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Importing problem with 1440x1080 video in FCPX

ImpostorOak

ImpostorOak

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 27, 2009
86
43
So I have a 1920x1080 project and I want to bring in some new footage that's 1440x1080. I'm running FCPX 10.1.2 on Yosemite.

Now, I'm not that knowledgeable about video editing and I'm definitely very new to Final Cut, but I can't seem to import the new footage, no matter what I try. Even making a new event or a new library/then event, the videos are grayed out when I try to import them. I tried opening them in compressor to see if I could convert them to 1920x1080, but compressor wouldn't open them. I even downloaded the free xilisoft video converter from the app store, but it told me the videos were invalid. I can watch the videos just fine in VLC or quicktime, but nothing that can edit or transcode videos seems to be able to know what to do with them. Any ideas?
 
hvfsl

hvfsl

macrumors 68000
Jul 9, 2001
1,867
185
London, UK
VLC can transcode video. But where did you get the video from, I am assuming it is HDV if it is that resolution?
 
ImpostorOak

ImpostorOak

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 27, 2009
86
43
I'm making an educational video for this fellowship I'm on. We had made what was essentially a demo with really nice animations and really crappy (audio and video quality) footage. So once they saw the difference, the bosses got the AV department from the university to reshoot the footage with us. All I really know is that he shot it on tape of some kind and told me to give him a couple of days to transfer it to the computer. Of course, the university is closed for Christmas break so I can't ask him to re-encode it or anything right now. But I really need to get it done.

I did finally manage to get some random transcoding app on the app store to open it and convert it to 1920 but there was a noticeable drop in quality. Like huge.
 
ImpostorOak

ImpostorOak

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 27, 2009
86
43
I used VLC to transcode it to a 1080p .m4v and the picture quality stayed the same (I actually think it looks a little better, but that's probably my imagination). But the video itself is super jittery and completely unusable. I guess I'm getting closer, but I can't just keep transcoding it to everything possible because it takes like two hours every time I try to do it. Unfortunately, my iMac is a late 2009 model so the processor isn't the fastest. Normally I'd do transcoding on my PC because it has an ivy bridge processor, but I'm out of town at the moment.
 
LethalWolfe

LethalWolfe

macrumors G3
Jan 11, 2002
9,370
124
Los Angeles
ImpostorOak said:
I used VLC to transcode it to a 1080p .m4v and the picture quality stayed the same (I actually think it looks a little better, but that's probably my imagination). But the video itself is super jittery and completely unusable. I guess I'm getting closer, but I can't just keep transcoding it to everything possible because it takes like two hours every time I try to do it. Unfortunately, my iMac is a late 2009 model so the processor isn't the fastest. Normally I'd do transcoding on my PC because it has an ivy bridge processor, but I'm out of town at the moment.
Click to expand...

If you download the trial version of Adobe Media Encoder (it might be bundled with Premiere Pro, I'm not sure), you'll be able to import the files (I assume they are HDV) into Media Encoder and export out to Pro Res.
 
ImpostorOak

ImpostorOak

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 27, 2009
86
43
Adobe Media Encoder says the file could not be imported. Error while decompressing the source file.

I might just have to email the guy and ask him if he can re-encode it for me or something, but time is a factor here. It shouldn't take that long to actually edit, but he won't be able to do it for a while since it's the holidays. I need to finish the edit (video is like 17 minutes) so we can get a finished transcript because we're getting it translated to Spanish. Then I have to subtitle it before we present it at a conference on Feb 12.
 
R

rei101

macrumors 6502a
Dec 24, 2011
976
1
Welcome to the club...
I have been working with video for 20 years and still dealing with those issues every day. The problem with video is that there are way too many "standards".

Keep trying, check the bit rate, that may be the reason the video looks crappy, probably is HD but 1500 kb bit rate, or something like that. Make averything Apple Pro Res HQ.
 
ImpostorOak

ImpostorOak

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 27, 2009
86
43
Well I'd love to convert it to pro res, but everything that can do pro res says it can't open it. Final Cut, AME, even tried to open it in iMovie just for kicks. Nothing will touch it. And everything that can open it (VLC, quicktime) doesn't have the options I need to convert it well.
 
O

OneAnswer

macrumors member
Sep 20, 2014
75
0
ImpostorOak said:
Well I'd love to convert it to pro res, but everything that can do pro res says it can't open it. Final Cut, AME, even tried to open it in iMovie just for kicks. Nothing will touch it. And everything that can open it (VLC, quicktime) doesn't have the options I need to convert it well.
Click to expand...

Use VideoSpec to analyse that video file and post the results here if you can.
 
ImpostorOak

ImpostorOak

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 27, 2009
86
43
Well I think I got it taken care of… handbrake managed to convert it to an h.264 .mp4 from the MPEG-2 .mpeg that it was. The quality looks the same and Final Cut let me bring it in. It's actually still 1440x1080 but it looks fine and sounds fine so I'm just going to leave it. No idea why handbrake was able to handle it while every other program freaked out so much.
 
C

ColdCase

macrumors 68040
Feb 10, 2008
3,360
276
NH
Kinda late, since you have it figured out. I've had good luck with bigasoft's prores converter. I think they still have a trial version that you could try. I haven't found anything yet that makes it cry uncle short of a badly corrupted video file that nothing can play.
 
LethalWolfe

LethalWolfe

macrumors G3
Jan 11, 2002
9,370
124
Los Angeles
Glad you found something that worked. It sounds like there might have been some corruption to the file which is why so many programs wouldn't open it.
 
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