What are the versions of OS, iMovie and FCP are you using? When the drives disappear do they still show up in the Apple System Profiler? Are the drives formatted HFS+?

Jeff,

We're on OSX 10.2.5, IMovie 3, Final Cut Pro 4.
We have one external Quest 80GB drive on one port, and the DSR on the second port on the IMac.
We can boot the systems, power up the drives and see them. As soon as we turn on the DSR, we lose communications with the Quest. The drives still appear on the desktop, they simply stop responding (spinning wheel icon). As soon as you power the DSR down, they respond immediately. I haven't checked the profiler, and the properties of the drives say Mac OS Extended (begging your pardon, but I'm a PC guy not a Mac guy and still getting up to speed on the Macs) If you need more I can check the partition and volume info at the Unix level.
It appears that something in these two decks (we have 3-4 others as well as DS-2x/4x that work fine) is killing the Firewire bus, but the local service depot (broadcast transports they do great with video, audio & alignment and everything else, but they're not up to speed on the data portion) hasn't been able to isolate the problem. I thought I'd float this out there and see if anyone had any thoughts before I bundle them off to Sony.

Thanks for your help,

Todd

There might be two ways. The first is checking if your program
has it. I don't know that because I don't use a Mac. Vegas on
the PC can make a list of all Clips with the properties of them.
You can then copy this to a spreadsheet program like Excel
to add some more information etc.

The other way is manual, which you must do anyway. When I
had shot all my footage for my Lady X episode I made a
spreadsheet in Excel where the capture filename was in the
first column (which I autofilled from a DOS script. The captures
were split on each scene automatically by the capture software
and then renamed by me to indicate scenes & takes before this
process started) and other information like notes and quality
of the take in other columns.

I then watched all my footage on the TV (through Vegas' firewire
output through my camera) and dotted down the information.
This was invaluable for me to write down my notes and see
all the footage. Now if you are doing this anyway it won't be too
hard to note the details of the clip as well. If you watch it on your
computer (or have it at hand) you can enter it digitally directly as
well which saves even more time.

converting vhs footage
 

What is the best way to convert vhs footage to edit in FCP. Is something like the Canipus ADVC100 or recording to dv tape then to FCP about the same? Is there any difference in quality between the two ways? Which way would be better?

The easiest way to check the decks is to swap a deck that isn't causing trouble with one that is. If that solves the issue then you know it is the deck. But if the problem continues then your drives or the OS are the probable cause.

How old are the drives and are they using the latest firmware? Check with the FireWire (Quest?) vendor for the latest firmware. You may want to try upgrading your OS to 10.2.6 or 10.2.8. The middle OS versions have some FireWire issues. The upgrade is free from Apple and all you need to do is download the Combo version of the upgrade and run the installer.

Linc, I think FCP 4.1 has solved many capture issues people had with 4. I'm sure there are still a few, but that will always exist. Trying to guarantee compatibility with tens of thousands of 3rd party hardware devices and software is impossible. See if you can try your camera on someone else's FCP 4 system. Are you near an Apple Store?

I would try the Canopus convertor. It may offer better quality and it saves time, over recording to other tapes. You can try passing the signal through, E-E, if you have two cameras. Not all cameras will pass through the signal

re: sequence details any help pls?
 

Thank you Rob,

FCP has great logging properties that I use, but I can still find no way of getting a printout or details in the browser of all the clip details AFTER I have made a sequence. Is this possible in FCP?
The clips are not listed in the browser,under the newly made sequence tab.

Rick Banfield

Exporting & Compression - HELP ?
 

Ok - im learning day by day.. .

I need some clear cut info on exporting & what codec is best to work in ?
I have been using dv pal for everything ie: capture the footage from pc105 pal - edit then export the clips as dv pal for use in after effects - then add filters such as magic bullet & export as dv pal , ready for fcp again.
Anyhow - by reading some post's - this is not the method for retaining good quality - I just found out.

So what is ?

I read that maybe I should - log & capture as dv pal - then make new sequence as either "uncompressed 8 bit" or "photo jpeg" then render & export as qt reference movie (not sure how ?) ready for use in AE.
once finished in AE - I then export as dv pal thus only rendering & compressing once.

I understand that a bit but can someone really post some nice clear cut instructions & info on this ie: whether this is the correct procedure for good quality & settings etc ? ie : I dont even know whether I should use compressor or QT or use qt settings for export to AE ?

