New FireStore FS-4 - DTE for Hand Held Camcorders

[Chris Hurd]

With an XL2, you don't need a tape inserted in order for the FS-4 to work. It'll record just fine without a DV tape. Hope this helps,

[Matt McEwen]

Hi Ronnie,

As Chris has pointed out, FS-4 does have a mode called Tapeless Trigger which allows you to control it from the camcorder without a tape. The camcorder's we have tested include the Canon XL2 and XL1s, Panasonic DVX100/-100A and the Sony DSR-390. I expect more camcorders to be qualified down the track.

Hope that helps,

Matt

[John S. Warrick]

First I'd like to say hello to everyone. "Long time listener, first time caller!" I've been reading the DVI forums for over four years, since I got my XL1, and there is just a wealth of information here.

Matt,
Question: Any update on the FS-4 release date? I pre-ordered mine a week ago and am very anxious to get my hands on it.

Also, I'm curious as to the format recording options. I'm sorry if this has been answered elsewhere but I haven't seen it so I'll ask it here, but is the 24P AVI Type 2 and Quicktime 24P true 24P or are they 3:2 or 2:3:3:2 pulldown conversions?

Thanks for the info guys!!

John S. Warrick

[Neil Goodwill]

I found this link today:- http://www.smarter.com/product.php?prodid=2393903&source=inktomi_2393903
Bearing in my mind that Holdan do not have the so-called PAL version in stock yet, it is very tempting to just buy from smarter.com, and if they ship it by DHL or Fedex there is a good chance of not paying customs on it!
There is no excuse for charging over £100 more for the PAL version.

[Frank Fulchiero]

<<<-- Originally posted by Vic Owen : The Firestore breaks up continuous video streams into 2GB segments. The typically splice together seamlessly. -->>>
I am considering this drive, but had some questions:
1. When you hook up the Firestore to OSX Macs, do you see is a bunch of 2 gig files even if it is one capture, as with iMovie?

2. Is there an easy way to create one file, from the segments, when you copy them to the computer?

3. Can you reformat the Firestore to the OSX file system, so you don't have to break up the files?

4. Can you "play" the video in real time in Firestore, to its firewire output so you could, say, record it to a set-top DVD-R video recorder's firewire input, or send it to other video equipment that works with firewire video?

Thanking anyone for any answers.

[Matt McEwen]

Hi all,

Here is some answers...I'll start with John's questions...

1.) Currently, we expect to ship FS-4 sometime in February. I will update this forum when I have more news.

2.) The 24p AVI Type 2 and 24p QuickTime file formats record with either the 3:2 or 2:3:3:2 pulldown. It is basically the same type of file that FCP or Vegas would capture from a DVX100 or XL2 set to 24p standard or advanced mode.

...and Frank...

1) Yes, when you hook up a FireStore to a Mac, you will see a bunch of 2GB files (if recordings were longer than 9 minutes, 13 seconds). Each start and stop is also broken up into separate files.

2) FireStore products only use the FAT32 disk format. It is not possible to use them with HFS+.

3) With FireStore, you can play out in real time to other DV25 based equipment such as decks, camcorders and DVD burners (as long as they will accept a DV25 input.

Hope that helps,

Matt

[John S. Warrick]

Matt,
Thanks so much for the information. Sorry to be so impatient, but I'm really anxious to put the FS-4 to use (as are most, I'm sure)!!

That's good to know about the formatting. So I'll still have to pick up a copy of DVFilm Maker as well.

John

[Frank Fulchiero]

<<<-- Originally posted by Matt McEwen : Hi all,

1) Yes, when you hook up a FireStore to a Mac, you will see a bunch of 2GB files (if recordings were longer than 9 minutes, 13 seconds). Each start and stop is also broken up into separate files.

2) FireStore products only use the FAT32 disk format. It is not possible to use them with HFS+.
Matt -->>>

Matt, thanks for the prompt answers.
We often go directly from captured files, after trimming the ends with QT Player Pro, to either MPEG2 encoding with QTPlayer Pro, or to Cleaner for compression to web movies.
Having a bunch of 2 gig files makes this impossible. We need one continuous file. It's also easier to edit, in systems like Final Cut Pro, one long, or several long, files, instead of many 2 gig ones. You might consider, once the first product is out the door, developing a version formatted with HFS+. Or, if OSX 10.4 can read/write to NTFS, one formatted to this.
Just a suggestion.

[Matt McEwen]

Hi frank,

Thanks for your suggestions. We always appreciate the feedback.

FAT32 was used on FireStore due to its universal compatibility with computer OS' (except Windows NT). We intend to stay with this format for the time being. However, it is possible sometime in the future that we would switch to another format.

