I've got some ideas, below, on configuring external HDD's with the new 17" MacBook Pro but would appreciate some feedback / suggestions if this is a good / ideal way to manage my media assets or maybe another way.

- For Capturing and Editing, (2) SATA II drives (maybe 320gb each) in (2) seperate external enclosures, each of which has FW800 / FW400 / USB 2.0 / eSATA external ports.

- For Projects (completed and in progress) a (1) SATA II drive in an external enclosure (same as above), maybe 320gb.

- For Audio / Still Photos / Graphics (1) SATA II drive in an external enclosure (same as above), maybe 250gb.

Is it doable to daisy chain all these enclosures together or would it be better / safer to get a single (4) drive enclosure?

I would be editing stuff originated from Hi8, MiniDV, AVCHD, MXF (P2), XDCam HD.

Again, any suggestions would be more than appreciated.

Thanks!!

I can use 1080i no problem but downloaded latest firmware for both and I just cant display 1080p 25 on my apple monitor. The display is all distorted, lots of lines, hard to explain. I have selected in final cut pro aja kona 1080p25 8 bit 1920x10080. Have also tried the other settings 10 bit and rgba.

Any ideas?

Thanks

What is the exact workflow to ingest 1080/24P footage (not 1080/24PA) shot on the AG-HVX200P into Final Cut 5.1.4, and watch the footage in 24p?

It seems like a simple question, but I've had a hard time getting an exact answer and all the literature provided by Apple and Panasonic leaves me with a stuttering image.

Whoever is kind enough to answer, would you please be ultra-detailed in the steps required?

I greatly appreciate it. Thank you.

Joseph Campo

Hi Everyone,

So, I've gotten myself into a bit of an editing mess. Forgive me if I sound confused or unclear about any of this; I'm still trying to wrap my head around everything. I could use any help and advice that anyone has!

So here's the deal.

I have two problems. Or, really, three. I shot footage with the Sony HVR-V1U in 24A and 30p (by accident. I swear it was set to 24A. Didn't figure this out until yesterday). The three problems are:

1) I messed up my workaround and need to figure out how to fix it
2) I have two frame rates, much to my dismay. 24A and 30p, all encoded in a HDV1080i60 stream.
3) Converting HDV to SD was horrifying yesterday. Cadence problems, interlacing, flickering, noise and TERRIBLE quality.

Just so that everyone knows right off, I have a delivery date of July 9th and it needs to be delivered in SD (DVD) for projection on big screen. Eventually it also needs to be online.

So. Here we go.

1) I messed up my workaround and need to figure out how to fix it

Using information in this thread: <a href="http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=83651">DVInfo</a>

And this thread: <a href="http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=87189">DvInfo Again</a>

I decided to use this workaround: <a href="http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/articles/camcorders/FCP_24P_HVRV1U.htm"> V1U Workaround</a>

I captured HDV 1080i60
Edited in a 1080i60 timeline

Went to finish the workaround by:
-Creating new sequence set to Photo-JPG 75%
-Paste project into new sequence, render, export, open in CinemaTools and Reverse Telecine

And I realized that I had to reverse the INDIVIDUAL clips, not the project. One good thing (I think) is that the footage is 24A, so the A frame should be the very first frame of every clip. Unfortunately I tried reversing a few clips and they looked very odd.

So to fix this do I go in and reverse all the clips I'm using individually, then reconnect my media to those new files? If so, what timeline do I do this in?

----------------

2) I have two frame rates, much to my dismay. 24A and 30p, all encoded in a HDV1080i60 stream.

How do I safely mix these? I'm lost here. I've never mixed frame rates, and this is my first time working with HDV on top of the fact that FCP doesn't support this camera. Do convert one frame rate to the other? Or?

