[Pat Defilippo]

Hello,

Given your situation, where you simply want to insert whatever length of video BEFORE your first clip, why not simply do this:

1) Start a new Sequence
2) Edit your new video at the start
3) Nest your existing Sequence after that

You will be able to see the Markers from your original Sequence within the nested clip in the new Sequence. You would have to transfer them to the new timeline from that nested clip for them to go thru Compressor to DVDSP (or wherever), but at least they’re where you originally put them.

Does that work quickly and easily enough for your specific need? It’s a little messy having two sequences where you should only need one, but it’s probably faster and less work than “Shift ~” (which I also use, in most situations).
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hi Chris!

Thanks for your help with this!

The total edited length ended up being 1 hour, 2 minutes and 24 seconds. I was just using the Best Quality 90-minute setting in Compressor but I will definitely try the numbers you listed.

Thanks again,
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hi Chris and thanks for your quick response,

I’m viewing the pixelation on the DVD (I’ve burned four of them in two sets – two original edited and two revised edited) and in DVD Player right from the Video TS folder.

The DVD-R stock is Memorex 16X.

When looking at the Quicktime movie Exported from FCP in Quicktime Player before it goes in to Compressor, there there appear to be no pixelation problems.

It appears to be in the same place twice on both sets of DVD burns, but I just spot-checked it – I didn’t check the entire DVDs.

It wouldn’t be something like a trash the Compressor and/or DVDSP prefs, would it? It doesn’t seem to be given that both programs appear to be working properly.

Thanks again in advance,
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hello,

Just a thought – have you tried “collapse multiclip” to the one angle you want before going into the mangler? That pretty much chooses the one angle out of the however-many-you-had and helps reduce dropped frames during playback, anyway. The multiclip does keep your unused angles, so you can go back later and “un-collapse” if you need to.

I don’t know if this might be your answer or not – I haven’t tried it myself before MM. Just select all of your multiclips, right click and select “collapse multiclip”. Then, try the mangler and see if that helps.

Good luck,
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Good point, Steve Eisen! Again, you’re thinking ahead! It would make sense that MacBook Pro Air has got to be where they’re going next with MacBook Air, with firewire & SATA perhaps possible via an ExpressCard port and all the other toys needed for professional FCS use.

At the same time, I was somewhat surprised that some type of HDDVD and/or Blueray “SuperDrive” was not announced by now, at least for the Mac Pro line. Instead, Steve Jobs’ moved away from optical drives altogether in the “Air”!

Perhaps MacBook Pro Air and/or a HD burner will be announced as soon as at NAB? As most of us know, Apple introduced a new MacBook Pro at NAB last year (or maybe that was two years ago) and hopefully they’ll announce something useful for pros yet again.

I’ll be at NAB again in April and now I’m looking forward to it that much more!

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hi all!

Thanks for all of your help! I still have the dead pixels, but I appreciate your quick responses!

Jeremy – yes, I did try un-plugging and re-plugging both connectors that come out of the white box. I tried them again today and I still have the dead pixels.

Rennie – Steve is right, I did buy the 30″ Cinema Display two years ago and my warranty would only have been for a year. A client of mine had a second Cinema Display monitor (the 23″) that was down, so I gave him my Cinema Display power box about six months ago until he got his fixed. Ever since I got it back, though, I’ve had the black pixels. I guess it doesn’t pay to help a colleague out!

Wayne – even with the black pixels, I’d still buy another Cinema Display! The picture is awesome, although I haven’t worked much with any other similar monitors other than Apple. I would suggest you at least use an Apple Mighty Mouse, though, because the screen is so big that you have to move the mouse all over the place sometimes. With the Mighty Mouse (I actually like the wired better than the wireless because it never loses connection), you get the mini-trackball which lets you scroll left/right/up/down. This minimizes to a great extent how much mouse movement you have to do and is definitely worth the $60 price tag.

Well, if anyone hears of any way I might be able to address this problem down the road, please do let me/all of us know. For now, it’s not killing me as it’s over where I put my video and audio scopes (in the upper right) anyway. If I get many other dead pixels, though, I’ll probably have to bring it to the Apple Store and bite the bullet.

Thanks again!
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hi all!

Thanks for all of your help! I still have the dead pixels, but I appreciate your quick responses!

Jeremy – yes, I did try un-plugging and re-plugging both connectors that come out of the white box. I tried them again today and I still have the dead pixels.

