Can someone quickly clear this up for me... at DVinfo.net

Bryan Roberts · October 7th, 2005, 05:52 PM

Ok, so I'm preparing to edit a feature documentary with 30+ hours of HDV footage shot in varying framerates on an FX1. I have access to both FCP HD and FCP 5 and am planning on buying a g5 2.5 with 2.5 gigs of ram etc. and working off of a promax external firewire drive.

1. I do not have an HD monitor and will not be buying one, so if I want to do external monitoring on my NTSC, then should I plan to use Lumiere with FCP HD and steer clear of FCP 5?

2. In the past I've used my little DV camcorder sent to my NTSC monitor as a way to monitor projects in FCP. Is there a cheap vid card to avoid using my camera?

3. How long does Lumiere take to do its business once I've captured my HDV footage into FCP? I heard nightmares of rendering times like 4 hours for each hour of HDV content, I surely hope not! (capturing HDV footage into FCP is not a big deal right, like DV?)

Thanks guys!

Mel Namnama · October 7th, 2005, 08:10 PM

Hello,
I use a Mac 2.5 G5 with 4 gigs of ram & had been using Lumiere HD 1.5b11 to capture off a JVC HD 100U. I've used FCP 5.0 HD with Lumiere's Beta version (until 2.0 is released) and can only tell you that I've had to wait an average of 10 min. of final render time for every 30 min. of HD timeline video. Lumiere's wait time is also similar during its timeline codec conversion.You get immediate use of your footage once you import Lumiere's XML file into FCP. Using native/simple filters & titles/graphics via LiveType & Motion will final render in a blink of an eye, using plug ins like Magic Bullet will make you wait...1hr/min of video. I also use After Effects, Boris Red & LightWave in FCP/HD format and have not had to wait "forever". As far as video cards, I use a NIVIDA GeForce 6800 to run Apple's 30" display & use an Apple DVI to Svhs/rca adaptor (plugged into the second NVIDIA port) to a regular monitor. I'm sure it's not ideal but it does give me a picture of what the video/dvd will look like . The video card was $500., I assume it is cheaper now..the adaptor was $20. Just a thought..Have you used iMovie HD to log & capture & then transport to FCP? or is frame rate your concern?

Bryan Roberts · October 8th, 2005, 05:59 PM

Mel - I didn't even know they made a dvi to rca, I'll definitely check into that. Framerate is somewhat of a concern as I'm not sure what rate I need to conform all my footage to as FCP doesn't handle multiple framerates in a single project (unless 5 does and I just don't know any better). I assume pick the one the majority of the footage was shot in and try to get the rest to match. I know how to conform with 24p, and 29.97 DV footage and also reverse telecine with film transfers but I haven't delved into the HD or HDV world so I'm just a bit shaky on the new standards.

Mel Namnama · October 8th, 2005, 06:52 PM

I'm learning HD editing too, The HD workflow on a Mac does not seem any different, just like using DV or analog footage. You know with Macs...learning by experimenting ( playing) is half the fun. I'm still experimenting with DVDSP and its dual layer settings. Practice makes perfect. Good luck !

Ben De Rydt · October 9th, 2005, 01:01 PM

I don't know why you would use LumiereHD if you have FCP 5. FCP 5 supports HDV and the FX1 natively.

You don't need to worry about frame rates. Everything the FX1 shoots is 60i (or 50i in PAL countries) with either some kind of (bad) deinterlacing applied or not. Your timeline stays 60i (or 50i) all the time.

As for monitoring on an external monitor, you cannot do this with HDV the way you do it with DV. You will need a Decklink or AJA card with HD-SDI out and/or HD component out and you need a HD monitor with a matching input. You can use Digital Desktop inside Final Cut combined with a second computer monitor attached to the Mac to have a full screen preview but this is not usable for colour correction.

You can however use the camera to downconvert the footage to DV. This is what I would advise you to do if you're short of cash and your Mac is kind of slow, PROVIDED your tapes haven't got any timecode breaks and you're not planning a lot of speed changes. Working in DV means you can use any cheap DV cam or a DV-analogue converter like the Canopus ADVC 110 to monitor your footage on an analogue SD monitor. You can colour correct on a real monitor this way. (BTW using a camera as a digital to analogue converter won't wear it out. Capturing will.)

Working with DV means your Mac won't have to work so hard. Encoding and decoding HDV is quite processor intensive. Working with DV means much more realtime effects, multilayer realtime playback and overall a more responsive environment. It will be faster if you have 30+ hours of footage to dig through. You won't save on harddrive as DV and HDV require the exactly same amount of space.

When your edit is in it's final stages, you can use Final Cut Pro's media manager to upress the selected footage to HDV. You ask Media Manager to recapture the clips in your final sequence, but this time you leave "Downconvert to DV" in the camera off. Read upon the media manager first, and try it before deciding on this offline (DV) - online (HDV) method. You need to know that speed changes inside the sequence make the media manager do all kind of strange things, and timecode breaks make recapturing (and thus the whole offline/online workflow) practically impossible. You also need to be carefull with the initial capture of the footage. Use reelnames or you'll have a hell of time recapturing! I hope this doesn't scare you too much, but be assured, you're not the first one to do an offline/online type of edit.

