What are you guys using to edit Af100 footage?

Premiere CS5 on my cheap OLD lap top cuts like butter (windows 7 64bit). I am just in awe how well CS5 does with AVCHD. I may never use my Xenon workstation again (okay, maybe just for After Effects)
 
Hi Taras,

I just got my AF100 two weeks ago, but I've been cutting on Premiere since the pre-pro days. CS5 (with proper hardware) cuts everything I've thrown at it without a hiccup. It's been stated before, but the best things about PP CS5 are performance and integration. I can easily stack four or five layers of AVCCAM, two or three layers of graphics (Photoshop, TIFF sequences, etc) and six or seven audio tracks... and still get realtime playback. On top of that, I can send clips from the timeline to After Effects for color correction, motion graphics or effects and then bring them back into Premiere without rendering (soon, with CS5.5 you'll be able to do this with multitrack audio with Adobe Audition).

In the end though, any NLE you choose is just a tool. If you can, try as many of them as you can before making a purchasing decision. AFAIK, they all have free trials that you can download and run for 30 days.

Here are the common specs for the workstations I currently use at home and at work:

Adobe Production Premium CS5 Suite
Dual quad core 2.66 Xeon
24 GB of RAM
NVidia Quadro FX 3800
Windows 7 Professional Edition 64bit
300 GB RAID 10 array (system drive - OS and programs)
4 Terabyte external RAID 0 array connected via eSATA (work drive)
 
I watched this Adobe CS 5.5 Production Premium Feature Tour video [43:38] with Jason Levine, and must admit that this point release is very interesting. More features, better integration/commonality, better performance, and new member programs (i.e., Audition and Story) are certainly worth the upgrade for me. I sense that this point release aims at making users' life easier and saving time. It took Adobe (only) 20 years to get this far, and the product has become very impressive indeed.
 
I finally bought CS5.5, because I didn't own CS5 yet. Has anyone heard about when the preorder will ship? I will probably be getting Final Cut X too, as long as the it gets solid reviews. As it stands, I am still cutting most stuff on Final Cut Studio. I just got a new generation macbook pro, and I will be installing software on it as stuff gets released.
 
blackcat said:
I finally bought CS5.5, because I didn't own CS5 yet. Has anyone heard about when the preorder will ship? I will probably be getting Final Cut X too, as long as the it gets solid reviews. As it stands, I am still cutting most stuff on Final Cut Studio. I just got a new generation macbook pro, and I will be installing software on it as stuff gets released.
Click to expand...

I think the ship date is May 20th (or something like that).
 
My computer specs are:

Laptop:

ASUSTeK Computer Inc.
Model U36JC
8,00 GB RAM
64-bitars op
2.67ghz i5
Geforce 320m

Works like a charm!

Workstation:

Asus Sabertooth x58
intel i7 3.6ghz hexa core
Geforce GTX 470 with Zalman cooling
24gb ram

Never gives me problems :) (works so good with 3DS MAX 2012 also)
 
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I cut mostly on FCP because i love the way it works with Soundtrack pro and I like that as well....but I've always hated Motion for some reason and really like AE much better for green screen composting and just a ton of other stuff plus the amount of free tutorials out on the net is crazy.

So after reading how many people seem to love Premiere CS5 (I never liked the earlier versions) especially when editing footage from the AF100, I went ahead and upgraded. I haven't used it yet because my camera just came the other day and still waiting for my adapter plus lenses, but the fact that you can apparently switch between Premiere and AE back and forth without rendering has me excited to work on my next project.

Can anybody who likes the FCP/Sountrack Pro workflow comment on if they like working with the CS5 workflow better and why? I've had audition and all that for some time but only opened it one time when I first installed it to make sure it worked. If the CS5 stuff is more manageable to work with then I'm thinking of changing my workflow altogether.
 
FilmBoy77 said:
I cut mostly on FCP because i love the way it works with Soundtrack pro and I like that as well....but I've always hated Motion for some reason and really like AE much better for green screen composting and just a ton of other stuff plus the amount of free tutorials out on the net is crazy.

So after reading how many people seem to love Premiere CS5 (I never liked the earlier versions) especially when editing footage from the AF100, I went ahead and upgraded. I haven't used it yet because my camera just came the other day and still waiting for my adapter plus lenses, but the fact that you can apparently switch between Premiere and AE back and forth without rendering has me excited to work on my next project.

Can anybody who likes the FCP/Sountrack Pro workflow comment on if they like working with the CS5 workflow better and why? I've had audition and all that for some time but only opened it one time when I first installed it to make sure it worked. If the CS5 stuff is more manageable to work with then I'm thinking of changing my workflow altogether.
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If you dissliked Premiere pro before you should whait for CS5.5 the after effects and audition is super amped in that version.

Adobe has and will continue to blow the competition in the water.
(Mac will loose the editing battle now that they has allied with ATI instead of Nvidia ho is champion in the graphics industries)
 
Alvasin

Get a better synch shoot workflow and save your self the hassle of fixing it in post is what I suggest.

Whatever you are doing and with whatever hardware is the issue.

Maybe shoot ewith AF100s instead.
 
Alvasin said:
One problem that I have with concert video is getting my external audio recorder to sync up to the video. I usually am doing 3 camera shoots with Canon HG-21 cams while recording stereo audio with a SoundDevices 722. Even when I remember to record in 48k (doh!), after 10-15 minutes the sync is lost in FCP on all cameras.

