Recording HD straight to computer

[RecTeach]

Would it be possible to shoot say 720 24p HD straight to a powerbook with an external firewire drive?

Thanks!

[Elton]

You should be able to. If you can have the HVX on the same firewire bus as the hard drive then you should be golden. Just select the FW drive as the capture scratch within FCP.

[darwinandpaine]

I'd be suprised if you could. I hope Elton's right. That would be cool!

[Barry_Green]

Yes you can do exactly that, if you use FCP and "log & capture" and ideally you should have an external firewire hard disk on a separate bus (which may mean installing a PCMCIA firewire adapter card).

[unfiltered]

Yes you can do exactly that, if you use FCP and "log & capture" and ideally you should have an external firewire hard disk on a separate bus (which may mean installing a PCMCIA firewire adapter card).
Do the 400 and 800 ports on the Powerbooks reside on the same bus?

[Jarred Land]

/... installing a PCMCIA firewire adapter card).

yes..and if you have a expresscard Firewire cards are starting to pop up everywhere.

http://www.deepdiscounters.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&currency=USD&products_id=83567

[JazzNET]

I've been successful so far (have shot six one hour sets of music) just plugging the camera into the FW400 port and recording directly to a FW800 drive. And that's at 1080i 60. Capture now in FCP 5.0.4. I have a PB G4 133MHz. A PCI card would be a good idea....maybe I've been lucky. I do hit ESC and end recording at the end of each song 10 - 20 minutes. Just in case.

[David Saraceno]

I've shot 24p/720 straight to the internal drive of a PB 1.67 Ghz without dropped frames. I don't recommend it, but it was a test and worked well.

Now is the MacBook Pro has a p2 card slot, that would be the best solution.

[doondoon]

On a seperate bus?

Is this because generally Powerbooks lack a lot of processor power, and using the firewire 400 would perhaps result in dropped frames because the processor is overloaded?

If so, would this change if I had a Dual G5 on set and was going into it's FW400?

[Jarred Land]

its not a proc issue.. but a bus issues, firewire can only share so much data in its pipe, and if your coming and and going out at the same time its filling that pipe pretty fast.

[doondoon]

So if the camera is connected to my G5 via firewire 400, and GRaid is hooked to G5 via Firewire 800 port.... then that's not an issue correct?

[Jarred Land]

that should work.. but remember you have an entire USB bus there as well.

[doondoon]

Sorry for the sort of rudimentary questioning. Appreciate the help, really.
I'm in the middle of shooting a Varicam/HVX feature. We haven't started using the HVX yet... and this direct to hard drive recording is very appealing to me.

So the firewire 400, firewire 800 and USB are all on a separate bus, correct?

I can come out of the HVX either on the firewire 400 or USB, right?

Are there advantages to using one over the other?

[Jarred Land]

you want to put your HD on the USB bus.

[Digital Angel]

And what about us non mac users. How would we capture from a HVX200e. Id like to capture 25PN footage if possible, 25p if not, 720x1280.

cheers

[RecTeach]

So I guess this begs the following question... If one doesn't mind carrying their computer around on a shoot then you really don't need any P2 cards right? As a matter of fact doing it that way would have great advantages as you could preview your shoots faster because you wouldn't have to wait to offload the P2 card to the computer.

If someone can confirm this I think it would make a lot of people happy!

Also just to clear things up for everybody which of these would be the best way to record to FCP 5.04 on a G4 powerbook (I have the 17" model w/1.5gb of RAM)

A. record to the internal drive
B. record to a firewire drive hanging off the 400mhz bus
C. record to a firewire drive hanging off the 800mhz bus
D. record to a USB 2.0 drive hanging off the USB bus
E. record to a firewire or USB drive hanging off the PCMIA slot

[Fernando Kurezyn Jr.]

would be wireless???.... i mean... like airport stuff... sending by firewire from the HVX (this firewire connected to a wireless port) and then reciving the information in to the powerbook... and re-connected to an external firewire harddrive????....

if i could not explain my self OK just ignore my post..

Fernando
(the mexican bad ass monkey boy...) :kali:

[RecTeach]

would be wireless???.... i mean... like airport stuff... sending by firewire from the HVX (this firewire connected to a wireless port) and then reciving the information in to the powerbook... and re-connected to an external firewire harddrive????....

if i could not explain my self OK just ignore my post..

Fernando
(the mexican bad ass monkey boy...) :kali:


yeah...uh... basically I have no idea what you are talking about. No where in my post did I even mention the word "wireless". I am simply talking about hooking a hard drive by either the firewire 400, 800, USB or PCMIA slot. No more, no less...

