Best workflow for live mixing / recording 4 hvx200s on location?

H

Hawkeye

Active member
Hi
Could anyone please suggest the best workflow for live mixing / recording from four Hvx-200 cameras (ntsc models) all shooting 720p 24fps on location?

I would like to sync up the four cameras and mix live through a mixer to computer for digital storage or through my Final Cut software and Mac, to record the mix in DVCProHD 720p 24fps to Mac hard drive or external hard drive.

If doing via FCP and Mac, how do I manage inputs of four cameras streaming live 720p into the Mac and FCP program for mixing? Is there more hardware required?

If doing via a portable mixer and / or other hardware - what workflow would you suggest as the best price for reliability?

I have Final Cut Studio on G4 and also newer FCP running on Quad Core Mac, if the system could work with both the G4 and the Quad Core that would be great, my G4 is the last model before went Intel and has FW800 and 7200 rpm drive and 2gb DDR so maybe it can handle recording the mix if there's some way of mixing it that wont overload the G4's ability.

Any help appreciated
 
I'm guessing an easy option would be a simple mixing desk that would allow 4 cameras to be input with its own TBC (time base corrector) so can mix them in sync and just record the output of the desk streaming via G4 / FCP to Hard Drive... problem is I'm not easily finding info online for what basic video mixing desks out there can do this and handle the Panasonic HD formats.
Anyone have a link to Panasonic or other brand mixing desks which would do this job?
 
Hi mcvideo,
I'm shooting at events indoors and also at track events using a utility vehicle parked at the track, typically four cameras, but the editing is so basic I just want to cut all the footage and post and mix the events there and then.
Surely there's a cheap switcher that we can plug the hvx200s into using the firewire and just get the mix out with one firewire that we can capture through Final Cut's capture just like we would if we were capturing one camera via firewire via FCp - hell if I can find one though!
Seems like we have to pay over 10k for something complicated and bulky without any simple options.
I cant' figure out though if this HD Extreme Deck by BlackMagic does anything for me...
Cheers! will let you know what I find if I find...
 
You can't switch live with the hd extreme. It's going to be hard to find a switcher that accepts Component. Most accept HD-SDI. You could get this http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=587599&Q=&is=REG&A=details but then you would need something like this http://www.avenview.com/component-t...html?utm_medium=organic&utm_source=googlebase for each camera to turn the component signal into HD-SDI. It seems real expensive. A much cheaper option is to throw firestores/p2 cards on all the cameras, sync them up, and do a multi-cam edit after the event. It will take more time but it is probably the most logical and cheapest way.
 
thanks JR! interesting... I'll look into those options with your links

I'm confused why I can capture a HVX in HD live via firewire with Final Cut capture but can't get a simple switcher with firewire inputs to allow me to mix four camera feeds down to one firewire feed into my mac to the capture facility of FCP.
That would then capture the mix of four cameras like it captures the single camera... seems like a basic workflow but I cant' find the solution, surely there's a firewire mixer that works like this with these cameras and FCPs capture facility?

Is there an option at the Mac and FCP end for increasing my firewire input options and mixing on the computer?

Or is there even a simple firewire switcher out there that would do a basic mix by simply cutting between camera sources and sending that out via firewire that could plug into my mac?

As a last resort could I mod some firewire cable system that the camera operators could just plug their cameras in and out of to create the mix themselves at their end by the director prompting them over the talkback... :)

Seriously I'm wondering if this is just another case of big business making a big deal out of something that could be simple and cheap... or maybe I'm stupid and missing the technical reason why it's not possible to have a simple firewire switcher between several HVXs and FCP's capture to get a mix instead of a mass of footage that needs brain-numbing 'editing' later.
 
Seriously I'm wondering if this is just another case of big business making a big deal out of something that could be simple and cheap
Click to expand...

I feel like it's a lot more complicated than it seems. Also, if a company is going to buy a switcher they're going to use a better connection than firewire. I really don't think it's possible or practical to switch between cameras using firewire. There is also a finite length that a firefire cable can send a signal. My search found 4.5m to each device. Some things in this business are just expensive. There always isn't a "cheaper" option for them. This might be one of those cases.

I found this. http://www.prosecuritys.com/vs-81fw.html But will it really work? hell if I know. I feel like FCP might freak if you change the source during capture.
 
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Thanks JR!!! that looks like it may be worth a try! maybe FCP capture would just search for timecode on tc break like it does when importing SD tapes with diff clips, then could just run it together as a multiclip sequence really quickly, :) worth a try I think! thanks!

I'm not sure about the firewire signal length, I have a good quality ten metre firewire cable and I'm pretty sure I used it to record with HVX onto an external drive via FCP capture.

At the end of the day, the cables are the problem we face and all the technical complexity that this industry savours, they make nothing easy, there's licencing agreements coming out their ears for everything they do and it's big! money above all.
It makes all our lives a real pain in the butt that every new advance in AV technology becomes a format war between the big competitors... new cables, formats, regions, blah blah, they just complicate the crap out of it all for us.

There's component HD SDI switcher like Datavideo's SE-2000 but I know nothing about them only they have the HD SDI which allows about 1.4 gigabits data rate which is up on the SDI

Then there's AJA breakout boxes and AJA IoHD firewire 800 which seems to work cutting a few cameras but they don't make it easy to figure out and therefore I'm not buying their product unless someone makes it clear to me what the hell it does - pity they can't employ someone who could not just build a gadget but explain what it actually does.

If a G4 can live capture one HVX200 by grabbing it's stream of data and copying it down to the Hard Drive then surely there's a device that can do the same x 4 and mix and feed it to the G4, maybe would need 4 x 7200 rpm drives and 8 gigs of DDR but whatever - I'm not technical - I need an alternative to forking out 10,000 dollars to cut between 4 hvx200s, and an alternative to all the P2 cards and firestores and so on they cost a small fortune when added up too, I'm sure there's a simple device missing in all this expensive stuff. It's like they're dragging bnc cables into the digital world (I used them bnc cables 20 years ago) or maybe it's the other way round that we need bnc connectors on our G4s.... exasperating,!

If was in the business of selling cameras - PANASONIC LISTEN - I'd be making it easy and cheap for us to use multiple cameras with our computer NLEs by making simple cheap switchers that are compatible with what we have.
 
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