[Mike Weber]

I had this same problem, and your solution (power down/power up AJA box) fixed it for me. Thanks Bob!

[Mike Weber]

We often insert edit video from FCP to DSR-80, DSR-1500 or UVW1800 decks via an AJA IoLA box. The only time I’ve experienced extra black frames is due to operator error – In the Edit to Tape window, under the Mastering Settings tab, there’s a Trailer “Black” Box. If the box is checked and there’s a duration entered, then indeed black will be added after your out point on your master tape.

But I think you can only enter whole number seconds there, not frames, and since you are getting 15 frames of black, that’s probably not the problem for you. But worth a quick look anyway.

mike

[Mike Weber]

At least once before mastering, I force myself to turn off the computer monitors and watch the program solely on the NTSC monitor. I find if the computer monitors are on, I frequently glance at CTI location on the timeline, and thus am anticipating cuts, effects, nodes, etc. Watching the show (and the entire show all the way through, I might add) on the NTSC monitor alone gives me more of a fresh perspective.

[Mike Weber]

Hello Walter

Just a curiosity question – You say you use Title 3D for all your lower third work. As far as I can tell it’ll only do a text layer. What if your lower third needs a solid color, logo, picture, shape, something like that? Do you then move over to LiveType or Motion? Or do you build the lower third on your FCP timeline layers, just using Title 3D for the text layer.

I use Boris Graffiti for lower thirds because its very quick and has a good interface (almost identical to Title 3D). It is buggy, however. I’ve had lots of issues with things looking one way in Graffiti, then a different way when actually on my timeline.

thanks –
Mike

[Mike Weber]

Hello Dave, thanks for your help. In the Crop tab I set the value back to none/0, and then went to the Mask tab and entered the parameters for top/bottom. Looked just like it did when I was cropping. However, when I exported the .pct, the exact same thing happened – masking went away. Is there a different way I should be doing the masking?

I did discover a work-around: nest my two layers in a Pre-composition before exporting. My background image retains its cropping that way. However, this wasn’t 100% fool-proof. After I export the file and then import it into Final Cut and dropped it on my timeline, it looked noticeably brighter than it did when I was in Graffiti. Conversely, if I just dro the Video Generator file on the timeline, it looks more like it should.

Mike

[Mike Weber]

Hello Dave

Thanks for your help. I downloaded and installed Graffiti 5.2, and indeed it made the black frame/alpha channel problem go away. But now I’m sorry to say I have a new problem.

My Graffiti file is two layers. One layer is text, and the layer below it is a still image file, which I am cropping to place behind my text. I’m cropping the top and bottom, but not the sides.

When I export the file as a still image, the still image layer loses it’s cropping parameters! It reverts back to it’s uncropped state. Not only does the pict file I exported wind up that way, but also the Composite window in Graffiti displays it that way. If I click the eyeball icon on the layer to hide it, and then click again to reveal the layer, it goes back to it’s proper cropped look. Help! This is driving me nuts.

thanks
mike

[Mike Weber]

OK, I did a search and found someone had a similar problem earlier, where they had no presets at all. Followed a link to this Apple doc describing the problem:

https://support.apple.com/kb/TS1097

I did what it said (uninstalled & reinstalled Motion & Compressor), and that fixed the problem.

[Mike Weber]

I’m not sure, but your clips like a little bit stretched horizontally, and are not displaying in a 4×3 aspect ratio. This would definitely cause your text & footage to look bad.

If your footage is DV 720×480, then it is made up of rectangular pixels. Final Cut Pro knows how to display this properly in the canvas window, but QuickTime Player doesn’t automatically – instead it will display them as square, causing a slight horizontal distortion. As an experiment, try exporting your video as a true square pixel aspect ratio, like 640×480, instead of 720×480, and see if that helps.

[Mike Weber]

I have had the same exact problem when trying to do a zoom/position change on a still in the Final Cut Pro timeline. I switched to making moves on stills with Motion. (The software that comes bundled with Final Cut Studio, not the Viewer window tab in Final Cut Pro). If you set a start and end keyframe for both position and scale, you can then set their interpolations to “bezier” in the Keyframe Editor. This will do a nice ease in/ease out motion for you, with no slipping and sliding. You can render a movie right out of Motion, or else drop the Motion project file into your Final Cut timeline and render there.

[Mike Weber]

For the MPEGs, try using MPEG Streamclip:

https://www.squared5.com/

When I’ve used it to convert MPEG to Quicktime, audio is retained. Might have to play around with field dominance to get the video looking right.