What is currently the best Editor for the XDCams? From beginning to end which editor supports all features of these Cameras ie... variable frame rates, HDSDI Capture, etc..etc... I am looking to buy the 350... and i'm currently using PC, and have Adobe Premeire Pro (Video Collections). I am however; seriously considering a Macbook pro, so i can be more mobile. And of course would get the latest version of FCP or I could get a Dell XPS laptop. So i am wondering before i make a decision what editor is better for these cams?

One more question, can you install a PCIx Decklink card into a Macbook Pro? to take advantage of HD SDI in the field or on the road and also for monitoring. Any assistance would be really appreciated, thanks.

Brian.

That's a very tough question to answer, as NLE choices are almost a personal thing. I love FCP, but other people hate it.

I think your idea of a Mac hold water for two reasons:

1-You can run both OS X and Windows, and try different packages without replacing hardware.

2-Most of the Macs these days are at least competitive in respect to performance/dollar ratio with the top PCs.

You're not going to be able to run a Decklink card in a laptop however. There's nowhere to put it!

Matrox has just come out with their MXO product to get accurate HD-SDI output from a DVI port, but myself and most editors I know are skeptical that it's a viable solution for HDSDI output, based on what we know about the Cinema Preview output in FCP. Worth looking into if you don't need SDI input.

Get a Mac every time. FCP (latest version) supports every single format of XDCAM and XDCAM HD and it works to perfection.

Avid on Mac will cost a lot more as Xpress Pro only supports 25Mbps constant, if you want an Avid system that supports the rest it is a £3,500 upgrade to media composer; rip off considering a Mac pro maxed out with RAM and hard drives with Final Cut Studio thrown in cost less than than for the complete hardware/software system.

PC; forget it, Premiere with main-concept plug in simply doesn't work smoothly and is more hassle than it is worth.

Decklink, no. You need a Mac Pro for this.

I would not recommend a laptop, not even the better Macs for video editing. Screens are too small, not enough RAM and low speed internal hard drives are not that great for this.

FCP on a G5 or Power Mac gets my vote. I also run FCP on a Macbook. You could try Vegas on a PC with a decklink card.

We had a Matrox MXO on a macbook pro at IBC and the output looked pretty good on the 27" HD monitor we had. Didn't get achance to look at any scopes etc, but for occasional use it looks good. Think I would want a proper HDSDi card for regular use.

I really think you need a good workstation for HD work. While it might work on a laptop, you need every bit of horsepower you can get.

I have both Premiere with MainConcept and Vegas, and Vegas playback is much better -- smoother and sharper.

As you can imagine, Sony is making XDCAM HD workflow a priority for Vegas, and their efforts have not been in vain.

Now if I can just learn Vegas...

Tip McPartland

Does anyone know how the new Mac Book Pros with the new Core 2 Duo Processors perform? I see you can get a 17" laptop with 2.33Ghz and 3 Gigs of Ram, and these new core 2 duo processors are supposed to be really awesome. Attach a 500 Gig LaCie and a 30 inch HD Cinema Display and i'd think that that could be a not bad setup!? but what do i know i haven't tried or seen how they handle.

Or perhaps i should just get a Mac Pro.

Brian, the Apple Mac Books won't have a problem editing XDCAM HD as the bandwidth is not really more than DVCAM or HDV footage.

Unless you are editing in the field majority of the time I'd have to encourage you to go for a Mac Pro, simply because you can use 4 internal HDs, add cards etc.

PC; forget it

I would not recommend a laptop, not even the better Macs for video editing. Screens are too small, not enough RAM and low speed internal hard drives are not that great for this.

Are you serious Nigel?

This morning I ordered a Dell m90 Precision laptop, core 2 duo, 17inch 1920 x 1080 screen native HDV, 2 Gig Ram, 7200 rpm 100gig hard drive...and I can connect it to my Dell 24inch LCD at native HDV resolution also.

Are you really serious? What have I done!

