Speed Changes CAN work from FCP
by walter biscardi
on
Apr 6, 2008 at 9:30:25 pm
At least on this project anyway....
Interesting thing happening here with a new series I'm grading. The client is out of state and they are shipping the Final Cut Pro timelines down here by Media Managing the final timeline to a Firewire drive.
Within the timelines there are a few speed changes, maybe 100% reverse, 90% speed, 50% speed. Just a few and I actually missed two of them in the latest timeline. But because the timelines were media managed with zero handles, the clips retained the correct properties when they went back to FCP. That is, the original clip and the clip from Color are exactly the same rather than Color rendering the wrong area of the clip. Obviously if the clip is media managed, there is only that exact amount of media available and Color doesn't go out and render the wrong area of a clip.
So if your timeline has a lot of speed changes, I suppose you could consider Media Managing that timeline into a new project which would probably be faster than baking all the speed changes. Something I'll have to test further when I get some time, but thought I would throw that out there while I'm thinking about it.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.
Re: Speed Changes CAN work from FCP by Russell Lasson on Apr 6, 2008 at 10:05:08 pm
That makes a lot of sense. I suppose that you could even just select all of the speed changes and media manage them and have the media manager create a new project. Then just replace those clips in the original timeline. This would prevent from having to media manage the entire project.
Re: Speed Changes CAN work from FCP by JP Owens on Apr 7, 2008 at 5:29:08 am
I've been seeing that for a while because pretty much all I get is Media Mangled projects.
It doesn't work with managed media that includes "outside selection". Then it reverts to rendering the whole clip, offset keyframes, blah, blah, blah.
The reason this works is because COLOR, I suspect, ignores the actual Quicktime timecode and goes strictly by absolute frame count/duration from the first frame of the clip, whatever it is... it doesn't care.
Try loading a CMX EDL sometime with first event at 1:00:00;00 with a tape capture that you picked up from, say the 59:30;00 mark. Guess what happens. COLOR assumes the first frame of the captured clip is 1:00:00;00 and lays down the import as cut list --> 30 seconds out of sync... it pays absolutely no attention to the clip timecode. Ever wonder why the default offset on the Import As Cutlist dialogue is 1:00:00:00? Because COLOR wants to lay down the clip media from 00:00:00:00, and also assumes that you captured from first frame of the movie. But an old pervert like me will also take some bars, for fun.
And that's trouble with a capital T and that rhymes with FCP...
I'm going to practice a little bit of thread-jacking here and ask if anyone has successfully kept keyframes in a COLORFX clip. FT never supported KFs in the FX room and I was a little surprised to see the clip accept them and even seemed to play the transition, but it seemed to me that it threw them away when I exited the clip. Didn't like the effect anyway, but its a thang dat make me go.... hmmmmmm....
Re: Speed Changes CAN work from FCP by Joe Murray on Apr 28, 2008 at 1:00:14 am
Just noticed this thread a few days late but wanted to comment...I've been media managing all projects before going to Color, but not for speed changes, for archiving purposes...I always Media Manage projects before archiving, and Color projects become irrelevant for future revisions if I Media Manage AFTER color correction and then try to bring the project back from an archive at a later date.
But I'm guessing that the problem with my approach is I usually use 1-2 second handles during Media Manage...am I right that these extra frames will "confuse" Color on clips with speed changes? And using no handles is the way to go?
Re: Speed Changes CAN work from FCP by Joseph Owens on Apr 28, 2008 at 2:24:05 pm
That's the way I read it. COLOR ignores time code and the first frame it sees is frame 1. Then it counts... "Frame 2, Frame 3, another frame, another frame..." just like the old ethnic joke.
That's how keyframes, speed changes, all that stuff gets shuffled, and dealt.
Re: Speed Changes CAN work from FCP by Michael Sandness on Apr 7, 2008 at 2:28:13 pm
Its been this way since version 1.0. And yes, it works! Constant speed though please.
One thing I know has been a big deal here in this forum is that it renders the entire source clip to make this work. Yes, that frustrating. Especially if your source clip is minutes longer than the edit clip. Case in point. If your source came from a 20 minute tape. You then render a 20 minute tape to achieve a 2 second slomo...yuk.
Try this though gang. Put a smooth cam filter on a cip is FCP. Or, Anaylize a clip in Motion for Optical Flow. Same deal in these programs as Color. It will analyze the entire source clip when performing the functions in these tools.
So, for today. Media manage, Copy with selected handles will create media so you could grade speed effected clips. Another quick trick here is this...what if I don't want to Media manage an entire edit-program? Select you speed effected clips, copy-paste into a new sequence, and media mange just those shots. Then cut the media managed speed clips back into your edit. Done.
As Walter's tutorial in prepping a sequence says...its all about planning your Color session.
Hope this helps.
Michael Sandness - Colorist
Splice Here, Minneapolis MN USA
Re: Speed Changes CAN work from FCP by walter biscardi on Apr 7, 2008 at 3:06:31 pm
[Michael Sandness]"One thing I know has been a big deal here in this forum is that it renders the entire source clip to make this work. Yes, that frustrating. Especially if your source clip is minutes longer than the edit clip. Case in point. If your source came from a 20 minute tape. You then render a 20 minute tape to achieve a 2 second slomo...yuk."
Well, actually the big deal has been that the speed clip is reconnected back in FCP all wrong. Using your example, a clip in the timeline that's slo-mo'd for 10 seconds will appear in Color correctly. But after you render out in Color and send that timeline back to FCP, it's the wrong section of the clip.
If Color just rendered the entire clip and I was able to slip and slide in the FCP timeline, that wouldn't be too big a deal, but Color only renders what it thinks it is supposed to based on the clip in the Color timeline. Or at least, that's all that appears in my FCP timelines anyway.
The only way to get the speed effects to show up correctly in Color AND go back to FCP correctly appear to be baking or Media Manage the clips.
Walter Biscardi, Jr.
Biscardi Creative Media HD and SD Production for Broadcast and Independent Productions.