-----------

3) Converting HDV to SD was horrifying yesterday. Cadence problems, interlacing, flickering, noise and TERRIBLE quality. I have a delivery date of July 9th, and to make sure I had something ready, I wanted to get a backup plan together, so yesterday I decided to just ignore the frame judder and try to just convert my current timeline (HDV1080i60) to SD.

To convert to SD I simply created a new timeline that was SD/DV/NTSC. Copy/pasted everything from the HDV timeline into it, rendered and took a look.

It was pretty terrible. The image quality was very poor, there was tons of noise/flickering in many of the clips, not to mention the obvious pulldown issues that were already there.

To fix the noise/flickering issues in the clips, a friend suggested that I export Uncompressed QT then create .Tiff files of each frame, import those into Shake and fix it in there. I'm not familiar with Shake, but my friend offered to show me how to do this.

One thing I totally didn't get was the fact that my 30p footage looked like it had interlacing problems when it shouldn't. My camera shoots progressive.

----------

Seriously. There has to be a better way to fix all these problems. I did some searching and found a few things.

This <a href="http://digitalcontentproducer.com/hdhdv/depth/edit_v1_final_cut_052907/index1.html">Workaround</a> for 24A.

Would re-capturing my used media as AIC and using the above workaround solve some of my problems? Any and all advice is appreciated.

So FCP 5.1 supports HDV editing? Specifically, can it effectively capture 24f from the XH-A1?

Thanks :)

Anyone know the best way to export audio from a sequence (audio only, no video) to then use in itunes for transcription. I can do it as a AIFF file but those are huge files.
How about as AAC or MP3?
Any work flow would help.

I have FCS2

R

I'm in FCS2 and I have a multitrack project open. I've tweaked and added EQ and reverb using SpaceDesigner and gotten the dialogue to sound how I want it to sound.

All I want to do is to export the single line of dialogue to an aiff file. However, whenever I do any export, whether it's a full mixdown, individual tracks or whatever, the resulting file sounds nothing like what I'm hearing in SoundTrack.

Most noticeably, the reverb is WAYYY off. I have just a small touch of small room reverb that I added with Space Designer, but my exported files sound like they're in a cavern. Additionally, immediately after exporting if I play back my Soundtrack timeline, the reverb is horrible there as well. But then all I have to do is open and then close the Space Designer window and everything in my timeline plays normally again.

I've had other issues with SoundTrack as well, but this seems to be the most basic and hopefully has the easiest solution. There's obviously something wrong here and I'm hoping somebody knows a way to fix it. All I want to do is to export an aiff that sounds like what I'm hearing in SoundTrack.

Thanks

I have some HDV footage, shot in 24p mode on the HV20, which I need to convert to DVCPROHD to be cut with Varicam footage. I've captured the material into FCP using the HDV preset, and the clips look OK. However when I attempt to do the conversion, the resulting clip has "ghost"/double image frames in it. Can someone run me through the settings in case I am missing something (frame dominance or some such)?

I'm new to motion and would appreciate help on this presumably straightforward task:

I'm working with 3d space enabled in the new motion and trying to do a peel of a 2d image. I'd expect there to be a pre-made behavior for this but haven't found it and have not had luck creating it. If I've neglected any necessary info, apologies.

Thanks,
Jack

I am shooting nature footage in the bay ...lots of footage for each 20 second clip that is good. So, I have to log and capture.

What is the fastest, most straight forward, way to log and capture?
FCS2, Firestore, a deck...what?


I have FCE 3.5.1, Mac book Pro 2.16 - gig, 1t my book, Cannon Xh A1. Shooting in 60i 1080. DHVSCap. Mpegstreamclip.

Willing try anything else.

Thanks in advance.

Hi there
Just trying to install an ATI radeon X800 XT onto my dual 2GHz PCI-X G5 Powermac.
It's running OS10.4.10 with QT 7.1.5 pro and FCP 5.1.4,
Problems start on boot up as soon as the display card driver kicks in.
I"m getting tiny red tramlines all over both screens, QT checkerboards, won't display anything clean, even playing a simple QT file off the desktop.
Horrible effect!
Effect lessens when I lower resolution, color depth, etc, but who wants to edit at 640x480 on 20" apple cinema screens...

