NLE Mac / Final Cut questions from 2004

[Ryan Wachter]

How do I export stills from my fcp footage to use on my website?

[John Locke]

Ryan,

Place the playhead over the frame you want to capture.

Go to File>Export>Using Quicktime Conversion

and then at the bottom of that window choose "Still Image". Name it and save it to disk.

After that, import it into Photoshop, choose Image>Image Size

UNCLICK the constrain proportion box and resize the height to 534 (if you're using an NTSC camera).

Crop off the black sidebars, RECLICK the constrain proportion box and resize as needed, and then choose Save for Web.

[Jeff Donald]

You may also want to de-interlace the image and if you have Photoshop got to Filter>Video>de-interlace to remove the interlacing.

[John Locke]

Any pointers you can pass on, Jeff, about using the Deinterlace filter? I can never seem to get a smooth deinterlace. It always looks as though someone took their fingers and smudged the image in rows...like dragging your fingers through a wet painting.

I've had to resort to localized deinterlacing, and floating a semi-transparent layer with Gaussian blur to get really smooth results. But I'm sure there's something I'm overlooking with the filter.

[Jeff Donald]

Use a digital still camera (DSC). Here is a site that can probably answer all your questions. There is no simple answer, each image is different, based on the motion present in the video frame.

[John Locke]

<<Use a digital still camera>>

Pow! In the kisser! I'm down for the count. ;)

That's an informative site, Jeff. Thanks. For some reason, I couldn't view the .avi samples, but I get the idea from the still samples.

[Stuart Goldstein]

The external monitor will show only the first frame at the playhead, and whatever frame I stop on. Nothing in between--no motion. "Show All Frames" is checked.

I'm using a JVC TM-910SU NTSC external monitor. I'm running a G5 1.8 single processor, 2gigs ram. I'm using an ADVC-100 converter through firewire--s-video out from the converter and into the monitor.

I'm using 24 fps on the timeline, used advanced 2:3:3:2 pulldown for my footage (shot in 24p on Panasonic AGDVX100). RT unlimited, playback "high."

Please help! Looking forward to color correcting, but just can't figure this out....so close....Thanks for you thoughts on this subject. I'm sure there's some setting that I'm failing to tweak properly.

Could it have something to do with the advanced pulldown removal? The canvas shows the footage perfectly.

[Stylianos Moschapidakis]

I am in need of "the best" (if that's possible) manual for FCP 2. What do you suggest?

Did a little research and found the following manuals that are currently available. Has anyone used any of them?

-Final Cut Pro 2 Editing Workshop
Tom Wolsky

-Macworld Final Cut Pro 2 Bible
Zed Saeed, Keith Underdahl

-Final Cut Pro 2 for Macintosh : Visual QuickPro Guide
Lisa Brenneis, Wendy Sharp (Editor)

-Final Cut Pro 2.0 for Firewire DV Editing
Charles Roberts, Foreword by Ralph Fairweather

-Revolutionary Final Cut Pro 2 Digital Film Making (with CD ROM)
Luther Blissett, George Kingsnorth, Jerome Turner, Diannah Morgan, Schuman Hoque

Thank you.

[Ken Tanaka]

Tom Wolsky's book is quite a good logical dance step guide.

Lisa Brenneis' "Visual" books are good references and are well structured presentations.

Browse our Read About It forum for more suggestions and ideas.

[Elmer Lang]

I have a TiPB 400 I'm using with FCP 3. I connected an external monitor to split edit. But when I play the Canvas on the PB's screen I get an orange matte. Even the Viewer sometimes has an orange matte when it plays.

Is there something in my Preferences or Audio Video Settings that's wrong, it's not RGB+Alpha which gives an orange tint, this is like an orange matte.

Or maybe the PB 400 can't handle it, I don't know.

Goin' crazy,
elmer

[Boyd Ostroff]

Not sure about the 400, but I ran FCP 3 on my TiBook 667 without problems, including an external monitor. Are you talking about a second computer monitor plugged into the VGA port, or an NTSC monitor plugged into the s-video port? Are you using the second screen as your external video device or just as an extension of the Mac desktop? Are you running under OS X or MacOS 9.x? I've never seen an "orange matte" like you describe, that's weird!

[Elmer Lang]

It's a computer monitor plugged into the VGA port and used as an extension of the Mac desktop along with my laptop screen. OS 9.2.

Orange matte: strange indeed!

thanks,
Elmer

[J. Clayton Stansberry]

Hey Guys,

I was wondering if my G5 can handle two monitors straight out of the box or do I need to get a dual monitor card?

I have the ATI Radeon 9600 Pro card that came with the dual G5 and was just wondering what it would take. I currently have a ViewSonic Graphic Series G90fb and another no name smaller monitor just sitting around and was wondering if it would be beneficial to hook it up (using adapters as it's not ready to hook directly up to the mac). It IS NOT the same and have read you should use the same 2 monitors??? Any clarification would be appreciated!

Thanks in advance...
Clay

[Rob Lohman]

That is certainly an option. Or record them back out to DV and
store the tapes. That is probably an easier, cheaper and more
reliable method.

[Shane Ross]

I second that.