[Warren Heaton]

A quick update to my prior post:

I have been able to get DVD Studio Pro and Soundtrack Pro to run on the Parallels Desktop virtual macOS 10.7.5 machine by editing the minsys.plist file for each application in TextEdit as follows:

Locating this line and changing YES to NO:

key>AELMinimumQuartzExtremeCapable

block
YES

Locating this line and changing 128 to 0:

AELMinimumVRAM

block
128

After making these changes, DVD Studio Pro 4 and Soundtrack Pro 3 will launch seem to work as expected. Although, I haven’t gotten as far as doing a layout to DDP2 in DVD Studio Pro yet. For the two to three times a year that I need to deliver a DVD-Video title for replication, it might be worth not having to restart to an older macOS. I’m not sure.

The same edits can be made for Final Cut Pro 7, Motion 4 and Compressor 3.5 minsys.plist files; however, FCP7 and Motion will quit almost immediately and Compressor will not display the Batch as expected.

[Warren Heaton]

The idea of being able to jump to DVD Studio Pro for the two to three times I need it per year without having to restart appealed to me, so I decided to upgrade my Parallels Desktop (I used to use it for Windows about a decade ago) and given it a go.

Creating macOS Lion 10.7.5 virtual machine is pretty quick and straightforward. Mavericks, Yosemite, El Capitan and Sierra all stalled at one point or another (I have a Sierra virtual machine that’s stuck halfway through startup – even though that’s the macOS I’m least interested in running with a virtual machine).

I have the Final Cut Studio installer DVDs as disk images and they all mount as expected, but the installer only gets as far as checking for the graphics support and the you have to quit it.

I did a clean install of Lion and FCP Studio on an external FireWire drive connected to my 2009 MacBook Pro and then used Migration Assitant to move the User folder along with FCP Studio over to the virtual machine; however, every application in the suite fails the “Minimum System Checks”.

I guess it’s no surprise that running a virtual macOS for FCP Studio on a newer iMac running macOS High Sierra is a dead end.

So, as best as I can assess, if you need to run Final Cut classic or any of it’s companion applications it’s better to put some cash towards an external boot drive than to purchase Parallels Desktop (pretty much what’s already been suggested in this thread).

The screen shots below are from the virtual machine.

-Warren

[Warren Heaton]

Heya Gribb,

Do you have the QuickTime MPEG-2 Playback Component installed?

https://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.wa/6194000/wo/t57cuP8C3bSa2dgAO7o1vhfuz10/1.0.21.1.0.8.12.1.14.1.13.0

Although, before you rush out and buy it, I believe it installs with DVD Studio Pro. So, if you have DVD Studio Pro you might double-check if I’m remembering this correclty.

With this component, you’ll be able to import your MPEG2 files into FCP like other media.

Here’s some more info from the source (Apple):

The QuickTime MPEG-2 Playback Component provides QuickTime users with the ability to import and play back MPEG-2 content, including both multiplexed (also known as muxed, where the audio and video tracks are interleaved together into one track) and non-multiplexed (also known as elementary) streams. It is perfectly suited for professional and semi-professional content creators with projects such as:

* Professional content production — Throughout the professional content production process, many approvals and progress checks are necessary. With QuickTime and the QuickTime MPEG-2 Playback Component, your clients and reviewers can view your MPEG-2 streams on either a Mac or Windows-based PC, and provide feedback.

* Transcoding video content — Now your MPEG-2 video content can be imported into QuickTime Pro and exported to other formats such as MPEG-4, the new international standard for Internet media, QuickTime Movie, or DV Stream, to name a few. The QuickTime MPEG-2 Playback Component allows the transcode of MPEG-2 video from both multiplexed and elementary video streams. By transcoding your MPEG-2 video into other formats, it can be used in new forums, such as on the web, on CD-ROM, or on DV tape. Note that the QuickTime MPEG-2 Playback Component will not demux audio and video, nor will it enable audio transcoding.

-Warren

[Warren Heaton]

Chris,

I’m glad this helps.

Hey, if you ever need freelancers on any of your projects, keep me in mind!

Take care,

Warren
wheaton@ucla.edu

[Warren Heaton]

Hi Chris,

I’ve posted some thoughts about your various issues below.

Take care,

Warren

Frame Size

A “medium” QuickTime is 320×240, but as you’ve noticed, this number is best suited for 4×3 material.

320×180 would be your 16×9 equivalent. Relative to your DVCPro50 source footage, this is a little less than 1/4 screen, but it corrects for both the anamorphic squeeze and the non-square pixels of your source.

Frame Rate

It’s common to reduce the frame rate to either 1/2 or 1/3 of the source for web, CD-ROM, iPOD, PSP, etc. If all other settings remained the same, a converted QuickTime at 15 fps will require half the storage space as a converted QuickTime movie at 30 fps. Accordingly, a 10 fps movie will require one third the storage space. For the web, the smaller the file size then the quicker the download.

QuickTime movies based on 29.97 fps (or 30) source are typically reduced to 15 fps or 10 fps.

QuickTime movies based on 24 fps (or 23.98) source are typically reduced to 12 fps or 8 fps.

Google Video’s support page states that they require no less than 12 fps.

HTTP Streaming (“Optimized for Download”) vs. RSTP Streaming (“Optimized for Streaming”)

Leave your Video Settings as “Optimized for Download”. You will be creating a self-contained file for HTTP Streaming (a.k.a. “Progressive Download”) that will play as it downloads. If your Video Settings are set to “Optimized for Streaming”, then you are creating a QuickTime file to be streamed from a Mac OS X Server running Apple QuickTime Broadcaster to QuickTime Player (Google Video isn’t using this).

Google Video has some information specific to creating content for their service here:
https://video.google.com/support

Interestingly enough, for footage originating from DV source, they recommend MPEG2. That being the case, you might reconsider going MPEG2 rather than Broadband – Medium QuickTime (although, the Broadband – Medium setting is iPod friendly while MPEG2 is not).

Progressive

Any digital video intendend for playback on a computer display, like web video, should be progressive. If interlaced, you will see what is typically described as “combing” (thin horizontal lines) in your picture, especially in areas of high motion. If your source footage was not already progressive, you would want to “de-interlace” it prior to doing an export using QuickTime Conversion.

Transcoding Time

H.264 provides very effecient video compression (good picture quality at a very small file size). Accordingly, it takes a good amount of time to transcode source material to H.264. On a PowerMac G5 Dual 2.0GHz, 10 minutes of DV (or DVCPro) source will require about 26 minutes to transcode to the Broadband – Medium QuickTime preset.

Based on this, your 88 minute cut will take about 4 hours to transcode at the default Broadband – Medium settings (but you have a Quad G5, right?).

You can get a rough benchmark for how much time your system will require to transcode your source footage to a delivery format by subtracting the “Created” time stamp from the “Modified” time stamp of the exported QuickTime movie. Export 10 minutes of a Sequence and then “Get Info” in the Finder (or look at the Preview Column information while in Columns view in the Finder) to get these time stamps. You can also do the conversion from the Viewer window in FCP. If portions of your Sequence require rendering in FCP, then render prior to doing the QuickTime Conversion as unrendered footage in your Sequence will lengthen the amount of time it takes to export a file

Compressor Errors

Look up your error message on the Apple support website.

While you’re there, you might look up the instructions on how to uninstall and then reinstall Compressor. It’s not uncommon to reinstall Compressor to fix various errors (like a failure to connect to the background process after submitting a job).