[Mike Raff]

Hi, Beau

Let me try to clarify the previous posts.

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Because Apple designed it not to. Walter is right, as usual; it’s a Digital Rights Management issue. Here’s the thinking behind it.

Apple intended iTunes to be used by consumers for the personal needs and just as it intended FCP to be used by professionals. Their presumption was that consumers would have no need to worry about sync rights and that professionals would acquire properly licensed music elsewhere. It’s a fair preseumption, but might not be accurate in all cases.

As you did not state your purposes, we cannot know whether you intended use falls within or outside of the generally understood meaning of “fair use” or is, in fact, a violation of copyright law. As many of us in the Cow Community are creators of intellectual property, we abide by copyright law, respecting the rights of others and hope that others will treat us with the same courtesy.

If you want to know HOW you can import the file into FCP, then follow Dan’s instructions.
If you want to know if you MAY (in the legal sense) import the file, then listen to Walter’s podcast.

Hope that helps.

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

Media Motion Ball

https://www.imugonline.com/events/2007/nab07.shtml

Wish I was going . . .

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

I read something recently–sorry, I don’t recall where–that said the speed of Boris opening was a function of the number of fonts you have installed.

Perhaps someone else can chime in on the subject of Boris and font management.

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

How about this?

Sync up the two video tracks and reduce each one’s size to 50%; move one to the left side of the frame and the other to the right. That way you can watch them play back side by side in real time. Make cuts where you need to and delete the bad chunks. Then resize all clips to 100%.

A little clunky perhaps, but it should work.

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

There’s also a free “aged film” filter available from CGM.

https://www.cgm-online.com/eiperle/cgm_aged_film_le_e.html

I haven’t used it myself, but it’s worth checking out.

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

Hi, Brian

I think you’ve already learned about your two best options: having somebody else do the captioning or biting the bullet and purchasing Maccaption.

A third option is UniSay Subtitler (https://www.unisay.com/subtitler.htm). I’ve never used them, but from the website it sounds like an interesting alternative. They create the subtitled files (at some price/minute rate) and you download them from their website and use some free software (PC only, but you can export as QT) to insert it into your FCP timeline (and fine tune it as needed).

But before you go spending money on any of these, you should clarify one point: does the station merely want the show closed captioned starting Jan. 1 or do they think the FCC requires that the show be closed captioned starting Jan. 1 ?

This is a very important distinction. A cursory reading of the FCC regs says that after Jan. 1, all new programming by local stations must be captioned. But there are some exemptions, which may apply to your program.

For example:

“locally produced and distributed non-news programming with no repeat value”

and

“programming provided by program providers with annual gross revenues under $3 million”

(See these and more at: https://www.fcc.gov/cgb/consumerfacts/closedcaption.html)

So if the station station simply wants your program closed captioned as a convenience to their viewers, you’ll have to find a way (and you might ask them to share the cost of this “convenience”).

But if they are only asking because they think they are required by law to broadcast the show with captions, then you might be able to persuade them otherwise and save yourself considerable expense and inconvenience.

Good luck! And let us know what happens.

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

Got it!

Thanks, Matte.

(Any idea under what circumstances I would uncheck the “options” box as described above?)

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

As pointed out above, DVD captions and broadcast captions are two different beasts. And I know nothing about captioning DVDs. But if your question is “Is there a way I can edit closed captions into a sequence in Final Cut Pro, so that the captions can be broadcast and decoded by a television set in someone’s home?” then I have an answer for you.

I have not used it, but there are a couple of products that allow you to encode text into Line 21 (in the vertical interval) and insert the signal into a FCP sequence as an additional–and functionally invisible–video track.

One is PC only (though you create a a QT movie which you can import into FCP) and the name escapes me at the moment.

But there is at least one Mac-native program: MacCaption (https://www.ccaption.com/index.shtml) and it’s not cheap ($2000-$7000, depending which version you get). That’s why there’s a booming business in paying somebody else to do it for you.

Good luck!

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

Thanks for the update, Peter. I stand corrected.

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA

[Mike Raff]

As far as I know, it’s OS 10.3.9 and QT 6.4.

I believe that 8.2 is not compatible with Tiger. Not sure about QT 7, but it may very well work with 8.2.

Perhaps someone who knows for sure will correct me.

Good luck!

Mike Raff
Richmond, VA