Hey thanks for the reply...

I'm not sure why the pictures were displayed jagged like that. It would happen even after rendering. My best guess is that it had to do with parts of the image having too much detail to be shown correctly on a TV that is lower resolution. I could be wrong though.

Anyway, I ended up adding a gaussain blur of just 1 pixel to each image, and it cleaned it right up. All the jaggies were gone, and the image still appeared very clear on the screen.

I still have another similar problem... and that's scrolling text. I made a credits sequence for the project I'm working on and the scrolling text has the same sort of jaggies. The deinterlacing and 1 pixel gaussian blur help a little, but does not fix the problem entirely. The scrolling credits I'm using now is actually a large photoshop file that I keyframed in final cut, but the same problem occurs when using final cut pro's scrolling text generator. The photoshop file I'm using is in 23 point type, and the font is Lucida Grande. I assume this font is big enough to be displayed without problems on the screen, but I may be wrong. However, I can't really afford to make the type any bigger. Also, the PS file has a black background, and has been flattened, so I am not trying to set scrolling text with a transparent background over video in final cut.

I hope that's enough info for anyone who may be able to help...

Thanks!

I doubt you can do it in FCE. But it can be removed but it requires
a LOT of hard manual labour. I would suggest add black bars till
you get rid of it if that is an option...

Or if it just is one scene for example you might get away with
cropping to a smaller resolution and blowing that up to full DV
again.

thanks for your reply!!

the cropping to a smaller resolution sounds intriguing. .
is that something i can do in FCE ?

it is a whole scene. may be too long.
but. perhaps edited in segments first. .
i'd be willing to try.

I guess it really depends on WHAT is underneath those letters and numbers. If it's a static background then it might be relatively simple to fix. But if people and things are moving in that area it will be much more difficult. I suspect that FCE can do this, assuming it has inherited some of FCP's features. Read through your manual about compositing and you should get some ideas.

Cropping would be easy. In the canvas make sure you have selected to show both the image and wireframe. You may need to drag the window larger and/or reduce the view scale to 50% so you can see the area outside the active image frame.

Grab one of the "handles" in the corner of the image and drag outwards. This should zoom your image wider. Now if you point to the middle of the image and press the mouse button you can drag it around until it's positioned such that the numbers don't show. Try not to enlarge the image any more than needed because it will quickly degrade as it's zoomed. You'll need to render this. If you just want to watch the video on a typical TV set you can get away with this up to a point, but on a good monitor you will notice that the image looks soft.

An alternate approach you might try would be letterboxing the image, as though you were shooting 16:9 or even something more extreme. Would that cover the numbers but still give you a decent composition? This can easily be done using the crop property of the motion tab . Click on the triangle next to "crop" and then move the top and bottom sliders to any desired position to create the letterbox you want. Again, this requires rendering.

Caveat: this is how it works in FCP, I'm assuming FCE is similar. Good luck, and let us know what you end up doing.

Thanks for your reply!!

I have been thinking about the crop idea. . .
wow.. sounds like it may help... i will try this as soon as i can...

have not imported any thing into FCE yet. . .

I'll keep you posted on how this works out!!

Thank you for your help!

In my sequences, when I try to render the final "cut", so I can export the sequence, most of the time I have issues rendering.
Most of the time when I try to render all or the current sequence, either the rendering time window/bar pops up for a millisecond and then dissapears and nothing happens or I get this message after it starts rendering 1/4 or 1/2 of the way through.

File Error: The specified file is open and in use by this or another application

Could this be a memory issue or something else?

Also, when I try to go into the rendering settings, the application quits.

It could be, how much memory do you have?

<<<-- Originally posted by Jeff Donald : It could be, how much memory do you have? -->>>
1.5GB of memory.
It's weird, earlier I went back on to FCP4 and it worked no problem, maybe it's just that the memory is all backed up. Well, I was doing a good bit of editing and had a lot of stuff to render.

Anytime you have a problem like that you can always save your work and log out or restart the computer. This will force any open programs to quit and restart. Quitting FCP and trashing the preferences may also help.

i just notice that FCP 4 requires panther, but i had installed in on my 10.2.8 already. i am able to use the software alright (maybe there are problems that i am not aware of), but i am not able to utilize any real time effects at all. my friend is running FCP4 on her powerbook and she is able to get several effects put on and viewing in real time. i have a 12 in powerbook 1Gz with 768 mem, and her mac is a 17 in PB 1Gz with 512 mem. i suppose that we have the same clock speed CPU will make us equal in performance. the only difference is that she is running Panther, and i am not. i know that 17in pb has bigger cache, but i don't know why that she can get some real time effects and i can't?

second, is dual 1.25 G4 is still up for the challenge?

thanks

In order to get all the features of FCP HD you'll need to upgrade to 10.3.4 I edit at home with FCP HD on a dual 450 with no problem, so I suspect a dual 1.25GHz should do just fine.