Cheers

What is your target/output format? If it's DV then work in DV in Final Cut.

For transferring files between FCP and AE, use a lossless codec. Ken Stone's Final Cut Pro page has a tutorial for that.

ok
 

I plan on purchasing a tower in january--thanks for all the info. One more question-Where would be a good*safe place to price used g4's on the net?

powerbook g4, s-video output to monitor
 

I'm a new apple user and i'm trying to edit and output through s-video for preview on another monitor, but i can't make it happen. I need some type of mentor for editing. I sold my whole windows editing system, DPS Velocity, and i bought a FCP 4 and powerbook g4. I need a mentor, please help

Torrey C. Harris
1-225-209-9640

Once you have the external monitor plugged into the S-video output of the Powerbook, go to Apple Menu>System Preferences>Displays and there should be a tab at the top of the Displays Window for the external monitor. You will probably need to adjust the size (try 640x480 to start).

If your Powerbook doesn't recognize the external monitor click on the detect monitors button.

New Apple Pro Apps update available
 

Mac Rumours state that is a new Apple Pro Apps update available. Has anyone downloaded and installed this yet? Any problems to report?

If you mean the Nov/Dec 03 updates to FCP4, Compressor, Cinema Tools, etc., they have been fine under 10.2.8. They are related to the Quicktime 6.4 update.

Quick Help Appreciated - FCP3 Chapter Markers -> iDVD
 

Hey everyone,

Brief: iDVD isn't seeing chapter markers from FCP3.

Quickly trying to burn a DVD of a family vacation I slapped together of last year's holidays for this year's holidays. First project I've completed with FCP3 and I'm just trying to send it through iDVD (not DVDSP 1.5) because I need it ready tomorrow (today, Sunday evening) and I don't have time to design my own menus with DVDSP.

Having said that, before I exported as a Quicktime movie, I set chapter markers using the playhead in the timeline. Hitting "m" then "command-option-m" and checking "Add Chapter Marker" and "Add Compression Marker." A little green marker would show on the bottom edge of the timeline (as opposed to the markers that show up on the actually footage in the timeline - what is the difference between the two?). I made about 7 then exported as a quicktime movie.

iDVD: I started a project, dragged the .mov in there but no scene selection menu is created. And when I "preview," and try to click through to another chapter, it just goes to black/ends.

Am I not setting the chapter markers properly in FCP3? Am I not toggling something in iDVD? Any comments would be appreciated. Though I'll give this 13 minute film to them without chapter markers, I'd prefer to get them in there....



Joshua

I'm not a big iDVD user, but I think you have to export a referenced FCP file and not a QuickTime. I think the conversion to QT strips the markers.

They are supposed to be available through Software Update via System Preference. If apps that need to be updated are recognized, the correct files will be seen as available for install or download. Use the download option. Do not update over the internet.

Ah, I discovered what I believe Andrew actually means. There is a 1.9Mb single update titled something "Pro Apps" that's out there now. I ran it on my PowerBook. No apparent change. The update appears to be basically some sort of internal patch. (Apple's beginning to look more like Microsoft's perpetual patch factory.)

You're a genius.
 

God bless you. Outputting it as a Final Cut Movie with chapter markers made the difference.

Problem solved.


Joshua

Please help- is there a way...
 

Hi,
If you have iMovie 3.0.3 it's very easy. On the right side you have an button called photos. these are photos from the photo library of iPhoto , which you can usevery easily in iMovie 3.

I believe you can export from photoshop to iPhoto or to iPhoto imoprt from photoshop.
good luck

Not in front of my mac at the moment, but I seem to remember having had trouble with iMoive not recognizing a file format after scanning a photo (specific to my scanning program). Check to make sure your photos are in a supported format (usually jpg is a good bet.) Good luck...

Clay

good to know
 

I have an older release of Imovie. But I'm thinking of buying the new updata of osx. I did find a way to get the pictures I needed into the project.

Thanks
MG

What's better, AJA or Decklink?
 

I'm pricing an HD system for my next film, and I'm looking at both AJA and Decklink. (Pinnacle is out of the question, due to my experiences with various cards.)

What's better? AJA is top knotch, but I've never used Decklink (it's also a lot cheaper than AJA).

AJA

Decklink

Anyone?

heath

Best external hd to use with gl2 and a mac?
 

