Apple ProRes 422
 

If working with ONLY XDCam HD 35mbps can anyone see any advantages to using ProRes 422? Obviously it looks like a fantastic tool when using multiple formats but all flavors of XDCam HD are native in FCP 6 so it seems that would be cleaner than turning it into PreRes 422.

I wouldn't convert raw footage to it or convert it on ingest. But if you apply color correction, effects, titles, etc, rendering out to a less compressed format like ProRes422 would be the way to go. The advantage of the new FCP is that you can mix both XDCAM HD and ProRes 422 on the same timeline (I think).

As I understand it, FCP6 will now allow you to specify ProRes as a render codec (as a side benefit of the open timeline).

So there would be no need to transcode on ingest as Brett mentions below. Just specifiy it as render codec and you'd be getting the best quality possible (with the exception of specifiying uncompressed as render codec).

I am pretty currious about this new "universal timeline" ability in FCPro 6. Playing HD/SD in the same timeline and in real time is already quite a performance, adding various framerates support is audacious but then, also supporting mixing PAL & NTSC clips is quite astonishing. I am wondering how well this thing really works...

Thierry.

NewTek has had the ability to have PAL and NTSC in the same timeline for some time in their VT[4] software.

In their new SpeedEdit software released last fall, one can have both NTSC and PAL, as well as 1080 and 720 in the same timeline as well. Doesn't matter if it is "i" or "p" either.

You just tell it what res you want the finished project to be. It works without rendering. You just drop the clip in and play.

The drawback for this forum is that they currently don't support XDCAM. I can make a file work by renaming it to a .mpg file, but the process broke down for me, as it won't export back to my camera. But I had 1081i, 720p, and NTSC all playing in the same timeline.

So, I'm assuming that if NewTek can do it with a $500 program, then Apple can pull it off as well.

I suppose, but "support" for Apple means that any of the "supported" formats (1080i, 1080p, 720p, 480i) can be viewed full framerate, full size out of either a Kona or Blackmagic card.

There's some programs out there that say they have an open timeline, but there are serious caveats with how you can preview or output. Even Avid does this.

I was reading the PDF manual for SpeedEdit just now, and it appears only DV or HDV via firewire out is supported, with a big caveat:

I mention this not because I'm trying be a cheerleader of a particular NLE, but to try to cut through the cruft of marketing claims (of which Apple is certainly capable of perpetrating at times).

Nate:

I have speededit. I usually preview my work inside the windows monitor. Speededit's preview window is not like others. It is really accurate, down to details like fielding. I know no other editor out there where you can spot a clip with wrong field order on the preview window.

Having said that, I tried the realtime firewire hdv out once and it blew my mind. It managed to give me 3 realtime hd layers (regardless of source format) with DVE's and color correction applied. I can't understand how they pull this off, but they do. And it looks really good too. This on a 2.3 Ghz Macbook Pro running XP on bootcamp.

If you ever get the chance to try it out, I recommend it. Some of what speededit can do might sound like marketing BS, but most of it is real.

Cool... how do you see field errors on a PC monitor that is progressive scan?? Must be the only software in the world capable of correctly displaying an interlace scan on a progressive monitor.

Luis,

Are you able to get SpeedEdit to export back to XDCAM HD? This is where it broke down for me.

If I change the name of each clip to an "mpg" suffiix, it will play them just fine. It's saving it that is my problem.

Thoughts?

That's really really cool. For some people that's just what the doctor ordered; getting real-time MPEG2 stream for monitoring.

The other part I left out that was a little implied, is that for me, having just FW HDV out doesn't help me, I need analog component or SD/HD-SDI with deck control.

A lot of the NLEs today seem to be leveraging the power of the video cards to do real time scaling and whatnot for preview on your computer monitor (Avid Xpress, Liquid, others), but to be able to leverage that hardware to get useful output (SDI) seems to be the real trick.

I asked one of the Apple support guys whether FCp 6's ability to preview HDV out through FW (as DV) would also allow the same with all XDCAM HD flavours but he was not sure that it would, saying only that it would certainly work for SP mode.

It would appear that the Matrox MXO box is still what the doctor ordered for those working in XDCAM/FCP

Nate, you should check out the new Liquid Chrome XE. This is Liquid with all it's realtime power for native XDCAM HD editing using the AJA Xena board. I was one of the beta testers for Liquid Chrome Xe and I can tell you it is amazing. Pretty much anything that is realtime in Liquid can be sent out via HD-SDI from the timeline.

Out of the 3 NLE's that directly use the Xena board I personally think the way Liquid does it is the best. The reason why I say this because Liquid looks and works 100% the way it usually does. The board just feeds the uncompressed buffer directly to the card to output. I had personally wished Avid would have supported a wider range of cards such as Decklink since there are cheaper options then the AJA Xena board but I'm happy they actually did what they did.

It converts the 30 interlaced frames into 60 progressive frames. It even shows flicker when you pause your video in a spot with lots of movement.