successful FCP native HDV capture

[Daniel Weber]

Originally Posted by Shaun Roemich

Hi David. I knew of what you were referring with the Adobe/Apple issue but some have speculated that FCP would be phased out, not Premiere.

This isn't going to happen. There is to large and powerful a community that relies on FCP to survive.

In my conversation with the guy from AJA this subject came up. He was laughing about it. He said that it is all based on rumors, some of which they even started (the one about AJA buying the Pro Apps) just to see how far they would go.

Daniel Weber

[Paolo Ciccone]

Daniel, I read your post with interest because it's really amazing how subjective our experiences are. AJA is having a great time with Apple. On the other hand every plugin developer that I talked to considered Apple one of the least cooperative companies. Same for a hardware developer that I know.

He told me that Premiere is just an interface and that when they write code so that one of their boards can be used they have to re write a major of portion of the program.

That seems a bit of an extreme. He cannot possibly mean that they are re-writing part of the NLE. That would be absurd. And the comment about "it's just an interface" doesn't make much sense either. I would like to hear it from a developer, product managers are not necessarily technical experts. BTW, Premiere shares the After Effects API for plugins, which is considered one of the best in the market.
When I talked with developers of plugins they told me that of the three "A"s of NLE, Avid is the easiest to deal with, Adobe a close second, Apple a distant third. As a beta tester for AE and AMP I can report directly that the Adobe is quite approachable. In fact the meetings of the SF Bay Area of SF Cutters, the FCP user group in San Francisco, are often held in the Adobe office :)

[Shaun Roemich]

Thanks, Paolo. Just wanted to make sure my INTENT was understood. Without inflection that speech imparts upon a conversation (and the recognition that this truly is an INTERNATIONAL forum where many people congregate and speak in English, which may not be their first language) it is easy to misinterpret one's intentions. This happens frequently on another Forum I contribute to and I have no wish to be misunderstood here.

Again, I hold all of you in the highest regard and consider myself lucky to have found such a welcoming and resource filled group of people.

[David Knaggs]

Originally Posted by Shaun Roemich

... but some have speculated that FCP would be phased out, not Premiere.

Ah! So you've been reading those "anonymous internet rumors".

"Sources say ... "
"An insider has revealed that ... "

There was a fairly recent comedy movie called "For Your Consideration" by Christopher Guest (of "This is Spinal Tap!" fame) where an anonymous internet rumor suggests that an actress on a current production might get nominated for an Oscar for that part (even though they're still filming it and the movie won't be released for months). And the whole thing just keeps growing and spiralling out of control until she even appears on national television concerning all of the overwhelming "Oscar buzz". All completely unfounded ("based" on that anonymous internet rumor). That sort of thing is funny in the movie. Not so funny in real life. Especially when used to damage a company's or individual's trade or reputation.

Here's a link to an official statement made last week by Richard Townhill, Apple's director of marketing for professional video applications.

http://tvbeurope.com/index.php?optio...=1269&Itemid=1

So they are NOT being sold.

Period.

And remember that your HD200 might have zero problems capturing with FCP (look at Justin Ferar's earlier post). Users of the HD100 series have had varying results, however. But your camera isn't in that category.

And you are very polite. I'm sure that no reasonable person could think otherwise. I'm just sorry that my earlier comments triggered off some FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) which had been planted there earlier by these unfounded rumors. Believe me, FCP and FCS are 100% stable platforms. Just because I perceived a current lack of adequate resources to keep them totally up to date for all users (and even speculated on ONE way that it might be solved [over in Area 51] - and there are also other options, such as hiring and training more staff) doesn't mean that things won't be reorganized and fixed. All companies, big and small, experience growing pains.

[Shaun Roemich]

David, thanks for the post and the link.

I agree whole heartedly that Apple has dropped the ball a couple of times in releasing "updates" that have caused other aspects of the program to cease functioning, with a quick "oops, here's what we MEANT to release" update soon after.

Obviously, this is a much larger problem if it has remained unsolved this long.

And may I state for the record that I never would have considered JVC as a contender had it not been for the amazing dialog and support of this Forum. I have been a dyed in the wool Sony fan for the past 10 years. I never thought I would support the "4th" company (after Sony, Canon and Panasonic in that order in my market) but MAN, what a feature set at an incredible bargain while the others are trying to keep their lenses in focus!

[Sean Adair]

I'll add that I also capture with my BR HD50u footage from a HD 100 and a HD110 on a pretty regular basis as well as my HD200. All has been updated to latest firmware. Current tapes have been simply working as they should. I haven't gone back to legacy tapes, which did have capture issues, but suspect that the camera firmware upgrades (as described) are part of the reason for improvement on recent material. Perhaps FCP has been tweaked a bit since then as well.
Mind you, in all respect, I do consider it still a fragile process on FCP, and drop-out I'm sure will cause a major gap. They should definitely make it more robust, and support native m2t files, and I'm real happy to know of the Premiere option should I have capture problems (and I prefer the DR-HD100 when I'm editing lately too!). Also good to know of its strengths. I will be tempted to try it when the time is right.

