FS4 / FS4 Pro HD various topics

Austin Thaler · January 28th, 2006, 07:37 PM

Success.

The only thing I hadn't tried was right under my nose. SD. I had been fumbling around the entire time in HDV and the damn hard drive doesn't "do" HDV. I flicked the switch and instant clips were created. It seemed to be pretty sweet.

I wasn't too concerned about matching timecode or anything crazy, yet. My main goals with the device were to (a) simply capture footage in a tapeless manner, (b) figure out the timelapse feature, and (c) weigh down the back end of the camera if at all possible. (Which that last one didn't happen. The mounting kit as another wad of money. And that made the accessory mounting thing worthless.)

Thanks for the help!

Daniel Kohl · January 29th, 2006, 03:07 PM

I wish that there was someone from Focus still visiting this Forum.

What happened to Matt McEwen?

Daniel Kohl · January 29th, 2006, 04:03 PM

I have been wanting to report about my experiences working with the FS-4 Pro together with FCP5, but the project refuses to end.

I finally have a breather, while the end client evaluates the most recent edit.

I described a few experiences with the FS-4 Pro while shooting, in a previous thread: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=54297

I just wanted to follow up on that thread with a few observations I made during the editing:

Using the captured video from the FS-4 together with FCP was a major asset for me on this project. It really saved me hours of capturing and capture related frustrations. All the footage is technically flawless, both image-wise and audio-wise.

I had to adjust how I deal with clips collected into the FCP Browser window since I am used to doing long captures from tape and then marking the individual takes with the FCP DV start/stop detection function.

Since the individual takes captured onto the FS-4 are individual video files/clips, it requires a bit more organization than I am used to, in order to avoid mixing up multiple takes of the same scene (for example). I found that the most direct way to create a "fake" long capture is to put all the individual clips into a sequence and edit with that sequence, or use it to match frame back to the original individual clips. In anycase - dealing with lots of individual media files was new for me, but proved to be more useful in the end, than it was annoying at the beginning. One advantage to having each take as it's own media file is that it is very convenient to remove out-takes from the HDD completely.

I wasn't able to check if this was true for all the cases where the FS-4 appeared to have not captured footage while shooting, but it seems that most, if not all the shots (which I mentioned in my previous, related, thread) were indeed captured. I was planning to (re-) capture the missing shots from from tape (which I had running as a fail safe while shooting). I discovered that these clips were present but had a starting TC of 00:00:00:00. I can't explain why this happened, but apparently the FS-4 was periodically not able to read the EXT TC coming from the XL-2 while recording. (that is why I expected these takes to be missing, since I observed unchanging 00:00:00:00 PAL TC on the FS-4's LCD (normally an indication that recording is not happening on the FS-4)) I had the FS-4 set to SYNC SLAVE and TC EXT. Around 80% of the clips were fine. It seems like the FS-4 switched to TC REC RUN when it could not read the external TC.

I haven't had time to check if the clip TC of the other media files matches that of the tape. I was able to use the the clip TC to navigate to positions on tape and that was generally accurate, but I suspect that there may be a discrepancy of some frames between the clip's TC and that of the matching footage on tape in general. I will see if I can test that when this project is finished.

Cheers

Greg Corke · February 13th, 2006, 05:33 PM

Hi Guys,

Just wondered if I could get a little advice. I recently bought fs4 pro hd 80 gig. I new before I bought it that hdv wrappers are not currently supported but focus plans to release compatibilty updates as and when they do them. My main reason for using the fire store is so I have a backup for all my footage. However, what I want to know is this, will I be on safe ground after each days shoot downloading the raw .m2t's onto external 320gb harddrives and then accessing them at a later date when the NLE situation catches up, either to edit the native .m2t's or encode using cineform or fcp if they ever get thier heads round it. I don't intend on purchasing an HDV NLE until Ican see a practical solution. In the meantime anyone see any problems with what I've outlined above?

Regards Greg C

Dan Euritt · February 14th, 2006, 02:52 PM

i haven't worked with hdv on the firestore, but what you want to do doesn't sound like a problem, based on my firestore dv experience... although you might want to research the timecode end of things, to see if that'll be a factor.

i guess by "compatibilty updates", you are editing with a mac? isn't fcp finally going to support native mpeg2 in the next release?

