Video Editing Category: Digital Rebellion Blog

Using Frame Controls in Compressor

Wed, 04 Jun 08 15:44:33 -0600

Compressor has some very sophisticated technologies in the Frame Controls tab of the Inspector to enable it to perform high-quality resizing, retiming and deinterlacing of footage.

These are incredibly useful but it is very tempting to set everything to "best" when it is not at all necessary and causes a significant impact upon the processing time. So what this post aims to do is outline what each function does and when it should be used.

Firstly, if you are not resizing, retiming or deinterlacing footage, do not switch Frame Controls on at all.

Resizing controls
When an image is resized, new pixels need to be calculated. If you downsize an image, an area that was once 10 pixels could now be 2 pixels and vice versa if you are upsizing. Compressor goes through the resulting image and calculates what each pixel value should be based on the value at that point in the original image. These are not always integers. For example, a pixel at point (3,3) in the resulting image might correspond to point (2.8, 2.8) on the original. As there is no pixel at (2.8, 2.8), Compressor has to calculate a suitable value. The following options are different ways of calculating these pixel colors.

Fast (nearest pixel) - Compressor takes the value from the closest whole pixel in the original image. This is very fast but can result in significant visual artifacts and inaccuracies, particularly when resizing by a significant amount.

Suitable for: Minor size changes, situations where a fast encode is more important than a high quality one.

Better (linear filter) - This improves on the nearest pixel method by taking the values of four surrounding pixels and weighting them, increasing accuracy.

Suitable for: Most downconversions (e.g. 720p to NTSC).

Best (statistical prediction) - This uses more complex algorithms to maintain edge sharpness, at the expense of processing time.

Suitable for: Upconversions (e.g. NTSC to 1080p HD)

Anti-aliasing slider - This smooths rough edges but don't set it too high or you will visibly soften the image.

Suitable for: Smoothing jagged edges when upconverting footage (e.g. PAL to 720p HD)

Detail Level slider - This sharpens edges, increasing our perception of detail in the image. Use sparingly to avoid adding noticeable noise or jagged edges to the image.

Suitable for: Sharpening soft edges when upconverting footage.

Deinterlacing controls
To deinterlace, first select Progressive from the Output Fields drop-down menu. Use this instead of the Deinterlace filter in the Filters tab as it will provide greater output quality. Choose one of the following from the Deinterlace menu:

Fast (line averaging) - The two fields are blended into one frame. This, however, can result in strange motion artifacts because you are playing two fields at the same time that were originally offset in time.

Suitable for: Situations with very little motion.

Better (motion adaptive) - This method analyzes the fields and only deinterlaces areas that require deinterlacing.

Suitable for: Most situations except those with extremes of motion. In most cases you will not get any benefits from choosing higher settings than this if you are working in Standard Definition (e.g. NTSC, PAL).

Best (motion-compensated) - This uses optical flow technologies to track the motion of objects and analyzes multiple frames at once. This is incredibly processor intensive.

Suitable for: Situations with extremes of motion (e.g. sports).

Retiming controls

Fast (nearest frame) - If you slow down footage, Compressor will need to add extra frames. This option just duplicates the nearest existing frame. It is very speedy but it can result in very choppy / juddery motion. If you are speeding up footage however, the choppiness will probably not be noticeable.

Suitable for: Minor speed adjustments, fast motion

Good (frame blending) - This blends frames together to create "in-between" frames and is a lot smoother than the nearest frame method, at the cost of processing time. This is suitable for most applications unless you are performing extreme slow motion.

Suitable for: Most speed changes with the exception of extreme slow motion

Better (motion-compensated) - This uses complex algorithms to analyze a range of frames and interpolate (predict) what the in-between frames should look like based on their surrounding frames. It then creates these new frames from scratch. Obviously this is very processor-intensive.

Suitable for: Extreme speed changes or footage with large amounts of motion (sports for example)

Best (high quality motion-compensated) - Apple's documentation is a little unclear on what makes this particular option higher quality than the one below it. It could be that it analyzes more frames to produce the final result, it blends using a higher bit depth for greater accuracy, or it recreates every single frame instead of just the in-between ones for greater smoothness. Or maybe all of them.

Either way, this is incredibly processor intensive and should only be used if you cannot get good results with lower settings.

Suitable for: Extreme speed changes or significant frame rate increases (e.g. 23.98 to 59.94 fps)

Conclusion

So what does this tell us? It tells us that "Good" or "Better" should be adequate for most situations and it is not worth choosing "Best" unless your footage actually needs it. The best way of finding a happy medium is to start with everything on "Fast" and perform small test renders (10 seconds or so) for multiple areas of your movie. If you are not happy with the quality, go up to the next level and keep going until you reach a level of quality you are happy with.

Rough cuts

Mon, 02 Jun 08 23:41:42 -0600

Shane Ross has a great post about "rough" rough cuts and how frustrating it is when producers cannot see past a lack of audio or sound effects, or a dodgy transition. What is worse is when the producer gets it into his or her head that you are trying to pass that off as the end product, despite your protestations to the contrary. That has happened to me and is a nasty situation for all involved.

I think the key is to make the producer comfortable with you. Normally these kind of problems go away on the second or third project as the producer realizes that you can do the job and are not a cowboy, and they get familiar with the way that you work. I also find that a comfortable producer will give you a lot more creative freedom (I prefer to see scripts as a guide rather than a rulebook for example) and in return you will take advantage of that freedom to return a better product, so it is mutually beneficial.

