[Robert Withers]

Thanks, Michael. I’m realizing FCP 5.5 to PPro CC is too big a leap. I will put FCP 7 on my latest Mac while it will still run on Mountain Lion. Transition through FCP 7 sounds like a good idea. Digital software/operating systems are a moving target! Especially when Apple keeps unsupporting them. I sort of miss working in 16mm which you could cut with a splicer or a scissors. But the labs are dying out too. Though I’ve seen some beautiful films shot on Super 16mm lately.

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Thanks for your thought, Rainer. That’s my current plan. I’ll leave issues of converting to HD 720p for a release format on the shelf for now and forge ahead with the editing. I wonder if my FCP text intertitles will hold up through that process. Maybe I’ll need to replace them with new text images from AE or some other source later. But I guess I can deal with that when the time comes.

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

I’ve been researching Compressor and deinterlacing cause of extreme comb/jaggy effect viewing my SD footage on an HD monitor. Not your issue I know, but here are some resources I’ve found:
https://documentation.apple.com/en/compressor/usermanual/index.html#chapter=23%26section=1%26tasks=true
https://www.digitalrebellion.com/blog/posts/using_frame_controls_in_compressor.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deinterlacing
https://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage/compressor_3.5_basics_stone.html
Some people say that “better” is better than “best.”
Blending vs interpolation seems to be an issue–supposedly the latter better for images with lots of movement.
I’m still working on this.

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Thank you, Nick. I’m happy to know that exporting from FCP (“saving as a self-contained QT”?) is a basic data transfer without loss. It sounds like I can get the timeline out of my retro FCP and try a newer Compressor version on a faster machine. Or find something in Adobe to do this.
I’ll also look into the options you suggest–the software, hardware, upscaling before de-interlacing, etc.
Some of your tech knowledge is a bit over my head–I’m just learning about de-interlace options like blending. The process that gave good results in Compressor on my old machine involved settings like “motion compensation,” “adaptive details,” “resize” with “linear filter,” and a little “anti-alias” and “details” thrown in. I don’t know if it was blending or doing something else. But this was so slow it would take days of processing for the whole file and I already replaced the motherboard once on this macbook p.
De-interlacing scene by scene is an interesting idea.
Fortunately I don’t have to de-interlace the sound 🙂

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Yes, evidently not as good. But it’s in the can already. Thanks for your response, Dave LaRonde. Nevertheless my project is to deinterlace and upres, and am trying to determine the best flow. In your experience, does it matter if I perform these operations directly from my retro FCP 5.5 or can I save as QT movie and do this on a faster computer with different software?

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Here’s something I’m curious about. If I save the timeline as a self-continained Quicktime movie and move it to a faster computer can I get the same quality deinterlacing, upresing, etc. from that file as from trying to do those things within my retro FCP 5.5 software. Is anything lost by saving the QT file and working with it externally vs. working with plug-ins or “save as” functions within FCP. It’s getting harder to find software that will work with my retro FCP 5.5, and I can’t install it on newer, faster, computers.

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Thank you, Nick. I see that the Natress plug in will actually work with my retro FCP 5.5. That’s interesting. To use Teranex hardware I will need to check around my local post houses to see if any have deals I can afford, if any. Appreciate your thoughts. R.

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

The material is not progressive, it’s interlaced 29.97 NTSC DV. I want the best quality file: resolution, color, etc.
Why?
I want it to look better. When I output from FCP through a miniDV camera to an HDTV monitor it looks jaggy and sawtoothed.
When it’s cut, I want to import it into a Premiere HD project to combine with other HD material as one segment of a larger project.
Then I want to be able to project it on a big screen in a theater and have it look as good as it can.
Thanks,
Robert

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Hmmn. Your video link doesn’t work for me.
Robert

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City

[Robert Withers]

Leslie Thornton makes beautiful round images, I had thought directly in a DSLR. I’ll ask her when I see her. I think you’d have to shoot with a round guide on a ground glass or a round matte in order to have the frame you want without “losing” image on the edges. Lenses make round images, but all sensors in film or video are square.

Robert Withers

Independent/personal/avant-garde cinema, New York City