Okay, I have read through the forums and no one seems to have a clear troubleshoot on how to fix the log and transfer issues with the HMC150. People have said to reboot till it works, others say use toast, but toast has an issue with the audio being out of sync and the frame drop issue happens. Others say it possibly might be a faulty SD card. I have the latest version of FCP 7.0, and the issue still remains. It cannot seem to recognize the .mts files. It is getting really frustrating. I am scared to take on more work cause I dont want to keep running into this issue. Sometimes it works and recognizes it, and other times it doesn't. Can someone help that has gone through this mess like me. thx!
What is the reason for log and transfer issues with .mts files
- Thread starter jcofilms
- Start date
My theory doesn't include the use of FCP. The fact of the matter is that FCP has an antiquated way of dealing with AVCHD. Its more the NLE"S fault that you have these issues. My meaning when I said switch to a PC would solve all your issues is in fact a step forward. PC's have a myriad of software options now for AVCHD editing, Apples implementation of AVCHD softwares is lame and not well supported.
There are however, lots of folk succesfully editing with FCP on Apple systems, just not as streamlined as a PC would do it.
There are however, lots of folk succesfully editing with FCP on Apple systems, just not as streamlined as a PC would do it.
FCP reads the metadata files present in the file system of the card in order to know what clips should and should not be there - instead of randomly taking any file that ends in .mts. This is slightly safer than try to render files that are not true .mts files but has the down side of needing the meta data in the right file, and in the right position within the file system.
If you copy the entire file system to your HDD and not just the mts files then you should have no problem ingesting the files later on. The extra files / file system takes up a tiny amount of room compared to the raw footage.
If all you have are the .mts files then you can use other software such as Cineform to convert them for you.
I'm using the 151 with FCP and don't see why people are struggling. I put the card in the reader, tell FCP to log and transfer, drag and drop the files I want and within a few seconds I'm done. Everything is inside FCP and ready to rock.
So, when you put the card in the reader (I assume you are doing this for now), does the file system appear in Finder? If you are connecting the camera via USB I recommend you buy a card reader instead.
Can you browse the card to all the files and see them in Finder? If you can't see the files on the card in Finder then FCP can't see them either.
If you copy the entire card to the hard disk (drag the 'Private' folder and all it's contents and put them in a sub folder somewhere), can you browser to that sub folder in FCP and have it see the clips now?
Are you formatting the card or erasing clips individually?
Does it happen on more than one card or just one?
If you copy the entire file system to your HDD and not just the mts files then you should have no problem ingesting the files later on. The extra files / file system takes up a tiny amount of room compared to the raw footage.
If all you have are the .mts files then you can use other software such as Cineform to convert them for you.
I'm using the 151 with FCP and don't see why people are struggling. I put the card in the reader, tell FCP to log and transfer, drag and drop the files I want and within a few seconds I'm done. Everything is inside FCP and ready to rock.
So, when you put the card in the reader (I assume you are doing this for now), does the file system appear in Finder? If you are connecting the camera via USB I recommend you buy a card reader instead.
Can you browse the card to all the files and see them in Finder? If you can't see the files on the card in Finder then FCP can't see them either.
If you copy the entire card to the hard disk (drag the 'Private' folder and all it's contents and put them in a sub folder somewhere), can you browser to that sub folder in FCP and have it see the clips now?
Are you formatting the card or erasing clips individually?
Does it happen on more than one card or just one?
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Based upon what set of factors?
Many prefer transcoding to pro res or pro res HQ or pro res 444.
I know I do.
I've been transcoding AVCHD files for well over a year, first with a 150 and now with a 40.
Never had an issue.
Some do, but I believe it's best to troubleshoot why than claim this approach is antiquated and recommend spending a bunch of money changing hardware and editing app.
Preferring to do something and being forced to do something are different things. Most PC-based NLEs do not force you do save full AVCHD directory structure, except for Panasonic's own HD Writer, which not only needs full directory structure, it accepts it only from either an SD card or a DVD, you cannot point to a directory on your HDD! But HD Writer is utter crap and I would bother using it at all.
What do you mean "not true MTS files"? Every decent application that works with files analyzes file structure, not just reads files by extension. MTS files have specific structure which is not hard to read and validate. If FCP does not do that, relying instead on some extra files -- which can be faked too -- then this is one more lame design decision that Apple has made.
I don't think you quite took what I meant in the way I meant it.