[Jarred Land]

you guys are on crack.. wireless isnt going to work.

[Aftabulis]

Is it possible to record 1080 24pA in log and capture though FCP?

[Barry_Green]

I don't have 5.1 yet, but it is my understanding that yes, 1080/24pA would work in log & capture mode now. Hopefully someone with 5.1 can write in and verify that.

[Pascal_Parvex]

D. record to a USB 2.0 drive hanging off the USB bus

Is this the same as having two Firewire buses? So, that there will be no bandwith issues? Because with my setup, I go from the HVX to the notebook through Firewire, and then on to the USB 2.0 external drive.

[Jan_Crittenden]

I can come out of the HVX either on the firewire 400 or USB, right?


If you come out of the USB you will only be able to do a file transfer. There is no live video from there. There is only streaming from the firewire port.

Hope that helps,

jan

[vincekeala]

Okay so this is good news for MacBook Pro owners, right?

Capture in FCP via 1394 to external USB drive. Correct?

Solves the problem of no pcmcia cardbus or having to buy/use a expresscard/34 1394 card.

BTW, we tested HVX 720p to internal hard drive and it played back fine.

[Barry_Green]

Yes you should be able to do that with an MBP.

[JazzNET]

The whole USB 2.0, Firewire 400 and 800 topic is kind of confusing. Even on a G5, in spite of the fact there are 'discreet' FW400 and 800 ports, they do use the same controller chip. This definitely limits performance. It is a good idea to have your FW400 devices (camera) on the 400 bus and FW800 drives on the FW800 port - this way you realize the transfer potential of the FW800 drive. But the controller chip can only handle so much. For example, if you are using an AJA Io or Mojo with Firewire drives, you *really* have to add a PCI FW card to even a G5 to get decent performance. Yes...it can work to some degree without it...but try doing 10 bit uncompressed and the system bogs down pretty quickly. Fortunately, the higher limit of HVX data transfers is only 100Mb/sec so it is not that tasking.

As I mentioned before, I am able to record 1080i to a FW800 drive with my HVX hooked up to my Powerbook on the FW400 port. I'll give the USB port a try, but whenever I've hooked up drives to a USB port they don't seem to perform as well as FW. Looking back, it's possible my experience with those tests may have been with a crappy USB drive. I'll try it with one of the new triple interface drives that I've been using lately.

Interestingly enough, I found that when playing on an Avid Xpress Pro PC system, I HAD to have the camera hooked up to USB to import the files into XPress Pro - it didn't like the FW ports....data corruption during transfers. Then I found a note in the HVX manual - if using a Mac, use FW - on a PC, use USB to transfer data.

[jeffyjones]

Okay so this is good news for MacBook Pro owners, right?

Capture in FCP via 1394 to external USB drive. Correct?
That's the million dollar question, eh? I've been meaning to give it a shot but I don't yet have an external USB 2.0 drive. There are some convenient 2.5" drives that power off the bus around 100 gigs that I'd really love to have. They're 5400 rpm, but that shouldn't be an issue since the internal drive in the MacBook is too (and I can tell you that editing performance is INSANE).

I've gotta try the direct 1080/24pa capture. That would be sweet. If I could just figure out the mapping between camera resolution/frame rate settings and timeline settings!

[jeffyjones]

Yep... captures like a champ, no hiccups or weirdness. I had to set device control to none, and create a capture preset that had the pulldown box checked, but other than that, it worked like a champ!

[snarton]

Yep... captures like a champ....

Can you guys clarify what's been tested on the MBP so far? Jeffy, you're confirming that you can capture directly from the camera to an external USB drive? Has anyone recorded directly to the internal hard drive? Which MBP are you using (1.83 or 2.0 GHz)?
Thanks,
Jeremy

[carlone]

Snarton,

You can capture what's on the P2 card via USB but you can't stream live via USB.

You can't use FILM Mode (or maybe it's called film native) for streaming. You have to use Video mode. Tried this last night and it works fine.

You can also stream live from the P2 into your NLE (I used Avid). Not sure why someone would do this but hey, it worked.

In terms of the P2 card - Film/native mode give you more recording time.
For those of us using 4 gig cards this huge.

Transfering 4 gigs to a firewire drive (this was a 7200 rpm drive) was not as fast as I'd hoped it would be but at least it worked.

Dragging and dropping from P2 card (while mounted in the pcmcia slot) was much quicker.

[snarton]

Carlone, thanks for the reply.

