Authoring Hi-Def discs Without a BluRay Burner

This discussion came up at the January NJFCPUG meeting, as I was discussing a job I did for Panasonic at Macworld Expo. Panasonic produced some short form content for the Macworld digital signage with the HMC150 camera. After editing the pieces on my MacBook Pro, we decided to create a disc to play in the Panasonic booth on our Plasma.

There are two methods of creating HD content on a standard dvd burner. One way is to use Compressor and DVD Studio Pro to create what Apple calls HD DVD (not the expired format). This special disc will play from the Apple DVD player or some Toshiba HD DVD players. The second method uses Roxio’s Toast 10 and the Blu-Ray plugin to create a high bit rate disc on standard dvd media that will play on BluRay players in glorious HD. For the Macworld Expo project, I used Toast 10.

I first exported a QT reference movie from FCP. I then used Toast 10 with the Blu-Ray plugin to create a Blu-Ray Video disc. Basically a drag and drop operation.

With a DVD-5, you are limited to 20 minutes of video. I have been told that you can also use a DVD-9 for 40 minutes.

Encoding is not fast. A 23 minute test that I did for this article took 2 hours to encode and another 20 minutes to burn the disc, but the results are stunning.

Apple Passes on NAB 2008

In a disappointing statement from Apple PR yesterday, Apple confirms that they are not exhibiting at the NAB show this year. This is disappointing because I was expecting the release of Final Cut Server that they showed last year. Apple has pulled out of many events over the past few years, Macworld Boston and the subsequent Macworld NY for example. But this announcement smells different. The NAB show is not just another trade show. Believe me, I have worked shows that are real dogs for the exhibitors, DV Expo comes to mind, but NAB is NOT one of those shows. My guess is that Apple has no new products to showcase. No FC Server, no major FCP upgrades, no BluRay support. Apple probably figured that the expense of doing the booth without any major announcement seemed fruitless. Remember NAB 2006 when there was no Apple press event on the Sunday before the show? I do, and it seems like someone sucked the air out of the room. I still think NAB is a great show and worth attending.

Final Cut Server info

I spent a few minutes in the Apple booth getting a demo of the soon to be released Final Cut Server.

FC Server is meant to manage projects and assets for multiple editors. If you remember, Apple bought a company called Proximity, whose Artbox is the basis for the FC Server.

There is not a lot of info on Apple’s web site about server, but there is a whitepaper from Proximity’s website that might shed some light on the features and setup.

Apple ProRes 422 and AJA IO HD

Apple has released a whitepaper that details the new ProRes 422 codec

It can be used with AJA’s new IO HD box, which provides SD and HD in/out over FW800.

Not sure how ProRes will benefit data shooters like P2 or Firestore.

Some (unofficial) clarification from Apple

I was able to speak with one of the Final Cut development team for a few minutes and asked him questions until he could squirm no more.

Regarding DVD Studio Pro, there was no reason to update the app until HD burners are available in a Mac. He would not elaborate any further. I would expect an update to DVDSP at some point this year, maybe at WWDC in June.

Live Type is still included in the bundle, but has received no attention.

I was also curious about the ability to play any clip/framerate combination in real time. It is not tied to the ProRes codec. It is being done in the processor on the fly. It takes the parameters from the first clip you drop in, and will conform the rest of the clips to that. He wasn’t sure about changing that after the fact. In other words, if I start with a HD timeline and drop in SD clips, then decide to make the timeline SD. Seems like one would have to start over.

I also asked him about Leopard, and benefits of the 64bit memory space. He seemed to indicate that there would be no benefit to Final Cut specifically from Leopard. He stated that this was not part of his job, so he was not certain.

More updates as I get a chance to see some more of the show.

Some thoughts on FC Studio2

There are some great new features in the new studio, like fixing formats and framerates on one timeline without rendering. But there is a lot of information that was “missing” from the press conference.

First of all, DVD Studio Pro was not updated at all. Why release a new version of all the apps and not touch DVDSP. Where is HD DVD authoring? Seems fishy to me.

Also, Livetype is mysteriously missing from the new package.

From the system requirements, it seems like it will run on most of the older hardware (G5, Powerbook etc). It will not run on intel macs with integrated graphics.

More details will be known as the week goes by.

Watch for updates.

apple event p2

lots of apple hardware people here. just saw the product manager for xserve raid.

apple announces FC server.
999 for 10 users

FC studio2 announced. new versions of all apps except dvdsp.
$499 for upgrade from 5.1
$699 from any version
ships next month

apple event about to start

waited in very long line for about an hour. at 10:45 they opened the doors.

the room is 3 times the size of the 2005 press conference.

Preparing for NAB 2007

As I finish preparations for the Panasonic booth where I will be working during the show, anticipation is high in the world of Apple.

At 11am PDT, Apple will announce something. We all expect to see the next generation of the Final Cut package. Word on the street has been quiet.

I expect to see FCP with support for MXF formats and new formats like JPEG2000, HD authoring capability in DVD Studio Pro, and new towers with Blu-Ray burners installed.

I was also anticipating some new wow features tied to new hardware announcements and the release of Leopard, Mac OS 10.5

My hopes were dashed a bit by Apple’s surprise announcement that they were delaying the release of 10.5 until October. The reason stated was to finish the iPhone and finish development the 10.5 release.

There is a lot of other exciting announcements that I will be following, like Adobe’s Premiere Pro for Mac and the formats that it will support.

I will post an update after the Apple event.

The Mission

I am up in Alaska with the P2 “Dream Team”. This team consists of (l-r) Mike Caporale, C.R. Caillouet, Bernie Mitchell, myself, and Barry Green. Sandwiched in between Barry and I is Chas St. George, Public Relations for the Iditarod organization.

We are working with the Iditarod production team to train them on the P2 workflow and to setup the HXP-2000 and HVX-200 cameras that they will be using.

The inventory for this production includes 5 HPX-2000 cameras, 5 HVX-200 cameras, 150 8GB P2 cards, and 2 P2 Mobiles.

The logistics to run this race are tremendous. Over 34 aircraft will be used to transport food, dogs, equipment, and the Panasonic camera crews around the race course.

Once the training is done, the P2 team is staying around to produce a behind the scenes documentary for Panasonic.