Greg Corke · February 14th, 2006, 05:26 PM

Thanks Dan,

Not really sure what NLE system yet. I think I will probably go with adobe as that's what I know best. However speakin to the guys at focus the other week it sounds like they are trying to get there wrapper sorted for FCP so I imagine that must mean that Apple have finally decided how they are going to deal with the 24p issue. As for native I'd happily go that way if a product turns up that can deal with the extra processing as Ive heard reports that it can be a bit clunky. I'll let you know what I go for.

Regards Greg C

Vic Owen · February 15th, 2006, 10:48 AM

I just moved up from my old FS-1 to an FS-4. The manual advised that there is a listing at the Focus Enhancements web site for the preferred formats (i.e., Raw DV, Quicktime, etc.) for the the various editing systems. Has anyone been successful finding this list? I remember one back in the FS-1 days, but I can't even find it anymore.

Daniel Kohl · February 16th, 2006, 04:24 AM

I can't find it either.

Maybe we should drop them a line.

Should we start our own list? -

FCP - will accept Quicktime without having to render.

(I know, ...I'm a big help) ;')

Vic Owen · February 16th, 2006, 10:17 AM

Ha! Might be necessary!

I've been using the FS-1 for several years with a MAC/FCP, so I'm presuming it's still Quicktime for that system, but I occasionaly have the need to dump data into other systems, so I'm a little uncertain.

It also seems to me like there used to be LOTS more real support stuff on the Focus website....?

(I did send them a note directly a couple of days ago, but no response, so far.)

Matt, are you out there?

Vic Owen · February 17th, 2006, 10:40 AM

Got a reply from Focus Support today. Apparently, there is no longer a listing on their web site. Below is a partial listing that I got from them. If you have a specific need, drop them a line.

Final Cut Pro: Quicktime
Adobe Premier: AVI Type 2
Sony Vegas: AVI Type 2 or Quicktime
Pinnacle: Pinnacle AVI
AVID: AVID OMF
Matrox: Matrox AVI

Daniel Kohl · February 17th, 2006, 01:04 PM

I am kind of curious about what AVI Type 1 is good for ... I answered my own question while I was asking it, by doing a search:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...22AVI+Type1%22

That is to say, I found out what the difference is between AVI Type 1 and Type 2. However, I am still wondering which NLE needs AVI Type 1 that can't handle Type 2? (Since it is not in the list)

Vic Owen · February 19th, 2006, 12:11 PM

When mounting the FS-4 on my MAC Quicksiver G4 DP, I consistently get 2 identical desktop icons for the FS-4. Both show the same info, and either one will open and allow me to dump the files to my media drive. Has anyone else seen this phenomena?

Daniel Kohl · February 19th, 2006, 05:19 PM

I have this phenomena too, with my G4 DP 1.42 GHz and G4 Dual 400 MHz. This doesn't happen when I connect the FS-4 to the computers for the first time after they have been freshly booted, but it appears whenever the FS-4 is reconnected after.

I have no idea why this happens. I mentioned it to Focus in my beta testing reports with the beta model, but it didn't seem to be an important enough of a glitch for Focus to mend it. It doesn't seem to have any adverse side effects other than being a little annoying, and unsettling.

I'm kind of glad to hear that it is happening to someone else as well - I thought it may have something to do with my computer environment.

Vic Owen · February 19th, 2006, 06:46 PM

I tried rebooting my MAC (DP 1G G4)-- I got the same results as you; only one icon. After disconnecting and reconnecting the FS-4, I'm back to the two icons. It appears to be widespread and repeatable. You're probably correct -- Focus must figure it isn't much of an inconvenience; only mildy unsettling!

It also appears that Matt doesn't lurk on this board anymore -- he used to be pretty responsive. I guess if it bugs me too much I can send a note to support -- Jim, at Focus, responded to my filetype question fairly quickly.

Cheers

Daniel Kohl · February 20th, 2006, 02:34 AM

It is too bad that Matt doesn't hang out here anymore. His presence, interest, and responsiveness were a major reason for me getting involved in the board and the FS products.

I even met him, in the flesh, at the IBC in 2004.

I guess he has been promoted or something. Sure do miss him here.

