[Zak Mussig]

Hey Jim,

Thanks for the response. DVDSP is a little out of the question for now given the state of HD DVD as a format (not to mention it doesn’t support the final spec.)

When I said replicate I meant the glass master version as opposed to burning in quantity. If you don’t mind sharing, what kinds of projects / markets are you distributing these discs for? I would be so nervous about selling something that should* work in someone’s player.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Walter,

Have you replicated from your Encore projects for distribution, or just burned BD-Rs for more specific people /purposes?

I remember you saying a while back that Encore was giving you trouble. I was also under the impression that it could burn but not make an image for replication.

We looked at Encore, but ended up with DVDItPro HD running under boot camp. It’s total crap, and drove me nuts… not to mention not actually working. Fortunately it was a “wouldn’t this be neat” situation rather than a real job, so no real harm/foul.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

If you’re trying to shoot HDV compatible footage, I’d shoot with the SP 1080i60 mode, but still transfer over USB as usual. I haven’t tried moving footage over the firewire, but I’d assume it would behave as a typical HDV device, and half of the appeal is transferring files vs. capturing real-time.

Files shot at that setting and transferred with the software play nicely with other Sony HDV footage in an HDV timeline.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Jeremy,

I would follow your last instinct and export with Compressor. FCP won’t print XDCAM in an HDV sequence to tape, you’ll need HDV footage.

Just export your edited sequence with Compressor and use Apple’s preset for whatever flavor of HDV you use. Drop that file into an HDV timeline and you’ll be good to go.

FYI, you will be adding compression to the footage this way. If HDV is what you have to output to, then its what you have. However, depending on your workflow and delivery requirements, you may want to explore another master/archive format.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Oh the Optimus keyboard… that thousand dollar piece of “look at the pretty pictures on my keyboard” vaporware.

From the first time that surfaced years back, I thought it was cool, and would be awesome if the keys changed dynamically as you pressed down modifier keys… which they don’t. That takes a software solution to take advantage of the hardware. This is exactly why the Apple patent is so interesting.

A keyboard that shows your icons for different operations and dynamically changes based on context and which modifier keys are down would really be a good way to get commands and options out in front of users. Hopefully we’ll see it sooner than later and for well under a grand.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Chris,

This is anecdotal, but .motn files seemed to render much faster in 6.02 than previous versions of 6, but still not as fast as with 5.1.2.

I’ve had some weird issues with the Motion QuickTime component since FSC2/ Leopard. My fonts all got changed to Times New Roman in FCP or when exporting with Compressor. Exporting from within Motion left everything as expected.

I don’t have the Adobe video apps, so upgraded to Leopard about a week after the initial release. Performance and stability have gotten better, but I still don’t trust this setup as much as FCP 5.1.2/Motion 2.x on Tiger. That may or may not be based on anything real.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

The green shows up with QuickTime issues or corrupted files. I think Arnie is right that you’ve gotten the wrong file. I’ve never even heard of that codec, but I’m just a pup. I would guess you’ve gotten their preview or web proxy version.

If the supplier can’t get you a better file, try transcoding it to your project format with Compressor rather than editing in the original AVI. QT can read them, but they’ll give you headaches if you try to work with them in FCS.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Steve,

Thanks for the response. I realize they’re different codecs, but I thought that FCP’s “open format timeline” would let them live and play next to one another in peace and harmony… or something like that but less adorable.

The HDV played back realtime when I changed the sequence to XDCAM EX. Is FCP only “open” to formats that Apple specifically written in support for?

For now I’m just going to shoot with the 25 mbps SQ or “HDV” format until all of the footage for this big HDV project is in the can. Do I have to say “on the card” now?

Thanks,
Zak

[Zak Mussig]

The “Captain’s blowout fixer” plugin by Patrick Sheffield w/ inspiration by Captain Mench (it gets a mention towards the bottom) is already helping me out a lot. Both of those guys are top-notch pros and the utility and performance of this plugin just reinforces that fact.

Zak

[Zak Mussig]

Hey Herb,

Did you send this error report to Apple? Their engineers will obviously be able to decipher this better than anyone on the forum.

I’m assuming you’re running QuickTime 7.3 since you have the latest Motion update. If you downloaded the Motion update directly rather than using System Update and still have QT 7.2 or lower, that could be your problem. That said, some bug affecting QT 7.3 on 10.4.x could also be the issue. These are both blind guesses.

I’d suggest to boot using your last system backup and see if that version of Motion still works for you. If that doesn’t panic then stick with it until a new round of updates come out, and even then read the release notes before installing to see if they’ve even addressed your issue.

Good luck,
Zak