As we move towards digital display devices the distortion effects of analog display devices are minimized or eliminated. LCD and Plasma displays will not exhibit the types of artifacts you are referring to. Newer and more expensive analog TV sets typically do not exhibit distortion either. I use FCP and by 7 year old Sony 32 inch XBR shows very little distortion.

I've found almost all SD video footage run through Magic Bullet comes out looking like mud. (If anyone has counterexamples, do pipe up!)

I'd use Magic Bullet strictly for its color correction and leave its core frame rate features alone. Especially, converting from 30p to 24p is asking for trouble.

Roberts, seems to work really well for pal stuff.

I threw some 50i stuff into it, came out 25p and looking fantabulous, too bad the render times are just plain stupid.

Zac

It seems to me that 50i -> 25p is a trivial conversion, as it's just a matter of an interpolation. There's no reason why it wouldn't look reasonably good, in Magic Bullet or just using a simple C algorithm.

DV-sourced NTSC footage comes out looking horrid when passed through Magic Bullet using the 60i -> 24p method outlined in the quick start tutorial. Which is why I implore, if anyone has footage that they've had more success bulleting, I hope they're able to share it.

Robert, they used magic bullet on the feature "Jackass" and alot of footage looked really really good, so it must work for some people.

Zac

Thanks to both of you. I will try your suggestions

FCP 3 academic version vs regular
 

Just wondering what the differences of FCP 3.0 Academic version and the regular version?

The software is exactly the same, no differences of any kind. The difference is in the EULA (end user licensing agreement). You may not do any work for profit with the Academic version, no exceptions. The EULA may be upgrade by contacting the Apple Store and paying the difference in the two versions.

The replacements are shipping and everyone I've talked to (8 to 10 users) that has received one has been 100% satisfied.

QuickTime 6.1.1 available
 

The latest version of QT is available as a stand alone installer or over the internet via Software Update from you System Preferences.

Any idea if this fixes the audio sync issue with FCP?

At work on windows right now :(

I'll try it tonight. I have not seen any reports one way or the other yet.

Dual monitors using FCP 3
 

Just wondering if someone can tell me the advantage of purchasing a second 17" lcd screen for Final Cut Pro editing.

A second screen is good as you can make your timeline the full width of "screen 1" and have your browser, toolbar and audio levels meter on your "screen2" and still have large viewer and canvas windows open at the same time.

Better for me however would be to have a single 23" monitor, as a long timeline would more beneficial great, less zooming. I only have one monitor on my Mac though and frequently change to different window, arrange settings (standard and customs that i have made)

dropped frames and batch capture errors
 

Ok

I'm still trying to properly capture to FCP 3. When using batch capture i set my in/out points and log the clip. Once i click batch the source material will cue, then show the first frame of my footage and freeze. Shortly after I get an error about dropped frames. I'm running a Dual G4 1.25 Powermac with 768mb ram , capturing on to my primary 80gb disk. I'm filming with a Canon GL2 and capturing my footage to the mac with a Canon ZR40.

Any thoughts on this?

Virus Protection?
 

Felix,

If you have any virus protection turned on, disable it. It has been reported, and I have experienced it myself, that virus protection can be a leading cause of dropped frames. I haven't had one problem capturing hours of footage since I did this one simple step.

Good Luck,

Bill

No i uninstalled Norton, but it's still happening.

Have Apple talk and all network connections (including internet) off. Do not use server to set date and time (see Date and Time System Preference) turn off mail or anything that polls the system or a network at specific intervals (check mail every 5 minutes etc.).

Do you have your drive partitoned? That can be a problem. If the OS (OS 10.2.4 etc) Application (FCP 3.x.x) and your media are all going to one large partiton, that can cause problems. Depending on how full the drive is, it can have problems accessing the OS, App and write media all at the same time. Partitoning the drive may help. How full is the drive? Are your FCP preferences set up for capturing from Canon DV? What version of FCP, OS and Quicktime are you using?

