I swear I'm not picking a fight here...

DammitJanet

DammitJanet

Well-known member
I've been getting used to FCP recently, and I was wondering why you have to pre-render things thrown into the timeline, as opposed to Vegas' method of just rendering them as you put them in so you don't have to stop, render, and then continue. Vegas even lets you resize the length of clips without waiting for rendering.

So my question is this...is there a specific reason why FCP does it the other way?
 
I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "pre-render", but if you drop a clip in the timeline and you have to render it right off the bat you are do not have FCP set up properly. Your sequence settings need to match your clip settings.


-A
 
But I think that is part of the question. (Again, not throwing rocks here) but in Vegas this doesn't matter. Drop anything anywhere and it plays.
 
Vegas doesn't pre-render anything. You can drag and drop any type of file (HD, SD, PAL, NTSC, MPEG, AVI, Quicktime, animated GIF, anything) and it all plays back immediately. It scales or converts whatever it needs to on the fly. And it's done it this way for about 4 years now, or so.

I thought that was one of the big updates to FCS2/FCP6, was the "open timeline" with no more pre-rendering necessary?
 
Barry_Green said:
Vegas doesn't pre-render anything. You can drag and drop any type of file (HD, SD, PAL, NTSC, MPEG, AVI, Quicktime, animated GIF, anything) and it all plays back immediately. It scales or converts whatever it needs to on the fly. And it's done it this way for about 4 years now, or so.

I thought that was one of the big updates to FCS2/FCP6, was the "open timeline" with no more pre-rendering necessary?
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It's not completely "open." I know for a fact that M-JPEG clips need to be rendered before they'll play back.
 
Barry_Green said:
I thought that was one of the big updates to FCS2/FCP6, was the "open timeline" with no more pre-rendering necessary?
Click to expand...

It is - I don't have to 'prerender' anything in FCP.
Sure, i have to render in the end if I drop a DV file into a DVCProHD timeline (or something similar) - but I can definitely preview everything without rendering.

It may be an issue of FCP version or machine specs.
Not sure.
 
Yes, now with FCP 6, when you drop a clip into a timeline, it will conform that timeline to that clip settings. And any other clip you drop in may playback properly, but will require rendering before you output.

But yeah, if you drop a clip into the timeline, and it immediately requires a render then you are not set up properly.
 
Well, for the record, I'm using 5.0.4 and I'm not totally sure what my sequence settings are at the moment. I've just edited a documentary consisting of 24F footage from an XHA1, and 60i footage from a GL2. I'd like for all of the footage to be de-interlaced in the end as I'm outputting to DVD, but so far I'm having trouble with any of the footage coming out looking right.

For some reason, and this may be controlled by settings, but when I captured my 24F footage, the preview in the Viewer and Canvas were both interlaced, and I asked on this forum if there was something I needed to adjust in capture settings, but I never got a response. I tried just rendering out an H.264 MOV file at NTSC 720x480 16:9 (XHA1 shot 16:9 and for the GL2 I used a built-in squeeze mode and put it in as anamorphic 16:9 in FCP). But when I render it out, I can never seem to get the proper aspect ratio in quicktime. Maybe I should try playing back in VLC, or maybe QuickTime's settings need adjustment.

My doc is due in a few days though, so any help on these last minute refinements would be much appreciated.

Thanks all!
 
I'm not familiar w/working w/24f footage so I can't comment on that but...

To find out your Sequence settings hit Command+0 while you have a timeline selected. For whatever reason QT doesn't seem to "see" the anamorphic flag so you can either render out your video in a 16x9 ratio (ex. 854*480) or trying using a differently player.

-A
 
I'm finding that exporting SD DV (720x480) out of FCP using one of the preset sizes in the pull down menu (eg: NTSC DV 720x480) in fact gives you a final movie at 640x480. The only reason I could come up with as to why FCP does this is: because it's retarded. However, If you go to custom size and manually enter your own 720x480 it will render and save out at 720x480. Yes, quite the head scratcher.
 
Yup- current version with proper sequence settings and you'll get the performance you're looking for.

Noah
 
jonnyh1968 said:
I'm finding that exporting SD DV (720x480) out of FCP using one of the preset sizes in the pull down menu (eg: NTSC DV 720x480) in fact gives you a final movie at 640x480.
Click to expand...

Not to hijack this thread - but if thats the case then there is definitely something wrong in your workflow.
I export DV clips from DV timelines all the time and my exports are definitely 720 x 480 using the DV NTSC presets.

If your sequence settings are right, then your export shouldn't do anything weird like that.
 
jonnyh1968 said:
I'm finding that exporting SD DV (720x480) out of FCP using one of the preset sizes in the pull down menu (eg: NTSC DV 720x480) in fact gives you a final movie at 640x480. The only reason I could come up with as to why FCP does this is: because it's retarded. However, If you go to custom size and manually enter your own 720x480 it will render and save out at 720x480. Yes, quite the head scratcher.
Click to expand...

You have a setting wrong somewhere are creating a QT w/square pixels (640x480) as opposed to un-square pixels (720x480).

-A
 
My 24F footage looks kind of stuttery after exporting, and upon further reflection of my sequence settings, things appear to be in order, except that the editing timebase is 23.98, and I suppose that it should be 30 or 29.97 or something. I can't change it though. Can I make a new sequence and adjust its timebase and copy/paste all my clips into it?

I'm also clueless as to how to export for DVD Studio Pro. :(
 
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DammitJanet said:
Can I make a new sequence and adjust its timebase and copy/paste all my clips into it?
Click to expand...
Yes, and I'd assume the should be 29.97. Once you have footage in a sequence you can't adjust the timebase.


I'm also clueless as to how to export for DVD Studio Pro. :(
Click to expand...
File-Export-Using Compressor then you can select from the various DVD Presets and/or pick a preset then tweak it to bette meet your needs.

-A
 
Alright. I got everything put into a new sequence, and the stuttering is gone. However, I really want to de-interlace all the 60i footage so it sort of matches up to the 24f footage before I print to tape.

What's my next step?
 
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