PhotoJojo Final Cut Pro keyboard sleeves

Sat, 24 May 08 00:50:55 -0600

PhotoJojo is offering desktop and laptop keyboard sleeves for professional apps including Final Cut Pro and After Effects.

Applications
* Photoshop
* Aperture (1.5)
* Final Cut Pro/Express
* Pro Tools
* After Effects
* Logic Pro

Keyboards
* MacBook Pro
* Macbook (Black and White)
* Macbook Air
* Apple Thin Keyboard
* Apple Thin Wireless Keyboard
* Apple Classic Keyboard

They're rubber and are great at protecting your keyboard as well as being useful. Laptop sleeves are $30 and desktop sleeves are $40 and then $6 for shipping on top of that.

"The filter failed to render" error fix

Thu, 22 May 08 23:26:48 -0600

Just saw an interesting fix for the big red "The filter ____________ failed to render" message some people have been getting in Final Cut Pro.

I have 2 graphics cards: GeForce 7300 GT and ATI Radeon HD 2600 XT (in MacPro) running 3 displays. The 2600 runs my 2 main displays and the 7300 runs a the smaller one.

So I just unplugged the display on the 7300 and rebooted. My FCP project spans the 2 remaining displays.

Boom, the render error message is gone and the effect (Prism) renders fine.

I seem to get it randomly every now and again but this is a useful fix for those who were experiencing it on a permanent basis. Pity you need to lose a monitor though.

Final Cut Pro: Copying Filters

Thu, 22 May 08 13:10:55 -0600

I never realized until today just how many methods there were for copying filters from one clip to another in Final Cut Pro.

1. In the Filters tab for the clip, Ctrl-Click on the name of the filter and select Copy or press Cmd-C. Select the other clip, switch to its Filter tab and press Cmd-V.

2. In the Filters tab, drag the filter name and drop it onto the other clip(s).

3. Some tools like the 3-way Color Corrector give you a little "grab" icon within its interface that you can drag onto other clips.

4. Copy the entire clip, ctrl-click the second clip and select Paste Attributes. Deselect everything except Filters.

5. Use the copying commands in the Modify > Copy Filters menu or use the shortcut keys: Ctrl+Alt+2 = Copy from 2nd clip back, Ctrl+Alt+3 = Copy from 1st clip back, Ctrl+Alt+4 = Copy to 1st clip forwards and Ctrl+Alt+5 = Copy to 2nd clip forwards

6. Select all of the clips you want to apply the filter to (Edit > Find is useful for this) and drag them up to a higher track. With the items still selected, go to Sequence > Nest Items and make sure the settings in the dialog match your current timeline settings. Click Ok and then apply the filter to the nested sequence.

7. Go to Effects > Make Favorite Effect. You can then select the other clips and go to Effects > Favorites (under the Video heading) and select your filter to apply those settings to other effects. Alternatively, you can drag the filter (using one of the methods of grabbing it described above) to the Favorites bin in the Effects tab in the Browser (you can also give it a more descriptive name here).

That's 7 ways I can think of... can anyone think of any more?

CalDigit SAN announced at NAB

Wed, 23 Apr 08 16:13:42 -0600

I just got this in my inbox courtesy of the LAFCPUG mailing list.

Right now at Digital Rebellion we're running Xserve RAIDs on Xsan 1.4. I love these things but they're loud, they kick out a lot of heat and they're no longer being made. They're still pretty good and they're not out of date yet but I have been looking at alternatives with the future in mind.

CalDigit, famous for their hardware RAID cards, demonstrated such an alternative at NAB. One major departure from the Xserve RAIDs and their replacement, the Promise VTrak E-Class, is the fact that it does not use 2 or 4 Gb Fibre Channel cables (which cost around $80 per cable) to transmit data. It uses ePCIe which allows it to transmit data at speeds of up to 20 Gbps and allows for very long cable lengths of up to 300m.

With the recent announcement of the entry-level Scarlet camera, the demand for real-time access to extremely high resolution streams looks set to increase dramatically and, luckily, the CalDigit SAN has the bandwidth to transfer multiple 2K streams in real-time.

Uniquely, there is also an ePCIe ExpressCard device to allow laptop users (MacBook Pro only) to access the SAN. This is not currently available for fibre-based networks.

There's nothing on their site as of yet but they have a press release out and it looks like more details will be announced nearer the shipping date, which is currently unknown. This is definitely something I'm keeping my eye on.

My Compressor issues solved

Wed, 16 Apr 08 14:29:19 -0600

I recently experienced the dreaded "Unable to submit to queue. Please restart your computer or verify your Compressor installation is correct" error message when submitting batches with Compressor. I noticed that it listed "No Value" under Cluster instead of "This Machine".

Going to Qmaster Preferences and clicking Start Sharing gave me a message saying that "qmasterd" was not running. This was the cause of the problem.

The first thing I did was look on Apple's support boards where I found many posts on the subject. Unfortunately most users found that they managed to solve their issues by removing and reinstalling Compressor or the entire Final Cut Studio. This is something I did not want to do.

I used the terminal command sudo qmasterprefs -reset (this seems to be equivalent to trashing prefs as far as I can gather) and then sudo qmasterprefs -restart to relaunch qmasterd. I then relaunched Compressor and everything worked as it should.

