FCP users -- here's a question for you.
 

After waiting for a 2 clip cuts-only (AIC or DVCPRO HD) Sequence, to export to HDV, we get an HDV file. One assumes the frames are being encoded to MPEG-2. Specifically, to HDV.

If we now import this back into FCP, we can try to Print it to Tape.

Now we wait for a message "Conforming HDV."

If so, how can a 2 minute HDV file take 20 minutes to be "conformed?"

And, what -- after the Sequence is already HDV -- why does it need to be conformed? And, what is conforming.

And, if something goes wrong in the write to tape -- it needs to spend 20 minutes conforming it again.

Equally strange, Apple claims a cuts-only Timeline HDV timeline uses Smart Splicing at the cut-points. Yet, it takes a long time to export/conform when it should only take a few seconds.

Steve, it depends on the compression that you have configured for your sequence. Open the sequence, press Cms-0, under the "General" tab check the parameters. If th Sequence is configred differently from the clip, FCP will need to conform it. If the clip was capured with HDVxDV using AIC then you should use the same compressor in the "QuickTime Video settings". This doesn't affect how you export the suquence later.

--
Paolo

That's correct. The clips are AIC and so is the Sequence.

When you do you an export, the AIC is decoded and encoded to HDV and then written to disk. This I expect to take time because we must decode and encode MPEG-2.

When I open an ALREADY encoded HDV file into the Source window and request a Print to Video -- why does a 2 minute movie that is already an HDV file, take another 20 minutes to "conform?"

What can need to be done when it's already HDV? What possible meaning could "conform" have?

If you have bars & Tone or countdown selected, it needs to be created and rendered into whatever codec you are using. Generally this process is 1:1, but in the case of HDV it could take longer.

This is why I stick with codecs other than HDV. In my limited testing of posting in a complete HDV workflow, there just seemed to be too many circumstances where HDV was been "conformed" or transcoded at some point, instead of just letting me work.