January 29th, 2006, 03:07 PM	#167
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	Chris, What happened to Matt McEwen?!? I wish that there was someone from Focus still visiting this Forum. What happened to Matt McEwen? __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

January 29th, 2006, 04:03 PM	#168
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	Editing with FS-4 Pro SD together with FCP5 I have been wanting to report about my experiences working with the FS-4 Pro together with FCP5, but the project refuses to end. I finally have a breather, while the end client evaluates the most recent edit. I described a few experiences with the FS-4 Pro while shooting, in a previous thread: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=54297 I just wanted to follow up on that thread with a few observations I made during the editing: Using the captured video from the FS-4 together with FCP was a major asset for me on this project. It really saved me hours of capturing and capture related frustrations. All the footage is technically flawless, both image-wise and audio-wise. I had to adjust how I deal with clips collected into the FCP Browser window since I am used to doing long captures from tape and then marking the individual takes with the FCP DV start/stop detection function. Since the individual takes captured onto the FS-4 are individual video files/clips, it requires a bit more organization than I am used to, in order to avoid mixing up multiple takes of the same scene (for example). I found that the most direct way to create a "fake" long capture is to put all the individual clips into a sequence and edit with that sequence, or use it to match frame back to the original individual clips. In anycase - dealing with lots of individual media files was new for me, but proved to be more useful in the end, than it was annoying at the beginning. One advantage to having each take as it's own media file is that it is very convenient to remove out-takes from the HDD completely. I wasn't able to check if this was true for all the cases where the FS-4 appeared to have not captured footage while shooting, but it seems that most, if not all the shots (which I mentioned in my previous, related, thread) were indeed captured. I was planning to (re-) capture the missing shots from from tape (which I had running as a fail safe while shooting). I discovered that these clips were present but had a starting TC of 00:00:00:00. I can't explain why this happened, but apparently the FS-4 was periodically not able to read the EXT TC coming from the XL-2 while recording. (that is why I expected these takes to be missing, since I observed unchanging 00:00:00:00 PAL TC on the FS-4's LCD (normally an indication that recording is not happening on the FS-4)) I had the FS-4 set to SYNC SLAVE and TC EXT. Around 80% of the clips were fine. It seems like the FS-4 switched to TC REC RUN when it could not read the external TC. I haven't had time to check if the clip TC of the other media files matches that of the tape. I was able to use the the clip TC to navigate to positions on tape and that was generally accurate, but I suspect that there may be a discrepancy of some frames between the clip's TC and that of the matching footage on tape in general. I will see if I can test that when this project is finished. Cheers __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

February 13th, 2006, 05:33 PM	#169
Greg Corke Major Player Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: London, UK Posts: 245	Anyone see a problem with this Hi Guys, Just wondered if I could get a little advice. I recently bought fs4 pro hd 80 gig. I new before I bought it that hdv wrappers are not currently supported but focus plans to release compatibilty updates as and when they do them. My main reason for using the fire store is so I have a backup for all my footage. However, what I want to know is this, will I be on safe ground after each days shoot downloading the raw .m2t's onto external 320gb harddrives and then accessing them at a later date when the NLE situation catches up, either to edit the native .m2t's or encode using cineform or fcp if they ever get thier heads round it. I don't intend on purchasing an HDV NLE until Ican see a practical solution. In the meantime anyone see any problems with what I've outlined above? Regards Greg C

February 14th, 2006, 05:26 PM	#171
Greg Corke Major Player Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: London, UK Posts: 245	mucho gracias Thanks Dan, Not really sure what NLE system yet. I think I will probably go with adobe as that's what I know best. However speakin to the guys at focus the other week it sounds like they are trying to get there wrapper sorted for FCP so I imagine that must mean that Apple have finally decided how they are going to deal with the 24p issue. As for native I'd happily go that way if a product turns up that can deal with the extra processing as Ive heard reports that it can be a bit clunky. I'll let you know what I go for. Regards Greg C

February 15th, 2006, 10:48 AM	#172
Vic Owen Major Player Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Seattle, WA Posts: 540	FS-4 File Formats I just moved up from my old FS-1 to an FS-4. The manual advised that there is a listing at the Focus Enhancements web site for the preferred formats (i.e., Raw DV, Quicktime, etc.) for the the various editing systems. Has anyone been successful finding this list? I remember one back in the FS-1 days, but I can't even find it anymore. __________________ -- Vic Owen --

January 28th, 2006, 07:37 PM	#166
Austin Thaler New Boot Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 5	Success. The only thing I hadn't tried was right under my nose. SD. I had been fumbling around the entire time in HDV and the damn hard drive doesn't "do" HDV. I flicked the switch and instant clips were created. It seemed to be pretty sweet. I wasn't too concerned about matching timecode or anything crazy, yet. My main goals with the device were to (a) simply capture footage in a tapeless manner, (b) figure out the timelapse feature, and (c) weigh down the back end of the camera if at all possible. (Which that last one didn't happen. The mounting kit as another wad of money. And that made the accessory mounting thing worthless.) Thanks for the help!