Except when I restarted my machine, at which point I was back to the same error messages again. I knew that a fix must be possible without a reinstall, and it was probably something simple. So I did some digging around and I discovered that the folder /Library/StartupItems/Qmaster had the wrong permissions. It was set to No Access for some bizarre reason, preventing OS X from seeing any files inside it. Note that this was not picked up by Disk Utility when doing a permission repair. So I set the owner back to system and clicked Apply to enclosed items to be 100% sure that the permissions would be correct for all files.

I restarted my machine and everything worked. Two restarts later and it still works.

I can't say it will work for everyone but try it if you are experiencing these symptoms.

Why does QuickTime report a different resolution?

Sun, 13 Apr 08 03:02:01 -0600

Ever wondered why QuickTime reports a completely different resolution to the one you exported at?

Welcome to the world of non-square pixels. NTSC and PAL use rectangular pixels to fill up space on the screen and save transmission bandwidth, which was more of an issue when the standards were invented. Computer monitors use square pixels and so QuickTime has to squeeze one side of the image in order to prevent it looking stretched. This is purely for display and the file is not modified.

The pixel aspect ratio of NTSC footage is 0.889 meaning 720 x 0.889 = 640 so it is displayed at 640x480. For PAL it is 1.067 so 576 / 1.067 = 540 and it is displayed at 720x540.

QuickTime also has some options for controlling how the movie is displayed. Open up your movie, go to Window > Show Movie Properties and click on the Presentation tab.

You will see an option marked "Conform aperture to:" with the following options:

Classic - Classic is identical to having the conform aperture setting switched off.

Clean - Scales the image to compensate for the pixel aspect ratio and crops it to mimic the overscan on a broadcast monitor.

Production - Scales the image to compensate for the pixel aspect ratio but does not crop the image.

Encoded Pixels - No modification is made to the footage. Note the stretching caused by non-square pixels.

This is one of the many reasons why a broadcast monitor is essential.

Final Cut Pro 6.0.3 released

Fri, 11 Apr 08 00:39:02 -0600

Can you see an update in Software Update called "Pro Applications Update 2008-01"? Well, confusingly, that's actually Final Cut Pro 6.0.3 and Compressor 3.0.3. It also includes Apple HDV Codec 1.4 and Plugin Manager 1.7.3.

Release Notes

Final Cut Pro 6.0.3

This update contains the following:

XDCAM HD422 support
"Project is too new or unreadable" error fixed (yay)
Still images are now exported using their native aspect ratios
FCP now uses the aspect ratio of the clip when stacking multiple filters in a mixed-format timeline
When using XML import, FCP can now reconnect files that contain slashes (/) in their filenames
You can now place generator clips in FXScript filter clip wells, although read the release notes for the caveats

If this update is not appearing for you, you must have OS X 10.4.11 or OS X 10.5.2 installed.

Compressor 3.0.3

This update contains the following:

You can now create Apple TV movies with non-square pixel aspect ratios and there is now a Dolby AC-3 output for it as well

I was very disappointed that it did not fix any of the bugs with Compressor on Leopard.

Apple HDV Codec 1.4

This update contains the following:

4:2:2 support

Plugin Manager 1.7.3

This update contains the following:

This fixes FxPlug plugins on FCP 5.1.4 that were broken my previous Plugin Manager updates

As always, never update a system mid-project. Don't update if you are not affected by the changes listed above - if it ain't broke, definitely don't fix it in the world of FCP. If you do update, make sure to make a clone of your system first.

You can get the update here as well, but you will need to have your Final Cut Studio serial number handy.

Exporting chapter markers to DVD Studio Pro

Fri, 04 Apr 08 01:35:36 -0600

I am constantly seeing posts on Apple's support boards by people who can't get this to work. This seems to be a common problem so I'm going to give a step-by-step workflow followed by troubleshooting tips at the end.

1. In the Final Cut Pro timeline, navigate to the point you wish to place the marker, press M once to place a regular marker and then press M again to open up the Edit Marker dialog.

Make sure that you are adding the markers to the sequence itself and not to an individual clip. There are some rules though - Don't place one within 1 second of the beginning, don't place one within 1 second of the end and don't place them less than 1 second apart.

2. Click the button marked Add Chapter Marker and it will automatically insert some text into the box. Do not change this text; just click Ok.

Repeat for every marker.

3. Go to File > Export > QuickTime Movie. Do not export as QuickTime Conversion. Under the Markers drop-down, select DVD Studio Pro Markers.

Or Go to File > Export > Using Compressor. This will not display a dialog box but you will be able to see markers on the timeline in the Preview window.

4. Export the file.

5. Open up DVD Studio Pro and drag the exported file onto a track.

In the timeline, drag the edge of the horizontal scroll bar to decrease the size of the timeline and see everything at once. You should be able to see all of your chapter markers.

6. Go to Simulate and double-check that they work.

Troubleshooting

I think most problems are caused by not knowing the restrictions on chapter markers. This is from the FCP 6 manual:
* No chapter marker should appear closer than 1 second to the beginning or end of
your edited sequence.
* A chapter marker should be at least 1 second away from any other chapter marker.
* A maximum of 99 chapter markers can be placed within a single program.
* When you export from a sequence, only sequence markers are exported; markers in
clips are ignored.
* When you export a clip from the Browser, the clip's markers are exported.

Markers within nested sequences will not be exported.

You must select DVD Studio Pro Marker and not Chapter Marker under the QuickTime export options.

Don't put chapter and compression markers in the same marker!

I have had better luck with DVD Studio Pro Marker rather than All Markers in the QT export dialog.

Be aware that if you export a QT movie with markers and then import it into Compressor, you will lose your chapter markers if you do not have Compressor 3 (included with Final Cut Studio 2).

