Workflow for AVCHD 5.1 audio in FCP

I have a Panasonic HDC-TM700 cam using the included 5.1 audio offering. I know it's not "true" 5.1, but I want it anyway.
I 100% understand FCP does not natively support AVCHD, but worse....it mixes down the 5.1 to stereo when I Log and Transfer to any of the available codecs. I know FCP can edit 5.1.
I tried ClipGrab in hopes it would produce a ProRes file w/ 5.1. It did not.
Premiere Elements 9 demo not only allows me to natively edit my AVCHD files shot in both 60i and 60p (no transcode), but it also retains the original 5.1 tracks and can output either a Dolby 5.1 or an AAC 5.1. My issue is I don't know how to edit in Premiere. I've been using FCP for almost 8 years and would prefer not to learn a whole new app.
HDD space is not an issue and 3rd party apps are an expected solution.
I have a hunch I'll have to edit in Pre9 until Apple includes this in FCP/FCE, but wanted to ping all you to see if I've missed a work around somewhere.
Thanks!

Hi Pi,
Yes I have setup all channels as you mentioned. I am not sure if this matters, but I am only given a1 and a2 tabs on the left though. What I mean by this is that there is the column in between the show/hide audio button and the connecting destination A tracks. I believe these are the source buttons. Does that make sense? Shouldn't I see a matching button for all tracks?
I would also add that my ending goal was to convert this file to multiple file types such as a .m4v so that it will work on aTV and iPads. I have tried exporting to .m4v from FCP and received a non-specific general error. If I try the self contained QT option I am downgraded to 2 channel audio which is not ideal.

Similar Messages

Best workflow for AVCHD 1080i50 footage in iMovie 10.0.7?

I shoot video using both my iPhone 5 and my Canon Legria HF R16. The first shoots progressive video, but with the second I shoot AVCHD (mts files) interlaced 1080i50 (that is 50 fields/second, giving 25 interlaced frames / sec). I recently purchased iMovie 10.0.7 from Mac App Store and I like it a lot. I don't have any problems with iPhone's (progressive) footage, but Canon's (interlaced) footage appear very noisy. Do we know how this version of iMovie handles interlace video? Any proposed workflow for interlaced video for good quality of export?

To increase the possibility of getting an answer, I would like to set a simpler general question: when using interlaced video with iMovie, do you:
a) import it as it is (interlaced)?
or
b) deinterlace it and then import the resulting progressive video?

Mobile workflow for AVCHD

I am using MacBook Pro and capture all my video with Panasonic HDC-SD9EP-S. I use large external Firewire disks to archive (already) and cut (soon hopefully) my video. However, I spend a lot of time away from home, so I am wondering if FinalCut (Pro or Express) will allow me to apply the following workflow:
1. Copy AVCHD media from my SD card to an external hard disk archive
2. Backup the AVCHD archive to another external drive
3. Convert each clip to a small (480x270) preview and store it on an internal hard disk
4. Away from home (no access to the external had disks) - review new clips using the small previews, name them, rate them and assing keyowords and other meta data to them, mark those I want to delete permanently
5. Back at home - delete the clips I marked for deletion permamently from the archive
6. Again away from home - precut a video using the small previews
7. Back at home - convert only the clips used in the video to AIC or ProRes, store the converted media on external hard disk, and finish cutting with all details
8. Export result video to the desired destination formats
Can anyone suggest whether FinalCut Express or FinalCut Pro will let me apply this workflow? If not, what would be the minimum necessary modification of the workflow to make it possible?
Also, do you see any problems with my workflow which I seem to be overlooking?
Thanks!
HOnza

Roger,
What is the workflow like for the newer AVCHD format hard drive and memory stick camcorders? Do you use the USB port to just pull files directly off the camcorders memory, then import these into premiere elements?
>> After connecting the camcorder to your system, you can either
1. Copy the files locally and then import them into Premiere Elements.
Or
2. Directly use Media Downloader and import files. A copy of file will be saved in the default location.
Does the camera make a separate file for each "scene" each time you turn on/off the record button that is?
>Scene Detect is available however this feature does not exist for AVCHD camcorders. For DV camcorders, one can certainly use this feature.

What is the best workflow for AVCHD with iMovie/iDVD 09?

