Final Cut Pro and Windows, making DVCPRO HD work
I shot a project (what seems like ages ago) on the Panasonic AG-HVX200 and I had to transfer a working copy to my sound editor’s Windows computer.
Unfortunately, I discovered that Apple’s DVCPRO HD codec doesn’t really work on Windows, at least, not Sonar. I tried to convert it to ProRes and use the Apple’s ProRes Decoder Quicktime for Windows, but this didn’t didn’t seem to play either (It played in Quicktime, just not Sonar).
The one thing that seemed to work was exporting the video as an avi.
Final Cut > File > Export > Current Settings (and make a self-contained Quicktime movie)
Then open the file in Quicktime and choose the AVI option
Then choose the following AVI setttings (as far as frame rate goes, just choose the frame rate of your sequence settings in Final Cut Pro)
This creates a lower-resolution, but playable video file in Sonar that appears to sync up to the audio OMF file well (then again, the piece is under 10 minutes long, so there’s not really a lot of room for drift).
Check out some videos I made…
Below is one of two promotional videos I made for the Gladstone Hotel. I actually shot it back in the spring but then I got busy working on Inside The Haiti Earthquake, so I’ve only had time to finish it now.
Music was courtesy of Gentlemen Reg.
Thanks to Jeremy Vandermeij for providing all the resources necessary (people, locations, exhibits) to produce this video.
Gear:
Canon Rebel T2i
Tokina Wide 11-16mm lens f 2.8
Manfrotto 558B Monopod
Better playback with Final Cut Pro
If you’re using Final Cut Pro on a laptop, you’ve probably experienced your fair share of headaches trying to play back video (especially if it’s HD).
However, I just discovered if you go to System Settings > Playback Control and set the following – voila! – video can play back, albeit with lower quality:
- RT: Safe
- Video Quality: Low
- Frame Rate: Half
It’s the equivalent of setting the quality to “half” or “third” or “quarter” in After Effects, but instead of having a convenient toggle button near the viewer (where you think it should be) Final Cut Pro has buried this deep in the system settings.
setting the buffer time in OSMF
OSMF will automatically calculate a buffer for your video…but I needed to change it because my RTMP stream was stuttering.
I initially had:
player = new MediaPlayer(); player.bufferTime = 5 seconds;
But this didn’t seem to be affecting my buffer time. Well, it seems like you can only set the buffer time after the player has started playing:
player.play(); player.bufferTime = 5;
Using Compressor to create h.264 for Flash Media Server
After a few days of headaches, I’ve discovered that using Compressor for making h.264 videos to upload to a Flash Media Server isn’t really the smartest idea. However, short of shelling out the $600 or so to buy Sorenson Squeeze or Episode Pro, I’m stuck with it for now, so there.
I think I’ve finally come up with a Flash Media Server Compressor Setting, feel free to try it out and let me know if it works for you.
Here are my notes:
You have to set “streaming” to none. “Fast Start” is good when you are leaving this video as a Quicktime, but on a flash media server, “Compressed Fast Start” won’t work at all, and “Fast Start” only works for me some of the time.
If you are “copying over” files, delete the originals before uploading the new files (the ones with the same file name) onto your server.