Sam Lee
1
COW Coin
Forum Replies Created
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“Different byte size on the files” is not a good thing. If I were in your situation, I’d be very concerned and make sure to set proper file attributes for protection.
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I’m in similar situation with over 200 Tb of data archives from various sources. You may want to look into Imagine Products Shotsum (https://www.imagineproducts.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=5&products_id=51>
Unfortunately only for Mac. But it’s something you’ll want to invest in for long-term, ever expanding raw media library. Saved me lots on unnecessary duplicate media archives and I’ll have a peace of mind that all archived data are 100% intact. Whether it’s residing in hdd or LTO media, I’m confident to know that there’s no error on those priceless raw camera footage.
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I had this unable to import catalog problem with 3.15 to 3.16. But the latest 3.17 works fine in El Capitan OSX. It will show up in the Restore. Prior to this nothing appeared in the Restore.
I always export the catalog .zip file whenever the archive is completed. This saves a step if there’s ever a need to reimport the catalog from the LTO media.
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The 8 tracks of poly wav audio varies. Sometimes the sound guy forgot to turn off the unneeded tracks. Any many instances they’re properly turned off but forgot to provide the last two tracks as the mix. This makes it very hard to track down which track is which. There are many situations where the final mix can’t be attached (via XLR) to the cam because of mobility and location restrictions. Plus the sound coming from the cam over and over just doesn’t sound as good as it’s from the recorder’s CF. It lacks that sonic clarity and nuances that only a dedicated sound recorder can produce.
The Syn-N-Link is nice but quite costly for this particular production. I’ve already moved on to FCP 10.2 for several years but occasionally have to use the legacy 7 for clients who just don’t want to bother with the upgrade. Not sure how much longer 7 is compatible with OSX. So far El Capitan is OK. But 10.12 and beyond may be not.
For me now, I’ll have to go into the tracks and determine which track is best and mix it. That’s what the producer wants and I’ll follow it. But I think it’s not the best plan and prefer everything track to be able be unmixed and in its native isolated track. Then I”ll manually place them on a sequence and export them via the work area one by one. In an ideal production environment it’ll be nice of the sound recordist use the same gear all the times and with consistence track layout throughout the entire shoot and use the Auto Mix feature on the higher end recorders (SD and Zaxcom) where it actually auto mute unused tracks and/or silence it when it’s quiet. That in itself is a huge post time saver.
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Speaking of 4K:
90% of my most profitable acquisition-post prod-delivery are still in 720-1080p! And it looks like for many years to come, just like the silver tower Mac Pro fr 2006-2012 era. 8K is on the horizon within this decade. I’ll let the 4K (lenses, high-end cams) craze to go by when 8K will make 4K obsolete within this decade.
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I have five maxed out Mac Pro 5,1. Sadly my 2014 MBP Retina with 16 MB RAM beats it in overall FCP X mp4 rendering (5 hours to 1 hr on MBPro), After FX CS6 and CC2015 is 4.5 hours to 1 hour. Substantial processing tie difference. If this is the case, I think the black cylinder Mac Pro will outperform the 2010. Factoring the energy cost to run these Mac Pro (about 350-500W), in the long run the black cylinder MPro may be a good upgrade after all. The only value I seewith the older Mac Pros are the four SATA drive bays and legacy PCI-e expansion. I can put up to 32 Tb of nearline storage on the internal 4 trays and use the OWC 3.5->5 1/4″ adaptor in the free DVD-R slot. When 10-16 Tb hdds come out, I can have up to 64 Tb of near line file storage to tackle the ever growing 4K raw footage content.
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Do you know when exactly did Apple incorporate the h.264 hardware acceleration into the CPU? I assume starting with late 2013 with the new black cylindrical Mac Pro, iMac, Mac Mini , Mac Air and Mac Book Pro?