So I've done a bit of research, and upgraded to the Aug 2005 v109 ROM upgrgade, whereupon I discovered that in safe boot mode (which you have to get into to install the ROM upgrade) the screens clear up and there's no problems.

However, without the driver installed (and yes, I downloaded the latest versions from the website), the Quartz Extreme mode needed to run FCP isn't installed and so FCP won't boot.

So I can't be the first person having this problem, right?

I started a ticket at the ATI site (now down for maintenance, apparently), and it stated that there's a Jan 2007 driver available on the ticket entry window, but of course there's no such thing on the download page. That's probably my problem, since OSX.4 came out at about the same time this mythical 2007 driver did.

Is it a simple driver issue, as I suspect?

Thanks!
Cheers
Chris

Hi.
Is there any way I could select an object in a video scene? i mean, like creating a path in Photoshop and using the pen tool to isolate an object from its context. what are the tools for doing the same in Final Cut Express HD?
Thanks.

I used to shoot with 2 DVX100s and recently upgraded to an XH-A1. I could only afford one as I also upgraded both tripods and lighting. Does anyone have a recomendation on using both of these cameras together? I like shooting in 24p. For my last wedding I used the DVX100 with the letterbox setting and the A1 in HDV 1080i. I then upconverted the DVX100 footage to HD with UpConvert 1.0....Besides the tremendous render times...my results were still mediocre. I wish to edit in Final Cut Studio 2.0 in HDV and downconvert on the export. I consider my editing skills to be pretty good but this is giving me a lot of trouble in post. Any help would be appreciated as I can not afford another A1 at the moment.

I am editing footage shot from an XLH1. It was recorded 24f, ingested wrapped as 60i through it's HD-SDI out. It was transcoded to the Sheer codec to save space. Now that FCS2 is out, I'm trying to get it to ProRes HQ in Compressor 3.0.1 (or whatever the latest is) but it doesn't work. I don't think it is the sheer codec itself, as I can transcode to every other codec listed, except ProRes. Now if I convert it to another format, such as Apple Uncompressed HD 8bit 4:2:2 and THEN to ProRes, it works. Strange? How come I can't go straight from Sheer to ProRes, but I CAN go from Sheer to Other Codecs? Is this a problem with ProRes itself? Compressor? Quicktime? I'm stumped.

If you ever use DCDP, read this. It took me forever to find the solution…

I opened up my FCP HDV720p24 project to discover I could not view the DCDP on my second monitor. I repaired permissions, restarted, cleared my PR ram, launched FCP again—nothing happened. I changed the easy setup and adjusted my settings once more, and it didn’t work.

Out of desperation, I deleted my Prefs folder. It turned out there was a preference corrupted. After launching the program again, everything worked fine.

Hopefully this will help someone out there who hasn’t yet found the answer.

I’ve been having a rather difficult time trying to find the correct way to capture my 24f material into FCP. I shot HDV 24f and want to down convert using the camera (XH-A1) to DV 24f into FCP 6. I know how to capture straight HDV 24f using the preset in FCP, however my workflow requires me to down convert from the camera. When I try it now my footage doesn’t play smoothly or match frame to frame when compared to the same footage captured in HDV. Has anyone had experience doing this? Is there an “Easy Setup” option in FCP 6 that I should be using? I’m assuming it’s a frame rate setup problem. I need to know what preset I should be capturing with and what preset setting my Timeline should be at. I don’t see any other threads discussing the workflow for down converting HDV 24f with FCP 6. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Hi all,

I noticed Final Cut creates PAR folders in various places.. Just wondering if anyone can shed some light on what this folder is used for??

Thanks,
Mike M.

