[Outis]

On this subject, our company needed to purchase a few travelling firewire drives and I wanted to get the word out there on what is working best. We had some LaCie’s–20% died in a year. G Raid has been nothing but trouble (we don’t travel with these) though very highly recommended. Heard OWC drives were highly rated at the moment.

Anyone have an opinion?

[Outis]

Thank you very much for your responses. We have been pondering uncompressed which might be possible, though we don’t have a RAID, but the segments are 2-3 mins long. If not, a .dv stream might be an option.

We are working with the client right now to see what they can take. Actually, as this project is moving into HD mastering, they are trying to figure it out at the same time. Sort of the blind leading the blind…

Any ideas for capturing at the highest possible quality?

Thanks very much for your help.

[Outis]

Thank you very much for your reply. I am going to create a 29.97 timeline to output the OMF and send a tape. Then if all goes well, I will import the finished AIFF into my 23.98 timeline. According to your info it should sync. No?

Thank you!

[Outis]

OK — your answer brings up a key issue that could lead to the solution. Converting the video to 29.97 is possible, but how does one create an OMF that the mixer works with that MATCHES the timecode of the video?

The timeline is 23.98, doesn’t that mean the OMF –and the clips associated with it –has a timecode based on 23.98? I understand that sound programs do not work in time code per se, but if he is trying to lock sound with picture, there must be some kind of reference timecode. Would I not have to re-edit or reconform the entire movie into 29.97? Will copying the clips and pasting them into a 29.97 timeline and rendering it lead to some kind of speed change in the sound? And when I go back to the 23.98 picture, which we want to do because we do not want the pulldown or repeated frames for 29.97, won’t that conversion also alter the sound?

You mentioned audio facilities being able to handle 23.98 materials. How? What formats do they use? I have seen pro tools take in a reference movie to sync sound to. Can someone please explain this or give suggestions?

The problem is not making a tape at 29.97, the problem is creating an OMF file from the 23.98 timeline as well as a movie the mixer can work with for reference. The mixer requests a tape because in his system for playback he uses a digibeta deck which plays on the external monitors. He says that quictimes are not reliable for locking sync. Has anyone else used quicktimes and not tapes to mix in 23.98? If I can find that answer, I can output the OMF at 23.98 and give the reference movie at 23.98 OR an OMF at 29.97 and a tape and we can go to work.

Thank you all for responding to this thread. Your comments have been much appreciated.

[Outis]

The film was telecine and the sound locked onto a DVCam tape at 29.97. Then I removed the pulldown and converted both the picture and sound (they were locked) to 23.98 using Cinema Tools. So now I have an offline timeline with sound and picture running at 23.98. I would love to keep it this way and have the sound mixer work in 23.98.

But, he says he needs a tape to watch the picture to. So now I have to get the picture and the sound from my timeline BACK into 29.97. Then I can create an OMF and a tape that match in 29.97. What is the best way to accomplish this? OR, better yet, how can I give the OMF and video to the sound mixer in 23.98 so they match and not convert the video back at all?

How do shows that shoot 23.98 HD but record sound at 29.97 (as is recommended) do it? I think they don’t convert the picture to 29.97 because that would defeat the purpose. There must be some way of handling the sound. Anyone with experience with this out there?

thank you.

[Outis]

I guess I am getting confused because that is not truly the problem. Yes, I have a monitor hooked up to my fcp system. But the problem is coming from the timeline where I editied in 24fps and from which I create the OMF. He is then trying to lock the sync to a tape, but that runs 29.97fps so the two don’t match.

My question is, is there a way to create a 29.97 EDL from the timeline? Or, is there a way to create a 24fps file that he can sync to — and has anyone used this system with their sound mixers (he led me to believe that it was not possible and not professional).

Bottom line, do I have to convert the entire project back into 29.97 and from there output the OMF and the tape for him to sync to?

Thank you.

[Outis]

Yes, he uses a monitor in his mixing room and that’s why he wants a tape in 29.97 to sync to. Any suggestions?

Thank you.

[Outis]

Thanks very much for the suggestions. I did notice it looked worse in the fractional views of fit. But the problem still occurs on the curves of the letters.

I turned on the continuous rasterization and while it worked on straight lines, for the curves it got worse.

If anyone out there has some other ideas, please let me know. This could also be a problem on the illustrator end, but am I wrong in thinking that many designers create their logos in Illustrator then import them into After Effects?

As for the language issue, I suppose I shall refrain from comment, and merely humbly apologize to those that I offended.

[Outis]

I have a Quad, 4 x 2.5 GHz Power PC G5 running 10.4.2.

It seems like it could be a problem with the newer OS? We have an Imac in the office that is having the same problem. But this software runs fine on computers running 10.3.8

Any solutions?

[Outis]

Well, I finally figured it out and the problem was not the alpha output but the way that FCP deals with it. The matte goes UNDER the fill and the fill is the one that is set to composite as a luma matte. Slightly counter-intuitive and hopefully the FCP developers can work on this as when we go to online in an Avid, we have to flip everything.

Thanks to everyone for their help and input. It’s so great to get so much feedback when I needed help.

Thank you!