FCP to DVD to Betacam SP

T

tmp309

Member
Hi, beginner here,

I'm doing a music video that's going to be broadcast on TV. The station has told me to just give them a DVD of the video, and that they will take care of putting it onto Betacam SP from there. However, I'm a little nervous about exporting the footage and putting this DVD together.

Can anyone help with any suggestions of the settings I should use to export the footage? Should I just use Export->Quicktime Movie->Current Settings? Or is there some other preset I should use, considering it will be going to beta? It was shot with a DVX100a in 24p and I captured with the "DV NTSC 48Khz Advanced (2:3:3:2) Pulldown Removal" preset.

Also, any tips for color correction, specifically how to keep the footage broadcast-safe?

Thanks immensely for any help anyone can give.
 
My advice is just export as Quicktime Movie. The compression & encoding in Toast 7 is brilliant. I did a big performance event with that workflow and it worked and looked fantastic, but i do recommend waching it all the way through just to make sure all is well.
 
it would be better to give them a Mini-Dv tape (if they will take it) rather than going through the compression for DVD.
 
have you ever compared them? unless its a Data DVD, Mini Dv is supperior.
 
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i can probably get them to take a miniDV. Would that be better? How should I get the footage back onto miniDV? With a video camera?

Alternately, I could probably give them a DVD-R with the movie on it, ie, not a playable DVD made on iDVD or something, but rather just burned with the data on it. Would I just export to Quicktime Movie using Current Settings?

Thanks for your help!!
 
the best would be an uncompressed file on a DVD, BUT you need to find out if they will take that because they will have to bring it into a suite and lay it to tape rather than just making a dub on a rack...
 
sink said:
have you ever compared them? unless its a Data DVD, Mini Dv is supperior.
Click to expand...


They're both lossy.. at least with a dvd you can change the bitrate and do vbr 2-pass compression.
 
They're both lossy.. at least with a dvd you can change the bitrate and do vbr 2-pass compression.
Click to expand...

I think it depends on what the video was originally shot on and edited on. If the video was originally shot on mini-DV and edited on a DV timeline, then outputting it on mini-DV will not incur further loss. Outputting to DVD can only approach what you could get by putting it out to mini-DV tape, not surpass it, as it involves further compression.

If it was shot on HD and edited on an uncompressed timeline, then testing would have to be done to see which was better, but the order of quality would probably still be:

uncompressed file on DVD>mini-DV>DVD (though the last two might be reversed, depending on what was used for compression).
 
What exact settings should I use to get the uncompressed file exported to put on a DVD? If I use Export->Quicktime Movie->Current Settings, it does use the dv compression, I think. Am I wrong?
 
as you can see he shot it on a DVX, if he shot on DVCPRO or beta or whatever obviously he wouldnt go to mini-dv...

I shot a spot on a DVX edited in final cut and burned the final uncompressed file onto a DVD, then brought that file into an adrenaline and made a DVCPRO 50 dub. the encoders ranked the three dubs as DVCPRO(by a longshot)>Mini-DV>DVD


Don't use 'current settings' click the tab and for compression pick 'none'
A. depending on how long this is it may be too big for a dvd
B. obviously it isnt uncompressed because it orginated on Mini-DV but you wont be adding another round of compression
 
Thank you for your responses; they've been really helpful.

I talked to the station again, and they are OK with me giving them a miniDV tape, but not a data DVD with the uncompressed file on it.

Should I just play the sequence in FCP, and hit record on my camcorder? Is that the most straightforward way to get it onto the miniDV tape?

Thanks again for your help.
 
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