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Just yesterday I noticed a surprising drastic Compressor export time on my tiny MBP 15 Retina 2014 model vs the 2011 Mac Pro 5,1. Exporting a typical 1080p H264 for Youtube with time code filter applied to lower right took only 1 hr 2 min on the MBPro Retina w/ 16 Gb RAM vs a whopping 7 hr 4 min on the Mac Pro 5,1 with 64 Gb RAM! Both Macs use USB3 hdd interface and USB3 hub (4-port). The Mac Pro 5,1 have a PCIe USB3 add-on card. That’s about a 6 hour saving in waiting time plus power consumption of about 400 W cut down to 1 hr at 85W on the newer MBP 15″ Retina. I was expecting to wait at least 10 hrs but it was indeed a pleasant surprise.
The biggest annoyance in FCP 10.2.2 is the abnormally long time it took to relink media file. I only have 39 files and it took a staggering 3.5 hours just to relink it as I copied to another new hdd with a different volume name.
This tells me newer model is a worthwhile investment. I hope the 2.8 Ghz Mini Mac can be faster than the legacy Mac Pro 5,1.
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Only Micro P2 that will require firmware update.
However, I already have one 32 Gb Micro P2 rec plastic casing of fragile SDHC form factor already coming apart (glue would not stick and rec tab broken). I do not recommend Micro P2 for anything serious. Their claim of 10x stronger than SDHC is full of theory and not in the real world. It’s not much difference than SDHC.
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SDHC or Micro P2 cards are falling apart. I have two 32 Gb P2 Micro P2 cards that lost its rec tab after 1.5 years of light use. My 2007 16 Gb P2 is still going strong after 8 years. The claim of Micro P2 to be 10x stronger than SDHC is full of baloney. It’s just can’t handle heavy duty field use.
You can use all of the latest codecs providing you’re using Micro P2 and not SDHC class 10. With Class 10 you’ll limit to AVC-I 100. I personally do not like SDHC due to the fact that it’s so easy to get lost and build quality. Unfortunately to fully span between two media you MUST use Micro P2 on the PX-270. The PX-270 has only a single P2 slot. I refused this and still use the HPX-250 which will span over two P2 slots. Sorry Panasonic, if your Micro P2 is rugged as P2, I’ll migrate. But after 1.5 years of light use, Micro P2 is no better than SDHC in terms of build quality.
It’s a false sense of security to use AVC Ultra 200 on a cheap $4K PX-270 with stock lens. I own the HPX-250 and its optical fidelity is already fully maxed out at AVC-50. You’ll reap the potential with AVC Ultra on a 2/3″ PX-5000 and a $30K 2/3″ HD EFP grade lens than the PX-270’s stock lens. Optics make a huge difference. You can argue all you like but I have seen it over and over that no matter how good the camera’s electronics (PX-270), it can’t overcome the lens bottle neck. And quality lenses cost $20-240K, depending on the focal length and features.
I still use FCP 7 for AVC-I 100 rewrap. It’s an excellent app to verify all P2 spanning media are present.
1) How big a difference is there in quality between these cameras? Will I notice any difference in the SD mode and my HVX-200?
2) I have heard that you cannot use the micro-P2 cards with some of the higher codecs on the PX-270. Is this true? Also I have read that you need to “upgrade” the PX-270 to get the AVC-Intra 200 codec. How much is this?
3) As I stated above my clients want DVDs and I have a DVD burner that is connected via a composite cable. I realize that I lose quality by using and analog cable, but I write DVDs in real time and I have never heard any bad feedback. I’m kinda leaning toward the HPX-250 as it has analog outputs where the PX-270 would require that I purchase a converter box and then connect via HDMI out. Should I just stick with my current camera?
4) I use Final Cut Pro 7 (groan) and DVD Studio Pro. Will FCP7 even see the AVC-Intra codecs? Is it time to finally make the jump to FCPX? Is there any viable replacement for DVD Studio Pro? It seems to work just fine under Yosemite.