FS100 - what setting is best: P2, P2N, QT, QTPN?

J

just2frames

New member
1. Does any know what setting gives the best quality and is there a difference in size of files?

2. What is the difference in the P2 and P2native or QT and QTnative?

:dankk2:
 
If you're editing on a Mac, use the QT or QT PN mode. If editing using Raylight, or EDIUS or Avid, use the P2 or P2 PN mode.

P2 PN and QT PN can give you twice as much (or 2.5 times as much) recording space on your firestore. But the limitation is, it only does so for 24 fps/25 fps/30 fps. No other frame rates are supported; it'll default to regular QT or P2 mode if you set any other frame rate. And you won't get any audio playback if you try to play your clips back from the FireStore. You'll get audio when you import it into your NLE, but not when playing back from the FS-100.
 
Firestore still has not released their firmware fix (3.1). If you are using 3.0 it will still be buggy in the PN modes on SOME NLEs.

MAKE SURE you test out your workflow completely before you commit a whole shoot to it.
 
Also keep in mind that when editing in FCP, the P2 formats will allow you to span clips while QT will create individual movies of 2:16 each. Having said that, you can seemless drop all of those clips in a sequence and create a nest to handle them as one clip. Some people have had problems importing/rewrapping MXF files into FCP but that is pretty much solved with FCP 5.1.4. I'm looking forward to Raylight for Mac to be able to work natively in MXF's but I also must say that I am not terribly troubled over the QT re-wrap. It just is not that big a deal to me.

Ned Soltz
 
Barry_Green said:
If you're editing on a Mac, use the QT or QT PN mode. If editing using Raylight, or EDIUS or Avid, use the P2 or P2 PN mode.

P2 PN and QT PN can give you twice as much (or 2.5 times as much) recording space on your firestore. But the limitation is, it only does so for 24 fps/25 fps/30 fps. No other frame rates are supported; it'll default to regular QT or P2 mode if you set any other frame rate. And you won't get any audio playback if you try to play your clips back from the FireStore. You'll get audio when you import it into your NLE, but not when playing back from the FS-100.
Click to expand...
I appreciate all the feedback

1. is there a reason you say use QT on Mac vs. the P2? Is it simply for the drag and drop versus using the P2 import function?

2. I'm shooting a sports documentary (lots of slow motion)...When I use the P2n formats I can shoot 24fps as well as slo mo and use the frame converter, but in the QT and QTpn formats I can do the slo mo conversion but my 24fps comes in at 30 and I'd like to edit the entire project at 24p. SO, I guess I'm gonna shoot everything in P2N mode unless you can recommend a trick to change my QT back to 24p??
 
You cannot over/undercrank using the native modes in the FS-100. You would need to shoot in a 720 format (at whatever rate, 24 or 60), do your over/undercrank and record to the FS-100 in non-native, which would be just P2 or QT. That footage would then go into FCP and you would use the framerate converter to strip the duplicate frames and achieve your speed effect.

Ned
 
thanks

thanks

Ned,

thanks man (and everyone else) - that makes sense. I just couldn't get my head around the logic of the 4 different formats (P2, QT, native and non-native)...especially when the FS100 was recording them a little differently.

I think I'm figuring it out. God bless.
 
I am having trouble importing clips from the fs-100. When importing the clips into final cut pro, some of the clips, usually the spanned clips give an error (a red ! pops up beside the clips). It imports other clips recorded at the same time with the same settings, but the spanned clips just won't work, they play fine from the drive itself. I tried copying the files to my hd using the same file structure, final cut recognizes them and I can play them, but still can't import them.
I'm shooting a movie and the clips are very important to me, and can't be re-shot, please can someone help?
PS. I've read about a MXF converter from Focus Enhancements, but it only mentions converting to any DV format, nothing about DVCPRO HD, Is this so?
 
Belzee--

Which version of FCP? We have seen some import issues (and I have seen them personally) in FCP 5.1.2. No problem in 5.1.1 because it does not span clips and it seems to be fixed in 5.1.4.

Also, which version of your FS-100 firmware.

I spoke briefly with an Apple engineer who was in the Panny booth and who was one of the leads in the P2 area. He claims that the problem occurs because of a change in the way Focus handled spanning between clips. "We wrote 5.1.2 with one firmware in mind and then Focus did something else." He says that 5.1.4 fixes it and "we have some other enhancements coming in FCP 6).

You might want to take this to a new thread since it is OT. I'm not a mod here so I can't move it; if I were a mod I would have moved this to new thread.

Ned Soltz
 
I am running FCP 5.1.4 and the Firestore is running on version 3.0.0 It imports some of the spanned clips, but most of them it won't. I even tried copying the files back to a P2 card and re-importing. Maybe I should try importing from an older version of FCP.
I have 5.0 running on my machine as well and it sees the files as seperate 4:56min clips, but 5.0 can't import p2. So I'm going to give it a try on a machine running 5.1 and see what happens.
ps where is the best thread for this topic?
 
nsoltz said:
You cannot over/undercrank using the native modes in the FS-100. You would need to shoot in a 720 format (at whatever rate, 24 or 60), do your over/undercrank and record to the FS-100 in non-native, which would be just P2 or QT. That footage would then go into FCP and you would use the framerate converter to strip the duplicate frames and achieve your speed effect.

Ned
Click to expand...

How do you do this with Avid instead of FCP?
 
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