I'd like to get a MBP for field use with my HVX, and on occasion I'd like to use it for direct recording instead of transfering from P2. I read about people with Powerbooks adding a second firewire bus with a PCMCIA card. I'm wondering: with the MBP, can you record directly to the internal hard drive? (There were dropped frames when this was done with the Powerbook.) It sounds like Jeffy tested that recording directly onto a USB drive worked, but I wanted to confirm this.

Thanks,
Jeremy

[jeffyjones]

Can you guys clarify what's been tested on the MBP so far? Jeffy, you're confirming that you can capture directly from the camera to an external USB drive? Has anyone recorded directly to the internal hard drive? Which MBP are you using (1.83 or 2.0 GHz)?
No... that was to the internal drive. I'll have an external USB drive on Friday, and I don't see any reason that won't work just as well. I have the 2 GHz model.

What I do find confusing is that when you "analyze" video, the 1080/24pa capture still shows as being 1080/60i. Is that correct? I'm not very deep into using FCP yet, so I'm a little confused.

By the way, I did a capture preset copy using 1080/60i and checked the box to remove pulldown. I think I may have forced the resolution to 1920x1080, but I don't have the machine here in front of me.

[snarton]

... that was to the internal drive. I'll have an external USB drive on Friday, and I don't see any reason that won't work just as well. I have the 2 GHz model.

Hey- thanks for getting back to me. That's great news that capturing to the internal drive works. Although the laptop is bigger than the firestore, I think the simplicity of recording onto one device is a big improvement over the laptop+external hard drive solution that was needed in the past. I had been holding out for the 17" MBP (just for the extra screen real estate), but you made me think again about the 15" for an even more compact setup in the field. I'll look for your post about recording to an external USB.

Thanks,
Jeremy

P.S. I've been sticking to 720P, so I can't comment on your question about 1080 analysis.

[jeffyjones]

I'm pleasantly surprised with the 15" screen. I had a Dell with that size that was also 1680x1050 (widescreen), and that was nice for Avid. But the FCP interface is such that it fits just fine, and really pretty well at the 1440x900 MacBook resolution.

[CINEMANIAC]

Before my story, I have 5.1 and did some testing of streaming with 1080 24pA and no problems - just set it to 1080/60i and it reads it fine (though the guy on the mac help website said it wasn't supported yet when I ordered it, so it was a nice surprise).
I had a nightmarish experience with 5 hours of back to back interviewing, but think it was probably partially my fault due to it being the first time ever doing this on Final Cut Pro. I had my HVX set up with a firewire 400 to a Lacie Porsche 250GB 7200rpm(used it because of 2 firewire ports on back) and daisy-chained it to my Macbook Pro, which had the Lacie as the scratch drive. Strangely (and alarmingly), every 4 1/2 minutes (or 2 GB) on 720/30P Log and Capture would stop recording, saying there wasnt enough room, where I would have to quickly hit capture now as quick as possible to not lose more than a couple of words said. Then, I overheated my drive (2.16 2 GB ram but was on a cloth chair - helped when moved to wood), so it would report dropped frames every ten-forty seconds and delete everything it had recorded to that point. I had to hit escape as quickly as I can to get it to stop and save before hitting capture now - the interview took 45 minutes yet has almost 100 segments (not so good) - but in the middle I disconnected the extrenal and recorded straight to my internal 100GB 7200rpm, and this was actually when it worked the best, with no problems at all. I have no idea why so many things went wrong, but any thoughts/expanations would be appreciated. I am about to buy one of the SIIG expresscard double firewire 400 cards and hope that daisy-chaining was to blame. I didn't have a recording limit set, which perplexes me. I bought a Swiss Army backpack that's pretty popular now (Maxxum computer backpack, $40 on the Dell Webste) that actually fits an HVX standing up, an external hard drive (or four if you pack creatively), tons of cords, and the MacBook Pro in a separate pocket. I pad the Hvx with shirts so it doesn't get banged up by other drives. My system otherwise has worked great, but there were so many things that could've screwed up that shoot that I don't know anymore. Luckliy just premiered the cut interviews and no one knew any different, and even the 720 footage looks astounding - I can't wait to try more with 1080/30p which didn't seem to always work on my configuration (think RAID was needed, had to buy the drive the day before and only have one firewire port, only RAIDs I found had only one so no daisy chaining; forced to buy non-Raid). However, could it be because one of my firewire cords is 6.5-7 ft long? (the other is 1.5). Any help appreciated, don't want this to reoccur; also, got first short shoot coming up in next week, will do some P2 some straight to laptop so will tell you about the streaming stuff. Thanks, and hope this helped somehow.

[Bryan Xin]

CINEMANIAC,

Maybe this info might be helpful to you: http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=54917

It looks like we're using similar equipment. I didn't try daisy chaining to the MBP though.

