Vegas over FCP?
- Thread starter NO CA$H
- Start date
NO CA$H
Veteran
John_Hudson said:
I have a PC. I'm editing my zombie film on FCP HD(not my computer) right now and I really don't like it. I've used vegas 4 before and really liked it. I've just never edited any 24p before now. I don't feel like buying a mac just so I can have the "Industry Standard" editing software so I'm gunna buy vegas 6 + DVD.
J.R. Hudson
Spirit Animal
Word. Jump Suits and Nikes are in the mail.
Just don't tell Ulanta.
(Oh relax; I'm just kidding man)
Just don't tell Ulanta.
(Oh relax; I'm just kidding man)
ullanta
Veteran
Jubal28 said:
Aaargh! I feel like I (and others) have answered this 10 times in this very thread.
1) FCP can insert standard, advanced, and crappy pulldown. Everyone who uses FCP for 24p uses it every day, it's the only way to output to an NTSC monitor from the timeline. THE GUY GRAEME IS RESPONDING TO IN THAT POST HAS AN UNDERSPEC'ED COMPUTER, and so he needs to use the crappy pulldown when playing back from the timeline. I don't know how vegas performs on an old 800 MHz laptop, and I'm not sure exactly what that dude's issues are - I struggled with a slower laptop for a while and was able to do 24p with normal pulldown - but that's it. FCP adds pulldown for playback and print to tape. I'll say it again: FCP adds pulldown for playback and print to tape. I mean really, do you think anyone would use it if it didn't? What kinda idiots do you think we are? (I'm wide open, hit me, baby!)
2) FCP can indeed render a DV file as 60i with pulldown, for removal later. Standard - yes! advanced - yes! crappy - yes!
3) What it doesn't do is let you RENDER the pulldown in the timeline. It's not an issue on even a 1/4way decent system. Macs tend to have longer useful lives than PCs, and thus more issuers come up about newer, more demanding software and applications on older machines.
However, from what you describe, Vegas is constantly pulling down, pushing up, converting framerates... so, in a typical project, I'd imagine Vegas is converting framerates about 30-40 times more than FCP (everytime you do anything), while FCP is doing it once on ingest and once on output. Thus, FCP seems to maximize resources available for RT effects, while Vegas maximizes convenience of mix'n'match clip formats. BUT FCP CAN DO THE SAME THING. Be assured. It is NOT a limited platform for 24p - it is a full-featured one. Compared to Vegas, it has trade-offs... but these are true tradeoffs - better in some ways, worse in others - but none of the tradeoffs are major or limiting in the ways you seem to think.
Before I forget - FCP adds pulldown when playing back from the timeline, and cas export DV files with pulldown.
Your pulldown scheme is chosen at the time of creating the sequence - not when printing to tape or exporting to file like in Vegas.
You can. Your sequence just has to be 29.97 w/ the appropriate pull down. Export as 60i.
Having used both Vegas and FCP, I see where the confusion is coming from. Vegas lets you export/print using different pulldown settings than what your project is setup to use. That's nice because it's flexible, but at the same time you run the risk of choosing the wrong setting and wreaking havoc down the road. Final Cut has the same options, it's just handled at the time of creating the project (rather, sequence). When you export/print to tape, you use the same pulldown settings as the project was created with. It keeps things consistent so you don't inadvertently mess things up later. You can change the sequence by just creating a new one (for the on-the-fly ability like Vegas).
It all does the same thing. Vegas follows the more PC-centric attitude of allowing you to do almost absolutely anything w/o considering of the results. FCP follows the more Mac-centric attitude of allowing you to do what is more appropriate based on what you've done (but you're free to say fuggit if need be).
Hope that helps..
ullanta
Veteran
John_Hudson said:
Who's kidding? That little guy staring at me?
I'm happy with not liking FCP. That's a good reason not to use it. And when the hell did it become the industry standard?
I admit it, I just like the cool box FCP it comes in. Haven't even opened it yet. I stare and stare all day, and drool...
