What hardware are you guys using for your SDE's? I'm about to purchase a new Mac and I'm trying to decide on a higher-end laptop or an iMac.
Thoughts?

Hi Chad,

What format are you shooting? What is your standard wedding day like? For example - here in the midwest we often have long periods between the ceremony and the reception.

Personally I think a MacBook Pro (if you're capturing HDV via firewire) or a new MacBook is the way to go. A quad iMac would be very nice to have, but even with a 2.5 ghz aluminum MacBook Pro and HDV I don't find rendering to be the thing that I need to speed up. (I do projections right off the timeline, so I just need to render the timeline (set for ProRes (LT) as the rendering codec). The big bonus to a laptop is (obviously) the portability. I capture at the church and even during driving between locations after the ceremony. Just put it to sleep, put it in the backpack and open it up at the reception to continue. Just like the triathlons I used to have to time to do - the transitions are often the biggest time-wasters. And for transitions an iMac isn't the best choice.

Joel,

Thanks for the info. We don't have very much time between the Prep, Ceremony and Reception. The whole thing lasts 7-8 hours. I was thinking about using footage from the 5D or 7D for the SDE and leaving the tape for the long form edit later. I think we just need to note which clips we need and then use Mpeg Streamclip to convert. I like the new Quad-Core iMac, but I thought that it might be a little overkill for a 2 1/2 or 3 minute highlight video.

I have done five or six SDEs with another studio using their Macbook Pro and a combination of Z7s, 5Ds, and 7Ds, and in my experience you would not want an iMac. Most of the times I have been editing on a couch in the banquet hall lobby, or even on the floor. For portability's sake, that would rule out the iMac for me if I were starting from scratch and putting together a list of SDE gear.

I'm not sure what the exact model is, but I would imagine that any of the current Macbook Pro models can effectively transcode and edit HD video. Of course, since you're editing video I would go with the biggest screen you can afford.

I would also recommend Compressor over MPEGStreamclip. I use both, and find that Compressor works quicker. I have the workflow down at this point. I drag the clips into the program, and mark my in's and out's on each clip before transcoding.

This way, if we want to include a little bit of the first dance, and the clip is something like 8 minutes because the grand entrance happened directly before, I can find thirty seconds and choose that little bit of video so that it won't spend the time exporting the full eight minutes. Plus, you can get rid of any clips that aren't usable before hand and don't waste your time transcoding them.

Anywho, since I've began answering questions you haven't asked, I'll shut up :)

Nothing is overkill with a deadline looming. My fingers have been crossed for a quad laptop from Apple for a few years now. Someday...


Quad-core chip makes sense for Apple laptop | Nanotech - The Circuits Blog - CNET News (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10384128-64.html)


Joel,

Thanks for the info. We don't have very much time between the Prep, Ceremony and Reception. The whole thing lasts 7-8 hours. I was thinking about using footage from the 5D or 7D for the SDE and leaving the tape for the long form edit later. I think we just need to note which clips we need and then use Mpeg Streamclip to convert. I like the new Quad-Core iMac, but I thought that it might be a little overkill for a 2 1/2 or 3 minute highlight video.