Avid and JVC HD

[Antony Michael Wilson]

Originally Posted by Hamad Abdulla

So, I should purchase the Avid Liquid 7.0 software and install it onto my Avid MC HD system and everything will be OK?

Yes, you probably should purchase Liquid because it's fantastic value for money and will give you some sort of work-around and a great second NLE with quite a few features you don't have in MCA. This is what I use as the basis for my work-around, btw. However, it certainly is not satisfactory as a work-around for high volume and fast turnaround work.

No, everything will not be okay if you buy Liquid unless you cut and finish in Liquid exclusively. Liquid just gives you the ability to ingest native HDV1 over at 24 and 25 fps via firewire and then batch export Avid QT files for fast import into MCA. However, you will not retain TC so it's not much use for offline/online work unless you go through some seriously painful fiddling. The export/transcode is also time-consuming and only tolerable if you do not have to do it frequently. If you have the HD250 then you have HDSDI out already so, if you shoot 720p/50, you should be able to do an acceptable cross-convert to 1080PsF which you can capture WILD into MCA in a 1080i or 1080p project. If you want TC then you'll need a converter like the Convergent device to give you RS422 for capture/control. For this workflow, Liquid offers you no help whatsoever.

However, nothing gets around the problem that there simply is not any 720p/25 project set-up in AXPro, MCA or Symphony. If you want to work at the native frame size at 25 or 50fps, you cannot.

I repeat, the traditional Avid apps are a very poor companion to the ProHD camera gear and if you have the opportunity to choose another camera when you have already invested heavily in MCA, I would do so. We have had Avid gear for years for general use and we bought our HD100 for a specific purpose, so we are victims of misfortune/Avid's slow development for this format. If you have the chance to avoid the rabbit hole, I recommend that you do. You could be entering a world of pain!!!!

[Stephen L. Noe]

Yes to what Antony writes but I offer more. You could get the Liquid workflow to accomodate your ProHD camera(s) completely and not use MCA with ProHD until/unless Avid comes to the table with an upgrade for Media Composer and ProHD.

Your Liquid station will run everything your MCA will run (with the exception of the Adrenalin). You would not be missing much of anything by using the Liquid station to edit and and deliver (compared to MCA).

Good luck.