Final Cut Pro Tips

One of my favorite video tech sites, HD for Indies, had a post yesterday with some tips for using Final Cut Studio:

So it appears HDV will drop seamlessly as is into high def DVD Studio Pro 4 projects - it sounds like HDV is already formatted as an MPEG-2 that is acceptable for use in DVD Studio Pro 4. So you don't have to transcode it to anything else, it's ready to get muxed into a disc.

So it also appears that DVD Studio Pro 4 will transcode to MPEG-2 on it's own without discretely having to use Compressor 2.

Apparently, Compressor 2 will DEFINITELY handle 10 bit, 4:2:2 video conversions - this is great! You just have to be sure to enable Frame Controls, otherwise you'll get 8 bit output results. At least enable Automatic in the Frame Controls tab in the Settings in Compressor 2.

It's a bit gibberishy to me too, even though I worked with Final Cut Pro for years. But I haven't done any HD editing and the key there seems to be maintaining picture quality through to your output -- in this case DVD.

To my mind, the now eternal Avid vs. Final Cut Pro debate is a no-brainer for the independent filmmaker. FCP keeps adding features at a fraction of the cost. Why rent an Avid suite for a few weeks when you could buy an Final Cut Pro suite forever?

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