It sounds like you are on a Mac, but we do have a PC application available called FireStore DV File Converter which will stitch multiple QuickTime (or virtually any other DV file types) together into a single clip. It will also quickly and easily convert QuickTime to OMF or AVI Type 2 to RawDV etc. There is also a version that does DV-PAL / DV-NTSC standards conversion. You can check it out at: http://www.focusinfo.com/products/firestore/dvconversionsuite/dvcsuite.html

I use it with Virtual PC on my Powerbook and it works quite well.

Matt

[Daniel Kohl]

Hi Frank,

I too am a Mac user. You could use QT Pro to copy and paste all the individual clips into one QT movie. That is just as simple as trimming the films in QT Pro. After you have pasted them all together you can save the film as a "dependent" Quicktime movie (I don't know what it is called in the english version of QT) and it won't even take up any more drive space. You can then export the QT film at any later time (as long as you don't delete the original QT clips (that's what I mean by "dependent")) as whatever you like. Media cleaner also recognized "dependent" Quicktime movies as if they were a stand alone movie.

I hope that this makes sense.

Cheers,

[Frank Fulchiero]

<<<-- Originally posted by Daniel Kohl : I too am a Mac user. You could use QT Pro to copy and paste all the individual clips into one QT movie. That is just as simple as trimming the films in QT Pro. After you have pasted them all together you can save the film as a "dependent" Quicktime movie....-->>>

Yes, I know I can do that. Isn't QuickTime great! However, one of the goals for me is to make it as easy and fast as possible to go from camera shoot to one DV file on a computer hard drive. Selecting/copying/pasting 2 gig files with QT Player Pro, remembering the menu/keyboard shortcuts for exact selections, and worrying about dependencies, is a bit of a kludge, given the ability of HFS+ to overcome this limitation. I also thought some clever chap could create an AppleScript to automate the entire process of making a folder of files into one self-contained QT movie on another drive. Just drag the folder to a droplet, select the new location, and click OK! Gotta move the files anyways...

With all due respect to Matt, it's also seems painful to have to install Virtual PC just to join a bunch of 2 gig files. Right now OSX 10.3 can read from NTFS volumes, just can't write to them. If Apple implements write ability in 10.4, an NTFS formatted FireStore could then be used on both a Mac and PC, and not have to split files into 9 minute segments.

Thanks for reminding me that Cleaner can work with dependent movies, I keep forgetting that! Probably because we always keep the one final DV QuickTime file as an archive, so we have to create this anyways.

Of course, if there are Mac users that don't need to end up with one self-contained file, this FireStore limitation is not a problem.

[Scott Loiselle]

Concerning the FS4 FAT32 format, I didn't realize that I'd end up with a bunch of 2G files, that's a bummer. If I butt-splice several 2G files together in FCP, how accurate will it be timewise?

Is this limitation shared by other similar products? Isn't it the FS1 that lets you use your own drive(s) - can you avoid the 2G file limit by going that route?

I was preparing to place my preorders for FS4 but I would like to understand this a little better before I commit.

Any help is appreciated!

Best, Scott

[Don Berube]

Hello Scott,

Nice to hear from you and thank you for visiting the forum here :)

Could you please let us know what computer OS (Mac or Windows) and what NLE software you currently edit with? Do you see yourself using this same editing system for the foreseeable future? Assuming that you work mostly with 25megabit DV, yes? Please do let us know.

Best regards,

- don

[Scott Loiselle]

Hi Don, sorry if that was bad etiquette.

I'm using fcp4.5 (barely) on a G5dual2.5, panther OS. FCP exceeds my needs enough that I don't foresee changing, especially once I have some more time into it and can bang stuff out quickly. 25megabit DV - uh - I assume that's standard DV, like the XL1's I use? I'm an audio engineer with a duplication company who's been doing start-to-finish packages for choirs, orchestras, schools, etc.

I've started integrating video into it, just basic 2 camera stuff but the audio is good - that's my pitch. So while I'm up to speed technically in some other respects, I'm a beginner with video.

I'm doing jobs now and capturing the tapes into FCP and - besides taking a long time - it basically sucks. I do all my audio to a pair of 24 track HDs, then just bang the stuff in over firewire, it sure would be nice to do the same with video. I don't need a bazillion features in a direct-to-disk box, I just want it reliable, start & stop, and (hopefully) one file in FCP at the end. I really don't need more than that to get my work done.

Sorry if that was too much! Best, Scott

[Daniel Kohl]

Hi Scott,

The Quickstream and CitiDisk (two alternative products to the FS-4) have similar limitations as far as file size are concerned for the same reasons as the FS-4.

It sounds like what you need is something like a laptop capture system. Take a look at this thread:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=22097

It doesn't sound like you need the mobility of the FS-4 or similar. However, these products are very convenient because of there size and I am looking into getting someone to design an OSX application that would automate stitching sequential film files together.