I have recently purchased a new mac pro system with FCP 5.
in the video transitions the effect (Explode) does not do what I imagined
as would have thought it would breakup and reveal the picture B underneath
can any body help

regards Andrew masters

Sine I can't get the 5.1.4 update for some reason... Are there any good third part capturing solutions that I could use to capture 24fps HDV video? I just don't think I can afford to get Final Cut 2 yet.

I'm trying to sync clips on the timeline using their waveforms in the audio tracks. The clip names keep covering up the bits of waveform that I need to use to sync. Is there a way to hide the clip names or some other technique? It's never been a problem in Premiere Pro, I'm hoping that there is a simple thing I'm missing here in FCP.

Setup: MacBookPro 3gigsRam, External FW400 drive, FCS 2 with 6.0.1 update

I was using Compressor to create a .m2v from a .mov file. After submitting the job, it just hung. I paused the job, and it wouldn't pause. I cancelled the job and it wouldn't cancel. I exited Compressor and restarted the computer. When submitting a new job, the old job was still there trying to cancel. Tried to pause it with no luck. I exited Compressor and deleted the .prefs. Same scenario. I then deleted the .prefs for QMaster.

Now QMaster will not start unless I start it from the terminal. Whenever submitting a job to Compressor, it asks me to reboot and check my Compressor installation.

Sounds like a Compressor reinstall to me. What is the best way to do this to make sure my "old, stalled" job will be erased and I can use Compressor again? (This affects "Print to Video" and other functions of FCP as well.)

Thanks a bunch!
TG

I have had this issue before and never found out how to correct it, so I am hopeful someone on this board will!

I shot footage in 24p, 16:9 anamorphic with my Canon XL2. I captured it with all the setting matching the above info and the laid it out in my timeline and everything worked just fine.

When I went to "print to video" back to my deck, the audio played and was recorded but the video did not appear. I tried the same thing going directly back into my XL2 and same problem. When I scrub in the timeline, the video shows up on my deck, but if I play it in my timeline, only audio?

Never have this problem with 60i or 30p, only 24p:(

Also, why is it that my 24p footage has the interlaced look after capturing? Does this have to do with the reverse pull-down? I wasn't aware I would have this issue when capturing in progressive mode. I can de-interlace it before exporting, but seems weird that I have to do this???

I am capturing with Mpeg Streamclip....sometimes I forget to adjust the framerate to 29.97. I plan to make a dvd later. Will it matter that some of the clips aren't captured to 29.97?

Will the FCE or Toast convert everything to 29.97 or do I need to correct that step with all clips right now?

Thanks in advance.
Tobin

I'm trying to set a variable speed to a clip with both video and audio. The motion manual says this at page 1136:

"Motion allows you to retime audio clips or individual channels to speed them up, slow them down, or play them back at a different speed. All of the controls below can apply either to a stereo audio clip, or individual channels.
Note: When retiming video, audio attached to the footage is automatically retimed along with it. You can unlink video and audio to retime them separately. For more information on retiming footage, see “Retiming” on page 312."

However when I set Time remap to variable speed and change the speed curve, only the video is affected, audio remains unchanged.

Does anyone know if this is possible with Motion? I'm using Motion 3.
Thanks, Winfried

Hi,
I run FCP 5.1.4 and would like to know why the picture on the Digital Cinema Desktop Preview shifts lighter when the timeline is running compared to when the time is stopped?

Which picture is the most correct one?

Sequence is HDV 1080p25.

Thankful for any answer. /Johan

Im about to undergo outputing an 80min film to mini dv using final cut. Its 23.98 on the timeline. Ill be using an XL2 but have access to a dvx100. Can someone please walk me through this. For example, should I make a new quicktime movie of the project or print to video straight from the ediitng timeline?

Hi there,

I'm pulling my hair out here, I have shot in 25p on a V1E, but whenever I capture into FCP the footage appears as 'HDV 1080i50'. I realise that the 25p stream is stored and streamed as 50i, but how can I get it back to 25p in FCP??!?!

