Add HDV Footage to a DVCPRO HD Project with FCP Media Manager

STEP 1: Gather your HDV footage into a sequence

Once you’ve ingested the desired HDV footage onto your hard drive using Final Cut Pro v5.1.4, assemble the clips into a rough edit sequence. It is from this sequence that the Media Manager will accomplish its task. When placing the HDV clips into the sequence, make sure you add two to three seconds of extra “handle” on the in and out points of each clip. Doing this will help you later on, in case you need to slightly adjust the in and out points of each clip after they’re recompressed to DVCPRO HD.

STEP 2: Set up Media Manager to recompress to DVCPRO HD

Using the mouse and cursor, select and highlight within the sequence all the HDV clips to be recompressed by the Media Manager. Next, navigate to the File menu and select Media Manager. Once inside the Media Manager window, you’ll see that it’s divided into four sections: Summary, Media, Project and Media Destination. The Summary section displays the overall Media Manager settings that have been selected, as well as a sliding bar representation that shows the original file size of the selected clips in relation to what the new file size of the clips will be, once the recompression has been completed.

- In the Media section of the Media Manager, select Recompress Media referenced by duplicated items.
- Select Recompress Media using DVCPRO HD 1080i60.
- Place a check next to Include Master Clips Outside Selection.
- Place a check next to Delete Unused Media from Duplicated Items.
- Place a check next to Use Handles if you want to add more handle length to the in and out points of each clip; select the desired length.
- Place a check next to Include Affiliate Clips Outside Selection.
- Select Base media file names on Existing File Names.
- In the Project section of the Media Manager, place a check next to Duplicate Selected Items and place into a new project.
- Place a check next to Include Non-Active Multiclip Angles.
- In the Media Destination section, click on Browse and navigate to the desired hard-drive location for the final recompressed media to be stored.

Click OK to allow the Media Manager to begin the recompression task. A sliding bar graph display appears that displays the remaining time left for the job. The length of time will vary, depending on how many clips you originally selected within the sequence to be recompressed.

STEP 3: Import the recompressed clips into your DVCPRO HD edit

Once the Media Manager has finished recompressing the media to DVCPRO HD, the new DVCPRO HD clips, plus a new sequence containing those clips, will appear in the Browser window. All that is left to do is simply double-click on the new DVCPRO HD sequence created by the Media Manager. You will then be able to review the Item properties of each new clip within that sequence to make sure that the clip has been correctly recompressed to the DVCPRO HD format. Using the mouse and cursor, select and highlight one of the recompressed clips. Navigate to the Edit menu, select Item properties and then select Format. By reviewing the Format properties of the clip, it’s possible to identify the Compressor used for the clip media, in this case DVCPRO HD 1080i60.

At this point, the new recompressed DVCPRO HD 1080i60 clips are ready to be imported into your original DVCPRO HD 1080i60 edit. Simply select and highlight all of the recompressed clips within the new DVCPRO HD sequence created by the Media Manager. Copy those recompressed clips into your original DVCPRO HD edit sequence and start cutting.

YOUR GUIDES

Daniel and Donald Berube
Founders
noisybrain. Productions, LLC

Daniel and Donald Berube are founders of noisybrain. Productions, a collaborative, full-service production facility based in suburban Boston. Both have more than two decades worth of production and editing credits on public and network television. Daniel is an Apple Certified Trainer and founder of the Boston Final Cut Pro User Group. Donald is a DP who works with a range of SD and HD acquisition formats.

Daniel and Donald Say Keep in Mind... Here’s a quick tip we’ve found useful when we need to incorporate some HDV 1080i60 source material into a DVCPRO HD 1080i60 project. Using the Media Manager within Final Cut Pro v5.1.4, it’s possible to recompress the HDV material into a different codec, in this case, DVCPRO HD. In steps 1 through 3, we see how to recompress your HDV 1080i60 clips into DVCPRO HD 1080i60 material.

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www.noisybrain.com
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