Dont know if this should be in combocams or videography but anyway..

I now have Nikon D90, Sony Ex1 and Sony SR12

I can get the footage of any one of these cameras into Final Cut 'native' or whatever the phrase is so they can be edited without rendering the clips

What I cant do is get a situation where they are all running in one sequence without at least one of the cameras running red on the timeline (needing rendering)

What I am after is a peice of software that can prepare or normalise all the footage

Creating a workflow thus..

Raw clips put in a folder A

Software X runs an 'action' on that folder

Folder B then contains footage all in a format Y that than then be imported and edited with a green timeline in FCP

I am aware that running such an 'action' may take a (very) long time - but not time where I have to be sitting in front of the computer - I could be drinking coffee or even sleeping or shooting more images

BTW I am on a 10.4x mac of intermediate spec

Any hints most welcome

I suppose I am looking to get all input all the 'RAWs' and output them all as 'Tiff'

BTW what is the 'Tiff' of video ?

SMM

You really want the colour bars in the FCP timeline to be colour-less so that there is no rendering to be done except for effects & transitions.

The easiest way to achieve this is to use an 'interchange format' - I currently use either the HDV-Apple Intermediate Codec or the HDV-Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) for editing. This is set up in each individual FCP Project in the Audio/Video Settings before importing any footage.

Each Sequence within the FCP Project should have settings that match the import codec format.

Here is my current workflow for mixed format video such as yours:

- I copy the camera's original files (including all the extras that Sony cameras like to create) into a uniquely named folder in my 'archive' drive.
This archive is the Hard Drive equivalent of old my old HDV Tape Storage .
I use a hot-swappable JBOD eSATA box with HDs that are simply used to store all the original footage. That way on export from FCP, I can always go back to the originals if I want to conform from the original footage.

- Using FCP's Log & Transfer function, open the archive copy of the above 'native-to-camera' footage and log and transfer the footage into the FCP project. All your original material will be imported into FCP in the format that you have set up.

I think you will find these two articles on Ken Stone's website very useful as primers

Am I Rendering And Viewing At The Best Quality With FCP?

Setting Up a Project in Final Cut 6

There really is no TIFF format for video...what we need is RED to continue to convince all the manuf. to shoot RAW!

So log and transfer kind of sucks all the footage into FCP -

I have just been dragging clips into the browser

If the directory structure changes there are problems : 'media offline'

I take it a FCP project that has been 'logged and transfered' is way bigger than an FCP file that is relying on external media

Thankyou - will go and play - then I will ask again waht an intermediade codec is

sounds like 'tiff' ie high quality place the edit happens before the product is outputted to 'jpg' at a certain size (web/print) for delivery to the client

(thats my stills workflow anyway - I do all my PS on 16bit tiff and then generally save out lower res for delivery to the client)

SMM

Yes, likely more than twice as big - depending on the codec used for editing.

The original remains untouched; that footage is 'transcoded' into the intermediate editing format. This workflow is only necessary when mixing different original video formats and when you wish to avoid that dreaded red line - which is simply telling you that the footage referenced is not the same video format as that of the sequence you are editing.

Twice as big ? and the rest - as far as I can tell FCP files are tiny - ie an FCP file could say 'run this 50GB clip for 10hours' in about a 50k file beacuse FCP has only had to remember one instruction - maybe Im all wrong

--

I am glad video people dread the red line ! - I was dreading after 36hours of FCP ownership

Is there a software that I can get a whole pile of rushes and just say save as "HDV-Apple ProRes 422 (HQ) " (or whatever) cook dinner and have a nice pile of footage waiting to play with when I have eaten(slept)

or is that function done best at the import and capture phase

my reason of thinking to do it externally of a FCP project is that I see clips having many uses client, showreel, stock, whatever

I see many client projects having shots from my soon to be shot archive (btw a potential client group of mine is holiday complexes who will need footage of local atractions like the 'eden project' or 'surfers on beach' cut into thier 'own' footage)

so having a library of clips ready to edit in a standard format seems attractive

my desire would be to adhere to my photographic workflow of storing all images in 'day folders' with the subject matter of those day folders stored in a database for easy location most is going to be on offline HDs

thanks for helping a 'vid newb' - it is a strange place to be because my stills workflow from RAW storage to client delivery is completely sorted and has been for years

S

...'twice as big' because the original video is transcoded completely to new video files and will likely not have as much compression (AVCHD>Apple ProRes 422).

The FCP Log & Transfer function can be as simple as a drag & drop if you wish - walk away or go to bed and it will all be done when you return, so no need for a script or 3rd party software