I can also say that I went through hell with the old workflow recently. DVHS-cap was fine (but still a bit tiresome to deal with). However Mpeg streamclip conversions to DVCHD-Pro (clients editing format of choice - not mine) were an incredible ordeal, and I had to abandon it. I kicked myself when fcp went through that process perfectly in a fraction of the time. Literally 13 tapes in a row without a hitch.

Mpeg streamclip, took ages to cue up and make clips, lost the timecode (which the editor wanted to order & track clips with), lost audio sync frequently, and worst of all, randomly got stuck in the middle of a clip dropping & repeating frames for an effective 12fps from the 24fps.

Ugly - a solid 3 days lost, and no one to kick but myself.

[Steve Oakley]

well if you have native HDv capture working, you are very lucky. I have a HD100, BRHD50 both on current firwmware and I'm watching a tape I shot yesterday give FCP an absolute hissy fit. 50% failure right now. 1hr tape, with takes that run 30 secs to 4 minutes each. used a panasonic consumer tape :( no visual problems, but something isn't perfect.

even worse is that FCP is completely braindead in capture. if there is an error, it doesn't go on to the next clip, it just puts up a dialog saying there was an error, continue ? WELL WHAT THE @#$@#$!!!! DO YOU THINK I WANT TO DO! the real reason apple didn't show up at NAB was they didn't want to meet me somewhere dark and lonely......

FCP has so many bugs its crazy. it falls down everyday for me and I am searching for another option. right now the only two I see is Prem Pro and smoke. forget Avid they don't have their act together, and their UI is archaic and slow. its extremely aggravating that FCP just doesn't work correctly with some many things.

[Shai Camerini]

Can someone upload a full tutorial step by step, what to do with HD101E 720p25 material?
I keep getting breaks no matter what i do.
thanks

[Shaun Roemich]

So add me to the list of people who can't get FCP to capture reliably. If I try to use ProRes, I lose Log & Capture. If I Log and Capture in HDV, I get Stream Errors and the capture stops. This is on my 2 week old HD200UB and FCP 6.0.3 (starting to regret doing the 6.0.2 to 6.0.3 upgrade...)

To make matters worse, if I search Apple's Knowledge Base, I end up reading about every OTHER version of FCP or some article about iMovie or Compressor. Why don't search engines actually search for the terms you've entered anymore?

I can't justify a VTR until this fall. Can I also throw my "please advise on anything that WILL work" hat into the ring as well? I need to post this project in FCP so PPro won't cut it (pardon the obvious pun). Do I back up (UGH!) to FCP 6.0.2? If so, where do I get the updater? Apple.com keeps giving me a link to the 6.0.3 updater that I already have. And yes, my copy is COMPLETELY legit. I bought FCS2 the week before it started shipping so I have install disks for 6.0.0

PS. I'm trying to import 720P60 material.

[Daniel Weber]

Well I tried the HDV to ProRes capture trick to night and it worked great!!!!

Better than anything else I've tried so far with my HD100.

I am impressed.

I did find a few dead pixels though!!!

This camera is always needing something fixed.

It is a love hate relationship.

Daniel Weber

[Steve Oakley]

you can use FW for device control and use the analog outs into a kona / BM card to ProRes. that works with camera or deck. you will also need a 1/8 stereo to RCA or XLR

[Shaun Roemich]

I've started capturing my HD200U footage this way and I'm having issues with incorrect timecode. I can't recapture from tape anyway but it makes camera logs absolutely useless.

[Paolo Ciccone]

Shaun, the usual workaround for FCP's buggy capture for the ProHD cameras is to se the DVHSCap + MPEG Streamclip solution. Unfortunately this method removes the timecode which means that it will be impossible to re-capture the same tape at exactly the same point. Unless....you have a visual timecode for reference. In this article from my blog I explained how to use a timecode generator for multi-camera synchronization. If you use the generator for single-take tapes, even when you have only one camera, you can use the timecode to do an exact re-capture of the clip. Because of the pre-roll and other factors it will be impossible to match the frame exactly in DVHSCap but you will be able to set a frame-accurate inpoint in MPEG Streamclip and so re-generate the clip captured. You only need to make a note in your project of the timecode used originally.

[Sean Adair]

Just be aware, that for long form work at least there are 2 known bugs (other people have been hobbled here too), that can turn up randomly.
Losing audio sync. This can happen in the middle of a transcode. You can cue up to where it happened, and hope it doesn't happen again.
frame repeat/skipping, synced with audio, but alternate frames are doubled, giving a very stuttering look (effectively 12fps if it's 24p).
Again, this can just start in the middle of a capture, and it can be hard to spot right away if there isn't much motion (like a talking head). Easy to confirm by stepping frame-by frame.
This is with version 1.9 and very careful attention to settings. Use presets, since otherwise there are multiple areas to reset each time.
My output was to DVCPROHD 720/24p. It wasn't until I went to lnger captures that these issues cropped up. Luckily, my FCP capture works quite well, with only the adjusted minimal loss of frames at pre-roll of a new camera take.