<<<-- Originally posted by Jeff Donald : Anytime you have a problem like that you can always save your work and log out or restart the computer. This will force any open programs to quit and restart. Quitting FCP and trashing the preferences may also help. -->>>
I did the restart and all was the same.
But, I logged out of my account, and my girl use her account for about 45 minutes, then I logged back in, and I tried rendering all, and it worked perfectly and very quickly.

I did try to go to the Rendering settings that time, so I can't say if I would still have issues with the application quitting when trying to access the settings.
Also, what exactly does trashing th preferences do, and how would I do it?

I have shot footage of a totally black silhouette against a sunset, and I now wish to replace the sunset with something else. What would be the simplest way to isolate the black portion and to be then able to composite in other footage behind it using Final Cut Pro? Any advice would be greatly appreciated...

Driving me nuts! Could someone help me. When in Final cut pro 4.5, my video play back in viewer and canvas window ( both at 50%) are playing slow and out of syc. but when I go To 25% in viewer and canvas window,
video is playing in syc and okay. Problem is too small to view for edits I need to do.

Is there something I need to click on or off in my Final cut pro set up?
It has been working fine, that is the same project untill two days ago.

I have a G-4 laptop, 768 MB of memory, 26 gigs of space.

Ron

What happens when you set the size to "Fit to window"?

Just apply a Luma Key to the clip and tell it to key out anything brighter than the black silhouettes.

The the first post in this forum, at the top of the list of threads.

Upgradding to 10.3.x usually shows a performance _gain_ due to greater optimizations in the OS code. For me, it meant even my old PowerBook G3 333MHz is much more responsive as well as my DP 800MHz G4. The Journaled file system helps keep your boot drive running smoothly as well...

Brian,
You should check out the livefont ...Spotlight... in Livetype. You don't have tons of control but I think the effect is what you are looking for.

I cant seem to get the quicktime movies that I export from premier to retain the quality and proper field dominance when I import them to IDVD. I have the most recent version of IDVD and I also have Quick time pro with the MPEG 2 plug in,(even though I cant seem to locate it as an option). I have tried exporting as DV, DV stream, Annimation and video. I have my options set for best quality with the proper field dominance. When I play the rendered project in Premier I dont see these problems and I am playing them to an external TV monitor. Do I really have to export to tape and re import to IMOVIE for IDVD access?

I have a wedding that I'm shooting for a pro baseball player and I'm also making their growing up/together montage. Do you guys know where I can find some baseball player transitions for fcp?

Basically it would be the silhouette of a baseball player throwing a ball or swinging a bat which would transition into the next picture. I don't normally use cheesy transitions, but this is what they have requested.

I think I have seen these before, but I'm not sure if they have them for fcp. Thanks!

Speaking of cheesy... it sounds like you want those old Toast effects.

remove app and search for all .prefs (search for final cut in finder) and remove them relating to Final Cut. Reinstall software in default folder and follow *directions*.

In the mac world just always install in default folder that installer suggests. Almost ALWAYS Application folder. Dont try to move ANYTHING. ITS MADE that way so updates always know what to update. No such bull crap as a registry like in M$.

Enjoy FCPHD. Its a winner! Another trick when using a Mac is just to use it. Dont try to "tweak" it or customize anything. Just use the dam machine. ;-)

Joe

thanks, guys

Is it because those players are older models and can't play them? Should I get an external DVD burner that burns both -R and +R for my Powerbook G4(1.25gHz) just to cover clients owning older DVD players?

I'm confused on whether +R has better compatibility or -R is better. Anyone have this issue before? Should I get the +/-R burner?

The last compatibility list I saw still had the -R format with greater compatibility than +R DVD's. There can be many causes for DVD's not playing, such as media brand, burner it's burned on, burn speed, age and brand of player, software used to emulate hardware player on computers and much more. I've had the best luck burning with Maxell and most of the compatibility studies rank it at or near the top of such lists. Some older players, Toshiba in particular, I've had the most troubles with.

I've been reading up on lightsaber effects and from my search on the forums, usually only Adobe After Effects is being used for such an effect...

Personally, I believe it is just crappy programming that makes this the way to go (leave defaults, don't install in another directory). But then, it also has to do with how the file system changed from OS 9 to OS 10. A lot of programs hard code that the path should be /Applications/Application Name which is pretty silly, but the way it is. OS 10 in general is more restrictive in terms of where you can put files. It is really easy to create folders with the wrong permissions, so be careful and you might want to put most of your editing files on a separate drive, OS 10 has much more flexibility for non-boot drives.