Of course software validates the files - I have no doubt about that - but I'd rather it not even look for files that aren't supposed to be there. I am sure many people have taken [ choose you file type ] and renamed it to [ choose another file type ] and hoped it would work
If you don't like the way FCP does things - don't use FCP. There are plenty of other options. OTOH I don't like the way AVID, Vegas, Premiere and a few other programs work, and just because they can edit AVCHD instead of transcoding it first is not going to make me change from software I like to software I don't like for many other reasons.
In the end, some people like PCs, some like Macs. Calling something archaic is not going to change that, especially when the so called archaic function actually produces something that is possibly easier to edit.
Now, if we can leave out the crap about which O/S or software may or may not be anyone's personal preference and concentrate on helping some one with a specific problem on a specific O/S using specific software, it's likely to be much more useful. Those unfamiliar with either the Mac or FCP may be better sitting this one out.... and I'll try hard not to try to help someone having problems using some Windows software by telling them they should be using a Mac
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As I said, many prefer to transcode.
Some don't.
No one is "forced" to transcode. If you do not want to transcode, any user can move to an editor or OS that doesn't require it.
But there are advantages and disadvantages to every editor, and while some may require a transcode step, they perhaps offer other advantages past that initial requirement.
No set of factors,,, just one factor. You must transcode.
I'm sure one day you'll be able to edit raw with FCP and not have to "log and transfer"
Thank you guys for all your feedback, I have learned a ton and I truly appreciate all of your help. it seems FCP 7.0 DOES want you to keep the original file structure and not just copying over the .mts files. So I have decided to just buy more SD cards so I won't run into this problem again.
Now I have to find a software other than toast to transfer over the .mts files to pro res (HQ) that I have copied over already without the file structure. Pro res is like cutting butter with FCP. It works very well. Hopefully one day FCP will not need the whole file structure and you can just transfer the .mts files
Again thank you all for your feedback, I am still a newb when it comes to the film world. It is a learning experience for sure.
Now I have to find a software other than toast to transfer over the .mts files to pro res (HQ) that I have copied over already without the file structure. Pro res is like cutting butter with FCP. It works very well. Hopefully one day FCP will not need the whole file structure and you can just transfer the .mts files
Again thank you all for your feedback, I am still a newb when it comes to the film world. It is a learning experience for sure.
That's simply not true. How can you make such a claim? Actually Apple made a very smart decision by looking at the clipinf metadata instead of demultiplexing the transport stream and looking at the payload of each elementary stream to detect the properties of the encoded streams. It's much easier to read the things you want to know from the clipinf files instead of searching through the transport stream. If I had to write an AVCHD importer, I would do it exactly this way. Why should I make things more complicated for myself after all? FCP is supposed to import AVCHD content and not just loose arbitrary MPEG-2 transport streams. Moreover I believe FCP is able to detect when the streams have been split up because of the FAT32 4gb limit and it automatically joins them. Without the AVCHD metadata this is not possible at all.
But you don't really want to know all this kind of stuff, you just want to bash Apple and recycle your arguments, do you? Because everytime this topic comes up you're coming in repeating your assumptions about Apple's "design decisions". That is not a smart thing to do because the FCP engineers have definitely done their homework that's for sure.
Are we moving beyond what the OP requested, which was ". . . a clear troubleshoot on how to fix the log and transfer issues with the HMC150?"
Might want to start your own thread on Apple's implementation of AVCHD ingest.
davebonawits
Member
For a while, log and transfer wouldn't load the .mts files even though i was copying the entire folder structure directly off the card. Someone said to turn my airport off. I initially scoffed at the idea that something so seemingly not related to FCP would screw with my transcoding... but I turned airport off and my .mts files loaded quickly.
so i just read throguh this whole forum adn i have been copying the everything off of the SD card and i still get the error message reading the files are an unsupported format which i dont understand. i have done the exact same thing before and its worked fine. is there a reason for this? im becoming extremely confused and frusterated. any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!
Turn off airport.
Point to the AVCHD folder.
report back
Point to the AVCHD folder.
report back
butter1093
Member
My friend had a panasonic avchd camcorder and have ever had a log and transfer problem. FCP 7 was unusable even if his camcorder was on FCP's supported list. I just told him to make a conversion from avchd to prores for fcp7, it will get same effect as log and transfer. He finally found a tool to solve the problem by searching panasonic mts to apple prores 422 fcp7. Sometimes, I think conversion is a good way for saving your time.