[Todd Reid]

I’m not sure what’s happening, but I’ve had similar experiences. I think it has something to do with changing codecs and pixel ratios, and the text tool isn’t as sophisticated to display correctly. I would see it when I went from DVCProHD to SD. Like you all my video looked correct (center punched), but text was all over the place.

I assume you are using the FCP’s text title tool, that is where I had this issue.
My work around was to do a quicktime export of just the sections that had text,
and bring them back into the timeline. This kept them where I designed them.
A better option would be to use Motion (or even LiveType) for all your text.

I no longer have to deliver both HD & SD, so I haven’t had this issue in a long time.
I’ve also update OS and FCP/QT several times since then.

What system are you on?

[Todd Reid]

option-c
is the keyboard shortcut

[Todd Reid]

not sure if you can do it from a timeline with multiple clips. I would guess either way that it would be better to export making it one clip. Then bring it in and do the fit to fill.

There are other ways to speed clips up, but that it the most straight forward.

You can also put the clip you want to speed up in it’s own sequence (or at the end of your existing sequence – to avoid moving your other clips around – if you don’t know don’t ask yet) 😉
then right-click (control-click) and choose speed. then you can type in any percentage you want, say 1000% or a duration and your good to go.

[Todd Reid]

I just found a similar post below, (didn’t come up in my search even though it contained a word I searched for).

I’m having same problem, and I am connected to my mac firewire bus, and not my added firewire bus.
I’m processing a dvd right now, and don’t want to go poking around. After it finishes, I’ll move to a different mac port (same bus) and see if that makes a difference.

[Todd Reid]

https://library.creativecow.net/articles/cowdog/automator.php

never used Automator myself, but here is a link to a tutorial.
I think it may do what you need.

[Todd Reid]

I have seen this error on a few occasions. It scared me at first.
My only option was to ignore it and eject the tape. In my cases nothing happened to the tape.

I don’t know what this error means, cause it basically “went away” after power cycling the deck a few times, and maybe a repair permissions, and reboot.

Have you carefully checked the actual tape within the cassette? Make sure its not wrinkled or snapped.
That is the only logical thing I can guess that error message is referring to.

Anyone?

Again, in my 3 – 4 times I’ve seen this message, I eventually was able to digitize the tape on the same deck/computer.

Maybe magic gnomes?

[Todd Reid]

I am on fcp 6.0.3, QT 7.4.5 and os 10.5.2. Things are running normal.

May be time to clone your drive and make the upgrade.

Also, if you use this assistant editor a lot, you should discuss with him the need to make sure your two systems are compatible.
He shouldn’t upgrade until he knows you are going to. FCP doesn’t work well in that direction. If you were a newer version than his it would work, but not the other way around.

This of course depends on the frequency you use his services and how many other clients he has, but in my mind, it at least warrants a discussion.
From your post, it appears he has worked on multiple projects for you.

Whatever the case, good communication could have saved you some hassle.

[Todd Reid]

With a mighty mouse, I’ve been able to scroll timelines (left/right & up/down) as I see fit.

In my opinion, this would be a luxury.
I would not want it at the expense of something else, like realtime-ness.
I can think of many things I’d rather have, but that may be due to the might mouse making this feature unnecessary.

[Todd Reid]

How are you capturing? I/O box (like AJA) or FW?

If you have a box, you could down convert during the input process.

The problem is obvious, your using a different codec to edit, then your footage is, this will more often then not, need rendering.

first suggestion if you don’t have an I/O….
put footage in a new sequence and let it change the settings to match your footage.
This should negate the need to render.
You should still be able to do some “zooming” and still have good quality.
I’ve found that HD will hold up much better for this kind of thing than what I was used to with SD.

If something like this doesn’t work for you, I guess you would have to convert your footage to 720, maybe with compressor.

[Todd Reid]

I have noticed the lock sometimes, but it has never interfered with the import into FCP.

Do the cards have a lock function like a cassette?
I used to call this the idiot button, cause on a 3/4″ tape it was on the bottom and easy to forget about.