Using the Kona Io HD box with FCP

R

rc444

Well-known member
Has anyone here used the Kona Io HD box with FCP before?

What are your experiences of using it compared to capturing stuff conventionally, i.e. just through firewire?

I'm thinking of getting a Canon XH-A1 and FCP Studio 2. If I digitise footage from the A1 via the Kona box into FCP, you'd be captured footage in an HDV format at the source to begin with, (i.e. the original footage would already be compressed) so would using the Kona make any real difference in this situation?

Or, is the Kona box only effective if you're capturing footage LIVE by bypassing the HDV circuitry in the first place, i.e. through HD-SDI. I know the XH-G1 has the capability to do this.

Is it worth getting the Kona box if you're camera is just HDV or doesn't have HD-SDI???
 
The io HD is most effective if you are capturing an HD source that doesn't use FW (such as HDCAM) onto a pre-intel Mac (which can't capture ProRes on the fly) or a laptop or iMac (which can't take an internal I/O card). If you already have a Mac Pro then getting an internal I/O card will be just as effective, yet less expensive, solution.

If you have an intel Mac you can capture via FW and have the machine convert the HDV into ProRes (albeit slower than real time). You can also transcode your HDV footage into ProRes (although that would take a lot of time). FCP 6 lets you set ProRes as your render codec when working w/HDV or XDCAM HD and that's pretty much the best of both worlds (HDV sized source files but ProRes compression and color space for your renders).

If you are mastering back to HDV then there's no reason to work in any other codec. If you want to capture live from a camera then the Blackmagic Intensity card is a much cheaper alternative to the io HD assuming the camera has HDMI.


-A
 
As an aside, if HDCAM doesn't use FW, what does it use???

I'm still a bit confused by all of this. I guess what I'm saying is, I'm thinking of getting an HDV camera and the latest Powerbook.

I don't understand why io HD would give a better picture if you used an HDV camera, because HDV camera's inherently compress things inside them anyway before anything comes out of the camera.

My question is, is buying io HD going to give me a better quality picture with HDV at the end of the day???
 
It depends on what your final output will be. If you are just mastering back to HDV, then no. If you are going to something that isn't as compressed, it will be more forgiving when doing things like color grading/compositing/motion graphics.
 
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