I am recording AVCHD video with a Sony HDR-SR11. I don't have a blu-ray burner yet, so I want to create the highest quality DVD's I can from this source video using my MacBook and the software I have (iMovie 09 and iDVD 09).
Currently I am importing the video clips into iMovie 09 at the 1920x1200 setting. After creating a 16:9 movie I choose "Share to Media Browser" and export at the highest setting I see (I think 1280x720, I'm not on the MacBook at the moment).
After a long while this completes and I launch iDVD 09. I drag the movie I exported above into the theme and burn at Professional Quality. After another long wait I have my DVD but I'm quite disappointed with the video quality.
Even taking into account that DVD is not a hi-def disc format it seems like the video quality should be better. Is there a better workflow I should be using with this combination of software? Maybe some way to avoid scaling/compressing the video twice? Or is this as good as it gets with iMovie 09 and iDVD 09? I may have access to iMovie 06, if that would help.
Thanks,
Gerald

3) Share to Media Browser with Best Quality
For folks like me that wonder exactly how did you do this:
(I don't know what Media Browser is yet.)
I did this: (I got some warnings - did you?)
In iMovie:
Selected my 1280x720 "HD" video in the Project panel,
Share->Media Browser...
- if HD is greyed out, you already shared this size to Media Browser, go to next step,
or select "Remove from Media Browser, check HD, click Remove"
- if HD is not greyed, but is not check marked,
select Computer icon, then uncheck Mobile, Med, and Lrg, leaving only HD checked
With HD checked, Click Publish - watch "Creating the HD movie.."
Bring up iDVD, Select Create a new project, browse for location and enter project name
If Themes at bottom right is not selected (Dark), click it
Double click a theme - for example under Revolution, choose Chapters.
At bottom right, select Media, At top right, select Movies
Under iMovie should be your iMovie project - mine says "My First Project" (I didn't name iMovie proj)
Select your iMovie Project,
you should see a thumb of your video with dimension, size listed
(movie duration is down at bottom right.)
Drag the thumbnail onto the iDVD preview window (I don't what that window is officially called)
drop it under the theme title "Revolution Chapters" for this example
You should see a running preview of your video with the project name below it.
Important step: Project->Project Info, Under Encoding: select Best or Professional Quality
Ok re-encoding warning, close Proj Info window.
File->Burn DVD... Popup says "Warnings in Project", select Continue Burning
Insert DVD (Apple designed sharp edges on the SuperDrive on purpose?)
I used Staples 4x DVD-RW first.
Watch process proceed till DVD is ejected...Don't believe "Time remaining: about one minute"
My DVD-R120 player-recorder would not load the disk. It played fine on iMac, a WindowsXP laptop, and a Windows XP desktop. This DVD machine only likes old 1X RW media for some reason. I wish someone made a standalone Blu-Ray recorder/player. I burned a second copy to some gold Sony 1X/2X DVD-RW media, and this disk played fine.
Picture quality is soft compared to HD material, but the moire patterns on some edges is only somewhat reduced over the Share to iDVD version. This Share to Media Browser version is acceptable for folks that won't go to Vimeo or YouTube to see my videos in HD.

Workflow for avchd clips and meta data

Just started using a Panasonic AG-AF100 on a 5 month project. Will be producing 1000's of clips. So I have off-loaded the first 3 cards we shot and have discovered something about avccam material. If you just copy the .MTS files from their /stream folder or rename the file with a name instead of its original number produced in the camera you lose the timecode and other meta data.
If I leave the clips in that folder and other card folders in their associated directories and "import" clip with Premiere Media Browser it retains the timecode. Trouble is that I cannot see thumbnails in Media Browser and the clip number means little. Bridge on my Win7/64bit machine shows thumbnails (but no preview) and a double-click will preview in Win Media Player.
On my main edit station (Vista/64bit) Bridge neither shows thumbnails or previews and I get no avchd .mts playback in Windows Media Player. Everything worrks the same within Premiere, nice solid editing and playback of avchd clips. (I will probably upgrade this machine to Win7 next week)
So my request for advice/questions are:
Suggestions for managing and organizing large qualities of clips with what will be similar names, etc
Previewing updates or options to find media
How do you manage AVCHD material and still maintain meta data?
Thanks so much!! As I get older and the technology seems faster, stronger, sharper, the demands on my brain get tougher.
Rick