[tangierc]

How do you config your HVX so that you can go straight to computer. I have one with me I am trying to get familiar with. Camera is on, FW plugged in, FCP settings et for DVCPROHD 720p60 as is the camera. HVX is in camera mode, but I get no picture in log and capture in FCP (the latest version).

Please advise.

[Jarred Land]

make sure you turn it from DV to OHCI in log and capture.

[tangierc]

What is OHCI? I don't see that anywhere in my log and capture window for device control nor capture/input.

[tangierc]

I figured it out. Thanks though.

[boxcarfilms]

How do you config your HVX so that you can go straight to computer. I have one with me I am trying to get familiar with. Camera is on, FW plugged in, FCP settings et for DVCPROHD 720p60 as is the camera. HVX is in camera mode, but I get no picture in log and capture in FCP (the latest version).

Please advise.


I am having the same exact problem, and I can't figure it out. I am going from HVX over firewire to Powerbook G4 running FCP 5.04. I have the camera on and hooked up, set to video mode (I understand streaming doesn't work in film mode) and set to 720p24. Log and Capture settings are set to "non-controllable device" and "DVCPROHD 720p24." When I first set the "capture/input" to "DVCPROHD 720p24" (or any other setting) I get the error "Unable to Locate Capture Device."

Any help would be fantastic.
Cheers....

[dirtymatt]

When I first set the "capture/input" to "DVCPROHD 720p24" (or any other setting) I get the error "Unable to Locate Capture Device."

Did you ever solve this? I am having the same problem.

[chellokabab]

I don't know what the problem is, but we have been shooting with this camera for more than 2 months now without a P2 card. Here is our setup:

- PowerBook G4
- Firewire 800 drive (for interiors) USB2 Pocket Drive and even sometimes the internal drive for extrior shots if we didn't have AC power available.

We hooked the camera through the firewire to the laptop. Capture with FCP without anyproblems.

I don't know why other people don't use this setup. WE ARE CAPTURING 720P 24P TO A USB2 POCKET DRIVE WHICH RUNS AT 5500 RPM. I think that is amazing. Either I am missing something or people refuse to discuss the fact that you don't need an expensive drive to capture and edit DVCPro HD footage on a Mac.

The only problem which we have is all the extra wires.

[electricpig]

Check if you have all these:

/Library/QuickTime/DVCPROHDCodec.component
/Library/QuickTime/DVCPROHDMuxer.component
/Library/QuickTime/DVCPROHDVideoDigitizer.component
/Library/QuickTime/DVCPROHDVideoOutput.component
/Library/QuickTime/DVCPROHDVideoOutputClock.component
/Library/QuickTime/DVCPROHDVideoOutputCodec.component

For whatever reason, I only had a single DVCPro.blah.blah.component there and I've been banging my head against the wall with this similar issue for the last couple of months since I got my HVX. Same with HDLog. Couldn't find the answer anywhere.

Then Gary from ImagineProducts (the HDLog programmer) gave me a 10-minute phone session and we tracked it down to missing codecs.

And now everything is hunky-dorey.

[Vegas Bob]

I went to the Bootcamp in Las Vegas where Noah Kadner showed us how to shoot directly to a hard drive with FCP. For me it was worth the price of the camp as I shoot exclusively in a studio. Thanks Noah!

I finally got my set up to work. I'm using a MacBook Pro 2Ghz, 1 Gig of Ram and an 7200 internal drive. I added a Siig Firewire 2 Port Express Card. I'm running the HVX200 into the Siig card and Maxtor drives out of the built in Firewire port. I'm using FCP 5.1. I tried using 5.0 but there were major problems...don't waste your time. If you have a MacBook Pro get 5.1.

I've run quite a few tests without any dropped frames using 720P in 24, 30 and 60 frames.

No doubt shooting directly to the drives will save HOURS of time I used to spend batch processing tape.

I can't wait to implement everything else I learned at the Bootcamp. The training was worth every dime...if you have an opportunity to attend don't miss it.

[Jarred Land]

thanks bob :)

[Pascal_Parvex]

I can't wait to implement everything else I learned at the Bootcamp. The training was worth every dime...if you have an opportunity to attend don't miss it.

Well, when the European Bootcamp will become a reality, I will attend it, if it is not too far from Switzerland. But when I think of it, chose Switzerland, we're neutral! :)

[OliverM]

Open the app, system profiler and check under the firewire tab wether the camera actually connects. Firewire doesn't always play nice. :)
Never had that problem with panny gear yet, but Sony Dv cameras are not always easy...