SONY F3 FCP workflow - also combining with Canon 5D footage - seen mixed messages out there

Hi all,

thanks in advance for advice. I've seen a lot of differing opinions out there so I'm trying to figure out the best way to go.

I'm going to be editing a :30 for broadcast in FCP7. Footage was just handed to me. It was shot 23.98 and I will edit at that rate and convert at the end.

They shot on two camera's - A camera was a SONY F3 / B camera was a CANON 5D. I'm going to transfer the footage to a Thunderbolt drive and edit off of that on a new-ish IMAC.

My main question is trying to confirm what i should convert/import/transcode the Sony footage to, so that I don't lose any quality and so that it will work seamlessly in FCP.

Once that is decided I will also need to figure out what to transcode my 5D material to and what my FCP sequence settings should be.

Would like advice on all! Obviously it's too late for kipro, but I've read on one hand that converting my xdcam ex footage now to prores will not be the same as "transcoding". by the same token i've read that xdcam ex is still a super compressed format and i can't imagine wanting to convert the 5D footage to that, but i'd prefer not to edit mixed medias if i can avoid it...

thoughts MUCH appreciated! Thx in advance!

Thank you. That WAS part of what I was asking...if there was a 1-step process to get pro res files from the sony native files (mp4s) - which I see there isn't.

I guess the 2nd part to my question was if I really SHOULD/NEEDED to convert those xdcam ex .mov's TO pro res, or if I should/could just edit with the xdcam's (compressed codec mpeg2).