Brian

From what I've read, not from hands on experience, these days performance wise a top of the line laptop of whatever flavor is essentially equal to a desktop as is a laptop workstation more or less equal to a desktop workstation.

The choice of PC versus Mac is simply a personal choice, like the color of your lipstick or your underwear. Wasn’t always like that for sure. As Nate points out the price/performance things is near as damit equal.

I agree with your approach, I don’t believe it’s XDCAM specific, but I could be way off there as I don’t have an XDCAM, yet, although I have played around with some raw files off an XDCAM camera in Vegas 7 on an old bucket of bolts 3 years old PC. But a hot new state-of-the-art laptop machine, Mac or PC, using the latest cool processors and bucket’s full of external hd’s, and you’re away to the races.

That’s where I’m headed, for what it’s worth.

I have no doubt that the Macs are probably the best choice, but not the only, and not the cheapest. I currently edit xdcam hd on a pc laptop, a toshiba satellite A105, that cost $1250. I use Vegas 7.0 and it handles all the workflow perfectly. I ingest clips via firewire using FAM mode (usually to an external USB hard drive), edit the full quality MXF files on Vegas (previewing at full resolution is a little jerky, half resolution output to an external SD monitor works well, more RAM than the 1.5GB that come with the laptop would be great!), do post on vegas (color grading, etc) and output to dv using vegas (currently our TV show is broadcasted only on SD, hopefully HD starting next year). I also export a mxf file to save the full HD files for the future. I have been able to export HD files back to a prodisc without any problems.

Get Vegas 7. http://www.videoguys.com/vegasvideo.html

Handles XDCAM very well. Check out this this great tutorial DVinfo.net member Simon Wyndham made http://www.simonwyndham.co.uk/Vegas7.htm

Put it in a new Core 2 Duo machine. Don't go crazy on a graphics card becuase Vegas doesn't take advantage of it. Get 2GB RAM.

Total cost including vegas 7 +DVD - under $2,000 depending on your monitors.

You can check out the specs for a great core 2 Duo machine in our DIY 5 article
http://www.videoguys.com/DIY5.html

Gary

[...] can you install a PCIx Decklink card into a Macbook Pro? to take advantage of HD SDI in the field or on the road and also for monitoring. [...] If you are interested in connecting to an HD monitor from the Macbook Pro, you'll want to consider the Matrox MXO (http://www.matrox.com/video/products/mxo/home.cfm) box that connects to the DVI output from the Mac.

[...] seriously considering a Macbook pro, so i can be more mobile. And of course would get the latest version of FCP [...] As someone who edits, mixes, color corrects, and authors DVDs with Final Cut Studio moving constantly between three configurations: an edit suite built around a Mac Pro w/ Kona 3 card, a Macbook Pro laptop, and a Power Mac G5 w/ Serial ATA software RAID at home, I have two comments:

(1) if you need the versatility of interfaces and flexibility of adding PCI Express cards and want the best price/performance ratio, the desktop Mac will offer better performance overall (SATA 3Gb/s hard drives vs. laptop hard drives as one of several differences) if you don't need the portability of the laptop, otherwise, the portability of the laptop is a wonderful thing (I like having it both ways),

(2) Final Cut Studio offers a seamless integration of everything I do in one suite that works very well together. One way to judge a tool his how well it solves your problems today and as you grow and take on more complex projects. I use Final Cut Pro for picture editing, Live Type for titles and lower-thirds, Soundtrack Pro for some mixing, editing, and looped-based audio tracks, Compressor for preparing MPEG2 for DVD and H.264 for podcasting, and DVD Studio Pro for DVD authoring... all in one suite, and there's also Motion, which I've not dived seriously into yet. Of course, if you prefer Windows, then the contenders are Vegas, Premiere Pro, and Avid.

I'm using Avid Composer on an HP with AMD, dragging and dropping into the bins via FAM from my 330.

I've ingested about 60 discs with an average of say 80 clips each... so about 4800 clips.