Been googling for an hour now and not found a solution!!! I am using the following video settings:
sequence preset: HDV - 1080p25
capture preset: HDV
device control preset: HDV FireWire 25 fps

Thanks -

Kieran.

After updating my JVC GY-HD100A and double checking my firmware to be sure I did the procedure correctly, Final Cut has stopped importing footage successfully.

Here's the basic scenario: Before updating my camera's VTR, I could plug in the firewire cable, power-up the camera, open FCP and the camera would be detected. I used the sequence preset: "HDV- 720p24", Capture Preset: "HDV", and I believe the Device Control Preset was set to "HDV Firewire NDF". Watching the camera's LCD, I could import footage, though it would stop importing each time the start/stop button was pressed. What was strange about this setup was that pressing "Log/Capture" would initiate essentially a "capture now" window, prompting me to title the clip and see a full-res window of the video as it imported. The process of importing was tedious, but it worked.

Now, today when I try to capture, one of two things happens. In the first scenario, the camera is recognized and I can enter the actual "Log/Capture" window only to import 23.98 footage in which the video is completely black but retains sound. In this scenario, the Capture Preset is set to "HDV".

In the second scenario, I tried setting Capture Preset to "HDV-Apple Intermediate Codec", which was only SOMEWHAT successful. Here, video is imported successfully but changes from 24p to 59.94fps. The difference in this second scenario is that I can see a full-screen preview of the video being imported and that window REMAINS open when scene breaks pass in through it. Where those scene breaks occurred in the preview, they enter the bin as segmented clips without any loss of video.

I'm completely dumbfounded. I have no idea why Final Cut would suddenly stop me from being able to capture 24p video. I'm using a 1.67ghz Powerbook g4 with 1.5gigs of RAM and using Final Cut Pro 5.1.4. I know this setup is not ideal nor terribly fast, but until I updated my camera, I experienced no significant trouble importing footage.

Any help in solving this problem is greatly appreciated. Also, the greater the detail in your description of the Final Cut setup, the better.

Thanks in advance,
Matt

I was workin gin a final cut 5.1.4 with different projects at the same time, one in a 1080 50i settup and the other 1080 60i mixing thins in the time line and rendering a lot, but one day the project in 60i didnt open , fcp showed a message sawing tha the project was unreadable and probably too new for this final cut, but the project was created by this very same final cut.

I figure its some kind of a bug maybe...?

does anyone has any idea of how i can access my project? i already tryed the autosave version...

thanks a lot for the help and attention.

CD

I'm working with a 1Ghz dual CPU G4 with a recent version of Tiger that has Final Cut Express 3.5 and an Mbox 2 audio interface, connected to a powered USB hub.

I don't have the option of connecting the MBox 2 directly. The audio is coming to the Mbox from a mixer board in the next room via spdif or XLR (can't recall which)

I'd like to use the FCE voice-over feature, but FCE see no signal coming out of the Mbox 2. The funny thing is that
1) FCE lists the Mbox 2 on the list of sources you can select
2) Pro Tools LE sees the signal just fine on the same machine.

The simple obvious solution is to use PT LE, but I'm trying to make the workflow as easy as possible even though PT is the better tool.

As far as I can tell this G4 has no analog audio input.

How might I most simply and cheaply fix this problem?

Some people have suggested looking for new drivers for the Mbox 2 but I haven't been able to find any.

Shayne Weyker
http://weykervideo.com

I've got some 30p footage that I want to edit in 25p.

Is there any way in FCP where I can just drop the 30p footage, and have FCP conform it to 25p? Or is the only way of doing this to going through the process with dvhscap and mpeg streamclip?

Would anyone recommend shooting HDV w/ hdr-fx1 for Luma Keying in after effects, to output as SD? I ask because it seems like people have trouble downgrading to SD -but I don't see why.
Also is HDV recommended for keying, anything's better then SD right??

thanks for any tips.

