A1/FCP Worklfow?

[Jason Aumont]

I should be getting my A1 today (woohoo!), and in preparation I want to make sure I know exactly how to capture and work with the footage in Final Cut Pro (latest version). I've been searching the forums, but I have not found a detailed explanation of the workflow, just bits of info here and there. I was wondering if somebody could either post a link or respond with the details on the best way to cut the A1's footage in FCP?

Thanks in advance,
Jason

[Max Huettermann]

Hi Jason,

you will need the latest version of FCP - 5.12

It recognizes 25f/24f as 1080 p and works very nice for me.

[Stu Siegal]

Just use the appropriate easy setup. 108024p works for Canon 24p footage, and 1080i basic firewire for interlaced.

[Jason Aumont]

So, when I choose this "easy setup" in the latest FCP it captures it to Quicktime HDV or does it capture the native HDV?

Thanks,
Jason

[Bill Pryor]

Yep, you have to have the latest version, which includes 1080P23. That's an Easy setup, and it works great. Make sure your sequence setting is proper too, or it will want you to render. If you don't see the camera when you go to capture, check your View menu and go down to Refresh AV devices and that should do it. The camera needs to be in the playback mode. It's a good idea to shut things down before plugging in and unplugging any firewire device (even though allegedly you can do it, it's better to be safe).

[Phil Nolan]

I Just got my A1 and I'm planning on transcoding to DVC Pro HD in Compressor
after I capture in HDV. To go to 4.2.2 for better titles and transitions. Also for less generational loss.
Phil

[Evan Donn]

Originally Posted by Phil Nolan

To go to 4.2.2 for better titles and transitions. Also for less generational loss.

Are you planning to do multiple render passes through FCP? I.E. edit, add effects, etc, render, export, reimport and repeat? If not you shouldn't have to worry about generational loss - in fact, I'd be surprised if you didn't lose more by rendering first to a DVC Pro HD than if you just stuck with the HDV source.

FCP renders everything internally in 4:4:4 I believe, so quality of things like titles/graphics is only affected by your final output format, not the format of your timeline. So you may want to export your finished master to DVC Pro HD (instead of going back to HDV) but you'd probably be better off keeping your source camera native:

HDV source -> FCP 4:4:4 internal render -> DVC Pro HD master = 2nd generation compression
HDV source -> Compressor 4:4:4 internal render -> DVC Pro HD intermediate -> FCP 4:4:4 internal render -> DVC Pro HD master = 3rd generation compression

The only thing you'd stand to gain with the second option is lower processor overhead during playback & therefore better realtime performance on your timeline - but I don't think you'll gain anything from a quality standpoint.

[Chuck Spaulding]

I've only had my Mac Pro for about a week, so I'm down converting from HDV and working in DV. At this point I'm more concerned with learning the software than I am about making big pictures.

But I wanted to chime in here, I've hear that FCP takes for ever to render a native HDV timeline [I have not tried this yet.] It might be interesting to compare how long it takes to convert the HDV with Compressor to DVCProHD versus editing in HDV and then converting.

How do you like your A1?

[Bill Pryor]

I'm shooting 24F and capturing into FCP with the 1080P24 setup. As long as your sequence setting is correct, there's no rendering of the footage.Effects, of course, have to render.

[Chuck Spaulding]

Originally Posted by Bill Pryor

I'm shooting 24F and capturing into FCP with the 1080P24 setup. As long as your sequence setting is correct, there's no rendering of the footage.Effects, of course, have to render.

It's the "of coarse, have to render" part that I'm interested in.

I did a test for one of the editors I'm working with, which is the reason I switched to fcp. We capture enough footage to edit together a 20 minute project from his JY100 HDV camera with PPro2 and converted on the fly to the Cineform HD intermediate Codec. There's about a 10% lag time while AspectHD converts the clip to the Cineform HD AVI, which he pointed out that he didn't have to do when he capture to FCP.

We then added as many transitions [which I don't consider effects] as he wanted [and believe me the more I added that didn't need to render, the more he added to see how far I could go]. We did some 3-way color correction [no-rendering required] and we dynamiclinked into AE7 added quite a few effects there which are automatically placed back into the PPR timeline. A few of these did require rendering but was quick. He was impressed, he kept saying things like "I couldn't do any of this in Premiere 5."

Nothing earth shattering, but then he said that's enough, "lets output it and go to lunch." I saved it, droped the file into Record it Now [DVD burning software] recorded it to a single layer DVD, the project was under 20 minutes [took about 10 minutes to write] and immediately played the DVD in the JVCProHD JD100 DVD player on a 42" plasma in 1920x1080.

He spent the entire lunch explaining to me how long that would have taken him to do in FCP. This isn't so much a FCP versus PPro as much as it is about HDV vs HD, or more directly editing HDV natively 4.2.0 8bit mpeg versus vs converting it to 4.2.2 10bit interframe. Apple just doesn't provide the tools to adequately address this.

Personally I think editing HDV natively in any NLE sucks. But that doesn't mean HDV is bad. I am really impressed with the quality of image from A1. I have an HVX and I think that in the majority of situations I shoot in the A1 will provide a better image. In the small percentage of situations where I have control over the lighting sure the HVX is better [although I am very critical of the DVCProHD codec].

Sorry for venting. Since I've been trying to learn FCP I've spent some time over at the Apple site and many of the members have been incredibly helpful but there are several threads really bashing HDV. I think much of their objection to it is misguided, I think it has more to do with the lack of tools available to them to efficiently work with HDV and get the level of quality they should...

[Bill Pryor]

All I've done is dissolves and they seem to render about like in a DV timeline. I don't know about the people bashing HDV. Looks great to me. Back when I shot BetacamSP, and miniDV had come out, I was one of those DV bashers, until I got hold of a camera and starting working with it. I think a lot of the bashers are like I was then--they have opinions but haven't really used it or seen any professionally-produced stuff by people who have learned to work within the limitations of whatever medium they're working in.