I have heard of people having success by trashing their preferences. We have a free utility that will automate it for you - Preference Manager.

Let me know if you can think of any more troubleshooting tips.

QuickTime 7.4.5 released

Thu, 03 Apr 08 00:17:01 -0600

Apple just released QuickTime 7.4.5 to coincide with the release of iTunes 7.6.2 and Front Row 2.1.3. The coincidence of these releases suggests that the QT update specifically affects those applications and offers no specific benefits to Final Cut Studio. If you have a working system, DON'T install it!

On the other hand, if your system is not working, you have nothing to lose. I'd advise cloning your system beforehand though, as a non-working system could potentially be made even worse by this update.

Here are the links... use at your peril!
QuickTime 7.4.5 for Panther
QuickTime 7.4.5 for Tiger
QuickTime 7.4.5 for Leopard

I have also updated our list of QuickTime downloads.

Does Application X work with Application Y?

Thu, 20 Mar 08 00:43:00 -0600

Does Shake work with Final Cut Pro 4.5?
Does Motion work with Final Cut Express?
Does Compressor work with iMovie?

These are very common questions and I get these questions so often that I'm going to type the reply here to save me time in the future. The answer is very simple. Some applications have workflows between each other, such as round-tripping from Final Cut Pro > Color > Final Cut Pro. Obviously such workflows would not be possible with the above-mentioned scenarios but at its core, each application has the ability to import and export media files and it is just the simple case of exporting a QuickTime from one to the other and back. The "Send To" option is doing exactly the same thing in some cases, just automatically.

How to banish the Final Cut Pro registration screen forever

Sat, 15 Mar 08 16:26:47 -0600

Everyone hates it - the annoying "please register" screen that pops up every 5 or 6 launches of Final Cut Pro and Apple's other ProApps. Of course, the easiest way to get rid of it is to just register but that may not always be practical or advisable. Many companies do not connect their editing machines to the internet (quite rightly) and some of the tinfoil hat-wearers among us might not be keen on giving their personal data out to Apple.

Whatever the reason, here is a method of stopping the Final Cut Pro registration screen from appearing again without having to register.

1. Make sure all Final Cut Studio applications are closed.

2. Go to /Library/Application Support/ProApps and open the file Final Cut Studio System ID.

3. In Property List Editor, click the arrow next to Root and you will see some details about the unique ID that FCS has created for your machine. On this machine, I upgraded from Final Cut Studio 1 to Final Cut Studio 2, so I have two IDs listed under 100-1 and 100-6. If you look under fullKey1, it tells me that the original ID is marked 100-1 so the new one (FCS 2) must be 100-6.

Yours may differ a little but if one doesn't work, try the other.

Update: As noted by Steve in the comments, Property List Editor is only installed if you have the optional OS X developer tools installed - an issue I was not aware of when I wrote this article. However, it would be quite simple to open these files up in TextEdit or, as Steve recommends, PListEdit Pro (free trial available).

4. On the 100-6 option (or whatever yours says), double-click the data under the Value tab to select it and then copy it to the clipboard.

5. Go to /Library/Preferences and open com.apple.RegFinalCutStudio.plist.

6. Click the arrow next to Root and delete all of the entries in the list.

7. Now select Root and click New Child. Enter the name AECoreTechRegInfo, select Data as Class and paste the value you copied earlier into the Value column.

8. With the entry you just created still selected, click New Sibling up the top and type AECoreTechRegSent, keep the Class as String and enter a value of YES. Your final plist should look like this:

9. Save the file and enjoy a nag-free Final Cut Studio experience. It works for all applications in the Studio, not just FCP.

It is worth noting that this works for all of Apple's ProApps including Shake, Aperture and Logic. For Shake, use /Library/Application Support/ProApps/Shake System ID and /Library/Preferences/com.apple.RegShake.plist. The issue is especially annoying with Shake because if the registration screen appears, Shake will "forget" the project or file you wanted to open, so you have to open it again.

Also, if you do want to register but don't want to keep opening and closing the application until the registration dialog appears, just delete the com.apple.RegFinalCutStudio.plist file, launch FCP and it will appear immediately.

160 GB SSDs coming soon?

Wed, 12 Mar 08 12:08:11 -0600

This is a few days old but still worth mentioning. Intel has announced that it is entering the SSD (solid-state disk) market this year. In addition to bringing down prices through extra competition, Intel is also offering speed improvements over existing SSD drives from other manufacturers.

Details are sparse but enough to whet our appetites - there will be a SATA (3 Gbps) version and the drives will range from 80 to 160 GB in size (in comparison, the largest generally-available ones are 64 GB). This means that SSDs can, for the first time, directly compete with hard drives on a technical level. They can't yet compete with hard disks on price but Intel is predicting prices of less than $200 by 2010.

This means a lot because solid-state disks are considerably smaller, faster and more reliable than conventional hard disks. Tests with the MacBook Air have shown considerably faster boot and application loading times. The traditional downside to SSDs (and something Intel did not mention) is that their write speeds are considerably lower than their read speeds - in fact, lower than the write speed of a conventional hard disk. This will no doubt change with time but for some tasks such as high-bandwidth acquisition, they are not yet ready to replace something like the RED Drive.

They would be great in a video editing environment though, where you don't need to write large amounts of data very often and much of the your time is spent reading data. With a lot of editing systems (particularly with the advent of 8 core Mac Pros), the bottleneck lies in the disk speed. It can also improve the responsiveness of applications like Final Cut Pro that store only a limited amount of timeline information (such as clip thumbnails) in the main memory, with the rest on disk. I can't wait to see these new drives in a RAID 0 configuration.