Rennie – Steve is right, I did buy the 30″ Cinema Display two years ago and my warranty would only have been for a year. A client of mine had a second Cinema Display monitor (the 23″) that was down, so I gave him my Cinema Display power box about six months ago until he got his fixed. Ever since I got it back, though, I’ve had the black pixels. I guess it doesn’t pay to help a colleague out!

Wayne – even with the black pixels, I’d still buy another Cinema Display! The picture is awesome, although I haven’t worked much with any other similar monitors other than Apple. I would suggest you at least use an Apple Mighty Mouse, though, because the screen is so big that you have to move the mouse all over the place sometimes. With the Mighty Mouse (I actually like the wired better than the wireless because it never loses connection), you get the mini-trackball which lets you scroll left/right/up/down. This minimizes to a great extent how much mouse movement you have to do and is definitely worth the $60 price tag.

Well, if anyone hears of any way I might be able to address this problem down the road, please do let me/all of us know. For now, it’s not killing me as it’s over where I put my video and audio scopes (in the upper right) anyway. If I get many other dead pixels, though, I’ll probably have to bring it to the Apple Store and bite the bullet.

Thanks again!
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Would this work and be one less step?

What if you simply made a new sequence and then dragged in your master sequence with the 8 audio tracks? Then, hold down your Option key to copy/duplicate audio tracks one and two to three and four before outputting to all four tracks via your Io LA.

This way, you’d get two additional benefits over Exporting:
1) No extra time or disk space doing this (which is minimal anyway)
2) If you ever make revisions in your master timeline (the one with the 8 tracks), it will automatically ripple through to the output timeline (with the duplicated audio, the way you’d like it to go through your Io LA).

When I was linearly editing, by the way, I used master audio differently than the way you described. I’ve never done this with FCP yet, but I used to put the stereo audio on 1 and 2 (exactly how you described) but then I would put Narrator/SOT on 3 and SFX & Music (Mono) on 4. I’m just bringing this up because you might be able to take better advantage of the four audio tracks for easier possible re-editing down the road via the Io LA than dual stereo. If I had more than just a UVW-1800 (which is 2 audio channels only) hooked up to my Io LA, this is exactly how I’d master everything.

Just an idea!
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hi ScottGFX,

The first linear editor I worked with was the Sony BVE-5000 in ’85. I went 3/4″ to 3/4″ for the first two professional years I was in this field while also editing and directing 6pm and 10pm newscasts for a CBS affiliate in Quincy, Illinois. We also used to edit 2″ to 2″ on the fly, too, where you had to anticipate the edit as it wouldn’t engage until about a second after you hit the record button.

You might think I was spoiled starting out with a Sony BVE-5000, but when I went freelance in 1990, I quickly got to work with all of the other good and bad linear editors at the time including several models from brands including Mach One, Emme, Grass Valley (my favorite was the 151), CMX, Sony, Ampex and the Axial (which was both linear and non-linear).

I edited on several of the early non-linear’s as well, like the EMC2 and D-Vision through the Avid and the like but, until Final Cut Studio in 2005 for me, my favorite was clearly the VideoCube/TurboCube/StrataSphere systems. I never had many problems with any of them (of course, I knew all the work-arounds to keep them running smoothly), but I still did have to buy the expensive extended service agreements and then replacement boards after they were not offered any more. I avoided upgrading to Affinity becuase I heard of all of the problems with it and held off, but the company went under before they made that system stable enough to be in business.

Thanks for the tip on the workaround for the Workspace! That’s a good idea and I supposed I could, like you said, just stack alternate takes, etc., above the take currently being used and either turn the video and audio tracks off or moving the transparency and audio levels to zero. The advantage doing it that way in FCP is that it would ripple, which the Workspace was unable to do. So, thanks again!

Like you, I am happy with Final Cut Studio even though Strat had some things that were better even to this day. By the way, I have played with the new FCP 6.0.2 “scrolling playhead” feature and, although it does in fact leave the playhead over the Timeline area that you stopped at while playing, the playhead still rolls off the screen to the right! So, it’s still not as good as VideoCube (circa 1994) in that the FCP Timeline doesn’t itself scroll to the next screen with the playhead (if you’re zoomed in – if you’re zoomed all the way out, it scrolls just like VideoCube). Hopefully, in an upcoming upgrade, they’ll figure out how to get the Timeline to scroll to the right while the playhead plays off the screen that way so that, like VideoCube, you can even be zoomed in all the way and still see what edits you’ve got coming up as you’re reviewing. Good start for FCP, though – 13 years after ImMix! Again, though, FCP is way ahead in many other aspects.
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671

[Pat Defilippo]

Hello,

I, too, made the jump from StrataSphere in 2005 (like David) after being an owner/operator of that system since the VideoCube days in 1994! In fact, my StrataSphere still works very well and I used it in August to update an annual spot that I’ve been doing for years. I’m looking to sell it, by the way, since I’m entirely on FCS2 now. If you know of anyone interested, please let them know to drop me a line (my contact info is below).