What can I do to help this? I have tried Plural Eyes and that doesn't seem to help this. My only other option is to keep breaking up my vids into 10 minute segments which isn't always convenient and looks unprofessional.
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What framerate were your cameras running at (DF or NDF)? You may need to set the 722 to .048 to get it to match.
See this link : http://www.sounddevices.com/notes/recorders/file-formats/sr-frame-rate/
jeff
 
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quick question, ive heard people saying i really need ssd drives for editing? However, would it not just be ok to upload and save all my video files on external hard drives as the ssd drives are always really small and a lot more in price!?
 
taras4444 said:
quick question, ive heard people saying i really need ssd drives for editing? However, would it not just be ok to upload and save all my video files on external hard drives as the ssd drives are always really small and a lot more in price!?
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Most people run their intensive applications, like Final Cut or Avid, on the SSD, and they use external drives for the footage and scratch.

You might not need the SSD. They are nice; it depends on what you are doing and your budget.
 
SSD is great for everything provided one has deep pockets. In the real world of limited budgets, SSDs are often used for boot, OS, and applications as these workloads are skewed towards random access and limited/fixed storage size. NLEs, transcoding, and most other media manipulation workloads are typically skewed towards sequential access and large/growing storage size. Note that we're talking about notebooks/desktops/workstations here. Some high-speed modern HDDs are on par with many SSDs when it comes to sequential access patterns while offering significantly lower cost per GB.

This is to say that it makes sense to use an internal SSD for boot/OS/apps, and HDD for media. Be aware, though, that many external USB enclosures may slow data transfer. A better way is to have internal (SATA or SAS) HDDs and, if you must, use DAS, eSATA, FireWire for external storage, or SAN/NAS for group access. Putting media storage on RAID-0/10 has been popular too. In any case, have a solid data backup and disaster recovery strategy.

There are tons of storage reviews at THG, AnandTech, and StorageReview.com. In fact, THG just posted Best SSD For The Money article. You can just skip directly to conclusions. My favorite SSDs are Intel X25-M, Intel 320, Intel 510, OCZ Vertex 2, OCZ Vertex 3, and Crucial m4. My favorite HDDs are WD VelociRaptor, WD RE4, and Seagate. Hope this helps.
 
blackcat said:
Most people run their intensive applications, like Final Cut or Avid, on the SSD, and they use external drives for the footage and scratch.

You might not need the SSD. They are nice; it depends on what you are doing and your budget.
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Yea .. the limited write-cyles and (current) sizes make SSD's impractical for scratch and
render disks (IMHO).

For OS and Apps, they're wicked fast ....

jeff
 
I just noticed several good deals on storage now: newegg.com has Intel 320/510 SSDs 120GB for $225/270, and mcmall.com has top capacity WD VelociRaptor 600GB for $180.
 
Alvasin said:
One problem that I have with concert video is getting my external audio recorder to sync up to the video. I usually am doing 3 camera shoots with Canon HG-21 cams while recording stereo audio with a SoundDevices 722. Even when I remember to record in 48k (doh!), after 10-15 minutes the sync is lost in FCP on all cameras.

What can I do to help this? I have tried Plural Eyes and that doesn't seem to help this. My only other option is to keep breaking up my vids into 10 minute segments which isn't always convenient and looks unprofessional.
Click to expand...

I don't know about the Canon cameras... i have three Panny cameras (HVX, HMC, DVX) that I sync daily with 744t and/or ProTools audio, and the drift between them is on the order of 1 frame an hour. As said, check the settings for the recorder and camera to make sure they match. However, some equipment is slightly off (like all the Zoom recorders) and make syncing problematic. But rather than breaking up your video, you can usually find a place to sneak in an audio edit that lets you cut or add a frame's worth of audio to smooth over a re-sync point.
 
Take it from someone who has used almost every NLE on the market today.... If you are cutting AVCHD, Premire Pro CS 5 is hands down the best way. There is simply no competition. I can cut something in CS5 in less than half the time it would take on other NLE's. The Mercury Engine still makes me giddy when I can drop 6 layers of effects on top of native AVCHD and still have it play back in real time and intergratiion with AE is just gravey. No contest... if you don't believe me go see a demo or download it and take for a test drive. Not sure what to make of the new FCP yet but I'll give it a whirl when it comes out in June.
 
I've had a great experience with Sony vegas Pro 10 - downloaded the trial, and played around with cutting AVCHD files - amazing. You owe yourself to give it a whirl www.[B]sony[/B]creativesoftware.com/download/trials/vegaspro

It comes bundled with a stabiliser plugin which I found useful. AVCHD files are all drop to the timeline and edit. I used the 64 bit version - it is FAST
 
ullanta said:
I don't know about the Canon cameras... i have three Panny cameras (HVX, HMC, DVX) that I sync daily with 744t and/or ProTools audio, and the drift between them is on the order of 1 frame an hour. As said, check the settings for the recorder and camera to make sure they match. However, some equipment is slightly off (like all the Zoom recorders) and make syncing problematic. But rather than breaking up your video, you can usually find a place to sneak in an audio edit that lets you cut or add a frame's worth of audio to smooth over a re-sync point.
Click to expand...

Depending on your framerate and settings, you may have to alter the sample rate of your
field recorder to get things to match up (aka pull-up, pull-down). That's why pro
field recorders have the odd sample rates (48.048, etc).

The best way to avoid the problem is to use a TC generator (Denecke etc) that emit both
a TC line and a word-clock line. The TC's go to your cameras, and the wordclock goes to
your field recorder(s). Setting the TC generator to the spec'd framerate (and DF vs. NDF), setting
your cameras to those same settings will make sure everything lines up. There won't be
any surprises in post.

You can (kind of) fix this in post (like in FCP setting the speed on the audio to 99.9%, for example)
.. but they will eventually fall out of sync for long running clips.

If you can get an LTC line too, then you can sync your field recorder's time so the BWF's are time-coded
as well ... another big help.
jeff
 
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