"Run the risk of choosing the wrong setting"? Not sure what that means.
J.R. Hudson
Spirit Animal
I did walk into an APPLE a few months ago and played with some G5's and FCP and admit it was kind of arousing.
ullanta said:
I think you're responding to a different point than I'm making.
Yeah, I get that; I understand that to play a 24p file from the timeline to a preview monitor, pulldown must be inserted. (Really; I'm not a moron! :shocked: ). I in no way thought FCP couldn't do that (see "not a moron," supra).
I mean, nothing that guy's talking about is an issue for me if all I want to do is make a mini-DV copy. I would go to "print to tape," choose my pulldown, and it's done. Slow machine, fast machine, hamsters on a wheel, whatever. The only difference is the time it would take on the processor.
I don't know, either.
Well, GOOD! I would have been damned surprised if it couldn't.
What you're talking about here is a pre-render, right, or a mixdown?
What I'm seeing here -- and again, correct me if I'm wrong -- is that the way FCP prints to tape is to play out the preview and record it? And that's why the guy's got a problem -- his computer is too slow to do it in real time?
And this is where the confusion comes from. I mean, if that's the way FCP does it, then it's a design choice and I'm sure it has its advantages, but holy CRAP, I wouldn't want to be limited to that. It never even occurred to me that a program as robust and well-regard as FCP would have such a limitation, so I didn't even consider it.
Rrrrriiiiight. Gotcha. :thumbsup:
I have no doubt FCP is full-featured, and that it can do those things. But even from everything you're telling me, it doesn't do them nearly as conveniently, which is my whole, entire, ultimate, and complete point.
So, before I forget: If you're working wtih 24p, you want to be working in Vegas. :evil:
ullanta
Veteran
Jubal28 said:
Hmmm... what do you mean by "the preview"? Playing back (sometimes done to tape) from the timeline plays... what's in the timeline. Potentially with crappy effects, but not if you've rendered everything. Printing to tape basically renders everything that must be rendered, adds your colorbars and whatnot, and basically cuts off all other processing to decicate everything to the output to tape. How else would ya do it? I don't do much with the low-quality-preview-for-later-ingest-of-full-quality-video-for-final-output stuff, so I'm not sure if the print to tape setting assembles the full quality version or if you have to push some other button for that... but in general, I think print to tape does about the rightest thing that can be done....?
But yeah, his problem is that his computer's too slow to handle one of these processes in real time. Or maybe he has 36 apps open, or has the laptop in battery conserving mode. He is a Mac user, after all, so who knows what the hell freaky stuff he may be doing?
Again, I really don't understand this... what's "the preview", and what's the limitation? Print to tape prints "the finished product".
OK, I'll concede, big time. Vegas is probably much better for giving a presentation on the topic of converting 60i to 24p and showing the differences between the two.
But FCP is just as good (or better) at doing something useful. And I certainly won't concede that 60i is "native 24p"!
ullanta said:
Then I don't get what the "limitation" is that Graeme's talking about. If it works in Vegas, it works for any speed computer can run the program. It might work more slowly, but it works. Any pulldown. Anything.
And to test it, I installed Vegas 4 (you know, the version which did both 24p and HD before FCP?) on a PII 450MHz laptop running Windows 98. It was slow, but it worked.
And again, that being the case, what difference does it make how old the computer is?
Obviously, there's some kind of limitation here, enough of one to send the poor guy into After Effects to work around it. All I'm trying to do is figure out what it is.
You do understand the concept of "example," right?
But, ya know, it's funny; the 200 (or so) people at the NAB Post|Production conference who watched the presentation sure thought it was "useful," including an a pretty good number of FCP users. Don't presume to tell me which of my projects are worthwile and which aren't.
And I certainly won't concede that 60i is "native 24p"!
OK, dude -- you send me one of your 24p captured files ('coz we wouldn't want you think I'm cheating, right, even though I'm perfectly capable of making one myself in Vegas. . . and hey, how's that WM9 export going?), and I'll edit you something right pretty with it, in -- yes -- native 24p.
