THANK YOU!

Question

I've been a lurker in this forum for awhile, and so appreciate all the great help that is available here. I was especially needy in that, although I'm an experienced FCP user, I was attempting a large HD project for the first time. I have now completed this project and wanted to offer some help as a "thank you" for what I have received from this forum.
I have just completed the HD project (108060i) on Final Cut Studio 2 using a dual core G5 (not the fastest anymore). It involved hundreds of clips, lots of rendering, and a "print to tape" final that was over an hour long. So I wanted to share what I discovered to make it smooth (which it was).
1. There are three settings that must be absolutely correct, or the program simply won't let you work. They are (as you already may know), EASY SETUP, AUDIO VIDEO SETTINGS, and SEQUENCE SETTINGS. There are some quirks…
a. Easy setup will automatically change the Audio Video Settings, but NOT the Sequence Settings. So you must manually set up the sequence settings for your HD project. It you don't do this correctly, the program will continually try to re-render your timeline every time you open and close. Look at all the Tabs!
b. HINT: Use the new Apple ProRes 422 as the codec for HD (sequence settings tab "render control")
c. On my G5, FCP doesn't keep these settings unique. In other words, when you open a Standard Definition project, FCP still has the HD settings! (Yikes). So you have to reset everything for SD, then set it back for HD when you return. This is DANGEROUS and might cause a whole re-render of your HD product when you return and have to re-set all the parameters. So try to stay with the HD until it's finished (not always easy… but just a hint). Perhaps this is only on my machine?
I have made screenshots of every setup screen for SD and HD just in case my brain can't remember all the settings that work.
2. SAVE after every single render! Just get used to it with a quick keystroke. If an when you have an issue (and you may), you can simply go back to the save bin and get the last version. I did this many times and it works well. For whatever reason, I was minding my own business and suddenly a render screen popped up and said "4 days to render"! (honest). The timeline turned red, and I was in trouble. I simply went to the bin and got my last save and it all reverted back to five minutes ago (yeah!). Who knows what happened?
3. Although this version of FC allows for SD and HD on the same timeline, be aware of an issue: Start the timeline with a real HD clip. If you don't, for whatever reason, FCP will "look" at it and often decide attributes for the whole clip. So make certain your first video clip is full HD.
4. When you go to "print to tape" (for HD, it's practical since we can't make DVD's just yet), be aware of a whole new deal… a new render screen "CONFORMING TO HDV VIDEO." This gets it ready for tape, and it's an entire timeline rendering. My 72 minute program took 4 hours on my G5. Then it returns to a screen that asks you to push the record button. I did four versions of my program, each one requiring this render time to print to tape. In each case I did it before I went to bed, and awoke with it ready to record. No problems.
HINT: If you have an HD deck (I have a Sony HVR-M15), sometimes it requires a bit of trial and error for FCP to actually "see" it (changing AV and Deck settings to match each other). So I use a 30 second TEST SEQUENCE and do the "print to tape" to make certain it actually is going to work before I do a 4 hour render and find out it won't.
All in all it went very smooth with the expected learning curve, and I made my deadline. It's a nice system when you listen to it, don't go too fast, and allow for a few hitches (save often!).
Thanks to all of you for your fine hints!
LC
G5   Mac OS X (10.4.7)  

Answer 1

Thanks for your post allasone.
Glad you were helped along the way. I still learn new tricks and tips reading these threads as well.
Couple of minor points/corrections in response to your long and worthy post:
1. There are three settings that must be absolutely correct, or the program simply won't let you work. They are (as you already may know), EASY SETUP, AUDIO VIDEO SETTINGS, and SEQUENCE SETTINGS. There are some quirks…
a. Easy setup will automatically change the Audio Video Settings, but NOT the Sequence Settings
actually Easy Setup does all of the above.
when you choose an Easy Setup, you are choosing a precofigured set of Audio / Video Settings, which includes amongst others your Sequence Settings.
there should be no special need for you to mess about with either Audio / Video Settings or Sequence Settings if you choose your Easy Setup correctly.
when you create a new project, FCP automatically creates a sequence for you using the Sequence Preset as set in your Audio / Video Settings. if you create a new project, and then choose an Easy Setup for your project that is not the same as the previous setup, then the Sequence Settings of your automatically created sequence will need to be changed.
of course, Easy Setup does not retroactively change the settings of an existing sequence!
the very easiest thing to do, rather than messing with those settings though is, after changing your Easy Setuo, simply delete the original automatically created sequence, and then press Cmd-N to create a New Sequence. The new sequence will carry the settings of your newly chosen Easy Setup.
however (as you mentioned in point 3) FCS2 also has a new feature configured in the User Preferences, to allow the Sequence to be auto-conformed to the settings of the first clip dropped into it ... and yes, very good advice, if you intend to use this facility when working with mixed formats, you need to make sure that first clip is in the native format that you wish the timeline to conform to.
c. On my G5, FCP doesn't keep these settings unique
FCP can have many projects open simultaneously (HD & SD, NTSC & PAL .. whatever) hence settings cannot be based on project. FCP's settings are system wide.
You should set them as you need them, when you need them ... as mentioned above it is easiest to use the Easy Setup feature to do this.
2. SAVE after every single render!
a little extreme! I would suggest as "general" advice to all, make sure you configure your autosave settings instead to the least amount of time you can afford to lose. however, it may well be that in your workflow, the save after every render was the best solution.
4. When you go to "print to tape" (for HD, it's practical since we can't make DVD's just yet), be aware of a whole new deal… a new render screen "CONFORMING TO HDV VIDEO."
its not an HD thing per se. this is specific to HDV and other MPEG HD formats and has been with us since FCP 5. darn good advice though to those working on long format HDV projects
cheers
Andy