I've had only one file out of those 4800 have a problem.

5K may seem steep, but I've gone from shooting to burning test standard def dvds and the workflow is pretty fantastic.

Why not Decklink?

I run FCP on a max'd out macbook as well as on a G5 Quad. I can edit XDCAM HD with both, they both work. BUT it is a much smoother, easier, faster experience on the G5. I have true realtime HD SDi preview via a Decklink card. Timeline playback is totaly smooth. I have HD-SDi and component out for mastering to HDCAM or whatever. I have realtime downconversion to SD component that I use for grading with a Grade 1 monitor. In therory there should be very little performance difference between the Macbook and G5, the reality is very different as the macbook chokes from time to time spoiling and otherwise pleasant experience.

I also have Vegas on a dual core P4 windows box. This is pretty slick and I use Vegas for some of it's batch processing capabilities, but it's no where near as smooth as the Macs, Premier with mainconcept is simply a non starter.

I run Avid Media Composer on both the Mac G5 and PC. On both this has excellent playback and is very smooth and slick. For clean jerk free playback this is the top dog. But I have better monitoring options with FCP and decklink so that's what I tend to use. If I was stuck on a PC then Avid Media Composer would be my software of choice. It's such a shame that Avid have chosen to restrict Xpress to 25Mb.

We just upgraded to Edius Broadcast using the canopus NX card for HD output. Now supports XDCAM HD in and out.
http://www.canopus.com/

Can someone answer the few questions bellow in regard to XDCAM HD support on Final Cut Pro using the new PDZK-P1 v1.1 XDCAM Transfer software:

- Can you import proxy clips in a FCPro project, off-line with those and rez-up to hi-res clips?

- Are all 3 HD resolutions supported?

- Can you mix different HD resolution in the same timeline and playback in real time?

- Can MXF HD clips playback in realtime without rendering to an external HD monitor connected using a third party HD hardware interface like DeckLink?

- Can you do partial import of MXF files ?

- Can you select the number of audio tracks to be imported ?

- Can you import clips shot using the F350's variable frame rate feature?

- Can these clips play realtime in a timeline or do they need to be processed or rendered first?

- Are they any limitations when writing a FCPro sequence back to XDCAM disc and how long does it take?

- Any other limitation that is not listed above?

Thanks.

Thierry.

I can answer most of your questions...

Can someone answer the few questions bellow in regard to XDCAM HD support on Final Cut Pro using the new PDZK-P1 v1.1 XDCAM Transfer software:

- Can you import proxy clips in a FCPro project, off-line with those and rez-up to hi-res clips? Not directly. You can export the low res proxy to MP4 then import that file to FCP. But there's really no need to use the low res stuff in FCP.

- Are all 3 HD resolutions supported? Yes, although there is no setup for 18mb VBR, I've used footage at that datarate and dropped it into the 35mb VBR sequence and it didn't require rendering.

- Can you mix different HD resolution in the same timeline and playback in real time? I'm thinking no, but it depends partly on the horsepower of your system due to FCP's Dynamic RT feature.

- Can MXF HD clips playback in realtime without rendering to an external HD monitor connected using a third party HD hardware interface like DeckLink? Pretty sure you can since the datarate isn't that much higher than HDV.

- Can you do partial import of MXF files ? Absolutely! That's one of the main functions of the XDCAM Transfer app. It is effectively your log and capture interface although you aren't really capturing.

- Can you select the number of audio tracks to be imported ?Yes.

- Can you import clips shot using the F350's variable frame rate feature?Yes, these files are no different except when you overcrank beyond 30, the vertical resolution drops to 540.

- Can these clips play realtime in a timeline or do they need to be processed or rendered first?No need to render, that's the beauty of doing it in camera.

- Are they any limitations when writing a FCPro sequence back to XDCAM disc and how long does it take?I've only written one finished sequence back to XDCAM disc. You'll need to set your stereo audio to dual mono. I haven't timed the output yet.