Rick,
If you just copy the .MTS files from their /stream folder or rename the file with a name instead of its original number produced in the camera you lose the timecode and other meta data.
If I leave the clips in that folder and other card folders in their associated directories and "import" clip with Premiere Media Browser it retains the timecode.
You mustmustmust keep the files in their folder structure, if you intend to maintain timecode. You've clearly discovered this Good you did so early. The folder structure thing is really not a big deal; there is very little need to manipulate these at the OS level, and the Media Browser in PPro makes it reasonably easy to bring these in for editing. You can pre-build a folder structure into which you can offload each card's worth of clips.
Trouble is that I cannot see thumbnails in Media Browser and the clip number means little. Bridge on my Win7/64bit machine shows thumbnails (but no preview) and a double-click will preview in Win Media Player.
On my main edit station (Vista/64bit) Bridge neither shows thumbnails or previews and I get no avchd .mts playback in Windows Media Player. Everything worrks the same within Premiere, nice solid editing and playback of avchd clips. (I will probably upgrade this machine to Win7 next week)
Windows 7 has built-in splitters and decoders for H.264 media, so that's the reason you can at least get thumbnails in Bridge and playback the files in WMP there. The Media Browser, even on Windows 7, won't show thumbnails as they are not saved into the folder structure the way that P2 saves a poster image into the folder structure. Note that even "standard" containers like AVI or MOV do not display a thumbnail in Media Browser.
As far as Bridge is concerned: I know a lot of people like it, but from my perspective, it's just about worthless for video. This is largely an application designed for photography workflows that has been shoehorned into "working" with video. I don't even like it for AVI/MOV.
The ugly truth is that Bridge is not going to be much, if any, help in this workflow. However, there may be another tool in the suite that will accomplish what you need: OnLocation. You won't get thumbnails, but you can browse through the folder structure without knowing you're doing it, import clips to preview them, and add metadata. You could do this for each card you offload. Then, in Premiere, simply use Media Browser to navigate to your OnLocation Project, and it will open up just like a folder, listing all your clips with the metadata you added. Granted, it is not a perfect workflow, but once you added that metadata, it will flow with the files wherever you move them around in the Adobe suite--it won't go elsewhere, as it's not injected into the files themselves. So long as you're editing in Premiere, you're good.
Now, there is another thing you can do that may make clip management even easier, though it does require a bit of forethought in pre-production. It will really depend on the type of project you're shooting, but you can preload metadata on to an SD card and into the camera, and then automatically record this to the clips as they are shot! I don't have an AVCCAM to give you exact workflow steps, but I do this all the time with my P2 workflow and it's a tremendous help once you hit the edit bay.
If you haven't already, head over to the Panasonic support site: Support Desk Top / Broadcast and Professional AV. You'll need to register for a "PASS" membership (it's free, and you don't need to register a camera), but you can then download the AVCCAM Viewer application. Unfortunately, this application is not quite as helpful as P2 Viewer is (it's rather cartoony, actually), but it does have the metadata editor in it that will let you create your metadata files in advance and save them to an SD card. Then, after consulting the camera manual , you can set those metadata files to be a data source for the footage as you record it. Here's what you can add to the metadata files and, summarily, the clips:
Once you load this into the camera's memory, that data is saved into the clips, and is readable by Premiere. The "User Clip Name" field can be set to auto-increment (again, this is going off my knowledge of the way metadata works in a P2 camera, but the AVCCAM should be similar) so that each clip has a base name and then a serial number. When you're done with a particular scene/shot, you'd load the next metadata files, reset the indexing, and continue. Lather, rinse, repeat.
The biggest hole in the metadata workflow, at least as it pertains to AVCHD/AVCCAM, is that there is no tool (that I'm aware of) that lets you edit this metadata after the fact. With P2, you can--there are a number of applications, both free and payware, that let you do this--but I've yet to find one that works with AVCCAM. Even Panasonic's own AVCCAM Viewer is incapable of this, it seems.
The major advantage to adding file metadata like this is that it travels wherever the clips go, and into whatever application they land in. Not being able to edit it after the fact, though, just plain sucks. This is where the clip metadata you'd add in the Adobe applications comes into play, with the obvious disadvantage that it's only useful in Adobeland. As always, ain't no such thing as a free lunch.
So that's my take on this--it's good you're looking into this before you have a couple terabytes worth of footage on hand Let me know if I can help fill in any details that I might have overlooked. And be sure to check on the Panasonic site linked above for firmware updates to the AF100--I see one came out just a few days ago. It's always good to stay current.
Good luck!

