Importing from a Panasonic HDC TM700

Better late than never! I haven't bothered using any SD cards yet myself, as the 32 GB of onboard memory is more than enough for me. These days, I'm just creating a new folder on desktop, then, using Clipwrap, I select the camera archives to rewrap, choosing the new desktop folder as the destination. I finally went ahead and purchased Clipwrap, since I've been using the camcorder to record my students' speeches. The other day, I downloaded the trial version of FCP, and while I didn't find simple editing to be any problem, the clips stutter when I watch them full screen. Believe it or not, I almost went ahead and sold my three-month old Macbook Pro because I can't do 60fps! And that, even thought the reults look fine at 30fps. A few teachers here were making offers the minute I posted my computer on our school's website. But I came to my senses. I usually just share my stuff on YouTube, so there wouldn't be any benefit to spending thousands of dollars, money better spent buying extra accessories, like some microphones, a wide-angle lens and a decent tripod.

Hi Alan,

Thank you for this fantastic little program. Funnily enough, it works for the AVCHD from my Panasonic LX5 perfectly, but isn't quite perfect for my old ZS3 AVCHD movies - it pauses significantly if you try to hop to another part in the playback.

Anyway, with regard to the output file location, are there any lines that can be added to the script to alter the output file destination?

I want to drag the MTS straight from my SD card to the ReWrapper and have the output file go to my OSX desktop. Is this possible?

Thanks!

Jeremy

Alan Somers wrote:

The app will close automatically when it's done. Did you get a rewrapped file? It should be in the same folder where you had the original.

Hello Alan,

I just bought a Panasonic HC-V700 and recorded in 1080/50p. Your workflow app seems to solve my problem to get this into iMovie11, with as little quality loss as possible.

Installed Clipwrap in Applications and Rewrap2m4v.app (version 14 Jan 2012). Perian installed, Lion operating system on a MacBook.

Copied the .mts file (60 MB) from the camera to my desktop, a new file was created with a .m4v extension. But it is completely empty (0kB).

Any suggestion what goes wrong?

Regards,

Hans-Peter

Hi Hans-Peter,

use Perian 1.2.1. instead of newer ones. There was and I think still is a Audio problem with newer versions.

My workflow is:

1. Copy the mts first to your harddisk.

2. Drag all on the rewrapper (I still use version 1.1).

3. Make direct a new named event folder under iMovie-Events in the finder.

4. Move all your new .m4v files to that folder.

5. Open iMovie or FCP X and thumbs are created.

best regards

Roland

Hi Roland,

Thank you for your reply. I understand the workflow you describe. However, my main problem is that the rewrapped .m4v files are completely empty (0KB). So Rewrap2m4v somehow does not work properly.

Possibly the older version does not have this problem. Can you tell me where I can find this, as Alan's public file (public.me folder) is no longer accesible.

Regards,

Hans-Peter

Hi Hans-Peter,

its easy! Write the script in Automator:

AND the hidden secret is....

You need to install prior ClipGrab. You'll find that here: http://clipgrab.de/

best regards

Roland

Thanks very much, Roland! It works 🙂

Replaced ClipGrap with the newer 3.2.0.6 (from the link you provided). Then the original ReWrapper already worked fine for video, but the sound problem was manifest. Replaced Perian for the older version 1.2.1 and voilà it works!

Regards,

Hans-Peter

the open source media converter is nice! thanks!

i had the same problem with my new sony rx100 (avc/ac3 1080p 50p), when i was not able to playback the 50p clips on my macbook pro 2010. except with vlc, but with shutter and high cpu load.

Alans script worked nice to rewrap .mts to .mp4, but still the i had a high cpu load, and the clip was shuttering in qt player, and there were audio problems (only one channel,etc...).

after some reseach i found out that the ac3 stram is decoded via perian, because when you unistall perian in system preferences there is no sound at all in qt x.

(for those who wonder - vlc uses its own decoder)

thanks to the tip from "veg" to the "open-source app called Media Converter"

http://media-converter.sourceforge.net/

and the script "rewrap-avchd-mov-pcm.mcpreset" everything is smooth as butter!

the audio is converted to pcm, and the avc/h264 stream is rewraped to a .mov file (is now the sort of same container like a canon 5D2 h264/pcm .mov file). which is still very fast, because only the audio is converted to "uncompressed".

cpu usage is about low as 10%, smooth 50p playback and sound ok!

perfect playback solution, but still not editing friendly on my macbook pro (too high cpu load in FCPX)

Corma, Alan, Anyone... I am having the same issue as Corma. Corma did you get your question answered:

"When I import the m4v file (generated using rewrap) the audio in iMovie is Mono and not Stereo!!!" How do you correct this? I use Final Cut Pro, and I have the same problem. My audio after using the rewrap tool is mono when I play it in Quicktime and then in Final Cut Pro. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Expecting a baby any day now and just trying to wrap up the baby video (everything but the arrival) 😉

Install again perian software, but not the last: the previous one!

Tks, Corma. That did the trick!

Hello,

first of all thanks for all the effort!! unfortunately I failed the soulve the following issue:

I am using:

- rewrap2m4v

- Clipgrab 3.2.0.7

- Perian 1.2.1

for processing .mts-data (1080p ; 50fps)

(Mac OS X 10.6.8)

....

the skript works perfectly fine for .mts-files < 2 GB ... the resulting .m4v files are slightly smaller than the original .mts-files and easy to import into iMovie ´09 (sound quality is fine)

however, the skript does not work for a larger file (3.9 GB). It runs "normally" for approx. two minutes, then it keeps running (indicated by the small icon still in spin) - but: the m4v-file freezes and will not get bigger than 1.5 - 1.9 GB (on several attempts). I let it run for nearly one hour, but it does not finish the process...

Does anybody have any ideas/suggestions on that? would be really nice -thank you!

Suggestion: I have upgraded to Mountain Lion (incl QuickTime 10.2) plus iMovie11. Now I no longer need the rewrapper.

Workflow: Import the .mts files from the Panasonic camera. All clips are in one file called 'PRIVATE'. When you doubleclick this file QuickTime opens a browser where you can see the different clips. Doubleclick on a clip and use QuickTime export option to export as a .mov file. This file can be used in iMovie.

Hope this helps,

Regards,

Hmmm? In Divergent Media's blog for August, they write,

"Double clicking them [the QuickTime files] will launch QuickTime X with a browser interface. While this allows you to preview your media in QuickTime X, you can’t losslessly export this footage, or convert to an edit-friendly format. For those needs, you’ll still want to turn to ClipWrap."

But you are saying the files can be exported as .mov and used in iMovie? I'm confused...

There is the quick work around option of splitting larger clips on the camcorder. You can edit individual clips, and split them at a convenient point, then you can import the two smaller clips

I accept this doesn't solve the problem, it merely gives you a way to work with it!