I would suggest that you look into a good training DVD. I learned from DMTS and their FCS1 package. It will get you up to speed relatively quickly, however as you know there will still be stuff to learn from there. The DVD Studio Pro tutorial from DMTS is particularly excellent as well, and since Affinity is editor-only hardware and software, you’ll need to get up to speed with the other excellent programs FCS2 offers in addition to FCP6.

You’ll find that the Affinity did some things better. One thing that FCP literally just got today with the FCS 6.0.2 update that even the VideoCube had way back in 1994 is the ability for the playhead to scroll while playing within a timeline. As you know, the playhead in an Affinity TrackSheet scrolls to the right as you’re playing so that you can glance down while reviewing a video, for example, and see what edits you have coming up and then quickly and easily stop to revise anything. Up until literally just yesterday, the only way to do this was to zoom out (Shift-Z) so that the entire Timeline is viewable because the playhead would disappear of the right side of the screen if you were zoomed in any tighter! I missed this feature a lot coming from having it in the StrataSphere world and I’m glad FCS2 finally added it!

I think the thing you’ll miss the most is the Workspace. I miss it every day! Right now in FCS (or Avid or any of them), you can’t place things like alternate takes, etc., anywhere but in the Bin. I remember being able to Shift-Drag alternate takes, etc., to the Workspace below the TrackSheet (Timeline) so that when you wanted to change the take, for example, all of everything was there for you within the edited clip (in-and-out point set, transitions and effects added, and even the in-point of where it started in the timeline) and it was much easier to flip-flop out the shot – and even Shift-Drag the one you’re swapping to the Workspace! The Workspace is an excellant feature that no other software I looked at two years ago embraced.

Other things you’ll miss is Command-Clicking on a clip to automatically jump to the in-point of it, and Option-Command-Clicking on a clip to automatically jump to the out-point. FCS2 has snapping, like StrataSphere and Affinity has always had, so you’ll end up getting used to moving the playhead on the Timeline close enough to snap to where you want to go or using the Up & Down arrows to jump to the previous & next edit points. While these are nice, they’re not as nice.

Other than that, everything about Final Cut Studio 2 is a major upgrade to Affinity – which makes sense because the last time that system was upgraded was at the end of the ’90s! I believe that if ImMix/Scitex/Accom kept up with R&D, that the StrataSphere/Affinity system would still be as highly regarded as Final Cut Studio is today! That system was definitely designed more by linear video editors, which is why it appealed to me in 1994 because I’ve been editing for almost 25 years now and about 50% of that was still linearly (including my first 13 years-plus)! You’ll find a lot of stuff about FCS and Avid uses Film terminology (Slug instead of Black, etc., most of which meant nothing/still means nothing to me doing spots, corporates and infomercials) or that was clearly created by computer programmers learning video/film.

All in all, though, I was in the same shoes two years ago that you are in today coming from the same non-linear system. I’d say that if you get the training DVDs and do several jobs on FCS right away (not your Affinity, which will be tempting to use since you know it so well!) that you’ll be up to speed well enough within a few days. Additionally, if you keep reading the Cow FCP forum weekly (if not daily) that you’ll be very comfortable with FCS within a month. A tip to the using the COW – first, do a SEARCH for an answer to the many questions you will have because you’ll get an answer quicker that way. If it’s not there, you’ll be surprised how quickly you can get an answer by the knowledgeable folks here!

Good luck!
-Pat

G5 Quad 2.5 Desktop with 4GB Ram, 500GB HD & Fiber Card ~
30″ Cinema Display & 17″ Sony SVGA ~
Swift Data 200 Internal 1.6TB SATA II RAID 0 ~
AJA Io LA ~
Final Cut Studio 2 ~
Sony UVW-1800 Beta-SP ~
Sony DSR-40 DVCam ~
2.33ghz MacBook Pro 17″ (with FCS2) ~~~

P D Post Productions, Inc. ~
TV~DVD~VHS~CD~WEB
for Corporate Communications, Commercials, Infomercials, Television Programs and Family Occasions since 1983 ~
E-mail PD@PDPost.com ~
Website http://www.PDPost.com ~
Business/Cell Phone (847) 275-5671