Steve Covello
Forum Replies Created
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Is there more than one user account on the G5? Might be a different set of preferences for multiple users, thus you might have to establish the preferences for all of the users the first time to ensure that they are correct. then they should stick.
I don’t think the FCP/AJA preferences function on a System level for that particular AES/SDI option.
Are there any other scheduled functions being handled by some utility like Tiger Cache Cleaner that are purging caches/preferences every night?
steve covello
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You can master and compress for DVD in 23.98. no problem. Hollywood does it all the time. DVD players [miraculously] add pulldown upon playback.
Go into the Inspector in Compressor and go through the manual settings. you will see that you can compress to 23.98 or 29.97. This allows you to compress at a better setting for the same length of material versus 29.97 since there are less frames.
I would not recommend doing this for material mastered at 29.97. you will get frame jumps and flicker. Only do it if your master material is 23.98 already.
steve covello
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>The problem is that you captured and edited this as drop frame. Are the DVCam tapes themselves drop frame, or did you just play them in that way?
To the best of my understanding, one does not have a choice as to whether to play a tape in NDF or DF — it plays, and digitizes, as it had been recorded. In my 20 years of experience with tape systems, I have never come across a dial menu option or a switch on a deck that allows this capability [thus, dailies specs]. I am willing to be wrong about this if there is some new ‘thing’ that does this, but then it would make the whole point of address track TC basically a moot point. the only exception to this that I can think of are tapes that had been errantly dubbed with NDF on the address track and DF in the VITC, which are useless unless you manually change the deck settings in FCP. [AAARRRGGG!]
You can convert an already digitized clip from one TC to another, but at the risk of destroying the integrity of the clip to its source tape.
Second, whenever a downconvert is made from HDCam 23.98 to SD 29.97, the TC is generated in realtime from the DC board through the RS-422 [NOT SDI] to the destination deck. The SD 29.97 TC does not actually exist in any recorded form on the HDCam tape.
As for your somewhat punitive rebuke of the editor who posted the question, I believe he was brought in after the fact, so cut him some slack.
I stand by my original recommendations. the finishing on this project is destined to be a “FFF” [frame f#$%^k fest] no matter what he does next.
steve covello
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ooops. My bad. Meant HDCam. No difference in process, so, as you were…
steve
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Try activating Caps Lock so that the screen does not attempt to render when it opens. If your project file is on an external drive, try copying it onto your desktop and opening it through the Open dialog after starting FCP from scratch.
Try deleting all of your render files. Upgrading to 5.1.4 is almost a whole number increment in terms of some of the revised features, so I would not be surprised if there were problems with 5.0.x media.
steve covello
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Might I also suggest firing the post producer on this as well? Not the wisest workflow situation here.
Why not do the online yourself?
As for audio pulldown, that should not be a problem since 23.98 and 29.97 are the same speed, just simply different frame rates. [If you were working in 29.97 and had to conform to pure 24, why then you would have a problem.] You can do the picture-only conform, then simply copy/paste your original audio tracks onto the 23.98 master sequence.
I would suggest exporting a master DV QT movie to your desktop, renting an HDV deck, acquiring an HDV-compatible drive setup, creating a new project, drag/drop the master DV sequence into it, then media manage it to having a consolidated EDL. If you can, do this with the original media drives NOT mounted since you don’t actually care about the media, only the EDL. I don’t know if CP will let you do this, but I know Avid would, so try it.
Delete ALL of the audio tracks. Change the specs of the consolidated video-only sequence to the format and frame rate you want it to be [cmd + zero]. Then create a new bin, mount the consolidated sequence into the timeline, select all, then drag/drop the selection from the timeline into the new bin. this will create new clips for everything. Delete the useless transition stuff.
then try capturing it in HDV at 23.98, one tape at a time, even though it is a 29.97 sequence. I have been able to do this with HDCam with some success.
It will be damn close for most of the clips, though you might have to do a few manually. Reconnect media for the consolidated sequence. then import the DV QT and place it over the HDV video tracks, scale it, then split the screen. Slip frames to match the DV sequence referring to “A” frames for sync. “A” frames are zero frames on the second, such as 32:02:00. These zero frames will be identical no matter which frame rate you use.
I have seen situations where audio clips will self-truncate when copy/pasted from 29.97 to 23.98. Be aware of it. If you did any scaling/repos on the original DV footage, you will have to redo them. The new HDV sequence will still think it has DV material in it, so you will have to do a mass remove attributes command to scale everything back to 100%.
This may seem like a lot of trouble and somewhat imperfect, but it’s not your fault. The correct workflow would’ve retained the framerate in the offline process by either using a more compressed version of the original footage, or setting you up to work natively in HDV from the beginning.
steve covello
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While I don’t have a specific solution for your problem, here are a few suggestions anyway.
Render your sequence completely first. This means selecting the render options in the pulldown menu that include the realtime effects as well. If, for some reason, there are problems rendering the sequence, trash ALL of your renders on your media drive, confirm the target location of your renders file, and try again. One thing FCP does not like are filename conflicts if you have more than one renders folder
I never compress directly out of an FCP sequence. I export a QT reference movie, then compress from that, or if it is a shorter sequence, directly out as a self-contained QT in native format.
[Sorry if you already know this, but for those who don’t, a QT reference movie looks and acts exactly like a regular QT movie, except that it contains no actual media. It is an ‘alias’ of your sequence, essentially, such that it ‘points’ to your media instead. thus it is much much smaller in size than a self-contained QT]
I always check to see if BOTH the OS volume of the Mac AND the target volume for the render are close to full. There may be temp files that the Mac creates that occupy space that you cannot see, so if it runs out of space or conflicts with virtual memory, no doubt there will be problems. If either of them are more than 85% full, get rid of some junk.
I assume you are keeping your drives maintained with Disk Utility [verify/repair disk], and the OS volume maintained via Repair Permissions. Your target drive should NOT be formatted as DOS or FAT 32. While the Mac will be able to mount the drive and function [poorly] with FCP, it will force you to work within a 4gb file size limit, which will cause problems in a prolonged render.
steve covello
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Archive your project in a its native format. There’s no point converting it to an as-yet determined future format or purpose. who knows what’s coming around the corner next!
steve covello
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Maybe I’ve been out of the Avid world for too long, but how do you get MXF media out of an Avid? Do you mean, by chance, OMF media? My Avid experience ends with Media Composer/Meridien v. 11.0.3 on OS 9.2. after that, Avid became too greedy to do business with.
steve covello
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Don’t worry about it until the end processing for web compression. Stay in the native format to relieve your system of processing an effect while in the rough cut process.
When you compress to Flash, MPEG or whatever, simply activate Deinterlace in the render settings.
Unless you have to provide some kind of wow factor for a client, don’t spend too much time on it. It’s like color correcting dailies before doing the rough cut first.
steve covello