Please check my workflow: mp4 to FCP via streamclip

Question

Hi all -
I'm hoping to edit video shot on a Sony Bloggie (MHS-TS20) in FCP 5.0.4.
The Bloggie footage is .mp4 with h264 compression, 1920x1080, 29.97 fps, square pixels, upper field dominance, at 1.2 MB/sec.
After several hours of forum research and trial/error, I'm pretty sure I'm on the right track. I'm converting using MPEG Streamclip (MPSC) via the Export to Quicktime command. I am using FCP 5.0.4, however, so I do not have the option to export with a ProRes codec, which seems to be the preference for those using FCP 6 or 7.
I believe my best option, therefore, is APPLE DV/DVCPRO-NTSC, selecting 1920x1080 (unscaled), 29.97 fps, with interlacing deselected. I have exported with both upper and lower dominant. (MPSC says to use upper for all codecs except DV, but even when I select lower, FCP tells me that the dominance of the file is upper.) The exported files are 3.6MB/sec.
The exported files import to FCP and are editable, but require rendering even when I set the sequence settings to the exact specifications of the file. So my first question is: Is there any (good) way to convert the files so that they are editable in FCP 5 without having to render them first? (I can achieve this by converting with an HDV codec, but my understanding is that the GOP compression makes this undesirable.)
A second, related question is: What is my best choice of output format for the edited sequence if I intend to post the movie to Vimeo and otherwise distribute online?
thanks
Rich

Answer 1

If 11 seconds of video takes 7 minutes you are doing something wrong.
My 3 year old iMac (see specs below) takes about 3 times real time, which would be about half a minute for an 11 second clip.
When you restrict the data rate you are making smaller file sizes. Half the rate equals a file half the size.
This can be important when you are posting on the web as many people have slow broadband speeds which cannot cope properly with high data rates/large file sizes.
Still images only require a tiny data rate as nothing changes from one frame to another.
The faster the movement, the more changes there are from frame to frame and this requires a fast data rate or the video will be jerky, blocky (showing loads of moving pixels) and generally unwatchable.
To see the effect, get a clip with movement and encode it at 1,000kbps to see how bad it is.
The size of the original video frame is also vital.
A 1920x1080 frame has around 4 times as many pixels as a 720x576 so it needs a data rate 4 times faster.
Conversely, if 10,000kbps is good for hi-def , a standard def video would only require 2,500kbps.
1280 has about half the pixels of 1080 so you can use a slower data rate and end up with half-size files, which as mentioned above, can be important when uploading or viewing on the internet.
AAC audio is more compressed than the standard PCM so once again it helps to keep file sizes/data rates down.