help codec error h.264 & DVCPRO

Although finalcutpro will often allow you to mix codecs, frame sizes and frame rates in the same sequence, in my opinion, it is much better to convert all material where needed to the same format. H264 is not a finalcutpro friendly format and although fcp may allow you to work with it, more than likely it will eventually cause problems. I would advise converting all your material to 29.97 1280 prores.

The simplest way to convert your material is to use compressor. If you need some help with workflow in compressor, post back. it's pretty simple when you get the hang of it.

If you've already done alot of editing you could try using media manager, but I'm not sure if that would work. It could take a long time and not be successful.

Sorry that this is time consuming but you really need to test your workflow BEFORE you start editing.

h264 is not fcp friendly. No matter how much easier it is in the short term, you're asking for trouble.

In the apple presets for compressor under other workflows: apple codecs: you'll see a number of prores options. The great thing about these is that they will maintain the frame size and frame rate of the source clips.

You said your original material had field dominance: none, this indicates that it is progressive material so choose one of the progressive options. Don't think there's any need to use the highquality option.

Do a couple of conversions and bring them into fcp and make sure they behave properly.

Once you've determined that everything is working ok, you can drag all the clips you need to convert into a batch window in conmpressor and apply the appropriate preset to all of them and hit submit and walk away. Make sure you have sufficient drive space on your destination.

Try MPEG Streamclip, I'm a big fan. It will do a batch list of all your clips and convert them any which way you want and it's fast. I use ProRes for EVERYTHING, either pulling it in via HDSDI through the Kona card, or SDI uprezing also via the Kona, or using MPEG stream clip to convert to ProRes or ClipWrap or Grinder.

In your case you can convert to your timeline format before working with the footage.

Working with H.264 in Final Cut really is a bad idea. I would like to mirror the suggestions of others..you should convert your H.264 media to ProRes422.

The easiest way to do this would be to close Final Cut and move your original media into a folder within the folder the clips reside in. This breaks Final Cut's connections to the media. Next, open up Compressor, go to the Destinations tab and make a new local destination. This destination SHOULD be where the original media was residing before you moved it. Now open Compressor's Preferences. Change the Default Setting to Formats -> Quicktime -> ProRes 422 LT and change the Default Destination to the destination you made. Now drag all of your original H.264 media into Compressor and hit submit twice.

When Compressor has finished open up the Final Cut project and reconnect the offline media to the newly converted media. Open the Sequence Settings and change the "Compressor" to ProRes 422 LT. Now most of your media is handled properly.

Your DVX footage should live on the timeline happily alongside the ProRes media without needing a render. If you run into trouble with it drag it into Compressor and go to the Geometry tab in the Inspector. Change the output size to 1280x720 with square pixels. Submit twice and reconnect in FCP.

we should run a speed test between MPEG streamclip and compressor to do this. I'm avoiding Compressor except for certain things. It actually makes much better MPEG files for me when I have the settings cranked to the max, but it takes forever.

If it does the job I'm happy. With a Quick Cluster a RAID-5 becomes the bottleneck in Compressor.

if you've got a multicore mac, you can setup a cluster in the qmaster preference pane and choose the cluster when you submit in conpresser. Speeds things up enormously (usually). A couple of caveats. I find I have to reset qmaster preferences every time I restart the mac and since compressor is dividing the task, and then has to assemble the resulting file, it makes no sense to do this with short files.

I'm happy to run some tests. If anyone wants to discuss parameters off this thread, we could start a new thread, or just email each other. My email is in my profile.

we should start the new thread. I've had to help way too many people setup clusters in Compressor. It's probably the weakest off all the apps in the suite, as useful and necessary as it it. I have the luxury of multiple machines. It's much faster for me to copy a "master" file to the other Mac Pro and render in Squeeze over there for outputs. Ingesting footage is fast without a problem using MPEG Streamclip, but I can run that on the other machine as well. And I monitor the other machine using screen sharing. I don't have any 5D files or I'd try Grinder on those. It looks fast in the demo.

Yes, Houston, we do have a problem.

Your stats show that you're way behind the times with 10.4, add that to FCP 5 and yes, you have some things missing. Is there some reason you haven't updated the OS for so long? You say you have an Intel Mac. FCP 5 is from 2005. Prores came out in 2007 with FCStudio 2. There are some codecs that you can install to read ProRes, but they're not supposed to work to write unless you have FCS 2 (minimum) installed. So you're way behind the times, if what I read is true.

I think it's better to do this outside of the forum. There are a lot of variables to decide so we're all testing the same file, etc. Anyone who wants to participate should email me. My email is in my profile.

We'll hopefully figure out a format we want to use as a source and someone will post a file for everyone participating to download and then upload their compressed files.

Michael