Workflow for AVCHD -- Blu-Ray

I have a Canon Vixia HFS100 that I've been using for personal video. The camera can shoot 1080/60i or 1080/30p. I've been shooting 30p. I'm looking for comments on my current work flow, which is:
1. Shoot video in 30p.
2. Log and transfer into FCP from AVCHD folder using ProRes 422.
3. Place in sequence set to 1920x1080, aspect ratio HDTV1080i, square pixel, no field dominance, 29.97 timing.
4. Edit then send to Compressor
5. Compressor settings are H.264 for Blu-Ray, stream usage Blu-Ray, frame rate 29.97, average rate about 17 MBps, 25 MBps max, frame controls off
6. Burn in Toast or Encore
The result looks very good, but I wonder if it could be better or if I'm forgetting something.
Also, the result is almost "too good", meaning there is almost too much detail on the screen for the eye to get, so sometimes the image is wearying to watch, unlike a Blu-Ray film which is detailed yet smooth. Is there a way to "smooth out" the video? Reduce frame rate to 24 or some such?

Rob Reuland wrote:
the result is almost "too good", meaning there is almost too much detail on the screen for the eye to get...
LOL. Isn't that the point of HD; Quality? If I wanted less detail I'd probably shoot at a lower definition or add a slight blur to the footage on your timeline...
If I wanted less quality, I'd just tie a cam to my head and shoot in SD.

Best workflow for HDV 1080/60i/24pA with FCP 5.1.4

I've spent hours trying to find the answer to this specific problem on the discussion forums as well as the FCP user manuals and I can't find it, please help! I've got a Sony HVR-V1U and I recently recorded several hours of footage at 24pA. I would like to edit the footage in 24p, and preferably in a different codec besides HDV and definitely not in AIC. I don't have any experience with Cinema Tools and I can't seem to get any files directly from FCP to Cinema Tools no matter what I transcode the video to. Also, is there any way to transcode the video to ProRes because it is so much faster to render video in ProRes than in HDV.
Thanks in advance!

Removing pulldown is done during capture if you shot 24pa, and in Cinema tools if you shot 24p. However I don't think that camera shoots a version of 24p that works when you remove the pulldown pattern. I could be wrong, but as I recall, the 24fps video that the v1u shoots isn't exactly the same as that shot by say, a DV camera so might not work removing pulldown. Just looked at the specs at Sony on the camera... it does apparently shoot with a 2:3 pulldown, so after you capture, you might try Cinema tools for the removal. Never heard of anyone doing this with HDV though, so it might be pretty problematic.
That said, you should be able to transcode to ProRes in Compressor, and it should look great. Don't use your computer display to judge the quality of the results though, use an external video monitor. Artifact may show up on the computer's display when it's really not in the video...
Jerry

What is the best workflow for AVCHD and iMovie/iDVD 09?

I am recording AVCHD video with a Sony HDR-SR11. I don't have a blu-ray burner yet, so I want to create the highest quality DVD's I can from this source video using my MacBook and the software I have (iMovie 09 and iDVD 09).
Currently I am importing the video clips into iMovie 09 at the 1920x1200 setting. After creating a 16:9 movie I choose "Share to Media Browser" and export at the highest setting I see (I think 1280x720, I'm not on the MacBook at the moment).
After a long while this completes and I launch iDVD 09. I drag the movie I exported above into the theme and burn at Professional Quality. After another long wait I have my DVD but I'm quite disappointed with the video quality.
Even taking into account that DVD is not a hi-def disc format it seems like the video quality should be better. Is there a better workflow I should be using with this combination of software? Maybe some way to avoid scaling/compressing the video twice? Or is this as good as it gets with iMovie 09 and iDVD 09? I may have access to iMovie 06, if that would help.
Thanks,
Gerald

