Help Replacing Mini-DV footage with Higher Res QTs with identical time code.

Hi There, I'm a new user and a first time poster.

The essence of my problem is that I edited my Super 16mm film on a Mini-DV transfer. We recently re-transferred the footage onto Digi-Beta which was transferred onto external hard drives as Quicktime (.mov) files.

What I want to do is disconnect the the Mini-DV footage and reconnect the Digi-Beta files so that we're working only with the higher quality version of the footage, but I just can't get my head around how this should be done.

If these files are the equivalent of tapes full of footage, how do I get FCP to reconnect and capture the media for each logged sequence?

I thought this might be similar to importing P2 cards but it seems like that method doesn't like the .mov files. Another way of looking at it is that the files have timecode, but I don't know how to get Final Cut to read it.

Apologies in advance if this has been discussed before, but I just can't think of a searchable way to explain this.

I'm using FCP version 5.1.4, OSX version 10.5.5

Thanks!

Mike

As with most things FCP there's probably a couple of ways to skin that cat.

If the files all have the same names (and they should) of your off-line media (DV), then one simple way to accomplish this is to move the DV files to a different folder, then when you launch that project and it doesn't find the DV footage simply reconnect to the Digi-beta footage.

Thanks so much for responding. The biggest trouble I'm running into is that my capture scratch footage from the first capture is broken up by clip:



This is "Reel 2" broken up into over 40 clips.

But the new files are just the unbroken reel:



The file names are different but you can see that these 11 reels are unbroken. When I disconnected a single clip and connected it to one of these files, it just replaced the short clip with that unbroken file with no regard to time code.

I'm afraid that if I disconnect all the old media, the same thing would happen since the files are broken up in different ways. How do I separate those large files into the separate clips?

-Mike

Sorry, you can't do what you are asking given the footage in the condition it is in. FCP is not great at media management...in fact, it is pretty bad at it. It will ONLY connect to the higher res footage if it a) has the same name, b) has the same timecode, c) has the same in point and outpoint d) has the same duration and e) has the same reel number.

In essence that would mean that for FCP to connect to this properly you would have had to have the footage telecined to digibeta, then captured at this high res setting, then offline versions made with the Media Manager so that you could retain the clip names and timecode...edit with the low res, then take them offline and reconnect the high res footage drives and relink.

FCP will not attempt to locate a short clip that falls within the timecode of a larger clip. It just won't do it. Either you have to go through the cut manually and replace the footage...manually. Or you need to do the typical offline/online workflow of media managing only what was used in your cut, then batch capturing that footage from the digibeta masters (meaning you need a capture card and speedy RAID)...and hope that the timecode on the digi's is EXACTLY what you had on the DV tapes.

Sorry, there is no way for FCP to automatically reconnect to the master footage you already captured.


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

This might be a problem and I'm sorry but I'm off to practice, I'll check back to see if anyone else was able to help.

If the files were captured via firewire you can create clips at start and stops, but I don't think you can do the same thing with digibeta.

Sorry I can't be more helpful, hopefully someone else will chime in.

Good luck

Yikes! That was what I was afraid of. I guess I'll just load it and re-cut manually.

Thank you for all your replies, it was a big help. At least now I can proceed knowing that there isn't a better way!

All the best,

Mike

Well, that's not technically the only way to do it, Shane. I know you were keeping it simple, but another option is to telecine once to whatever tape format you like, capture low-res, then make your low-res clips offline and re-batch-capture at high res. I find that a lot more convenient, personally.

Ah, yes. I was saying how to do it if you wanted to reconnect to the already captured high res masters. But your way is the traditional offline/online workflow.

But I mentioned that...

"Or you need to do the typical offline/online workflow of media managing only what was used in your cut, then batch capturing that footage from the digibeta masters (meaning you need a capture card and speedy RAID)...and hope that the timecode on the digi's is EXACTLY what you had on the DV tapes. "


www.shanerosseditor.com

Listen to THE EDIT BAY Podcast on iTunes
[itunes.apple.com]

Aw, crap. Shane caught me skimming. I suck. Sorry, Shane.