How do I transcode long clips?

A

AlexD

Active member
I'm using FCP directly to my WD passport. I'm transcoding an interview clip that is 15 minutes long. Naturally, this clip will end up being over 4gb with my usual prores transfer, and that won't fit on an external. How do I do this? Is there some setting I need to do?

Thanks

-Alex
 
you're gonna need a bigger hard drive. you can also switch it to transcode to apple intermediate codec, that will cut the size down a good bit.
 
I have plenty of space. Its just that macs only work with FAT32 settings and that doesn't let you have files larger than 4gb. I also tried the aic transcode and its still really big.
 
Macs only work with FAT32? Are you sure?

I'm pretty sure there's another file system format, called HFS I think, which is a Mac-only type that should fit files larger than 4GB. If your hard drive is FAT32 then you'll need to backup it's contents and reformat it. And of course, that drive won't be readable by Windows machines.
 
ahh so your WD passport drive is FAT32 formatted. yeah, thats not gonna work.

FAT32 is actually i think a DOS file format system, but macs can read/write to it where the other PC format macs can only read to it.

like tigerFX said, you're going to need to backup that drive's contents and then reformat it using your macs disk utility and change it to mac os x journaled, which has no file size limitation.
 
I think the camera records to sd cards that are formatted in fat 32, so the 4 gig file limit will apply regardless what hard drive, computer, or editor you are using.
 
Yes, reformat the drive as "Mac OS Extended" (also known as HFS+), and you'll be free of file size limits. This has the downside of making the external drive incompatible with Windows systems, if your workflow involves sharing the drive. But this is much easier and cleaner if you do everything on Macs.

If you need to work with both Windows and Mac systems, leave the drive formatted to FAT32, and find the checkbox (I think in System Settings in FCP?) that limits maximum file size, and set it to 4GB. FCP will then do what Windows does... write each big file as a bunch of file segments less than 4GB, and a file that references them all (IIRC, they'll be named something like "MyMovie.mov, MyMovie.av-1, MyMovie.av-2, MyMovie.av-3" where MyMovie.mov references all the other files... so that, in effect, you can just open, close, edit, MyMovie.mov as if it were a giant >4GB file.

-BArry
 
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