I am recording AVCHD video with a Sony HDR-SR11. I don't have a blu-ray burner yet, so I want to create the highest quality DVD's I can from this source video using my MacBook and the software I have (iMovie 09 and iDVD 09).
Currently I am importing the video clips into iMovie 09 at the 1920x1200 setting. After creating a 16:9 movie I choose "Share to Media Browser" and export at the highest setting I see (I think 1280x720, I'm not on the MacBook at the moment).
After a long while this completes and I launch iDVD 09. I drag the movie I exported above into the theme and burn at Professional Quality. After another long wait I have my DVD but I'm quite disappointed with the video quality.
Even taking into account that DVD is not a hi-def disc format it seems like the video quality should be better. Is there a better workflow I should be using with this combination of software? Maybe some way to avoid scaling/compressing the video twice? Or is this as good as it gets with iMovie 09 and iDVD 09? I may have access to iMovie 06, if that would help.
Thanks,
Gerald

Best workflow for image (LOGO) from Illustrator to FCP?

Greetings to all. I am struggling with this -- I want to bring my company logo into FCP 5.1.4, FROM Illustrator to FCP. Easy enough? Not for me.. as I have two issues:
1. My imported image looks great in the viewer, but jaggies in the Canvas.
I understand that for DV NTSC 48k, my frame size is 720x480 -- but in another post, I read that it is best to export as 720x540, .tif (another person said 720x540 jpeg, because jpeg embeds sRGB proile -- but that will be part of question #2) -- the square pixel vs. 4:3 pixel issue...
My Illustrator image is all vector art, and all fonts are outlined before export. I am saving as high-res (300 dpi). I tried saving as tif, jpeg, pdf. I tried bringing the PDF into photoshop, and saving as a psd. I tried opening pdf. No matter what I tried, the image looked perfect in the viewer, but like doo in the canvas. A tif, file size 720x540, 300dpi looks correct in the viewer, but jaggie in the canvas.
YES, the green "render" bar was visible in the timeline -- of course, that must be the problem -- but then I rendered the still clip, and there was no difference. I made sure the render indicator in the timeline was "dark grey" -- but yet, the imported still image from illustrator looks jaggie and not good enough for production in the canvas.
WHAT AM I DOING WRONG HERE?
2. Color space -- regardless of the jaggies issues, my imported still image from illustrator is all washed out when imported.
Regardless of file type. Yes, file set to RGB. Yes, gamma set to 2.2 (also tried setting imported still gamma to defualt - "source" - no change)
My LCD display (mac book pro C2D 17") is calibrated, using a Spyder2. Gamma is set to 2.2. My print output from illustrator (saved as pdf x-1/a) ALWAYS prints as expected.
If I add a color correction filter, and juice up the saturation, I can try to make the still image look close, but this shouldn't be the case, YES?
My expectation is that a still image in illustrator or photoshop should look the same in FCP.
What kind of newbie error am I making? What am I missing?
Thank in advance for any guidance.
Jeremy

Jeremy Roberts wrote:
I have been sending jobs to print (magazine ads, web, general print) for ages, and my printed materials come in as expected -- that is, within a few % points of my display -- which is what we are expecting -- and also EXTREMELY close to proof prints, using a reasonably high-end inkjet printer, with correct paper profiles... that is to say, that although I am no expert in color management by any means, I have what I need so that what I see on screen is very close to what is printed on a local printer, or a million dollar press.
CAN I EXPECT to achieve anything close to this with video?
When you print something on paper, you get to see exactly what it will look like and that's exactly how your customers will see it too. With video, there are infinite variables affecting this such as incorrectly calibrated displays; cheap TV components; the difference between CRTs, LCDs and computer displays; the size / resolution of the display, etc. There are so many variables that it will look different on every screen. All we can do as content producers is calibrate to a common standard, achieved through a properly-calibrated broadcast monitor.
But if your film has a single use in mind, such as a trade show, it is better to ignore the above advice and use the display device it will end up on as the monitoring device, if you can.
I am not near my FCP machine right now, so I can't try the test -- but I will try to revert my display color profile to stock apple LCD, and see what this brings. I know that FCP has simply NOT looked correct to me on my machine.
What do the "big guns" who are using FCP and having to use pre-defined creative print elements, created in AI or Photoshop or whatever -- all color matched for print, what do you guys do when you need to integrate this into FCP?
ARE FCP editors using Apple's 1.8 gamma (I guess you must because FCP uses it regardless of your colorsync profile, per the above article). ???
I set it to Source and have had no problems because I create still images on the same machine with the default gamma of 1.8. I think what happened was you created the images in Photoshop with a colorsync profile of 2.2 on the monitor but perhaps a different profile embedded (if any). When you brought it into FCP, FCP automatically assumed it was created at a gamma of 1.8 and boosted to 2.2 but as the images was not created at 1.8, it was already very bright to begin with and so was boosted x2. That's my theory.