New Macbooks and MacBook Pros

Tue, 26 Feb 08 09:53:27 -0700

Apple just refreshed its MacBook and MacBook Pro lines to support Intel's new Penryn chipset. Here are the specs:

MacBook

	2.1 GHz model	2.4 GHz models
CPU (Core 2 Duo)	2.1 GHz with 3 MB cache	2.4 GHz with 3 MB cache
RAM	1 GB	2 GB
FSB	800 MHz	800 MHz
Hard disk	120 GB 5400 RPM 160 or 250 GB 5400 RPM	160 or 250 GB 5400 RPM
Display	Glossy TFT	Glossy TFT
Graphics	Intel GMA X3100 144 MB MB shared	Intel GMA X3100 144 MB MB shared
Battery Life	4.5 hours	4.5 hours
Trackpad	Two-finger standard	Two-finger standard

More details here.

MacBook Pro

	15" model	17" model
CPU (Core 2 Duo)	2.4 GHz with 3 MB cache 2.5 or 2.6 GHz with 6 MB cache	2.5 or 2.6 GHz with 6 MB cache
RAM	2 GB	2 GB
FSB	800 MHz	800 MHz
Hard disk	200 or 250 GB 5400 RPM 200 GB 7200 RPM	250 GB 5400 RPM 200 GB 7200 RPM 300 GB 4200 RPM
Display	LED backlit Optional glossy display	Anti-glare TFT Optional LED-backlit display Optional glossy screen
Graphics	Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT: 256 MB with 2.4 GHz CPU 512 MB with 2.5 or 2.6 GHz CPU	Nvidia GeForce 8600M GT with 512 MB RAM
Battery Life	5 hours	4.5 hours 5 hours with LED display
Trackpad	Multi-touch	Multi-touch

More details here.

If you are buying an editing machine, you will want to choose a non-glossy display (preferably LED) with as fast a processor as you can afford. Buy the minimum amount of RAM and get it somewhere else for much less. Apple's memory is notoriously expensive compared to other retailers, even though it is identical. You are paying a premium for Apple's assurance that it will work, but I have never run into problems with third-party memory.

The biggest difference between the two is the fact that the MacBook Pro has dedicated graphics, which means that you will experience much better performance in applications like Motion. Color will not start up at all on a MacBook because of this reason.

The MacBook Pro also has the advantage of FireWire 800 ports for faster data transfers to external hard disks - essential for HDV editing.

So a MacBook Pro is recommended but you can get by with a MacBook if you are only editing SD footage and you will not be using Motion or Color.

Update 2/29/08: Engadget has some benchmarks showing that the speed is slightly faster between the new MacBook Pro and the old one but the heat output is considerably less.

How to clone and restore your system

Fri, 22 Feb 08 15:25:17 -0700

This is a quick guide to cloning and restoring your system. I'd advise that you print this out and keep it in a safe place by your machine so that you won't waste time looking for it when your machine goes down.

Cloning your machine will create an exact copy of every single file on your computer onto a second hard drive. This can be either an internal or external disk. I'd advise external over internal because if something damages your machine, the external disk won't get damaged as well. The best time to create a clone is right after you have done a fresh Erase and Install of your operating system, have installed all of your apps and are ready to go.

Cloning
1. Download and install Carbon Copy Cloner.

2. If you are cloning to an external drive, connect it now.

3. Fire up Carbon Copy Cloner from your Applications folder. In the dialog that appears, select your system drive as the source and set your backup drive as the target.

4. Under options, make sure "Copy everything from source to target" is selected. You must check "Erase target volume" too, so as not to cause conflicts with data already on the disk. If you do not check this, the drive may not be bootable and this whole process would be pointless.

5. Click Clone and wait for it to finish. Be aware that this could take several hours.

6. Unmount your external disk (if applicable) and keep it in a safe, dry place, not too hot and not too cold. If you're paranoid like me, I'd advise connecting it to your machine every so often and verifying the disk in Disk Utility to make sure that it everything is ok.

Restoring
So the worst has happened. Your system is completely hosed and you have a deadline in 12 hours. What do you do?

Temporary Solution
1. Mount your backup disk, go to System Preferences and click on Startup Disk. If it is an external disk, it must be connected via FireWire in order to be bootable.

2. Select the backup drive in the drives list and click Restart.

3. The system will now restart in the backed-up "fresh" operating system.

This is a temporary solution to help you get your project finished without wasting time. You are advised to follow the permanent solution below.

If you have an external disk, make sure that it doesn't get disconnected either deliberately or accidentally. That's a good way to cause a kernel panic, which is never good. Don't put the machine to sleep. Shut the machine down completely before unplugging the drive. I once forgot the machine was asleep and unplugged it and my system completely froze. Not good.

Permanent Solution
1. Backup any data that you do not want to lose.
2. Boot to the backup hard disk as detailed in the Temporary Solution above.
3. In Carbon Copy Cloner, clone the backup disk over the startup disk. Follow the steps for cloning above but select your backup drive as the source and your startup disk as the target.
4. You must select "Erase the target drive".
5. Click Clone and wait for it to finish. Again, this could take several hours.
6. Go back to System Preferences > Startup Disk and set your startup disk back to the old drive and click Restart.

