C100 Multicam shoot

[Dave Ande]

Hey all,

just shot a wedding a few weeks ago with a C100. XF100 and 5DM3. I was doing a quick edit within FCP6 putting the the timeline together and after I finished I decided to export as a quicktime movie and to my surprise I ended having a 22.5 GB file. I even unchecked the make a self contained movie. Keep in mind I haven't done any color balance etc. I just put the shots together on the timeline.

All footage from all 3 cameras were transcoded as ProRes. Any suggestions regarding a workflow I should use? I still need to fully edit and then make a DVD so that I can distribute to the clients. I apologize if I posted this in the wrong forum...Dave

[Daniel Epstein]

Not sure what the question really is. Size sounds about right for a prores sequence. If you want to compress it to DVD size there are settings in compressor you can use. Export a reference file or standalone quicktime and then open it in compressor choose settings and destination and you should end up with what yo want for the client.

[Dave Ande]

Daniel, thanks for answering my question. While we're on the the subject, I'm trying to figure a workflow for forthe best quality when outputting to a DVD and displaying on a tv. The workflow I'm currently using is log and transfer as RoRes then after I finish editing, I'll export as a QuickTime file using current settings and then bring it into compressor and use one of the DVD workflows. I've also tried exporting out of FCP as a QuickTime file using custom setting using an aspect ratio of NTSC dv (3:2) but of course the quality is not good at all. Any suggestion from anyone would be appreciated....Dave

[Matt Davis]

It's odd - I've not had to do a DVD for three years, and all of a sudden, I've had quite a few jobs requiring it - it's brought back a few memories.

First off: going from 1080p to SD can create aliasing - there's too much detail in the HD image for a simple shrink, so you'll see twinkling and steppiness. I used 720p for a long while, which made great SD, but 1080p tips the balance.

The trick is to reduce the amount of detail by doing a subtle blur on the whole image before scaling it down. How much you blur it is a bit of trial and error.

Secondly, I strongly recommend exporting a fully self-contained movie from FCP and letting Compressor deal with that. Ideally, I'd actually delete all render files before the export, so it's forced to recreate everything from scratch using the best quality settings. FCP6 had a few odd bits of behaviour regarding render files not updating correctly in nested sequences, and sometimes inserted black frames into the 'reference' movie export when it got confused.

FCP has a special trick when it exports both self-contained and referenced movies - it includes markers on cuts which really help optimise the MPEG2 conversion in Compressor as its highest quality setting sees these markers and ensures that the compression is prepared for the sudden jump. Compressor could be disappointing with H.264 encodes or other formats but it's a great DVD/MPEG2 compressor.

Having said that, because you're starting with HD material, you may need to do a bit of experimenting with a short 2-4 minute selection of difficult shots (action, transitions, graphics, subtle motion, detail) so you can play with 'switching the gears on' and playing with antialias settings, remembering to view the results on a representative target (i.e. judge the movie on a TV, not a computer monitor).

[Dave Ande]

Matt, thanks for the reply. I went back and selected some of the clips, made all of the exposure and color adjustments etc and then exported again as a self contained movie. I then imported it into compressor and create a new DVD setting and adjusted the Bit Rate to 2 Pass VBR with Average data rate @ 7.7 Mbps etc. This made a big difference with the test footage. Now when it comes to burning the real DVD, I hope I don'y get dropped frames etc..

Have you ever used a capture playback device? I've been reading up on them, but I haven't been able to find one that would support my iMac. My iMac is an 2009/2010 model so I don't have a thunderbolt port.I've heard there were some firewire devices available but so far I'm having a hard time finding something.

[Matt Davis]

Yes, I have a 'real time' DVD recorder - when I was pumping HVR-Z1 rushes with BITC into it to make client copies. Horrible thing. It did a job, but made the whole process a bit of an ordeal for not a very nice output.

The rule I learned was that anything that happens in real time isn't happening as well as it could.

OTOH, a colleague has an XDCAM deck, which records anything that arrives down an HDMI or HD-SDI port to be written as an XDCAM (4:2:2 8 bit, 35 Mbits) file. That has turned out to be very useful and popular. It was expensive, but it worked out well for him.

I prefer to shove all work through Compressor for DVD - no, you won't get dropped frames.

But note these caveats from the 'way back then' machine: not all DVD players could do the full 9 Mbits per second. You're always better off using the 90 minute or 120 minute settings for 5 minute programmes - that way, you won't push over 7 Mbits (some for video, some for audio). Dropped frames on a DVD recording can be because the decoder in the DVD player is sub-par.

On the whole, 'do it in software' in non-realtime. Real-time on a budget tends to be a bit crappy.

[David Dixon]

Another option if you want smaller files sizes - the XF100 and C100 clips don't have to be converted to ProRes - they can be edited natively. In fact, FCPX will not convert my XF100 clips on import - the option is grayed out.