I only have limited time on a trial download. I have a dialog going with Matt Caravella at Boris and when we buy this software I will let him know that you have been very helpful.

Thanks again,

Max Federman

[Maxwell Federman]

Hello Peter

Thanks again for the help.

Here is another quick question:

I will be working with the Presets library during a trial run to get the most out of the two weeks.

Lets assume I will be using the animated gradient lower 3rds with a vector text overlay.

The intention is to import a 30 second movie file. The vector text will appear on the file for the full composition duration; by default. This is not a problem.

How can I set the track for the animated gradient so the track resets the animation every six seconds?
… I scoured the online manual for an answer, but came up empty.

I assume there is a way to manually set keyframes within the gradient’s track at six second intervals, but which type of interpolation will make the track reset (effectively setting the effect duration at six seconds while nested within a longer duration composition)?

Thanks again for your help, I appreciate your assistance!

Max

[Maxwell Federman]

Thank you, Kieran.

I appreciate your assistance.

I am considering all options I have/may have for feeding SDI into a new KulaByte encoder.

Our old Media100i system is an option I have been considering, that would leave our AJA cards free for other jobs.

Thanks again for your assistance!

Max

[Maxwell Federman]

Hello Peter,

Thanks for your advice. I will be installing the RED trial into a system with a non-supported host; which explains my need to understand the RED Engine basics. If I can get a few simple effects completed I will be able to easily convince my employer to purchase Boris products for our CS3 (Windows) and Media100 (Mac) systems. However due to some prior unpleasant experiences I do not have authorization to install ANY trial software into a company machine.

I downloaded the RED trial before (and put it into a Mac w/o a supported host NLE) but got bogged down with paying work during those two weeks. The biggest question I was left with was how to work with clips of various durations within the same timeline.

Your post did make it clear that the this system is keyframe based. I will return to reading about the keyframe system in RED in the online help manual; which I assume will ultimately answer my question.

However, if there is any advice you could provide to speed up the learning process I would appreciate it. I did experiment with the Library Browser, but the duration problem prevented me from good results. I am hoping to import media tracks of different lengths and create simple flashy transitions such as light zoom or static (noise) for use in some promos. When I opened the light zoom transition (for instance) from the free presets in the Lib. Browser, there was a duration of a few seconds in the duration field in the upper left of the Timeline window. I had a difficult time figuring out how to use the “replace” media command when replacing with video media clips of different lengths.

Thanks again,

Max