Broken Clips

[Jim Giberti]

So we've got a new "A" version and were just capturing clips for a project for the first time off of it and it as the same problem as our original HD with broken clips in FCP.
Same routine...capturing HDV - 720p30, and every few attempts it searches for media and starts a new clip with a "-1" suffix.
Definitely not a sytem or firewire issue - it happens at the same frame on every break if you rewwind and try to recapture.
Anyone else dealing with this still?

[Nate Weaver]

I thought this was always intrinsic to HDV capture?

Wasn't aware this was one of the "NLE issues" supposedly fixed by the upgrade.

[Jim Giberti]

Originally Posted by Nate Weaver

I thought this was always intrinsic to HDV capture?

Wasn't aware this was one of the "NLE issues" supposedly fixed by the upgrade.

Yeah Nate, supposedly it was, and a pretty important one at that.
This is from JVC's uodate FAQ page:

"Will this address the problem of segmented frames during capture?

Certain NLE's have experienced issues with scenes being broken into shorter segments (clips) during capture. This upgrade addresses this issue."

Something ain't right.

[Dave Beaty]

I have about 20 hours of tapes here. We have two people digitizing them for a reality show we are doing. They completed them last week. They are capturing the tapes in one piece with Capture now. After looking at the clips and noticing all these 3 second clips, I found out the hard way about the problem with Final Cut Pro splitting up HD100 clips captured via 720p30 Firewire in HDV.

There goes lots of work down the drain. I have all these clips that are sound bites, now they are split in the middle of sentences. Arbitrary splits. They pick back up about 5 seconds after the split occurs. IOW, digitizing stops and starts again in the middle of a shot. Compared to the raw shots, which are continuous and have no breaks. Help!

Did I read correctly here, the offical fix is to use another NLE, digitize all the footage, then dump it back out to tape, then redigitize it all in Final Cut Pro? No friggin way.

Please tell me there's a way. Even if I have to go back and have them redo these tapes. Some are "A" version cams, others are not. Is that the problem or is it a FCPro problem. Does version 5.1 FCP solve this?

Dave Beaty

[Greg Boston]

Get the Apple Firewire SDK. There's an app in there called AV/C Capture. It will capture the 720 30p from the JVC. Load the captured file into MPEG Streamclip. If there are timecode breaks, Streamclip can fix them. Output file from Streamclip in format for editing in FCP.

-gb-

[Miklos Philips]

I had the same problems. Two things I avoided since and everything seems to capture normal, from start/stop points, sometimes FCP even captures 2-3 clips as one.

The two things that I avoided are: using SONY tapes and forgetting to set the TC REGEN switch back to TC REC.

Where was your TC switch? and what tapes did you use? You may have to try the suggested method _ I have not used that before - or figure a way to capture analog HD out of the component outs from the camera as the last resort.

[Carl Hicks]

Originally Posted by Jim Giberti

So we've got a new "A" version and were just capturing clips for a project for the first time off of it and it as the same problem as our original HD with broken clips in FCP.
Same routine...capturing HDV - 720p30, and every few attempts it searches for media and starts a new clip with a "-1" suffix.
Definitely not a sytem or firewire issue - it happens at the same frame on every break if you rewwind and try to recapture.
Anyone else dealing with this still?

Jim, were the tapes you are trying to capture shot before the "A" upgrade, or after? The reason I ask is that the issue which the "A" upgrade addresses affects the recording of the tape, not the playback. So, tapes shot on a non-upgraded camera may still be problematic. If this is the case, we may be able to lend a hand in a work-around. E-mail me directly if needed.

Regards, Carl

carlh@jvc.com

[Yoochul Chong]

in one of the preferences, can't you set one of them to "warn after capture" upon timecode break instead of "begin new clip"? I just realized this last night with my first capture using the HD100. I'm going to find out if this fixes the problem tonight.

[Jim Giberti]

Originally Posted by Carl Hicks

Jim, were the tapes you are trying to capture shot before the "A" upgrade, or after? The reason I ask is that the issue which the "A" upgrade addresses affects the recording of the tape, not the playback. So, tapes shot on a non-upgraded camera may still be problematic. If this is the case, we may be able to lend a hand in a work-around. E-mail me directly if needed.

Regards, Carl

carlh@jvc.com

Hi Carl. It was the first tape shot with the new "A" camera. Two subsequent tapes didn't have breaks. I've got to get into the studio to check some recent shoots and I'll report back on any good or bad news.