Thanks, this was the fix.


Ron

I have a finished project in FCP 4. If I make a reference file when I export and dump reference file into iDVD. Will this work okay?


Ron

I've never tried it with iDVD, so you might want to try a short test file. But i don't think that will work. You need to import the media in to iDVD so it can be encoded in to MPEG2.

Thanks Jeff,


I am new to the DVD prep/burning. In FCP how do I save project (what format in export do I use) so everything is as is, in FCP. I am probably not explaining this right. But how does iDVD know the arrangement of project , with out the FCP doc.

Ron

Hi Ron:

You can take your finished project from FILE, EXPORT to "Quicktime Movie" and use that file in iDVD. Do not use "Quicktime Conversion" because you will not get the same results.

I made a iDVD DVD with 3 edited sequences (3 different FCP projects) - 1 for the actual video which was the DVD presentation, 1 specified video that plays on the DVD when inserted to the player and finally one as an opening sequence montage which is played on the menu page. Each sequence was exported out of Final Cut Pro using Quicktime Movie and then simply inserted (by dragging it) into the iDVD theme of my choice. By using export to quicktime movie, iDVD knew exactly what the format was and all I did was place the right sequence in the right folder and iDVD did the rest.

I hope this has answered your questions. Just be sure to render everything then save your project. If you wish to copy it to a videotape, you should PRINT TO VIDEO.... the menu will walk you through everything.

Good luck!

Thanks for your help Rick

Ron

No problem Ron... Let us know how this works out for you.

Please forgive me I am still learning about my mac. My question is: Are there any benefits to setting up a RAID system when using my internal HD and an external USB 2.0(Western Digital 7200 80 gig). I use Premiere 6.5 on my internal. If there are no benefits should I run my scratch disk options to the internal or external HD. I dont use a lot of special effects. I do want to optimize my rendering times. Big surprise huh. Any input is greatly appreciated.

What computer? What OS? How much ram? How many drives and what type?

Thanks guys. Got it working. Everything cool.

Depending on the type of RAID I'd be leary of including my applications drive as part of the array (versus using two drives for projects). It also might be worth poking around on the internet to see if USB 2 is a good choice for this. While USB 2 and firewire have similar speeds in theory they are optimized for different types of data streams. My direct experience with the two is that USB 2 is slower than firewire for file copies on my Mac G5.

Can you even do a RAID between a USB 2.0 drive and an internal drive? The speed of USB 2.0 will be much slower than your internal drive so RAID would actually be slower than just using your internal drive. This is a Mac site but it has some speeds:
http://www.barefeats.com/usb2.html

See the note about Windows speeds being better. But still, the speed would be slower than most internal drives.

I have an Imac superdrive G4 1.25 with 768 on the ram and I am running Panther. I did some checking on Mac help and they said you could raid your internal if it was OS Extended HFS format. I couldnt set it up as a raid set unless I ran disk utility from the boot disk of osx. I thought that USB might be slower. Im just looking for a little more speed and faster rendering with Premier 6.5. I guess I will just capture to the USB, and run my previews and projects form the Application on the internal hard drive. Thanks for the replies.

Increasing your ram may help speed rendering time but in many cases it will be a function of your processor, not your hard disk.

check out digital juice jumpback, they have a sports package that might help. $249 per box, not to bad on the price.

I use some of their jumback wedding stuff. I will probably have to use that for some of the backgrounds since I can't find any transitions. Thanks!

Whenever I capture a large clip, more than 8 minutes, when I play it back in the viewer I get loud beeping sounds. The same kind of beeps you get when you need to render something. I don't know why this happens and have no reference to look up what the problem is. It's driving me crazy. Does anyone know why this is happening? Please help.

Hello, right now i'm torn between a 2nd Serial ATA drive or external firewire800. I'm leaning more towards the firewire800 due to portability, but my main concern is that does it move data quick enough where I can edit dv projects off that drive without moving them over to my primary Serial ATA drive?

Word going around is that an external 7200RPM Firewire 800 drive will give you equivalent to an internal ATA/133. This site has some stats:
http://barefeats.com/fire37b.html

Firewire 800 was getting sustained read/writes of 54/50 megabytes per second. Manufacturer mattered very little.

Was your clip captured in 12 bit audio? That might be the cause. Check the clip's audio profile (bits, hz) and see if it matches your setup.

It is in 16 bit. For some reason when I capture long clips, it beeps loudly, like it needs to be rendered.

Is there a red bar in the timeline? Render you audio.