Apple releases Xsan 2

Tue, 19 Feb 08 09:11:47 -0700

Apple today announced Xsan 2, a brand-new edition of its popular Storage Area Network (SAN) software.

SAN software allows you to manage storage devices on a network. It manages the reading and writing to the volumes through one machine (a server), otherwise data corruption can occur if two machines are reading and writing to the same area at once. It also allows you to control access to the data on these volumes. It is commonly used for managing video editing storage networks (we use Xsan 1.4 here at Digital Rebellion) so while it's probably not particularly exciting for most people, it is a big deal.

New features include a completely overhauled Xsan Admin (yay) which offers greater speed, greater stability and more monitoring features. There is now an Easy Setup wizard, a new filesystem offering up to 2 PB per volume (1 petabyte = 1024 terrabytes), and templates that optimize the system for a particular task (e.g. HD video, SD video, file sharing, etc).

There's also a new MultiSAN feature that allows you to connect to other SANs on the same server, such as a SAN for dailies and a different one for stock footage for example. It also comes with Spotlight support.

My number one favorite feature though would have to be the ability to direct files to a specific location. You can automatically set certain types of files to go to certain volumes such as dailies in one place, audio in another, project files in a third. This is very cool and is a great way to keep everything organized without having to impose rules on everyone.

I am very much liking the sound of this. My major complaint about Xsan 1.4 (and the same goes for Color and Shake) is that it didn't feel very Apple-like. It was complex to set up, it didn't "just work" and it was difficult to manage. Apple is famous for its ease of use but it was lacking in the previous version of Xsan.

I would be upgrading in the near future were it not for the following caveat: it is Leopard-only. The system requirements for the server are much higher too - 2 GB RAM minimum, plus 2 GB per volume (up from 512 MB per volume). I would not advise the use of Leopard in a critical environment yet. Some people edit on Leopard and have no problems at all but I am waiting until at least 10.5.4 before I consider upgrading.

Despite this, this is a great upgrade. Xsan 2 is available now for $999 per machine.

To see the difference an Xsan 2 network will make to a video editing network, see the graphs at the bottom of this page.

List of QuickTime downloads

Fri, 15 Feb 08 09:12:28 -0700

Are you looking for a non-current version of QuickTime to ensure compatibility with old software? Look no further.

QuickTime 7:
QuickTime 7.4.5 (Leopard)
QuickTime 7.4.5 (Tiger)
QuickTime 7.4.5 (Panther)
QuickTime 7.4.1 (Leopard)
QuickTime 7.4.1 (Tiger)
QuickTime 7.4.1 (Panther)
QuickTime 7.4 (Leopard)
QuickTime 7.4 (Tiger)
QuickTime 7.4 (Panther)
QuickTime 7.3.1 (Leopard)
QuickTime 7.3.1 (Tiger)
QuickTime 7.3.1 (Panther)
QuickTime 7.2
QuickTime 7.1.6

QuickTime 6:
QuickTime 6.5.3
QuickTime 6.5.2
QuickTime 6.5.2 reinstaller for QuickTime 7.0.1
QuickTime 6.4 reinstaller
QuickTime 6.3.1
QuickTime 6.3 reinstaller
QuickTime 6.0.3

QuickTime 5:
QuickTime 5.0.5

QuickTime 4:
QuickTime 4.1.2
QuickTime 4.0.3

Unfortunately Apple's site does not offer versions below 4, but I doubt many video editors out there are using a machine old enough to require QuickTime 3.

The proper way to install a Mac OS X update

Tue, 12 Feb 08 11:22:52 -0700

As always, I advise you not to update a working system, especially not in the middle of a project. And I am hoping that those without a working system are at least waiting a few days to see if any major issues crop up.

With that out of the way, here is the proper way to update your Mac OS X system.

1. Clone your system drive using something like Carbon Copy Cloner. This may take a while but it is worth it.

2. If you have a laptop, make sure it is plugged into the mains. You don't want it switching off mid-update.

3. Make sure you are logged in as an administrator.

4. Don't use Software Update. Always download the Combo Update manually, which is less likely to cause problems because it includes all previous updates.

5. Close all applications, including ones running in the background, minimized in your dock and residing in your menu bar. You don't want anything conflicting with an OS update.

6. Go to Disk Utility and repair permissions on your startup disk.

7. Install the update. Don't fire up any applications after it finishes, just restart immediately.

8. Your computer may reboot more than once; this is perfectly fine.

9. When it loads back up, go to Disk Utility and repair permissions again.

10. Install updates for your third party software to ensure compatibility with the new OS version (if applicable).

11. Repair permissions.

12. Test your applications thoroughly (including capturing, rendering, etc).

13. If it all went wrong, restore from the clone you made in step 1.

Essential tools: Perian

Thu, 07 Feb 08 10:21:13 -0700

Perian's icon is a swiss-army knife and that couldn't be a better description. It is a codec pack for QuickTime that allows you to play back a whole host of formats including AVI, DivX and 3ivX. These are PC formats that we editors get given from time to time and it is incredibly useful to have a free Mac component to view them with.

Some people have reported problems with it but I personally have experienced none so far.

The brand new version 1.1 (just came out today) features the following changes:
* Major performance improvements
* TrueAudio, MP1, and DTS audio support
* Slice-based multithreaded decoding for MPEG-1/2/H.264
* Apple H.264 now handles AVCHD/interlaced video
* Compatibility fixes for QuickTime 7.4 and Leopard
* Objective-C GC compatibility
* Fixed a crash in Toast
* Better subtitle rendering
* Subtitles play during MKV loading
* Snow support
* Miscellaneous bug fixes

Perian can be downloaded here for free.