FCP X workflow for export to MP4...

Hello
i would love if someone helped me and broke out a workflow for exporting to a MP4 file with a 2500kbps +, 1920 x 1080 or 1280 x 720.
in previous FCP no problemo - i'm really struggling with this.
i have FCP X 10.1.3 and compressor 4.1.3
Mac X, 10.9.4, 1.7Ghz, Core i7
I want to upkeep the max quality
I have a high quality audio track over top of a string of PNG files (basically powerpoint slides exported to PNGs) from a PPT presentation.
thanks a ton!
jks

Create a custom setting in Compressor by clicking the plus button in the bottom of the Settings pane of Compressor. In the drop down, choose MPEG 4. Make your adjustments in the Inspector. In FCP, choose Compressor Settings from the Share menu. That will open Compressor. Choose your MP4 setting.
Russ

Workflow for syncing uncut audio files to a complete cut?

Hello,
I've been working on a narrative project (about 30 mins). For various reasons, I was unable to sync audio before editing, and have now done all the cutting with camera audio. We recorded separate audio on a stand alone recorder, and now I want to sync it to the project in CC. There is one audio file for each night of shooting, so the audio is in these giant files not separated by take. Can someone advise me as to the best workflow for this? Clearly it would be possible to do it manually by cutting up the audio files, identifying the proper audio for each clip and lining up waveforms, but this would be incredibly time consuming. It seems that there should be some way to use either Plural Eyes or the new audio sync feature (which I don't have experience with) to sync audio automatically, but I'm not sure how to do this.
Thanks for the help.

If it was my task, and I didn't have the recorder files in advance of having to edit, I would probably jot down on a notepad the in/out timecode from the camera for every cut.
I would then take the recorder audio and sync it up with the original camera audio on a different sequence. This might prove a lot easier than trying to do it in a bunch of steps by waveform.
Once I had it all lined up, I would make the razor cuts at exactly the same place as the timecode I jotted down on the notepad. Then I would delete all of the audio portions that I didn't want to keep. I would then copy over the audio track to the original sequence and line of the audio with the original sequences cuts, once again using the notepad to keep track of the places where everything fit.
Painful? Yes, perhaps. But easier than trying to sync up lots and lots of clips.

Picture workflow for slideshow in FCP

i have forty pictures that have a resolution of 3000 x 4000 pixels approx. and need to know how to bring pictures into FCP video track.
Current problems:
1. Pictures are keyframed for panning but resolution gets blurry.
2. Pictures seem much larger than screen.
3. While playing movie computer seems to bog down and doesnt play right away.
What is the order of preparing pictures, assembling pictures into timeline so that pictures dont lose picture quailty while panning and pictures dont have to be resized to fit screen in beginning.
Just need a simple workflow for this simple task, most other other discussions have been very confusing. Is There a screen size and resolution for 4:3 or 16:9?

1. Pictures are keyframed for panning but resolution gets blurry.
this will go away when you view your rendered video on a tv set.
2. Pictures seem much larger than screen.
Video is about 500x800 pixels. That's all. So your images are about 12000% larger than they need to be.
3. While playing movie computer seems to bog down and doesnt play right away.
Yes, they're too big, so it take s a long time to scale them down, convert them to video, move them, nad then create the display image.
We hash out this thread about two times every day so you can scroll down and search for all of these same terms. You will find hundreds of similar posts and threads.
bogiesan

Workflow for jpeg's to FCP

I am working in Photo Shop Elements 6 and FCS 3. I have jpeg picture files (2048 x 1536) that I need to convert for use in a DVD project being authored in Final Cut Pro 7. The FCP timeline sequence is 720 x480 DV/DVC-Pro -NT. What is the workflow for preparing stills for use in Final Cut DVD?
Thanks for the help
Kent

Change the image size in Image settings and create batch action to do same steps in all images.

