[Zak Mussig]

I’m just a kid at this compared to you guys… I’m just in my first full-time editing job. But I actually had to capture some one-inch last Friday off of our Sony BVH-3100. I was told we bought it from some broadcast outlet for something like $50. It made me thankful not only for the G5 I captured it on, but even cassette tapes you can just pop into a camera or deck. It was an interesting experience. I’m kinda looking forward to years down the road when I have that time-tested experience you folks have… and I can have a “remember HDV” conversation.

Hope the replacement suite brings more good memories,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

I’m just a kid at this compared to you guys… I’m just in my first full-time editing job. But I actually had to capture some one-inch last Friday off of our Sony BVH-3100. I was told we bought it from some broadcast outlet for something like $50. It made me thankful not only for the G5 I captured it on, but even cassette tapes you can just pop into a camera or deck. It was an interesting experience. I’m kinda looking forward to years down the road when I have that time-tested experience you folks have… and I can have a “remember HDV” conversation.

Hope the replacement suite brings more good memories,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Dave,
When you’re going with big amounts of RAM (more than a gig) I feel it’s definitely worth it to look at a vendor besides Apple. I’ve always heard good things about Crucial. Just don’t cheap out, as crappy memory can equal crappy performance and lower reliability.
From what little I know, ECC RAM is error correcting and is meant more for high-end scientific work where rounding errors can make a big difference. I’ve also heard it performs slower with media apps or in general, and is not what you want for a computer doing normal work… even a media workstation. I’d go with the cheap, but not too cheap stuff from somewhere else. Just remember you have to add memory to G5s in matched pairs.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Jay,
If you just need to get an edited sequence to DVD you’re almost home… What I do is set my chapter markers (if you need any) in FCP on your original sequence so you can see your cuts to help guide you as to where to put them. Then duplicate your sequence in the browser (to retain your chapter markers), and change the name to something besides “original sequence name copy”. I just replace “copy” with “export ” to keep things nice and organized. Open your duplicate or export sequence, select all, and delete everything out the export sequence (we just want the chapter markers). Open sequence settings (Cmd-0) and change them from your HDV settings to whatever SD settings you want. I would suggest DV 720 x 480 for size, and pixel ratio, tick the anamorphic box, and set the compressor to animation. This will retain the absolute highest quality going out of FCP.
Now that you have an SD output sequence, nest your original HDV sequence inside of it.
Select your export sequence in the browser and export using Compressor. Your Compressor settings will depend on length of your project and such… so I’ll leave that to you.
Once you get your MPEG2 into DVDSP, set the display mode on the track you put it in to be letterbox.

Hope that helps,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Wayne,
Thank you for taking the time to respond. That is all really good information that helps me out a ton. I’m still a little worried about the amount of money I’m asking for (we’re not huge)… but I can’t see how it won’t pay big dividends in the long run.

Thanks again,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Wayne,
Do you capture HDV footage through your capture card as IMX 50 to match the rest of your footage? Subquestion… what is your HDV device (camera or deck), and how is it connected to your capture card? I really don’t want to edit HDV natively (the way it’s been done) in my new job, but I really want to have my workflow ducks in a row before I ask the boss for money.
Thanks for any help,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Brian,
I can think of two ways to do what you’re after, but I’m not sure either are THE way to go about it.
1) Select all of our tracks in soundtrack (hold down comand and click on them). File > Export > Export selected tracks
Put these in a folder somewhere, then import that folder into FCP and drop them into your timeline. This will get you back into FCP with the ability to scoot your audio around a bit and tighten it up as you like.

2) Make your your video edits, and lock picture the way you want. Use FCPs scoring markers (scoring marker button in the edit marker window) to put in markers at useful points in your sequence… where you want a VO to start, or a new bit of music to come in, or some SFX, etc. File > Export > For Soundtrack Make a reference movie, (you may want video only) then drag it from the file browser in Soundtrack to the video window. Your scoring markers will come along to show you the way. Worked in my quick 1 minute test at least.

Hope that gives you somewhere to go,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Mark,

What you’re doing is actually a pretty painless process…
I’m assuming you want your final version to be a regular old SD DVD, and you aren’t trying to master for HD-DVD or BluRay.

I do this through FCP, but seeing as how you already have an FCP QT file, you may want to just straight to compressor.

Import your HDV movie into FCP, and drop it into a sequence with SD settings (command-0 to change sequence settings)… I’ve used NTSC DV 720×480 aspect ratio, DV pixel aspect ratio, anamorphic, and set the compressor to whatever you want. I was told to use animation for the absolute highest quality, but do what feels good.
If your video doesn’t scale properly open it in the viewer and change your scale to 50% and aspect ratio (under distort) to -12.5.

Export this sequence with export > using compressor, and select whichever 16×9 preset you want, or make your own 16×9 setting.

You may be able to take your HDV movie right into compressor, but I’m not sure about HD – SD conversion doing that… haven’t done it.

Hope that helps you get started,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

I would love to say this is off topic… but it seems like an FCP forum might be the best place to post something like that.

very nice

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

So do you to have a Kona, BlackMagic DL HD card, or some other hardware to capture HDV as DVCProHD? I have a blackmagic decklink extreme, but it’s an older SD only version. Does using a capture card lead to an unavoidable digital – analog – digital conversion if your capture device doesn’t have SDI?

We also only have cameras (no decks) to handle capturing and mastering from / to HDV, but I really want to change our workflow and avoid editing (mostly rendering) native HDV.

Assuming I have to master a whole program back to HDV without a card that supports HD, am I looking at nesting into an HDV sequence, and putting it somewhere to render for a ridiculous amount of time?

Is re-capturing DVCProHD from HDV source tapes reliable / frame-accurate? Are there any sketchy HDV drop out or MPEG2 issues with that?

Thanks all for your participation, and great responses. I’m just starting to use HDV, and I really feel better about these things if I know as much as possible up front, and make good workflow plans. I’m also the new guy, and want a rock-solid defense for saying let’s change the workflow you’ve been using for quite a while.

Thanks again,
Zak