Compressor 3 and the HV20

A

aldous

New member
I just finished messing around with my friends copy of Final Cut Studio 2 and it is definitely worth it for us HV20 owners. No more of the AIC, cut the first few frames trick as previously outlined in the forums. With ProRes and Compressor 3 the process has been simplified. Just send the clip to Compressor, choose the ProRes 422 24p and then choose reverse telecine From the de-interlace dropdown menu located in the frame controls tab of the inspector. If you want you can also change the size and pixel aspect ratio in geometry. It looked great outputted as a 1920 x 1080 square pixel movie.
i tested this by intentionally starting on the wrong frame for the cadence and compressor didnt care at all. One less step for real 24p.:thumbup:
I did not have time to test this with a long clip that has a start stop break in the middle, but i will repost later after i had a chance to.
 
Great news Aldous. Thanks for sharing. I was on the fence about purchasing final cut studio 2, but now I will proceed. Question. What is the workflow you used to initially capture the footage from your canon hv 20. Did you capture in final cut first then use compressor 3 to remove the pulldown, etc.? If you could provide a quick step by step it would be really useful. There are so many threads floating around about this topic but really none using the FCS 2 since it just came out. Thanks again.
 
The workflow for the HV20 is really easy.

1 Shoot 24p with the HV20

2 Capture to Final Cut Pro using HDV out through the firewire

3 When all of the clips are in the bin you can export them straight to compressor.

4 In compressor i choose the preset for Apple ProRes 422 for progresive material HQ and leave all options on default except i enable the reverse telecine option.

5 Choose the output for the file or files and submit the batch for processing.

6 Re Import footage into Final Cut.

The revamp of compressor looks a lot different than the previous version, finding the preset and reverse telecine option may take a second. in the main window right click on the clip choose
new target with setting - Apple - Other Workflows - Advanced Format Conversions - Apple Codecs - ProRes 422 for progresive material HQ
Once You choose the output setting, if you double click the setting on the clip, an inspector window opens. There is a tab called Frame Controls, under that tab enable changes by clicking on the button. This will allow you to choose On in the field marked frame controls then toward the bottom there is a field marked deinterlace, there just choose Reverse Telecine from the dropdown menu.
Next Choose Save As down at the bottom. and next time all you have to do is load your custom preset.

I know this sounds confusing without pictures of the interface, but it is actually very easy once you get orientated with the new layout of compressor.
Although I have not tested anything more sophisticated I'm sure with automator you could do entire folders of media real quick.

I hope this helps.
 
One More Thing I forgot to mention.
When you capture clips using log and capture, every time a cadence is broken a new clip is created. i' not sure if this is the same as the previous version since I bought my HV20 after my buddy already had FCS2. i just used DV before with FCS1.
 
Capture settings

Capture settings

Do you initially capture your clips using Easy Setup 1080p60i or something other than that?:huh: Once you process the clips in Compressor 3 and save them, what preset do you then use to import them into FCP?
 
Yeah 1080 60i on import, but don't worry i had FCP setup for DV and it automatically detected HDV Coming out of the camcorder, and recorded it at 1080 60i HDV automatically. Then when i imported the footage back into Final Cut, I didn't worry about Easy Setups or presets. The first clip you drop into the timeline changes the timeline to match the clip this is a new feature in Final Cut 6. So don't worry about any settings except for Compressor. it is really easy i know My outlined steps look simplified but they are not, the new final cut really makes it easy.
 
Aldous - That's a super-helpful outline. Thanks for posting it.
To help clarify for others who might be working through it for the first time, you need to enable "frame controls" in compressor to get access to the "reverse telecine" option. It's also a good idea to just duplicate the ProRes HQ preset, then modify it and save it as "HV20 - ProRes 24p" or something a little more specific.
 
Yes - FCP v1 also breaks the clips automatically between shots. But i didn't laydown a timecode on the HDV tape before shooting. My guess is that if you do, then it won't separate the clips.
 
Did FCP2 automatically capture from the HV20 at 1920x1080? or did it come in at 1440x1080? I'm trying to figure out the settings for FCP1 to capture at 1920x1080. I know that the info is on the HDV tape, because when i direct connect via HDMI to a TV and playback from the camera, the image is 1920x1080.
 
HDV is recorded at 1440 by 1080, when it is outputted through the HDMI The pixels are basically stretched to show an image. This works because the pixels recorded into the 1080 HDV standard are not square pixels. There are not to many HD Cameras out there that shoot Full Frame 1920 by 1080. Even the really expensive sony HDCAM does not shoot square pixels to tape. So don't worry to much about the non square pixels.

Hope This helps
 
Does this mean that i can stretch the pixels (make them square) and use it as a B-roll to match it with real HD footage? End of the day, i want to create 1920x1080 content.
 
What real HD footage are you referring to? If you are editing multiple types of footage together, the best course of action is to encode all the footage into the same codec with the same frame rate and frame size. As i said before, even high end cinealta camera don't record down to 1920 by 1080, unless it is an sr version which records directly to hard disk and not tape.
Give me a little more info on what all of your source material is, format, frame rate. I also need to know what tools you use, such as are you planning on picking up FCS2 and how fast are your disks. When you mix media in any system there are a million ways to get the footage to look coherent. It is all dependent on what your output medium is, what type of media your source is and what editing system you are using
I'll be happy to help with your workflow issues. If you simply want to edit everything in 1920 then use compressor to encode the video to that size, but if all your footage is from the HV20 or any other HDV camera it is not worth it. Just edit using 1440 and output your final cut to whatever medium you want.
 
So I have a timeline with 1440by1080 23.98 Xh-A1 footage. My second camera was the HV20. I exported the HV20 footage to compressor to transcode to ProRes22 and changed it to 24 fps and selected reverse telecine.

When I put them on the timeline together, the audio from the HV20 goes off track like 10 minutes after the sequence starts. Is this because the Xh-A1 is 23.98 and the HV20 is 24 fps? Do I need to "write-in" 23.976 in the ProRes settings in Compressor when transcoding?
 
So it's fixed. Having one camera with 23.976 and one with 24 throws off the audio eventually. In compressor, choosing 23.976 for the HV20 footage was crucial if the other cams footage is 23.976. 24 is no good.
 
When capturing from HV20 into FCP there is an option of 1080i60 or 1080P24. Isn't it better to import as 1080P24 rather than 60i?
 
Is there a reason for using ProRes 422 over say AIC?
I only have footage from a HV20 and wonder what is the best codec to use for editing?
AIC is 4 times bigger than HDV, but is not an interframe compressor. How much bigger is ProRes 422 and is it worth it?
 
Thanks Aldous and all for the info. Could anyone provide the specs for their Mac setup? I am about to get a new Mac, and I would prefer to get a Mac Book Pro, not a Mac Pro. But I just read on the Apple site: "Capturing HD resolution video using the ProRes 422 format requires a Mac Pro with an Intel Xeon processor and a qualified third-party capture card." Does this mean that although I can't capture in ProRes 422 using a laptop, I can still edit in ProRes 422, as described by Aldous' first posts about workflow? Is anyone successfully capturing HDV footage from their HV20, doing the 422 conversion/reverse telecine, editing in ProRes 422 + 24fps timeline, and dumping to 16:9 letterbox SD DVD using a Mac Book Pro? This is what I want to do...

thanks for any help,

-Nate
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top