October 7th, 2005, 05:52 PM	#1
Bryan Roberts Major Player Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Los Angeles, CA Posts: 436	Can someone quickly clear this up for me... Ok, so I'm preparing to edit a feature documentary with 30+ hours of HDV footage shot in varying framerates on an FX1. I have access to both FCP HD and FCP 5 and am planning on buying a g5 2.5 with 2.5 gigs of ram etc. and working off of a promax external firewire drive. 1. I do not have an HD monitor and will not be buying one, so if I want to do external monitoring on my NTSC, then should I plan to use Lumiere with FCP HD and steer clear of FCP 5? 2. In the past I've used my little DV camcorder sent to my NTSC monitor as a way to monitor projects in FCP. Is there a cheap vid card to avoid using my camera? 3. How long does Lumiere take to do its business once I've captured my HDV footage into FCP? I heard nightmares of rendering times like 4 hours for each hour of HDV content, I surely hope not! (capturing HDV footage into FCP is not a big deal right, like DV?) Thanks guys!

October 7th, 2005, 08:10 PM	#2
Mel Namnama Regular Crew Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 25	Hello, I use a Mac 2.5 G5 with 4 gigs of ram & had been using Lumiere HD 1.5b11 to capture off a JVC HD 100U. I've used FCP 5.0 HD with Lumiere's Beta version (until 2.0 is released) and can only tell you that I've had to wait an average of 10 min. of final render time for every 30 min. of HD timeline video. Lumiere's wait time is also similar during its timeline codec conversion.You get immediate use of your footage once you import Lumiere's XML file into FCP. Using native/simple filters & titles/graphics via LiveType & Motion will final render in a blink of an eye, using plug ins like Magic Bullet will make you wait...1hr/min of video. I also use After Effects, Boris Red & LightWave in FCP/HD format and have not had to wait "forever". As far as video cards, I use a NIVIDA GeForce 6800 to run Apple's 30" display & use an Apple DVI to Svhs/rca adaptor (plugged into the second NVIDIA port) to a regular monitor. I'm sure it's not ideal but it does give me a picture of what the video/dvd will look like . The video card was $500., I assume it is cheaper now..the adaptor was $20. Just a thought..Have you used iMovie HD to log & capture & then transport to FCP? or is frame rate your concern?

October 8th, 2005, 05:59 PM	#3
Bryan Roberts Major Player Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Los Angeles, CA Posts: 436	Mel - I didn't even know they made a dvi to rca, I'll definitely check into that. Framerate is somewhat of a concern as I'm not sure what rate I need to conform all my footage to as FCP doesn't handle multiple framerates in a single project (unless 5 does and I just don't know any better). I assume pick the one the majority of the footage was shot in and try to get the rest to match. I know how to conform with 24p, and 29.97 DV footage and also reverse telecine with film transfers but I haven't delved into the HD or HDV world so I'm just a bit shaky on the new standards.

October 8th, 2005, 06:52 PM	#4
Mel Namnama Regular Crew Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 25	I'm learning HD editing too, The HD workflow on a Mac does not seem any different, just like using DV or analog footage. You know with Macs...learning by experimenting ( playing) is half the fun. I'm still experimenting with DVDSP and its dual layer settings. Practice makes perfect. Good luck !

October 9th, 2005, 01:01 PM	#5
Ben De Rydt Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2005 Location: Belgium Posts: 139	I don't know why you would use LumiereHD if you have FCP 5. FCP 5 supports HDV and the FX1 natively. You don't need to worry about frame rates. Everything the FX1 shoots is 60i (or 50i in PAL countries) with either some kind of (bad) deinterlacing applied or not. Your timeline stays 60i (or 50i) all the time. As for monitoring on an external monitor, you cannot do this with HDV the way you do it with DV. You will need a Decklink or AJA card with HD-SDI out and/or HD component out and you need a HD monitor with a matching input. You can use Digital Desktop inside Final Cut combined with a second computer monitor attached to the Mac to have a full screen preview but this is not usable for colour correction. You can however use the camera to downconvert the footage to DV. This is what I would advise you to do if you're short of cash and your Mac is kind of slow, PROVIDED your tapes haven't got any timecode breaks and you're not planning a lot of speed changes. Working in DV means you can use any cheap DV cam or a DV-analogue converter like the Canopus ADVC 110 to monitor your footage on an analogue SD monitor. You can colour correct on a real monitor this way. (BTW using a camera as a digital to analogue converter won't wear it out. Capturing will.) Working with DV means your Mac won't have to work so hard. Encoding and decoding HDV is quite processor intensive. Working with DV means much more realtime effects, multilayer realtime playback and overall a more responsive environment. It will be faster if you have 30+ hours of footage to dig through. You won't save on harddrive as DV and HDV require the exactly same amount of space. When your edit is in it's final stages, you can use Final Cut Pro's media manager to upress the selected footage to HDV. You ask Media Manager to recapture the clips in your final sequence, but this time you leave "Downconvert to DV" in the camera off. Read upon the media manager first, and try it before deciding on this offline (DV) - online (HDV) method. You need to know that speed changes inside the sequence make the media manager do all kind of strange things, and timecode breaks make recapturing (and thus the whole offline/online workflow) practically impossible. You also need to be carefull with the initial capture of the footage. Use reelnames or you'll have a hell of time recapturing! I hope this doesn't scare you too much, but be assured, you're not the first one to do an offline/online type of edit.