Mac OS X networking
 

I use my Windows PC for After Effects work and it renders while I use my Mac. So obviously I like to transfer the files back and forth via ethernet for this use. I have Jaguar and use the desktop "GO" menu to connect to my PC, which it sees, but when I try to click on it I get the message "Dave has not been installed correctly" and I can never access my PC. I tried a demo version of Dave way back before Jaguar and have deleted everything on the computer with the word "dave" in it, but I still get this message.

Any ideas how I can rid myself of Dave once and for all and use the natural networking abilities of Mac OS X to transfer my video files?

Thanks.

Go to the Dave website (Thursby?) and look for a document on how to uninstall Dave. It is a little tricky from what I remember, so they published a how to. I may have a copy on my desktop system. I'll check for it tomorrow. Let me know if you have any luck finding it.

I checked Thursbys' site and it said I needed to download Dave 4.0.2 and select "uninstall" from the installer. Problem is that their DMG file cannot even mount. I am using the latest incarnation of the Mac OS X.2.

Yes, I am quite upset.

Security Camera Look
 

Does anyone know if it's possible, and if so how, to make a clip into a duotone (black and white footage that has a bluish tint to it) and then to add noise with as much control over the hue and noise as in Photoshop?

I'm going for a security camera effect...but the thing is I'm trying to match video footage with still images that will appear side-by-side with the video footage and have them appear with the same noise and hue. The still images were made to look like security camera footage using the noise and duotone functions of Photoshop mentioned above.

FCP version 3.0
Quicktime version 6.1

I turned off stop on drop frames and timecode error in preferences and was able to capture properly, but then the audio is so far out of sync it doesn't matter.

Looks like capturing with Imovie works though.

What version of FCP are you using? I've been able to create this type of effect with the Color Correction filters in FCP 3. I'm happy to get more detailed if appropriate.

because...
 

you can work faster and more easily. once you use a big screen or a dual screen setup (for those of us that can't afford a big flat screen) you'll never look back. The small project I'm doing now is an example. On my left 17" monitor I have the viewer and canvas at 50% as well as the browser with the effects and project tabs. The latter are in a long column. There is space below the viewer and canvas windows to drag the filter or motion tab when working with them so as to be able to view the filters or motion screens and see the effects on the video. On the right monitor I have my timeline which is currently comprised of 4 audio tracks and three video tracks and will certainly grow beyond that. I don't know how in the heck people work on fcp on a single monitor. I know it's doable and I've had to do it here and there but it's very cumbersome once you have used a large screen. I'd prefer a 23" flat screen but dual 17" crts are a decent compromise since my video work is just family stuff at this point.

John,

Don't forget the very apparent scan line appearence of security footage, i have some nice plug ins for after effects to achieve this effect, as well as noise and overly contrasty video.

If this is a controlled shoot, try and shoot it at 60i not in frame mode, and also load your stills onto your dv tape either by shooting them or via firewire then capture them back as video, it may be easier to match the looks then.

Zac

OK I was able to finally get the DMG file to mount and uninstalled Dave, and now I am free to transfer the files back and forth to get the video work done. I am relieved, but still upset that Dave buries itself so deep into the system. That reminds me of Windows programs that needed uninstallers instead of dragging them to the trash like you can do with most Mac apps.
Oh well. Live and learn.

Hi Curtis,

Thank you for keeping us posted with how it went for you. Much appreciated. I will look into it and see what I can find out, not sure how long that will take though hehe my schedule is totally swamped as it is! Perhaps Jeff or another user here can chime in with an answer to your question?

In case you run into any snafus booting up with Jaguar, it's a good idea to read this article and perhaps have it printed out and handy.
http://www.kenstone.net/fcp_homepage...eding_jag.html

Don't forget to keep all of your original Jaguar install disks and system restore disks handy, in fact you should burn a copy of them for added safety.

- don

There are known problems with QT 6.x.x and FCP 3.0.4 regarding audio sync problems with tapes recorded on Canon cameras. The sync adjust feature in preferences is not working.