- Any other limitation that is not listed above?None that I've found, but Nate may have run across something.

I have to add to and clarify some of these answers...

Can you import proxy clips in a FCPro project, off-line with those and rez-up to hi-res clips? Not directly. You can export the low res proxy to MP4 then import that file to FCP. But there's really no need to use the low res stuff in FCP.

I've been working on an Automator script to take a folder of proxies, recompress them to Offline HD format, and rename them so they will match the imported full res media. If I ever get it working right you'll all be the first to know. Compressor will recompress the original proxies to Photo-JPEG 320x180 res at 1x real time, so if I can ever get an automated process working, it won't be a horrible way to go.

Can MXF HD clips playback in realtime without rendering to an external HD monitor connected using a third party HD hardware interface like DeckLink? Pretty sure you can since the datarate isn't that much higher than HDV.

This is the one I mainly wanted to comment on. I have a Blackmagic Decklink HD Pro card. All XDCAM HD plays out to it full res to my 20" JVC HD CRT. It's a beautiful thing...almost as fast as working with DV.

Incidentally, I rendered out an XDCAM HD 1080p24 timeline to uncompressed for the first time the other week for an HDCAM layoff...the uncompressed at 98 megabytes/sec plays back wonderfully on my cheap SATA 4 drive raid.

Can these overcranked clips play realtime in a timeline or do they need to be processed or rendered first?No need to render, that's the beauty of doing it in camera.

They play in real time in the viewer, but after they're put on a timeline they need to be rendered. Quicktime is doing the vertical stretch in the background (540 to 1080), so unfortunately they don't play back in real time.

If you do the same to am SD clip in an SD timeline, it all happens in RT, so it's a bit disappointing.

Thanks Nate, I knew you would be able to amplify and/or clarify. Just a question though since I haven't had a chance to do it myself. If you undercrank, which maintains full resolution, there shouldn't be any need for FCP to render it, correct?

I could have sworn I brought in some overcrank stuff and it played back without render.

-gb-

If you undercrank, which maintains full resolution, there shouldn't be any need for FCP to render it, correct?

I could have sworn I brought in some overcrank stuff and it played back without render.


The underlying MPEG data is is 1440x540. The Transfer software will report these overcranked clips at this resolution to confirm.

When the XDCAM Transfer software wraps the MPEG into a Quicktime wrapper, the Quicktime header informs the player to display at 1920x1080.

So for regular XDCAM HD clips, FCP is always scaling the 1440 1.33x horizontally so it fills out to 1920. The overcranked clips need to be scaled both horizontally 1.33x (to 1920) and vertically 2x (540 to 1080), and FCP can't do both at the same time without a render (at least on my machine)

Maybe on machines with better graphics cards (offload some processing to GPU), they don't need to render.

Going back to the original question. I use Vegas 7. No re-rendering needed for anything, direct connection to the XDCAM device, proxy files and full res files all supported along with cliplists which can be dragged to the timeline, essence markers etc. Mastering back to XDCAM discs. No special processing needed for slow motion clips. It doesn't have GPU support, but then it doesn't really need it on a modern machine, especially something like a Core Duo 2.

If they did a Mac version I'd dump the PC tomorrow.

Simon,

hadn't you heard - you can run Vegas on an Intel Mac!

Can you?
<sound of PC being thrown out of the window> ;-)

Simon,

hadn't you heard - you can run Vegas on an Intel Mac!

No you can't, not without Bootcamp, but the performance would be so bad you might as well just buy a PC to start with.

Macs are for Final Cut; end of.

Simon, you should try Final Cut, from what I can gather it does everything Vagus does anyway; and then some.

Also, FCP interface is really sleek and clean. Whenever I see Vagus, Edius or Premiere the interfaces remind me of those cheap comics I used to read when I was a kid, like the Dandy, Beano etc.

