NLE Mac / Final Cut questions from 2003

[Ken Tanaka]

Been there. Glad to have helped.

[Chris Kay]

Hello,

I'm printing my project to tape. Will I get better results (higher resolution) going to my DV deck via firewire or via the s-video cable/input? I once saw a web page that had all the compression numbers...but I lost it...any comments always greatly appreciated!

Take care,

Chris

[Ken Tanaka]

The DV format is a 5:1 compression no matter what you do. The transfer process has no influence on resolution. I'd recommend just using Firewire to get the cleanest digital transfer.

[Jeff Donald]

The resolution would in theory be higher with DV than S-Video. Also DV would eliminate several steps (D/A then A/D) that would induce more noise in the signal. So, for best quality keep the signal digital for as long as possible.

[Steve Nunez]

For kicks I installed FCP3 on an iBook 600 mhz and it ran fine...full time DV (no offline RT) and it performed well (aside from the slowed render times)......but I can attest to it's working perfectly without issue.....as for render time.....that's a whole 'nother issue.

I also captured to an outside FW drive (120GB) and it worked perfectly- not a single dropped frame!

$999 new- u gotta love it.

[Joel Brian]

Hello all,

I'm trying to get more familiar with the software and 3D animation field, and I was wondering what people's preferences were (if any) of 3D rendering and animation software. I've been reading a lot about it and the main names I keep seeing are Maya, Electric image Universe, and Lightwave. (some people say Cinema 4D as well). Anyone have any experience with any of these??

thank you!!! :)

[K. Forman]

I'm not bad at 3D modeling, texturing, and animation... But that's only with Metacreations Infini-D. They sold it years ago, not long after they bought it from Specular. Then it kinda died/ faded away.

It's extremely easy to learn and use, very intuitive. Very capable of amazing results, but kinda buggy. It is also nowhere as robust or capable as Max 3D or Bryce, and not even in the same neighborhood as Maya or Lightwave. But then, I could never use Bryces interface, barely capable of using Max, and more or less clueless with Maya and Lightwave. They are out there, and you either get it, or you don't.

[Boyd Ostroff]

I have worked extensively with two packages, Strata 3d Pro http://www.strata.com/products/strata3d.html and Bryce http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satelli...=1042551234521.

In the case of Strata, well it was one of the first full featured 3d modeling and animation packages to be available on the Mac and seemed like that best choice back in 1995 when I got it (was then called Strata StudioPro). There's such a steep learning curve the 3d that I've been reluctant to make a switch, and I can make it do pretty much what I want. Here are some Strata projects:

http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/per.../sketch/04.pdf
http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/capuleti/sketch/04.pdf
http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/capuleti/sketch/06.pdf
http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/tro...concept/05.pdf

I started with Bryce about 3 years ago and love the way you can easily create skies and landscapes. Often I render these out and use them as backdrops in Strata models. Here are a few recent examples of these "hybrids":

http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/tro...concept/08.pdf
http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/tro...concept/02.pdf
http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/tro...concept/07.pdf
http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/tro...concept/11.pdf

As far as animation goes, both these programs will do it, but you need to be very patient. Some of the sequences I've been working on can take up 3 hoursto render one second of output. Here are a few examples of those, some were done with each program (sorry they're pretty big files... should probably recompress).

http://tech.operaphilly.com/sets/trovatore/video-1

[Bill Furner]

I was up until 1:30 am last night trying to make my .mov files (I made them in Quicktime Pro from .mpg files) to show it''s audio in A.P 6.5. I get the video portion ok, I can even hear the audio in the project window and in the Source window, not in the timeline.
* I can only hear the audio portion of the .mov file in Premiere 6.5 when I use "Hinted Movie"as an export option in Quicktime Pro. Again that is only audible in the Source window and Project window NOT the timeline. If I export my .mov file in Quicktime Pro as a "movie" no audio is available in AP 6.5.

Again I am having geat troubles getting my .mov files (audio portion) to show up in the timeline. I SEE NO AUDIO WAVES IN THE TIMELINE.

Thanks for any help you may give.

Bill

[Rob Belics]

Maya is used throughout the industry but it is difficult to learn and use. Not intuitive and a steep learning curve. Those who know it well frequently tweak it with plugins and MEL, the embedded language. It's renderer is crap and most people use a different one, though I heard the latest version uses MentalRay.

I have 2.5 but have not had the motivation to learn it completely, like a project of some sort.

[Jeff Donald]

What OS are you using Bill and what version of QuickTime?

[Bill Furner]

Thanks for the reply. I found the answer after I posted.

It was interesting, I read at a post in Apple's Quicktime forum that mpeg files are combined together. This poster mentioned you need BBDemux and SoundApp. What BBDumex does is to seperate the audio from the video (m1v and m1a) then you convert the m1a file into Aiff file in SoundApp. Then import the m1a file into Quicktime Pro, then copy it to the Clipboard, then import the m1v file into Quicktime Pro as well. Then you use "Add Scale" from the edit menu to add the sound to the video. I saved it as a Quicktime Movie and imported into Adobe Premiere 6.5 mac. It worked! I was finally able to see the audio wave files in the audio portion of the timeline I was very excited, It was really amazing to me.

It all started with a tutorial book I had bought called "Complete Course" I really liked the book, but I couldn't continue with the lessons because there were so many mpg files that were used in various lessson in the book. I found out from Adobe's web site that you can't import mpg files into Adobe Premiere 6.5 (mac). You need Quicktime Pro. That is, Adobe's web site states that. But I found out after hours and hours of frustrtation you need to seperate the mpg file's audio and video in order to work in A.P. 6.5's timeline.

The author wrote the book on a Windows computer and of course you can import mpg's in Adobe Premiere (Windows). I guess that can be some of the problems you run into when you write a book in Windows.


Quite interesting I thought.

Bill

[Charles Papert]

I was chatting with an Apple reseller the other day and asked him which brand of firewire drives he likes. He told me that he doesn't like them, because they aren't reliable, tending to dump data after a period of time. He prefers (and sells) setups that use IDE drives that are built into housings and connect through to the CPU via firewire. HE claims these are much more reliable, as much as an internal drive.

I was a bit confused. Does anyone (Jeff?) have thoughts on this? It costs more for the setup he described.

[Ken Tanaka]

To my knowledge all Firewire drives are basically IDE drives in bridge housings. Certainly all 6 FW drives I own are of that ilk.

[Keith Loh]

I have two IDE drives that are in enclosures that are then daisy chained using Firewire Oxbridge connections. You can capture to them okay just as long as you're not doing anything else across the same chain at the same time. Usually that is the reason why there are dropped frames in my experience. I would rather capture to an internal IDE drive as it is faster. If I'm rendering out to the external Firewire drives that's fine as well.

The reason why I will stick with the enclosures is that you can swap drives out of them in some models or just shut them down and unscrew the casing to switch drives out in my case. The really expensive ones are hot swappable. If you're not doing anything like that then just get the ones which don't need them.