February 14th, 2006, 02:52 PM	#170
Dan Euritt Trustee Join Date: Mar 2004 Location: Carlsbad CA Posts: 1,132	i haven't worked with hdv on the firestore, but what you want to do doesn't sound like a problem, based on my firestore dv experience... although you might want to research the timecode end of things, to see if that'll be a factor. i guess by "compatibilty updates", you are editing with a mac? isn't fcp finally going to support native mpeg2 in the next release?

February 16th, 2006, 04:24 AM	#173
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	I can't find it either. Maybe we should drop them a line. Should we start our own list? - FCP - will accept Quicktime without having to render. (I know, ...I'm a big help) ;') __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

February 16th, 2006, 10:17 AM	#174
Vic Owen Major Player Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Seattle, WA Posts: 540	Ha! Might be necessary! I've been using the FS-1 for several years with a MAC/FCP, so I'm presuming it's still Quicktime for that system, but I occasionaly have the need to dump data into other systems, so I'm a little uncertain. It also seems to me like there used to be LOTS more real support stuff on the Focus website....? (I did send them a note directly a couple of days ago, but no response, so far.) Matt, are you out there? __________________ -- Vic Owen --

February 17th, 2006, 10:40 AM	#175
Vic Owen Major Player Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Seattle, WA Posts: 540	Got a reply from Focus Support today. Apparently, there is no longer a listing on their web site. Below is a partial listing that I got from them. If you have a specific need, drop them a line. Final Cut Pro: Quicktime Adobe Premier: AVI Type 2 Sony Vegas: AVI Type 2 or Quicktime Pinnacle: Pinnacle AVI AVID: AVID OMF Matrox: Matrox AVI __________________ -- Vic Owen --

February 17th, 2006, 01:04 PM	#176
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	I am kind of curious about what AVI Type 1 is good for ... I answered my own question while I was asking it, by doing a search: http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...22AVI+Type1%22 That is to say, I found out what the difference is between AVI Type 1 and Type 2. However, I am still wondering which NLE needs AVI Type 1 that can't handle Type 2? (Since it is not in the list) __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

February 19th, 2006, 12:11 PM	#177
Vic Owen Major Player Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Seattle, WA Posts: 540	Multiple FS-4 Icons When mounting the FS-4 on my MAC Quicksiver G4 DP, I consistently get 2 identical desktop icons for the FS-4. Both show the same info, and either one will open and allow me to dump the files to my media drive. Has anyone else seen this phenomena? __________________ -- Vic Owen --

February 19th, 2006, 05:19 PM	#178
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	I have this phenomena too, with my G4 DP 1.42 GHz and G4 Dual 400 MHz. This doesn't happen when I connect the FS-4 to the computers for the first time after they have been freshly booted, but it appears whenever the FS-4 is reconnected after. I have no idea why this happens. I mentioned it to Focus in my beta testing reports with the beta model, but it didn't seem to be an important enough of a glitch for Focus to mend it. It doesn't seem to have any adverse side effects other than being a little annoying, and unsettling. I'm kind of glad to hear that it is happening to someone else as well - I thought it may have something to do with my computer environment. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1

February 19th, 2006, 06:46 PM	#179
Vic Owen Major Player Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Seattle, WA Posts: 540	I tried rebooting my MAC (DP 1G G4)-- I got the same results as you; only one icon. After disconnecting and reconnecting the FS-4, I'm back to the two icons. It appears to be widespread and repeatable. You're probably correct -- Focus must figure it isn't much of an inconvenience; only mildy unsettling! It also appears that Matt doesn't lurk on this board anymore -- he used to be pretty responsive. I guess if it bugs me too much I can send a note to support -- Jim, at Focus, responded to my filetype question fairly quickly. Cheers __________________ -- Vic Owen --

February 20th, 2006, 02:34 AM	#180
Daniel Kohl Contributor Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: Frankfurt, Germany Posts: 571	It is too bad that Matt doesn't hang out here anymore. His presence, interest, and responsiveness were a major reason for me getting involved in the board and the FS products. I even met him, in the flesh, at the IBC in 2004. I guess he has been promoted or something. Sure do miss him here. __________________ Daniel Kohl Frankenstein meets XL1