QuickTime 7.4.1

Wed, 06 Feb 08 16:42:03 -0700

Apple today released an update to QuickTime, to bring it up to version 7.4.1. This update "addresses security issues and improves compatibility with third-party applications".

The big question everyone is asking is: does it fix the dreaded After Effects 10 minute rendering bug? Initial testing would indicate yes.

As always, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. And definitely don't install it if you have a Final Cut Pro version lower than 6.0.2.

QuickTime 7.4.1 for Leopard
QuickTime 7.4.1 for Tiger
QuickTime 7.4.1 for Panther

Update: Macworld claims that an Apple spokesperson confirmed to them that this fixes the After Effects issue.

Update 2/7/08: Adobe confirms this.

ProKit 4.5 update

Tue, 05 Feb 08 16:38:50 -0700

Apple has just updated ProKit to version 4.5.

ProKit, as far as I am aware, contains only UI elements such as button images for professional applications such as Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Express, Logic Studio, etc. There is unlikely to be anything exciting in it I'm afraid.

Apple's release notes are, as always, rather vague:

This update improves reliability for Apple's professional applications and is recommended for all users of Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Express, Aperture, Logic Studio and Logic Express.

As always, don't update a working system unless you are experiencing a major problem that this update may fix. And when you do it, make sure to clone your drive with something like Carbon Copy Cloner first.

Update: Some people are reporting that Motion 3 instabilities with the Ozone plugin are a thing of the past with the new ProKit update.

Update 2: Others are reporting that the DVD Studio Pro menu that had disappeared is now back, while others are reporting that it causes their Logic 8 installation to crash.

I know people have been experiencing issues with Compressor windows not opening, so I would advise them to give this patch a go and see if it fixes it for them.

List of video formats supporting alpha channels

Sat, 02 Feb 08 09:14:52 -0700

I had a request for this list, so here it is. It is a list of popular video formats that support alpha (transparency) channels. It also includes a few image formats that are used for video work, like TIFF.

I may have missed a couple, so let me know in the comments.

File Format	Maximum Alpha Bit-Depth
Apple Animation	8-bit
Avid Meridien Compressed	8-bit
Avid Meridien Uncompressed	8-bit
Cineon	16-bit
DPX	16-bit
Maya IFF	32-bit
OpenEXR	32-bit
PNG	16-bit
RLA	32-bit
RPF	32-bit
SGI	16-bit
SGI RAW	16-bit
Targa (TGA)	8-bit
TIFF	32-bit

DiskWarrior 4.1 adds Leopard support

Fri, 25 Jan 08 01:17:49 -0700

I've mentioned DiskWarrior before. It has been a life-saver to me, and is well worth the asking price of $99.95. It will diagnose and fix hard disk problems that Disk Utility cannot. DiskWarrior is an essential editors' tool in the fight against data loss.

Version 4.1 adds Leopard support and support for Leopard-specific features such as the ability to repair Time Machine volumes.

Note, however, that you cannot repair Leopard volumes from within Tiger, so if you were trying to repair a Time Machine volume it would fail.

A little update on Final Cut Pro's gamma quirks

Sat, 19 Jan 08 04:57:42 -0700

Last week I made a post about Final Cut Pro modifying the gamma of clips, causing some to be too dark and some to be washed out.

The washed out issue was the most serious because it only happened upon exporting the movie, and the image looked perfectly fine in FCP. The darkening issue was less severe because it only affected the user's perception of the image in FCP and if they were not performing color correction in FCP, they would be perfectly fine.

I was just going through User Preferences, trying to help someone who was having difficulty, when I noticed a new option that I had never seen before (I don't adjust user prefs very often). In the Editing tab, there is a section marked "Imported Still / RGB Video Gamma". You can choose from Source, 1.80, 2.20, 2.22 and Custom. My research indicates that this option has been there since 6.0.0 but Apple recently renamed it in 6.0.2 to clarify that it is for RGB footage only.

1.80 refers to the default gamma of RGB footage (eg. still images and special effects codecs such as Animation). This is also the default gamma of your Mac display. 2.20 refers to the default gamma of YUV footage (eg. NTSC, PAL, ProRes, etc). Camera footage falls into this category, as do a lot of the displays on Windows machines. Gamma 2.22 is also used by Windows PCs. I would advise leaving this option on Source, so that no gamma correction will be applied to the clip itself. The only correction that will occur will be when playing back in the FCP Canvas, and not upon exporting the movie.

This setting will fix the RGB gamma issue that caused images to be washed out upon export. This does not change Final Cut Pro's handling of YUV images.

Is your Final Cut Pro sequence too dark or washed out?

Sat, 12 Jan 08 16:34:07 -0700

This seems to be a common question. Sometimes people will create a sequence in Shake (or similar) and export to Final Cut, only to find that the image is much darker in FCP. Others have a different problem - it displays fine in FCP but appears washed out when you export it.

Final Cut Pro tends to make assumptions when it comes to gamma. If you create YUV (e.g. DV PAL, NTSC) footage, it will assume that it was created with a gamma of 2.2, which it would have been if it had been shot in a camera. Final Cut therefore lowers the gamma in order to mimic what it would look like on a broadcast monitor, resulting in a darkening of the image.

Note that the image is only dark in Final Cut Pro and if you export it, it will export with the correct gamma. However, the mistake that some people make is to brighten the image in Final Cut, leading to it being too bright upon exporting.