[Yoochul Chong]

So this is what happened. I captured some stuff for a wedding using two cameras. JVC HD-100 and a Sony HC-3. I'm using the JVC PRO HD tapes. Now the footgage captured on the JVC HD-100, i was getting stream problem error messages and tons of broken clips. I was suspecting the camera like a lot of people on the boards. However, remember I capture footage using the HC-3 with the JVC PRO HD tapes. I was getting the same stream errors from footage captured on the HC-3. Now the reason I suspect its the tapes is that I also have another tape that I captured using the SONY HD tape. When I capture footage from this camera it appears that i'm not getting the stream errors as I was before.

Feedback??? anybody see this problem. Anybody seeing these capture problems with tapes from other tape manufacturers?

Edit: I was premature. I'm seeing stream problems on the HC-3 as well :(

Yooch

[Dave Beaty]

Originally Posted by Carl Hicks

Jim, were the tapes you are trying to capture shot before the "A" upgrade, or after? The reason I ask is that the issue which the "A" upgrade addresses affects the recording of the tape, not the playback. So, tapes shot on a non-upgraded camera may still be problematic. If this is the case, we may be able to lend a hand in a work-around. E-mail me directly if needed.

Regards, Carl

carlh@jvc.com

Carl,

Dave here, similar problem as Jim.

My issues are related to non-"A" cameras as far as I can tell. But I don't have full info on exactlty which cams are doing this. We have one in for JVC A upgrading now. But the 20 hours are a mix of both "A" and non "A".

So far, the options I've considered:

Using iMovie HD, which captures the tapes correctly as one scene during continuous shots. But I don't relish the idea of exporting hours and hours to QT when the HDV raw files are all I need. Is there a way to get the material out of iMovie to FCPro without exporting?

Using CapDVHS from firewire SDK from Apple to load in the material, but perhaps it will result in the same problem of exporting 10 hours or more frame by frame.

Some combination of settings, that will work around the issue.

We use Panasonic DVM63MQ tape and TC is Rec Run.

Dave

[Dave Beaty]

Originally Posted by Yoochul Chong

in one of the preferences, can't you set one of them to "warn after capture" upon timecode break instead of "begin new clip"? I just realized this last night with my first capture using the HD100. I'm going to find out if this fixes the problem tonight.

I remember that setting, I wonder if that would matter considering the TC is supposed to be continueous during one long shot....but just maybe..I'm more interested in getting the shots to digitize correctly than TC at this point.

Dave Beaty

[Carl Hicks]

Originally Posted by Dave Beaty

Carl,

Dave here, similar problem as Jim.

My issues are related to non-"A" cameras as far as I can tell. But I don't have full info on exactlty which cams are doing this. We have one in for JVC A upgrading now. But the 20 hours are a mix of both "A" and non "A".

So far, the options I've considered:

Using iMovie HD, which captures the tapes correctly as one scene during continuous shots. But I don't relish the idea of exporting hours and hours to QT when the HDV raw files are all I need. Is there a way to get the material out of iMovie to FCPro without exporting?

Using CapDVHS from firewire SDK from Apple to load in the material, but perhaps it will result in the same problem of exporting 10 hours or more frame by frame.

Some combination of settings, that will work around the issue.

We use Panasonic DVM63MQ tape and TC is Rec Run.

Dave

Hi Dave,

I do not know of any faster work-arounds than the two you describe, but I will ask around.

Regards, Carl

[Dave Beaty]

I read on Cow that you can use an "A" version camera to play a tape with this problem and re-record it to a deck. The dub will no longer have this problem.

Has anyone heard this?

Dave Beaty

[Andrew Young]

Originally Posted by Dave Beaty

I read on Cow that you can use an "A" version camera to play a tape with this problem and re-record it to a deck. The dub will no longer have this problem.

Has anyone heard this?

Dave Beaty

Hi Dave,

I heard from Edgar Shane at JVC that cloning will not solve the problem, as the breaks will be cloned over - although he didn't mention the possibility of cloning off an A version. I will try it as soon as I get a chance.

I have talked to another filmmaker that is having this same problem with 2 A version cameras. Hi is going native 720p30 into FCP.

As far as I know, the only workarounds besides capture and output from premiere using the main concept plugin are:

1) capture the m2t stream with DVHSCap or HDVxDV, and use HDVxDV or MPEG streamclip to transcode in to an editing format such as Apple Intermediate Codec or DVCProHD (beware of scaling in the latter).

2) Use a capture card with HD analogue component inputs (Aja or Blackmagic) to capture as DVCProHD or uncompressed (the latter if you have tons of space or a little material). Use the serial connection on the BRHD50 for timecode.

I hope we can get to the bottom of this.