HDV vs. M2T vs. AIC

M

Mirezzi

Well-known member
Can somebody who's smarter than me (go ahead everybody, raise your hand) give me a quick primer on these codecs.

People are always saying that FCP doesn't support M2T, but what is the benefit of M2T?

FCP supports HDV, right? Mainly, I'm looking for the difference between HDV and M2T. I understand how AIC plays into things...okay maybe I don't understand that either.

If somebody has a link to where this is explained, that'll suffice, too.

Thanks in advance!
 
M2T is the MPEG-2 Transport Stream files that are created when you capture an HDV stream on a PC.

FCP doesn't use M2Ts. It captures HDV data but it captures it into Quicktime MOVs.

AIC is the Apple Intermediate Codec. Editing HDV is extraordinarily processor-intensive, so you have the option of transcoding your HDV files into the very edit-friendly AIC codec instead.
 
Barry_Green said:
FCP doesn't use M2Ts. It captures HDV data but it captures it into Quicktime MOVs.
Click to expand...

Thanks, Barry...this is the part I least understand. I mean, what is the advantage of capturing using M2T versus Quicktime MOV?
 
M2T is native the native HDV format. Going to Quicktime basically means a conversion. In general any kind of conversion means a loss of quality, but I dont know if thats the case with FCP.
 
Quicktime is a different file format. FCP is still capturing native MPEG-2 transport stream data, just capturing it into a Quicktime file. What it does is make FCP incompatible with all the PC editors out there, all of which use the .m2t file format.

Traditionally there's been some cross-compatibility between editors, most PC editors can edit Quicktime files and FCP has allowed PC-based .AVI files. Recent developments have kind of isolated FCP; it is the only editor that can't use native MXF files from the HVX (all major PC editors can, either natively or through RayLight); the FCP Quicktime DVCPRO-HD files can't be played on the PC version of Quicktime, and FCP won't recognize .m2t files which are the standard that all PCs use to edit HDV data.

A bad trend, I say. FCP is becoming more isolationist. There is no inherent advantage that I can think of towards FCP putting the HDV data in a Quicktime wrapper, but it makes it proprietary.
 
I agree, it is a bit of a bad trend. That said, FCP is one of the only NLE's currently that can output a 24F HDV native edit (HDV 1080 24p) back to tape. So you can transcode to any intermediate you like after locking down an edit, and just for safety you can "conform to HDV" and print the 24F edit back to tape.
 
Also, if you use a FireStore and FCP, you'll have to convert your clips to Quicktime MPEG-2's, as the FireStore FS-4 saves clips as m2t's.
 
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