[Ryan Holmes]

[Farhan Ali] “For the past 30 minutes it’s been “Connecting to Dynamic Link Server”. Nothing has happened. “

Sometimes it hangs. Simplest solution. Quit Adobe apps, and try again. Or you can quit Adobe apps, restart your computer and then try again.

You can also clean out the Media Cache as I’ve found that sometimes helps:
https://help.adobe.com/en_US/mediaencoder/cs/using/WSb8e30982e628fbec-54c04a521312559a5de-7ffc.html

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Jeff Pulera] “I never said that the DVD looked better than HD.”

Fair enough. I read your previous post and thought, “No way can Jeff can be saying that!” 🙂 If you have to go to SD, there are good applications to downconvert in now.

[Jeff Pulera] ” I’m very fussy about quality, pixel peeping my own work constantly, and I’m amazed at what the third-party “HD2SD” apps can do.”

True. I think the downconvert from HD to SD has gotten better (same with 4K to HD).

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Cristine Cardenas] “BUT my problem is that when I import the footage (whether through media browser or import) it comes in at 29.97 so interpreting the footage doesn’t do anything.”

Do you have 60i or 60p footage? 60i is 60 fields per second. 60p is 60 frames per second. You can slow 60p down to 30 or 24 to achieve a clean slow-mo effect. You can slow down 60i footage (speed change on the timeline), but since it’s a 30 frames per second format the software will have to create the extra frames.

My guess is you have 60i footage, which is 29.97 frames per second.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1080i

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Jeff Pulera] “I’m making progressive DVDs from 1080i sources and played on a Blu-ray player to a 60″ Plasma, looks like HD to me,”

You haven’t seen good HD content then! 🙂

To be clear: you’re above quoted line means that you’re downscaling 1080i onto an SD-DVD, playing that in a Blu-Ray player and that player is then upscaling your footage back to 1080p on a 60″ monitor. There’s really no world that exists where that would look better than just playing your 1080i content straight to that plasma monitor from a Blu-Ray disc. If you’re required to make SD-DVD’s I understand you trying to make the best product possible. But that’s not ever going to be as crisp, sharp, detailed, or chroma accurate as the 1080 source.

Just my $.02

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Joe Riggs] “Should we just throw the highest quality file at youtube, and let it do its thing, so Pro Res 422, HQ and or 4444?”

You can do that. YouTube does accept ProRes formats. But the time you save from encoding to h.264 mp4 you’ll lose in uploading time and YouTube Processing time with a straight ProRes file.

[Joe Riggs] “has anyone figured out the magic formula for great looking youtube videos?”

There is no such thing. Compression is as much art as science. For footage going to YouTube I encode at 1920×1080, 23.976 @ 50-100mbps CBR (depending on footage). Key frame distance is set to 12 (or whatever half the frame rate is). Maximum render quality.

VBR is good if you’re trying to save space on your final file – say because you have a bandwidth limitation or a size constraint like on a DVD. VBR helps to maximize the bits by looking at the footage and estimating how much data needs to be thrown at a particular scene. If the algorithm determines it can get by with less data for a particular scene it uses a lower data rate for that area of footage. CBR means that regardless of the image being encoded it throws all the bits it can at it.

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

You can do either 23.976 or true 24 in AME. My suggestion is to follow-up with them and make sure you’re clear on what they need.

If they are displaying this content in cinemas it will likely need to be true 24p. If they are putting it on the web 23.976 fits the bill for that. You’ll also need to determine if the file you have (your source material) is true 24 or 23.976. Doing a conversion one way or the other may mean you’ll need to slow down or speed up your audio to stay in sync.

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

You’re looking for ENG lenses to run on a Canon 7D DSLR? Or you want an ENG lens capable of covering an APS-C sized sensor like on the 7D?

I’m not aware of an ENG lens that is EF mount. Most ENG lenses are B4 mount. There may be an adapter to allow you to mount a B4 to EF. Further, if you need one to cover an APS-C sensor you’ll have to dig into the tech specs of the lens as most probably aim to cover a 1/2″ or 2/3″ chip.

Also not sure, why you’d want to run a DSLR as an ENG camera? Amongst all the things a DSLR does, serving as an ENG camera is nowhere among them! 🙂

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Terry Flaxton] “So my question is twofold – will final cut X on this old system do this a lot faster if I shove in about 32 gig of ram and or will a new Trashcan be the answer – is there anything else I should do to make this work better???”

If money is no object, go with Oliver’s solution. That’s the best.

But if you don’t have money to buy a 12-core trash can, that 2012 Mac Pro still has plenty of good life left in it. You just need to optimize your workflow for it:
(1) Convert h.264 footage to ProRes (this is a must if using FCP 7, or something FCP X can do for you – either way working with h.264 is a pain)
(2) A 2012 Mac Pro will run FCP X just fine, just purchase the application and run it on your existing hardware
(3) Upgrade your video card to benefit from X’s intensified use of GPU
(4) Add more RAM to your machine

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

[Karl Madsen] “I wanted to ask if it is possible to shoot in something like ProRess with the ML. “

No. ML unlocks the ability to shoot in a RAW format on your Canon DSLR. It’s a firmware hack done to circumvent Canon’s setup.

If you want ProRes or DNxHD you’ll need to make sure that your Canon DSLR outputs a “clean” signal from the HDMI port (clean = no menu settings, or record light get sent out through the port) and purchase a 3rd party recorder from BlackMagic, AJA, Atomos, Convergent-Design, etc. That will allow you to record in a ProRes format right from the camera.

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost

[Ryan Holmes]

Karl, I think you may be conflating some of your terms.

4:2:2 – is a reference to chroma subsampling
h.264 – a type of codec
RAW – a file format where no data has been discarded (unless you’re shooting a “compressed” RAW…but ML is not compressed)

If you shoot internally on your Canon DSLR you’ll be shooting Quicktime format using the h.264 codec. Depending on which camera you have you may be able to output this as a “clean” signal (no menu overlays) through the HDMI port. If your camera can output a clean HDMI signal then you can purchase an Atomos, Blackmagic, AJA, or other 3rd-party recorder and record that signal. Generally people will record to ProRes or DNxHD using one of the above listed devices. The benefit there is that you’re avoiding the internal camera codec (h.264) which allows you to squeeze a bit more quality out of your image.

If you want to go the ML RAW route, then as you note, those files are large. You’ll have to convert them using a RAW to DNG converter so that your NLE of choice can play them. The benefit of RAW is that there is no data thrown out so you’ll have the greatest possible amount of information when it comes time for visual fx, motion graphics, or color grading. However, the trade off is that the file size are substantial, and the conversion times are quite long depending on your hardware. You’ll also need to have a RAID capable of playing back RAW files in realtime.

[Karl Madsen] “Now is this possible with the ML or do I need to get a Ninja to do this?”

To answer this question you can go either route. Buy an external recorder (provided your DSLR outputs a “clean” signal) or use ML to shoot RAW. The answer to that question will depend on budget, project time, whether you need RAW or not, how comfortable you are with either approach, etc.

Ryan Holmes
http://www.ryanholmes.me
@CutColorPost