[Michael Cummins]

Thanks for the response. Glad to know I’m not the only one in this boat.

UPDATE! I ran some tests to see if I could pinpoint the problem and it is, in fact, an issue with Final Cut Pro. I shot a quick little interview in the studio on our Canon XH-A1, recording in HDV 1080i60 onto a Maxwell miniDV tape.

Test 1:
Captured via Deck: HDV > DV downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: DV NTSC Anamorphic
Device Control Preset: FireWire NTSC Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.94

Test 2:
Captured via Deck: HDV > DV downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: DV NTSC Anamorphic
Device Control Preset: FireWire NTSC Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.94 (seems to be consistent)

Test 3:
Captured via Camera: HDV
FCP Capture Preset: HDV
Device Control Preset: HDV FireWire Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.97

Test 4:
Captured via Deck: HDV with no downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: HDV
Device Control Preset: HDV FireWire Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.97 (!)

Test 5:
Captured via Deck: HDV > DV downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: HDV
Device Control Preset: HDV FireWire Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.97

Test 6:
Captured via Deck: HDV > DV downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: HDV
Device Control Preset: HDV FireWire Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.97

Test 7:
Captured via Deck: HDV > DV downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: DV NTSC Anamorphic
Device Control Preset: FireWire NTSC Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.94

Test 8:
Captured via Deck: HDV > DV downconvert.
FCP Capture Preset: DV NTSC Anamorphic
Device Control Preset: FireWire NTSC Basic
Output FPS in QT: 29.94

So it seems to be the DV capture preset…. Any thoughts?

[Michael Cummins]

All the DV clips have BlackMagic DV Codec coming up in the Quicktime HUD. But only a handful are at odd framerates. And again, all DV clips check in to FCServer, but only the ones that have odd framerates don’t check out correctly.

[Michael Cummins]

Yep. Quicktime sees it differently. This is the culmination of FIVE months worth of working directly with the Apple engineering group to resolve this issue. They’ve said that it’s our problem for having weird frame rates and it’s up to us to figure out this frame rate issue.

The BlackMagic problem isn’t much of a concern right now. The BlackMagic drivers for the card seem to want to add it’s name to any kind of generic DV compression. It’s weird, but it’s not screwing anything up, yet….

[Michael Cummins]

Reads the same as FCP and FCServer: 29.97 and 48kHz.

[Michael Cummins]

To find your clip settings, look in your bin window. Select the clip that’s giving you trouble, and it will highlight all the metadata to the right in blue. You can now find size (column named “Frame Size), fps (Vid Rate), and type (Compressor). You may have to scroll to your right to reveal those columns.

And just because the clip in your timeline doesn’t come up “Unrendered” when you play it, doesn’t mean it doesn’t need rendering. At the top of your timeline are two small horizontal lines that tell you what render state the clips are in. Grey or blue means they’re rendered. Green means they’re “pre-rendered”, meaning that a render file hasn’t exactly been created, but they’ll render on the fly (sometimes at a lower compression, hence possible fuzziness) when you have unlimited or safe RT set on your timeline. Read your manual for more details.

[Michael Cummins]

It is in fact the regular FPS, not the playing FPS. Some additional information I thought of that applies to SOME of the weird clips, but not all. Some clips were originally HDV, downconverted to DV on capture. Several months later, we installed a BlackMagic HD I/O card in our MacPro. The Format in the HUD for those files then went from DV25 (DVCPro 25, I think) to BlackMagic DV, as if the generic DV25 codec was renamed by the BlackMagic card after its install.

[Michael Cummins]

Do your clip settings and timeline settings match up? I know when I put HDV footage into a DV timeline, the resolution isn’t the between preview and comp views.

Any details you can provide would be helpful.

[Michael Cummins]

Thanks! The expression based chart was exactly what I was looking for. The chart looks amazing!

[Michael Cummins]

I’ve found a fix that seems to work just fine. Just needed a little “out-of-the-box” thinking.

I duplicated the image, garbage matted the problem spot, and applied the Match Move behavior to my analyzed motion. This moves a garbage matte revealing only the needed portion of the original image directly over the keyed image. Seamless.

If you know of other fixes/ideas, let me know. But for now I think I’m good.

[Michael Cummins]

I’ve got garbage mattes down; they’re easy. It’s applying the garbage matte to the luma key ONLY. So far, I’m ending up with a whole in the talent’s chest because the matte is applying to the image, and not just the key.