I just bought a new gl2 and am wondering if you guys have any recommendations on an external hd? I have a newer imac and imagine I will want an external hd soon, so I might as well buy one now. Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks,

Congratulations on your new GL2, Dave!

There is really no "best" external drive. There are many brands and models out there.

Personally, I use drives from Wiebetech. Reliable, great customer service, wide line. I especially like the bus-powered models since they are completely powered by your Mac's Firewire bus and require no wall-wart power converters.

They are having a sale on selected models until year-end.

Try <www.smalldog.com>
I bought a demo model dual 1 gig and it works great, and at a reduced price. I watched their website for a few weeks before I saw the G4 go on sale.

One word of advice- buy as much and as fast a computer as you possibly can. I suped mine up to 1 gig ram- and it was inexpensive compared to other macs I've had. I then bought extra hard drive space.

Good luck!

Jeff Patnaude

Repair scratches on iPod or iBook
 

Pretty neat.
http://www.ipodcleaner.com

- don

I've also seen a lot of good reviews for this one as well:
http://www.radtech.us/icecreme.html

The ones that use the oxford 911 bridge chipset are better than others I believe.

Larger drives are typically faster (which might reduce problems). And the extra space is always handy.

Be aware that some people have problems using firewire drives (dropped frames on capture and export). The workaround is capturing and exporting from an internal drive.

barefeats has some benchmarks on which firewire drives are faster. example: http://www.barefeats.com/fire29.html The numbers there are pretty high and not for real life situations. In practice you need a lot of headroom to capture DV without dropped frames. DV is 3.6MB/s, which is a lot lower than benchmark numbers. Yet some people have problems with firewire drives. So you need to take benchmarks with a grain of salt.

What you can do is to just buy a FW drive and refund it if it doesn't work (watch out for restocking fees!). Make sure you fill up the drive because some people report that the drive becomes problematic as it gets fuller.

OS 10.3.2 Update available
 

This update has a long list of improvements, so here goes:

These are some of the enhancements that are part of Mac OS X 10.3.2 Update:

Address Book and Mail enhancements

Mail moves messages marked as junk to the Junk mailbox more reliably.

In Address Book, you can now configure Exchange synchronization with either a hostname or full server URL, including a (https://) URL to automatically use SSL.

Improves syncing between Address Book and Microsoft Exchange.

You can now move an email to a different mailbox if you use an email server that previously didn't allow this and an "The destination mailbox does not exist" alert would appear.

Improves results when using Mail with a .Mac or IMAP account and an SSL connection.

Networking enhancements

Improves results when looking for SMB-based servers in the Network view.

Resolves an issue in which the Mac OS X firewall could no longer be available if you perform an upgrade installation of Mac OS X Panther.

Allows automatic configuration of proxy servers via Proxy Auto Configuration (.pac) files.

Resolves an issue that could prevent the computer from getting a DHCP lease after certain kernel extensions were unloaded and reloaded.

Improves DNS for Mac OS 10.2 clients that use a shared Internet connection from a Mac OS X Panther computer.

Resolves an issue with getting or maintaining an IP address via DHCP, under certain conditions.
Addresses an issue in which the L2TP VPN could not connect with leftover racoon.pid.

Print and fax enhancements

The size of printouts from certain applications, including Safari, has been fixed.

Addresses an issue in which an "No pages were selected to be printed in this document" alert appears when printing from Mail or Safari, before the application unexpectedly quits.

Improves compatibility for Microsoft Virtual PC 6.1's emulated printing features.

You can now save faxes in a folder whose name includes a 2-byte character.

Addresses an issue with some USB PostScript printers, including the HP Laserjet 2300, Lexmark E310, and GCC Elite 21, in which a "Printer not responding" message appears when you add the printer in Printer Setup Utility, or when you try to print.

Improves compatibility for Brother HL 1240 printers when used on an AirPort network with Rendezvous; an alert message with "-9672" could appear when adding the printer.

Addresses an issue in which an application could unexpectedly quit when sending a fax to several recipients.

Improves compatibility for some Lexmark printers when they print an A4-sized page.

Improves reliability of Mac OS X Panther's fax email delivery feature.

Finder and other enhancements

Addresses issues that could keep a disk image from appearing in the Finder when you open its file.

You can now eject a FireWire-based volume from the Finder without entering an administrator password.

Improves security of background applications when Screen Saver is on, and when entering a Screen Saver password.

The Repair Permissions utility no longer reports a permissions issue with the printer.conf file.

