Final cut codec advice

DVCPro PAL or DVC PAL?
If it is DVCPro PAL, then FCP supports that codec without any need to render or transcoding the footage.

fried-gold said:

I think just dvc-pal, but im only going by whats listed under finder -> file info.

As for the interlacing, the idea with the finished films is to load them up onto a video blog so I guess the end product will need to be de-interlaced. Is it better to get it out of the way before I start editing?

I am using a few different clips, some progressive footage and different sizes/frame rates. My last attempt FCP had to keep rendering everything, and playback jittery, so I thought i would start again and try and keep everything the same.

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Yuck I HATE everything that is the nasty concept of interlacing :O ! Different frame rates too? I would convert them all to one progressive scan format (hell I'd even say convert them to .mp4 H264 @ 29.97fps or whatever is close to the frame rates of all the clips :O) and when doing so make sure to deinterlace...Handbrake can do this but since I don't work with interlaced sources with the exception of TV capture I can't say I have the most experience with it. There are various settings with in it though that you can play with depending on how "bad" the interlacing is. I'm going to assume compressor probably has better deinterlacing though and if it does you could either keep it in DVC format or throw it in ProRes format.

That FCP had to render everything might mean that your Sequence settings weren't correct. To be sure that everything works fine, I'd run the original clips through Compressor and export them to either progressive AIC or one of the ProRes flavors, and set the Sequence in FCP accordingly.

Takes a lot of time, but you can run it as a batch over night, and it takes care of de-interlacing.

fried-gold said:

Is it better to get it out of the way before I start editing?

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If you haven't got a ton of footage and have got the time to spare, it will be less painful to transcode all footage to ProRes at a common frame rate, resolution and scan format before you edit.

To change the frame rate in Compressor, drag-and-drop the ProRes preset on your video file, click the Encoder tab, click the Settings button next to 'Video', then specify your desired frame rate in the pop-up window. Then click the Frame Controls tab and turn it on. Changing the Rate Conversion to 'Better' will result in a better image, but might result in an unrealistic processing time.

To deinterlace, in the Frame Controls tab, set the Output Fields to Progressive. Again, changing the Deinterlace setting to 'Better' will yield a better image, but might take too long.

To change the resolution, select one of the presets in the Geometry tab.

nateo200 said:

hell I'd even say convert them to .mp4 H264 @ 29.97fps or whatever is close to the frame rates of all the clips

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Don't transcode to H.264.

fried-gold said:

I have to edit a film for a university course I'm doing. They just gave me a load of .mov files at around 6gb each, with the dvc pal codec. I have no idea what I should be doing in terms of workflow so I need some help!

First of all somebody said that if I'm working with FCP (7) I need to convert the clips to pro-res (is this right?), but I'm having some problems with the de-interlacing, all the settings I've tried to convert to ProRes still leave the interlacing flickery bars wherever there's movement.

Thanks in advance,

Andy

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Don't de-interlace your video. You should be able to edit your PAL videos in FCP 7 Pal Sequence. DVC-Pal is lower field dominant and Pro-Res is upper field dominant. You need a field swap to go from DVC to Pro Res.