Text for iDVD
 

I'm creating a project in iDVD that includes a slide show consisting of text pages. When I display the text "slides" on a TV monitor, the text seems to show "ghosting" around the individual letters . . . and basically is less sharp than I want. Can somone suggest methods for dealing with text in this format that will provide better legibility and resolution?

Thanks, Dick

I'm not sure what ghosting looks like. Is it color bleed from too strong a color (over saturated reds etc.) or an encoding problem with iDVD? Can you post or email me some examples?

ghosting
 

Jeff:


Hmmmmm . . . ghosting. Well it's similar to a halo around certain parts of certain letters. So instead of getting a clean foreground (letters) against a background parts of the text/background seem unevenly lit (perhaps glowing or pulsing describes it better). Is this a function of the scanning technology inherent in NTSC monitors?

I hope this helps. And thanks!!

I don't use iDVD, but my best guess, without seeing the artifacts is, the MPEG 2 encoding is causing the text troubles. Are you using the current versions of iDVD and QuickTime?

The other possibility is you choice of colors. Try using neutral colors like shades of grey etc. and do a test clip to see if it disappears.

If you think it is your NTSC monitor, try taking you DVD to a friends or neighbors and view it there. If it looks substantially different then your monitor may be partly to blame.

John,
how about shooting your footage off of the tv and play with different white balance settings. I once shot some video of a friend and made it b/w and then played it back on the tv, then shot that with my video camera and I think I got it to look blue-ish and have the scan lines in it, the more you zoom in on the tv image the bigger the scan lines.

If you mess with your tv/camera controls, you can do some noise effects in real time and get a more analog feel to it. Do a dub of a dub and play that tape back and you can get more noise in it. Before NLE was affordable, me and my friends did all our stuff the analog way, shooting off the tv, feedback video, everytime my friend plays his experimental videos people wonder what software he used and they are surprised to find out he does it using tv feedback and shooting straight off the tv.

I'll send you a photo right now.

frame capture using an outside signal
 

I'm looking for help for a project I'm preparing.
I'm going to shoot some footage from a moving car, having a rev. counter ading a signal (a beep or whatever) on the soundtrack every 10 meters. Is there a way I can edit this film, by tacking a frame every time the beep apears on the sound track? I would like the end result to be the car looks like it's driving at a constant speeds of 240 meters per second (24 frames per second, each 10 meters from eachother), no matter what the actual speed of the car is. The sampling rate of the frames out of the basic footage will be varaible, correlated with the speed of the car.

I believe you will have to do all the edits manually. I don't know of a way to selectively edit only those frames with an audio tone. Perhaps an Apple Script could be written to perform that task.

Help with selecting a DVD burner
 

Hi,
Hoping somebody can direct me to an external dvd burner so that i can burn a movie i am making. I'w working on an Imac g3 500mhz. Also, can anybody direct me to good dvd authoring package as well that will work on my g3? thanx so muchin advance.
-kris

Well, you might need to upgrade your iMac first. iDVD, the simple to use, Apple DVD authoring program requires a built-in SuperDrive. It will not work with an external burner. Apple's full blown authoring program, DVD Studio Pro, only works with G4 processors. However, it does support external burners. Multiplexing, a part of the MPEG encoding process, is very processor intensive and would be very, very slow on a G3. You would also want to max out your ram. No company currently manufactures a G4 upgrade for your iMac. Newer Technology went out of business in 2001. I hate to say this, but a newer iMac might be in order.

Realtime capture cards for mac
 

Hi there,

Anyone have any experiences with any realtime capture cards? I was looking at the Matrox RTmac, but then it sounds like FCP 4 will be better off anyways

Any thoughts?

The Matrox RTMac is still awaiting Drivers for OS X and Beta drivers are to be used at NAB. The Matrox RT.X100 Xtreme is a new product designed for OS X and is said to be shipping in May. It also is to be shown this week at NAB. Matrox burned a great many people with RTMac and I doubt you'll hear many favorable things about their products. I would give FCP 4 a try first. If the performance isn't what you need then look into a RT card.