Character Palette no longer appears when you log in or after the computer wakes from sleep.

iTunes will keep importing songs from an audio CD if you switch to another account.

FileVault no longer prompts to recover unused disk space each time you log out; it will now ask only when needed.

A FontBook collection's name, if it included a slash, or solidus, character ("/"), could cause issues; you can no longer use a slash in a FontBook collection's name.

Addresses an issue in which a PowerBook G4 computer may stop responding when a Classic application's window is moved.

The consonant of the first character for certain words entered using the Simplified Chinese ABC input method is no longer ignored.

Improves compatibility for CH Products' joysticks and flight yokes.

Improves compatibility for MagTek credit card readers.

Improves reliability of third-party FireWire audio hardware devices.

More reliably recognizes some FireWire devices, including the iSight camera.

You can update via the Software Update panel in preferences. Do not update via the panel, but rather choose to download the update. The stand alone installer is not yet available, but Ill post a link when it is.

Sweet, Im goin to check the site out now--

soundsoap using it with FCP 3 (w/o Peak)
 

I just bought soundsoap. I own Final Cut Pro 3, but I have no idea what I did with my Peak DV disc.

Is there a way to use soundsoap with Final Cut Pro 3 WITHOUT Peak DV?

If so, could someone please tell me how.

Thank you.

I bought Soundsoap too, but it kinda stinks. I'd suggest using Adobe's Audition (used to be Cool Edit Pro) or something else with more options. Soundsoap doesn't have any options worth the money - it's to basic for something that requires lots of tweaking. I found that Cool Edit Pro was really good and also the Wave plugins that can be used with Digital Performer and ProTools are good too.

Chris

FCP and After Effects
 

Hiya

Before I start testing and playing around with settings, I was wondering if someone can tell me what the best export and render settings are between FCP and After Effects.

I'm editing in FCP 3 with 25 fps DVCAM PAL footage, and want to have my FCP-exported (and subsequently) AE rendered files to come as close to that format as possible.

Thaks in advance - sorry to be lazy ;-)

For that workflow, I like to export uncompressed out of FCP (Animation codec 100%) and render back out to that codec from AE, take the video back into FCP, and finally render out to DV to go to tape. It sounds painful, but it preserves the quality as best as I know how.

Graeme

QuickTime 6.5 Available
 

QuickTime 6.5 is available via Software Update in System Preferences. The update is also available as a stand alone installer here.

Improvements are listed as:



QuickTime 6.5 delivers a number of new features and important updates, including:
• Creation and playback of mobile multimedia in the new 3GPP2 format.
• Creation and playback of mobile multimedia in the popular AMC format.
• Improved text track support.
• Enhanced DV playback options.
• Enhanced support for iMovie, iDVD, and Final Cut Pro.

What is the AMC format? If I don't know what it is, it can't be that popular. They make it sound like everyone uses it.

Anyone gonna take the plunge? I am curious what "Enhanced DV Playback Options" are. What could that possibly mean?

Final Cut Pro 4.1.1 is also available, but it is only for Chinese people. Not sure why it shows up in my Software Update panel. Livetype is also updated as well as iTunes.

Powering External Firewire Drives
 

At work we use a lot of external firewire drives to move tons of data around from Mac to Mac. All connectors are 6-pin to 6-pin. They all also require external AC power to operate. I thought that the 6 pin firewire configuration had the extra two pins to transfer power. So why do I have to plug the drives in to an AC outlet to work? Shouldn't they get their power from the system? If not, then why are they using 6-pin? Couldn't they use 4-pin connectors?

We have a couple smaller firewire drives (10 or 20 GB IIRC) at work that we bought nearly 3 years ago to backup a mac server. They are indeed powered by the firewire cable and have always worked fine on our old G4/450. But they're the very slow old notebook drives. I don't know if they are still made, but I thought some of those tiny "pocket drives" were also like that. Again, I suspect they're slow mechanisms, and those little drives are also usually expensive.

I've asked the same question around here before and never gotten much response. I'd love to have an external drive to plug into my powerbook that was fast enough for editing. But I'm sure that would suck down the battery pretty fast (if the powerbook is even capable of powering a drive that way).

Just judging by how warm some of my full size 160 GB firewire drives get it makes me wonder if the firewire interface is capable of delivering that sort of current. The brick on one of those says it delivers 5v @ 1.5a and 12v @1.5a.