I read a post somewhere that some user is exporting M2v's directly from quicktime 2 pass vbr, and thereby avoiding the problems inherhent with 2 pass VBR in compressor 2.0. I am running Panther on this Imac and am tired of moving files from my intel mac running compressor 2.3 to my PPC mac to get a better encode. Does anyone out there have experience using quicktime creating M2v's this way and could recommend settings ie. motion estimation better best etc. Do you think this would yield similar results one gets with compressor 2.3.

Thanks in advance

Fred

I am cutting some HDV 16:9 footage that will eventually go to 4:3 (it won't be letterboxed) and I can't seem to find any sort of safety markers to ensure I'm cutting and adding graphics and titles properly.

Is there anything I can turn on or add so I know things are okay, within FCP 6?

Thanks,

Heath

I've been trying to resize a video, by going other routes except "after effects", but i cant match the quality with any of the popular algorithms, like bilinear, bicubic or lanczos.

Does anyone know what algorithm is used by after effects ?


Thank you so much.

FCP 6 is giving me some trouble as of late: the fxplugins won't work (i.e., Smoothcam), and I'm in dire straights. I've reinstalled the software twice with no luck. I've updated the software to 6.0.1, still no good. Recently someone told me that the ProAppsUpdate2007-01 will fix the issue. Unfortunately, when I try to download this from Apple I keep getting an error message. No matter how many times I try the Website just won't accept my serial number. Talked to the Apple support and they said to try again. No joy.

Does anyone have any idea where I can download this patch other than from Apple? Thanks.

It seems that Soundtrack Pro 2 doesn't have any way of using automation splines (curves) for the envelopes. It only seems to support a straight line between two points, so if you want to make a curve in the envelope you have to make a bunch of points that approximate a curve.

This is a particularly big problem when you bring a project in from FCP. If you have FCP volume automation using curves, then when you bring it into Soundtrack Pro 2, guess what -- those curves are now just straight lines! All your hard work in FCP with those curves needs to be re-done in Soundtrack Pro, unless the linear fades also work for the task.

Does anyone know if there is a way to get curves that I'm just missing? The docs and my searching have led to nothing...

Does anybody know what kind of solutions there are available for getting an ExpressCard reader for the latest Mac Pro's?

I realize the MacBook Pro's have an ExpressCard slot in them, but was wondering how one would do this for the Mac Pro's.

AC

I've run into what appears to be a really annoying bug in Soundtrack Pro. Can someone try this and let me know if they have the same results?

Using the audio envelope on a multitrack project, create some dips and rises in the audio and then select that range of the project to loop it, and play it back while looping. The first time through the loop everything sounds fine, but subsequent times through the loop the audio isn't following the envelope points correctly. Sometimes it doesn't follow the envelope at all, sometimes only some of the envelope, sometimes it just sounds really stuttery with static. The volume slider will move with the envelope, but the audio output doesn't.

You may have to try this a few times with different parts of a project, different projects. Sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't.

I'm running all the latest patches for Soundtrack Pro 2, QuickTime, Pro Apps Support, and OS X.

When creating files for upload to the web (all less than 50mb) and submitted to a folder on my MBPro 2.33, Compressor 3 produces a .mov-1 file. I don't remember this happening before the Compressor 3.01 upgrade but I could be wrong.

Any ideas?

Hi,
I'm about to deliver my HDV-2 video shot with a Canon XL-H1 in 25F mode.

The customer is a museum which will use the film as a presentation and show it using a Sharp XR-10S data projector with a maximum resolution of 1024x768.

Which codec and settings will produce the best results for this?
The film is only about 15 min so a setting producing a rather large file is no problem.
Do you suggest a custom QuickTime file 1024x576 (16:9) or what?
I guess this will be better than a regular PAL DVD setting.