Going back to the original question. I use Vegas 7. No re-rendering needed for anything, direct connection to the XDCAM device, proxy files and full res files all supported along with cliplists which can be dragged to the timeline, essence markers etc. Mastering back to XDCAM discs. No special processing needed for slow motion clips. It doesn't have GPU support, but then it doesn't really need it on a modern machine, especially something like a Core Duo 2.

If they did a Mac version I'd dump the PC tomorrow.

But as far as I could tell from the few test I ran with Vegas 7 demo, before writing back to XDCAM disc, Vegas first renders the timeline? An depending on how much FX you have, this could be a fairly lenghty process right? Also, this step would be necessary to playout a Vegas timeline through the now supported third party hardware like DeckLink and others, correct?

Thierry.

Vegas runs faster and better on my macbook under bootcamp than it does on my Dual core P4!

It also runs very well using parallels within OSX.

Vegas runs faster and better on my macbook under bootcamp than it does on my Dual core P4!

It also runs very well using parallels within OSX.

That seems hard to believe, but if you say so your word is good enough for me. I'm supprised though.

Shouldn't make definitive comments when you don't know the full story!

Bootcamp is not a PC simulator for the Mac it runs everything EXACTLY the same as a PC would. The new Macs have pretty much the same architecture as other PC's

I was going to say, Vegas 7 Demo ran in Bootcamp pretty damn speedy for me when I tried it.

A lot of PC users haven't grasped the power of the new Macs, it's a system that can run pretty much ANY software!

Vegas first renders the timeline? An depending on how much FX you have, this could be a fairly lenghty process right?

Yes, Vegas 7 would need to render out a file for mastering back to XDCAM disc. But this is the same for any NLE. This would only need to be done at the end of a project. And no, it isn't a lengthy process. Vegas 7 renders very quickly depending on your hardware.

Also, this step would be necessary to playout a Vegas timeline through the now supported third party hardware like DeckLink and others, correct?

No. Vegas will play everything in realtime. How smooth the playback is though will depend on your hardware. So, for simple projects you could play straight out through the Decklink since it can be used for monitoring on an external monitor. But if you have a lot of layers then yes, you will need to render. It all depends on your project.

I know what you mean Steve, but Bootcamp is buggy as hell right now and we are talking Windows after all.

I'm not advocating using Windows and Vegas at all, I'm not a big fan of either of them, but if you want to use Vegas as well as FCP on the same machine you can. Although I'll bow to other peoples experience on how Bootcamp is at the moment.

I know what you mean Steve, but Bootcamp is buggy as hell right now and we are talking Windows after all. Bootcamp may be buggy right now, however, give Parallels Desktop for Mac (http://www.parallels.com/en/products/desktop/) a try for running Windows XP and Windows applications on Intel Mac. They offer a 15-day trial activation key so you can take it for a spin and decide for yourself if it's as good as they say it is. The performance is excellent. Now you can have the best of both worlds... Vegas and Final Cut :-) on the same Intel Mac and swing both ways, Mac and PC.

a Mac-guy-friend-of-mine tried Parallel's, he said it's not very feasible, because you'll need a lot of ram, since Parallel's itself took out much ram. So if your mac book has only 1 GB, you can forget about any windows editing apps.
* that's what he said... correct me if it's wrong...

It is true that Parallels eats ram, but that's to be expected as you are running two operating systems at the same time. However it's a lot cheaper to stick an extra gig of ram in a macbook (or powermac) than it is to buy a PC for Vegas. One really nice feature is the ability to use the batch processing capabilities of Vegas, storing the files in the Parallels shared folder and then open them in FCP for editing without having to re-boot or swap drives or send stuff over a network. You do really need at least 2gig of Ram to run Vegas and FCP at the same time.

Alister, the workflow you mentioned regarding Vegas and FCP is what I'm looking for. Would you care to comment and elaborate more on that? I'll try parallells today. Thanks.

although mentioned earlier. and even tho I'm not a fan per se ... let me throw in another mention of Canopus Edius 4.1. recently added XDCAM import and export options with full proxy editing support.