Applications like Shake do not make any modifications to the display of the gamma so if it looks fine in Shake, it will look fine upon exporting, no matter what Final Cut Pro is showing on the screen. This is assuming your monitor is correctly calibrated, of course.

When you import RGB elements (such as the Apple Animation codec or still images) into a YUV sequence, the opposite problem occurs. Final Cut Pro will assume they were created with a gamma of 1.8. Final Cut will then increase the gamma to 2.2 (the gamma value that FCP assumes all YUV media is created at) to compensate for this.

The image is now considered YUV, so when it plays back, Final Cut will lower the gamma again to compensate, as it does with all YUV footage. The RGB elements will be displayed on the screen at their correct gamma but when you export the sequence, the boosted gamma will be used and the exported sequence will be too bright.

The solution is to convert the files to YUV before adding them to your Final Cut Pro project. For footage, convert to Uncompressed 8-bit 4:2:2 or Uncompressed 10-bit 4:2:2 to ensure that no data will be lost in the conversion process. If the file sizes for this are too large, try a high quality lossy codec such as Apple ProRes.

For images, the easiest method is to convert them to a single-frame QuickTime file with a YUV codec such as DV NTSC. It is better to perform this task with Compressor rather than QuickTime.

Capture HDV to ProRes via Firewire in Final Cut Pro 6.0.2

Mon, 24 Dec 07 14:43:07 -0700

Chris Poisson over at Creative COW has discovered that the recently released 6.0.2 update to Final Cut now allows you to capture from HDV directly to Apple's ProRes codec via Firewire.

This provides a means of getting rid of the awful HDV codec in one step, resulting in dramatically decreased render times, improved rendering quality of footage, and more latitude in color correction due to the 4:2:2 color space (as opposed to 4:2:0). Capturing to ProRes used to require a fast Intel Mac with an accelerated capture card, or AJA's Io HD. With the new update, you can now capture on a G5 Power Mac without any additional hardware, which very much levels the playing field.

As Chris explains, however, it is not quite a perfect solution just yet. It would appear that Apple has made some compromises (half raster import for example) in order to improve capture speed on slower machines. The preview window will also be considerably behind the actual footage being captured, making it difficult to monitor on-screen (an external broadcast monitor is always recommended, if you can afford it). But if you can live with these minor setbacks, you can capture to ProRes for a fraction of the previous hardware cost.

Before you rush to upgrade though, be aware that some people have been experiencing issues with the latest patch. As always, I would recommend not installing it in the middle of a production, and have a clone or backup of your working system before you upgrade.

Essential Tools: Carbon Copy Cloner

Sun, 23 Dec 07 02:46:41 -0700

Carbon Copy Cloner is a utility for performing an exact clone of your hard disk. The idea is that you install your operating system and software and then immediately run Carbon Copy Cloner. The program will create a bootable disk image on a separate disk or machine. If you run into problems in the future, you can then immediately boot from this image and instantly have a working system again.

The problems people have been running into lately make this an essential utility for video editors, or indeed anyone who cannot afford any system downtime.

The software is donationware, which means you can download a fully working version for free but a donation is appreciated.

Downgrading from Final Cut Pro 6.0.2 to 6.0.1

Wed, 19 Dec 07 23:49:59 -0700

I like to keep an eye on my server logs and I get a list of what people searched for in order to reach the site. A significant number of people have been searching for a way to somehow downgrade from Final Cut Pro 6.0.2 back to 6.0.1. I didn't realize so many people were having problems.

There is no easy "rollback" method of downgrading. You'd have to uninstall FCP completely and reinstall it again. You would, however, be stuck at version 6.0.0 because Apple only offers 6.0.2 on its site, unless you can find a mirror somewhere (I couldn't).

The best way of preventing this issue in the future is to use something like Carbon Copy Cloner to clone your hard disk onto another disk. You can generate an exact carbon copy of your working installation and instantly restore to it if you run into problems in the future. An essential editor's tool.

Also be aware that if you happened to save one of your projects under 6.0.2, you will be unable to open it in a previous version. I am not aware of a way of converting them back again. The best way to prevent this in the future is to save a backup before you upgrade.

The moral of this story is: don't install on a machine in the middle of a production unless you are having serious problems that the patch claims to fix, and always prepare a way of getting everything back to normal before you upgrade.

P.S. If you're installing Final Cut Pro 6 on top of Final Cut Pro 5, it is best to uninstall version 5 first. In most cases, it won't do anything untoward, but for a lot of people a working machine is their livelihood and you don't really want to take unnecessary risks when you can avoid them.

Update: We now offer a tool for removing Final Cut Studio from your system.

Importing MXFs into Final Cut Pro

Sat, 15 Dec 07 07:18:04 -0700

I think filmmaking is the only profession where the word "cheat" is used to mean a positive thing. Shane Ross has figured out a way of importing MXF files from Panasonic P2 cards. This is a way of importing P2 footage without having to go through Final Cut's "Log and Transfer" dialog. You just drag it directly into Final Cut and there it is, ready to be used.

In order to enable this functionality, you must install Panasonic's free P2CMS utility. The P2CMS utility allows you to view MXF files natively in QuickTime. Because Final Cut is built upon QuickTime, it also inherits this functionality. Presumably it should be backwards compatible with FCP 5 as well.

One caveat is that when you import, you will get a dialog saying that the media is not optimized for Final Cut Pro, so depending on the speed of your machine, you might have to constantly render everything. But this is good if you want to cut out the Log and Transfer step.