Best workflow for DSLRs and Speedgrade / Premiere?

Can anyone suggest a workflow for DSLR footage using Premiere and Speedgrade? I would like to be able to roundtrip and do a light grade on clips and sequences before completed the offline edit. Is this possible? I know in the video tuts it seems to work for Red footage, but I couldn't get it to work for me with my 5d mark iii footage. It's all new to me having recently switched to Adobe from FCP and also to DSLR from camcorders. Thanks

Speedgrade isn't designed to go pre-edit, so right now there's no dynamic link with the other CS6 apps. It's intended to sit post-edit in a classical film studio workflow, with Sg ingesting only the final edited frames and exporting your production masters.
If you "send" a Premiere Pro sequence to Sg you will render out a single DPX image sequence (including effects and transitions, and without any references to edit markers or original filenames) and so importing that back into Pr would flatten your entire timeline to a single clip. Any changes to the Pr timeline and you'd have to do it all over again.
You can export an EDL from Pr and use that in Sg to read the native footage (provided it's compatible*), but grading is not stored into the original files so it won't re-appear in your Pr timeline unless you manually re-import.
If you want to use Sg pre-edit, the options are:
Grade all your footage before ever touching Pr, export everything to lossless video or image sequences and work with those, forgetting about the original files completely (you'll need a bunch of disk space and hopefully a MOS shooting pattern, as your audio will be split out).
Grade a sample of every clip you're using, then save a Look for each one. Export the Looks as 3D LUT files (.cube) and use a plugin to apply them to your clips. Right now there's no official plugin for Premiere (Magic Bullet LUT Buddy isn't certified past CS5) but After Effects can apply both the .cube and the .look files via the "Apply Color LUT" effect. Note that some changes in Sg are not included in the Look, such as the choice of color space and tone curve, so what you see in Sg may not be what you get back in Pr.
I'm not downplaying the abilities of Sg, but it's a colorist's tool and doesn't sit very well in the CS6 unified concept of "one person can make a movie". It helps to think of it in terms of the union system in Hollywood - an editor never grades and a colorist never edits, so their tools look completely different, work completely different, and the electronic conversation only goes in one direction.
*Sg was designed with digital cinema in mind so it doesn't work with interlaced footage, plus it generally assumes you're feeding it log so be careful when picking defaults. It's one occasion where something like the Cinestyle fake-log profile for Canon DSLRs comes in handy.

Best workflow for creating logsheets before ingesting.

I'm looking for the best workflow for creating detailed log sheets of my avchd footage before ingesting/transferring it to FCP. I have many hours of footage shot with my Sony NX5U and only want to ingest the necessary clips. I'm using FCP 6.5 on a MacPro tower. Thanks.

>I'm using FCP 6.5
NO you are not. You might be using FCP 6.0.5.
Well, the only way you can ingest only sections of tapeless media is by using Log and Transfer. And you cannot Log clips first, and transfer later. You cannot do the same thing you did with tape, make a Batch Capture list. So you would look at your footage in the FCP L&T interface, and you can send one to be transcoded while you move onto the next one to watch. That can happen at the same time.
But, there's another issue here. The Sony NX5U uses an AVCHD format that is slightly different than normal...not that there is a normal. But I discovered that importing clips up to 10 min in length work fine, but anything over 10 min, and it took 4-5 times longer to import. meaning a 30 min clip took just over two hours. It was something that ClipWrap2 addressed before FCP did...and they only addressed the issue with the FCP 7.0.3 update. FCP 6.0.5...or even the last update for that version, 6.0.6, doesn't address this. There might be issues in importing this footage into FCP 6.
And the other options...Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere...don't have a "log and transfer" type interface. They bring in the full clips only. With Premiere, you are stuck with them being full length. But with Avid, you acccess the footage via AMA (Avid Media Access), and then you'd make your selects on a sequence, and then consolidate/transcode only the footage on the sequence.
And no, there's no way to make a logging sheet for these apps either.
The best you can do is watch the footage, note the timecode, and manually enter those numbers when you go to bring in the footage.

Workflow for AVCHD 5.1 audio in FCP

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