Workflow for stills in FCP

[yoak]

Hi
This spring I will do a film that consits of stills only.
The finished product will be projected, but probably from a tape format not 35mm.
There will be NO pans, zoom or Ken Burns effects

I´m trying to work out the best workflow, and need some help.

I will shoot RAW and convert them to a format that FC accepts. Is TIFF the way to go?

After some research I have realized that I will need Photoshop (or equivalent) to prepare the stills for FC

What format should I keep my sequence in, HD, Uncompressed 8-bit or any other?

I would like to do some of the editing on my 24" iMac, can it cope with these higdef formats.

Or can I do an edit in DV, then render it to a different format when finished?

Lot of questions (still have more), but hopefully someone here can give me some pointers. Lethalwolf?

 

[LethalWolfe]

When you say a "film that consits of stills only" I assume you mean an actual narrative work and not a photo montage (for like someone's birthday), right?

What format is it going to be projected as (MiniDV, DVD, etc.,). The problem w/uncompressed is you'll need a big, fast RAID to achieve the speeds needed for uncompressed. You should be able to get away using DVCPro HD and off the shelf FW400 drives so that would probably give you the best quality w/o having to do expensive upgrades. If you do it at 24fps then that'll also make it easier to handle (drives won't have to work as hard nor fill up as fast).

W/all that being said, I've never made a movie out of still frames before, so this might no be the best workflow. I dunno. If you did some looking around for stop-motion animation workflows that might give some more tailored direction.


Lethal

 

[Texas04]

Here is your workflow .

Enjoy

Edit: Posting Screenshot
Edit2: Screenshot posted

Alright this is the workflow that you will need... it would not allow itself to be downloaded from my website.. odd but there you go...

You might need AppleScript from there if you want it to automatically input the pictures into your project.

 

[-DH]

I do a lot of videos that incorporate still images and I seldom prep them in Photoshop first - that part comes later.

Here's my workflow:

· Scan the images in TIF format at about twice the resolution my FCP Sequence will need.

· Import them into FCP and drop them on the Timeline. FCP will automatically scale them to your Sequence settings.

· View them on an external TV monitor. Those that need touching up or adjusting, I open in Photoshop to do the work - Photoshop is set as the External Still Image Editor in FCP's preferences.

· After correcting in PS, I switch back to FCP to see the changes.

Last week I did a 5 minute fund raising promo for a non-profit client using nothing but images and text in an FCP DV/DVCPro NTSC Sequence. You can see it here: http://www.4allstars.org/video/AmericasAllStars.swf

Please don't judge the quality; I sent them a 320x240 Flash (SWF) file and for some strange reason, their web guy decided to stretch it to larger than the original DV resolution for playback. Go figure.

-DH

 

[yoak]

Thanks for the input.
-Yes it´s a narrative film, no birthdays

To -DH: I looked at your "film", nice work. However, I will not do any pans or zooms, you think I need to have twice the resolution for my stills?

To Leathal: I did try to do an uncompressed 8-bit 30 sec sequence last night. You were right, The iMac didn´t stand a chance even if my TIF´s were scaled down to 1280*720.
I will try DVCPro HD.
My iMac has FW 800 so that should help a little I suppose.
(Using the internal for these tests)

 

[yoak]

I spoke to the post-house today what solution would be best for them when it comes to transfer the edit to tape.
They had to come back to me as they realized we have one problem; Stills do not generate timecode.
They will try to figure it out and get back to me

This isn´t as straightforeward as i thought when I started out (nothing ever is, is it?)

Just thought to keep you posted on what´s happening.

 

[LethalWolfe]

Thanks for the input.
-Yes it´s a narrative film, no birthdays

To -DH: I looked at your "film", nice work. However, I will not do any pans or zooms, you think I need to have twice the resolution for my stills?

To Leathal: I did try to do an uncompressed 8-bit 30 sec sequence last night. You were right, The iMac didn´t stand a chance even if my TIF´s were scaled down to 1280*720.
I will try DVCPro HD.
My iMac has FW 800 so that should help a little I suppose.
(Using the internal for these tests)

If you are not doing any pans or zooms the images don't need to be any bigger than your timeline, but if you think you'll do any reframing of the shot then make them bigger than your sequence settings so you have room to do that.

I spoke to the post-house today what solution would be best for them when it comes to transfer the edit to tape.
They had to come back to me as they realized we have one problem; Stills do not generate timecode.
They will try to figure it out and get back to me

This isn´t as straightforeward as i thought when I started out (nothing ever is, is it?)

Just thought to keep you posted on what´s happening.

You lost me. Why are you talking w/a post house? Is it so you can get your finished project laid off to DVCPro HD tape? Will the people doing the projection have a DVCPro HD deck to play it back in?


Lethal

 

[yoak]

I´m not sure what the tape format I need to end up on yet. I started a dialouge with the post house to try to sort out as many problems as possible beforehand.
We will need a finished product on another format than a DVD. (It has to do with the sale and lease back deal in the UK.)

 

[LethalWolfe]

I´m not sure what the tape format I need to end up on yet. I started a dialouge with the post house to try to sort out as many problems as possible beforehand.
We will need a finished product on another format than a DVD. (It has to do with the sale and lease back deal in the UK.)

I don't understand why they are worried about the pictures not having TC. Couldn't you just give them a QT of your finished movie (or give them a HDD w/your entire project on it if they are FCP shop) for them to work with?


Lethal