Delivering P2 to clients
 

I have an Hd shoot coming up where I hope to use my HPX500. So, if I shoot on my P2 cards, how do I get the video to an out of state editor? So far, I've only had local shoots where I can go to the editor and instantly offload the video. I'd rather not part with my cards.
Suggestions?

Hard drives are so cheap nowadays that's gotta be the best bet.
Get a 320gb portable drive and that'll go into a small jiffy bag.
Before sending make a copy onto 2 drives or a RAID at home and keep them safe, then when the client tells you he's got your portable drive and the material's safe on their drives you can delete.
Steve

Lacie Rugged 500gb 7200rpm disk + fedex or any other proper carrier...done. Of course you also have a backup in your archive.

Don't know if it's a big problem, but I bought a Lacie Rugged for just this purpose and it wouldn't mount on my PC or Macbook at all.
Now got lovely Lacie portable bus-powered drives LaCie - Little Disk, Design by Sam Hecht - FireWire & Hi-Speed USB 2.0
It's easier sending a bus-powered drive like this rather than the Rugged which needs a power supply sent along with it.
Steve

Thanks for the info.
Now, to walk me through this process:
1. Shoot on P2.
2, transfer video to a computer like I would normally (giving me a copy).
3. Then, transfer that same video to a portable hard drive.
4. mail hard drive to client, hoping it gets there OK.

Is that it? Do I need to do anything else? Can I use the standard portable hard drives you can buy at a Best Buy or such?
It will be edited on a FCP 6. Does the editor need to have any kind of P2 software to pull the video off of the hard drive?

Shoot P2.
Transfer via a computer straight into a hard drive (theses are big amounts of data, your computer's drive will get full really quick!)
Transfer from your big hard drive to the portable one.
Mail the portable drive.
Client calls to say he's got it and it's safe on their system - ie it's now their responsibility!!!
Delete you drive.

Best if you have a card reader rather than transferring straight from camera (PCMCIA slot in your computer or DuelAdapter for Expresscard socket on a Macbook) or better yet the P2 card readers from Panasonic.
Also, yes you can use any USB drive but they are slow, better to use Firewire or other fast options.
And when transferring the cards it's advised to use a verified process (ie one that checks the data as it's being tranferred, so that what goes into the drive matches what's on the card). P2CMS is free and does this OK.
The editor may need the P2 drivers from Panasonic's website, but maybe not and as it's DVCPro HD it'll feed straight in as it's pretty universally supported.
Welcome to the 21st Century!
Steve

When I send files to my broadcast stations, I ingest them into FCP, clean up any errors, export a quicktime movie/s that is around 4gig and then burn that file to a DVD disc, can't get any cheaper than that.
Then simply post or express ship the dics/s. many broadcasters/producers today will "walk across hot coals" to save money.

Yes, if your files are many many gigs, the above posts would be better option..

Use what works for you, send a sample to your client, he will advise of your success or not, sending files is just like the old days of shipping tapes, just a different mind set.

PS if you export to Quicktime movies and your client has a windows OS edit platform, best to keep movies under the 2gig windows limit.


Cheers
Tom k

I have been using several Lacie Rugged drives with no problems using the bus power so you must be having some problem with yours.

It may be you have USB1.0 ? in you mac / windows, and not the USB2.0 of the Lacie drive you purchased.
a simple check on a later known USB2.0 Mac or windows will tell if that's the case.
Cheers

I use lacie rugged firewire drives with my G4 powerbook location transfer station, the data is then imported into FCP and stays on the two drives till delivery.

I also have two very small 2.5" 160gb usb drives that I can use direct from the camera which is an HPX301.

OK, I finished my shoot, uploaded 5 HOURS of video to my G5. I attach a Seagate portable HD (USB connection), tried to drag video into it - and I get a message that says the hard drive cannot be changed.
I go ahead and upload a few shots from my HPX500 onto my Dell computer (USB again), and I have no problem uploading that video onto the same portable HD. To check it, I put that video from the Seagate back into the Mac, open FCP, and the video works fine.
What's wrong? Why can't I drag video from a Mac onto my Seagate drive?
And can I change the title of the CONTENT folders once they've been digitized into a Mac?
So far, I've given each P2 card's content it's own folder on the Mac's hard drive.
I'm really computer illiterate, and the client needs the video.

Hi Glen,
maybe it's the permissions of that drive, was it formatted on the mac or your windows ?.
Go to, get info, and check the "ignore ownership" on that drive. or if your up against it with time, get in someone who is literate, and get them to help you out...
Not a good time to mess about when the client is waiting.

cheers

Your external Seagate must have been formatted using FAT32 - which is probably causing problems with your Mac OS. Format the Seagate under Mac OS - HFS+ format and you should be able to write into the drive using Mac OS.

However, if your editor you are sending the HDD to is using Windows platform, he might not be able to read the Mac OS HFS+ format, if he don't have the proper device driver for Windows.