Apple-flavored Kool-Aid is apparently potent stuff.
I don't know what everyone is freaking about about in regards to doing 24P in FCP. I captured, edited and burned a 24p DVD the first night I had my DVX100, and I had never used FCP, DVD Studio or the DVX100 before.
The only reason I selected FCP is because I already had a Mac for Pro Tools.
The only reason I selected FCP is because I already had a Mac for Pro Tools.
Daniel_Runyon
Well-known member
Say, purely for curiosity's sake, how does one go about making a simple crossfade in FCP? Step by step, please. :thumbsup:
ullanta
Veteran
Daniel_Runyon said:
Really? There's about 43 ways....
1) Drag from effects list thing onto the edit.
2) Use a keystroke (there are various...)
3) Specify a default crossfade for edits and have it placed on edits automatically
.....
plenty of other ways....
when dragging, where you drop determines if the edit is the beginning, end, or center of the fade; you can change it later.
you can drag the edit ends to change its length, or enter numerically in a few different ways
you can drag the fade (or any other transitions) around with the edit using roll tools,
etc.
I could go on... I don't know what other people do; I have a variety of keystrokes set up as variously-configured fades; I use those, or just drag one on.
Why do you ask?
ullanta said:
There's no other way to record to tape BUT in real-time; the "slowness" is in the render of the effects, etc.. You're saying that FCP, as soon as you press "go," renders the effects and records to tape in real time? As in, you have a 25-minute program, you press "go," and 25 minutes later, the tape is done?
I doubt it. You say yourself it needs to render first.
Which, apparently, doesn't give you the option of certain pulldown schemes if your computer is too slow. There is no such limitation in Vegas.
ullanta
Veteran
Jubal28 said:
Print to tape does not write and then render a new single file... it's still using bits of original material and grabbing pieces from the render bin, audio files, etc, as appropriate. So for complex projects with lots of edits, there can indeed be a strain on different aspects of the system.
Again, I don't imagine Vegas does anything different... if your machine is too slow to handle the print to tape this way, then you can do a non-realtime output to a single file, then print that to tape. Then it's just closer to a straight data copy, reducing processing load.
ullanta
Veteran
Anyway, can you give me on details of Vegas's subtitle support? That sounds like it may be a compelling feature for me. Specifically, if anyone knows... let's say you subtitle, say, a 3-hour opera performance, then need to do the next day's show... can you walk me through copying the titles over, then adjusting them. What export/import formats does it support? And how does it handle multi-language subs?
FCP doesn't handle subtitles; DVD Studio Pro does, but does not export subtitles and does not allow moving groups of subtitles... so the process takes longer than I'd like....
(For anyone interested, after much searching around, the best process I found was to use a nice spreadsheet template to enter subtitles and rough times, which calculates proper inter-title distance and such, and groups multi-language titles, which spits out an .stl file that i can then import into DVDSP for final tuning. It's a perfect one-show solution (allows a single-past insertion of an entire libretto, etc.), and better for shifting groups of titles than DVDSP... but I'd rather do the adjustment to the second show as a timeline-only operation in DVDSP if only I didn't have to move them one by one...
FCP doesn't handle subtitles; DVD Studio Pro does, but does not export subtitles and does not allow moving groups of subtitles... so the process takes longer than I'd like....
(For anyone interested, after much searching around, the best process I found was to use a nice spreadsheet template to enter subtitles and rough times, which calculates proper inter-title distance and such, and groups multi-language titles, which spits out an .stl file that i can then import into DVDSP for final tuning. It's a perfect one-show solution (allows a single-past insertion of an entire libretto, etc.), and better for shifting groups of titles than DVDSP... but I'd rather do the adjustment to the second show as a timeline-only operation in DVDSP if only I didn't have to move them one by one...
ullanta said:
I didn't say it does. I'm just fascinated by this inability of older machines to use 2:3 or 2:3:3:2 pulldown.