Thankful for any good thoughts here. / Johan

Hi,
I would like to do something looking like a 15 game but 2x2 or 3x3 sequence.

I want puzzle parts consisting of small clips from the film. One new clip should push another one out and only affect that position.

I managed to use the motion tab and select 48% size and move each clip to its corner. But a push transition affects a whole row or column and not just one clip.

Anybody who know how to make this effect? I should appreciate some ideas ... thanks.

I'm trying to edit SD footage w/ the newest final cut, on an imac w/ 2gigs sd ram. And it's dropping frames during playback, in the same areas of the clips each time. I usually edit on my powerbook, and have never seen dropped frames in SD. The standard fixits don't seem to help, so I'll try to recapture. Any suggestions?

I have some mixed footage 72024pn & 720p60.( From HVx200, mov created with Raylight)
If I set my time line for easy setup 23.98 when I add my 60p footage it only shows black but the audio plays, the 24pn footage plays fine.

If I set my time line for easy setup 60p, the opposite happens, the 60p plays fine and the 24pn shows black with audio.

Am I missing something, I am using FCP 6.01

Regards

_Eric


Equipment: Mac dual G5, 4GRam, 1.5TB array, OSX 10.3.9, HVX200, using Raylight

what is vsfx format ..? how can make or edit this..its used for tricaster studio (new tek)

The new iMacs, just announced, have a ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO graphics card. I looked up the specs and there is a line that reads: "MPEG-2, MPEG-4, DivX, WMV9, VC-1, and H.264/AVC encoding and transcoding."

Does that mean it does the H.264 compression in the hardware (i.e. fast)?

The new iMovie looks very nice, also.

--Darin

I am taking about 80 minutes of footage down to 3:30, and was looking for some tips for improving the look.

I added motion blur, which improved the choppy look of the person in frame (this is a surfboard being shaped), but really killed the detail on the deck of the board.

I have heard people mention deinterlacing and changing the field order or blending can help.....?

I'd appreciate any thoughts on the subject, thanks guys.

I imported some footage of a dance show I shot tonight with a GL2. The image is clear on my camera, however in the viewer of FCPS2 the image is a bit pixelated when the dancer moves.

any ideas why that is, or how i can fix it in fcps2

I did this months ago, but now when I try to do it again, my computer timeline via final cut pro seems not to be recognizing my Z1U vtr. I've gone through all the setting in the vtr and cam settings, checked the manual - no luck.

This is a native hdv edit of 1080i/60 which I want to record back onto tape using my Z1U. Please help.

A few days ago I posted this problem: http://dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=100641. In a nutshell, I noticed that when I brought my captured clips (24p HDV) into Final Cut, the quality was greatly diminished, and diagonal lines in particular became very blocky, even though the original clips were very sharp. I've made a little bit of headway and was hoping someone here might have some further advice.

It appears that the problem is one of frames and fields. I think I've got this right: the 24p is of course caught in a 60i stream, and when importing into Final Cut I think I was getting only part of the progressive frame. I downloaded the Nattress plugins, and have some success: the images suddenly become crisp again! This happens when I apply the "G Film Converter" plug in. The problems now are:

-- The Natress plugin seems to erase my color corrections.

-- The Natress plugin wants to convert the 24p back to NTSC (it doesn't seem to offer the option to just keep 24p as 24p), so a fifth frame gets added and frequently has interlacing artifacts (all this after I had to do a Reverse Telecine in the first place to get the 24p clips!)

-- I'm a little daunted by the notions that (A) after I've edited a short, I'll have to apply Nattress to every cut and (B) everything I've written here seems to imply that Final Cut actually CAN'T import 24p HDV Quicktime clips without a plugin! It automatically messes with the clips as soon as I pull them in. Surely this can't be the case. Have other people noticed that 24p HDV clips won't go smoothly into Final Cut without some kind of plugin? Is there another plugin I should be looking at to address this issue?