NLE Mac / Final Cut questions from 2003

[Jeff Donald]

What are the versions of OS, iMovie and FCP are you using? When the drives disappear do they still show up in the Apple System Profiler? Are the drives formatted HFS+?

[Todd Thayer]

Jeff,

We're on OSX 10.2.5, IMovie 3, Final Cut Pro 4.
We have one external Quest 80GB drive on one port, and the DSR on the second port on the IMac.
We can boot the systems, power up the drives and see them. As soon as we turn on the DSR, we lose communications with the Quest. The drives still appear on the desktop, they simply stop responding (spinning wheel icon). As soon as you power the DSR down, they respond immediately. I haven't checked the profiler, and the properties of the drives say Mac OS Extended (begging your pardon, but I'm a PC guy not a Mac guy and still getting up to speed on the Macs) If you need more I can check the partition and volume info at the Unix level.
It appears that something in these two decks (we have 3-4 others as well as DS-2x/4x that work fine) is killing the Firewire bus, but the local service depot (broadcast transports they do great with video, audio & alignment and everything else, but they're not up to speed on the data portion) hasn't been able to isolate the problem. I thought I'd float this out there and see if anyone had any thoughts before I bundle them off to Sony.

Thanks for your help,

Todd

[Rob Lohman]

There might be two ways. The first is checking if your program
has it. I don't know that because I don't use a Mac. Vegas on
the PC can make a list of all Clips with the properties of them.
You can then copy this to a spreadsheet program like Excel
to add some more information etc.

The other way is manual, which you must do anyway. When I
had shot all my footage for my Lady X episode I made a
spreadsheet in Excel where the capture filename was in the
first column (which I autofilled from a DOS script. The captures
were split on each scene automatically by the capture software
and then renamed by me to indicate scenes & takes before this
process started) and other information like notes and quality
of the take in other columns.

I then watched all my footage on the TV (through Vegas' firewire
output through my camera) and dotted down the information.
This was invaluable for me to write down my notes and see
all the footage. Now if you are doing this anyway it won't be too
hard to note the details of the clip as well. If you watch it on your
computer (or have it at hand) you can enter it digitally directly as
well which saves even more time.

[Steve Lehman]

What is the best way to convert vhs footage to edit in FCP. Is something like the Canipus ADVC100 or recording to dv tape then to FCP about the same? Is there any difference in quality between the two ways? Which way would be better?

[Jeff Donald]

The easiest way to check the decks is to swap a deck that isn't causing trouble with one that is. If that solves the issue then you know it is the deck. But if the problem continues then your drives or the OS are the probable cause.

How old are the drives and are they using the latest firmware? Check with the FireWire (Quest?) vendor for the latest firmware. You may want to try upgrading your OS to 10.2.6 or 10.2.8. The middle OS versions have some FireWire issues. The upgrade is free from Apple and all you need to do is download the Combo version of the upgrade and run the installer.

[Jeff Donald]

Linc, I think FCP 4.1 has solved many capture issues people had with 4. I'm sure there are still a few, but that will always exist. Trying to guarantee compatibility with tens of thousands of 3rd party hardware devices and software is impossible. See if you can try your camera on someone else's FCP 4 system. Are you near an Apple Store?

[Jeff Donald]

I would try the Canopus convertor. It may offer better quality and it saves time, over recording to other tapes. You can try passing the signal through, E-E, if you have two cameras. Not all cameras will pass through the signal

[Rick Banfield]

Thank you Rob,

FCP has great logging properties that I use, but I can still find no way of getting a printout or details in the browser of all the clip details AFTER I have made a sequence. Is this possible in FCP?
The clips are not listed in the browser,under the newly made sequence tab.

Rick Banfield

[Cane Carrington]

Ok - im learning day by day.. .

I need some clear cut info on exporting & what codec is best to work in ?
I have been using dv pal for everything ie: capture the footage from pc105 pal - edit then export the clips as dv pal for use in after effects - then add filters such as magic bullet & export as dv pal , ready for fcp again.
Anyhow - by reading some post's - this is not the method for retaining good quality - I just found out.

So what is ?

I read that maybe I should - log & capture as dv pal - then make new sequence as either "uncompressed 8 bit" or "photo jpeg" then render & export as qt reference movie (not sure how ?) ready for use in AE.
once finished in AE - I then export as dv pal thus only rendering & compressing once.

I understand that a bit but can someone really post some nice clear cut instructions & info on this ie: whether this is the correct procedure for good quality & settings etc ? ie : I dont even know whether I should use compressor or QT or use qt settings for export to AE ?

Cheers

[Glenn Chan]

What is your target/output format? If it's DV then work in DV in Final Cut.

For transferring files between FCP and AE, use a lossless codec. Ken Stone's Final Cut Pro page has a tutorial for that.

[Michael McConnell]

I plan on purchasing a tower in january--thanks for all the info. One more question-Where would be a good*safe place to price used g4's on the net?

[Torrey C. Harris]

I'm a new apple user and i'm trying to edit and output through s-video for preview on another monitor, but i can't make it happen. I need some type of mentor for editing. I sold my whole windows editing system, DPS Velocity, and i bought a FCP 4 and powerbook g4. I need a mentor, please help

Torrey C. Harris
1-225-209-9640

[Jeff Donald]

Once you have the external monitor plugged into the S-video output of the Powerbook, go to Apple Menu>System Preferences>Displays and there should be a tab at the top of the Displays Window for the external monitor. You will probably need to adjust the size (try 640x480 to start).

If your Powerbook doesn't recognize the external monitor click on the detect monitors button.

[Andrew Hogan]

Mac Rumours state that is a new Apple Pro Apps update available. Has anyone downloaded and installed this yet? Any problems to report?

[Ken Tanaka]

If you mean the Nov/Dec 03 updates to FCP4, Compressor, Cinema Tools, etc., they have been fine under 10.2.8. They are related to the Quicktime 6.4 update.