Workflow is an important topic today.
Everyone is trying to accomplish more in less time
and going tapeless is one way to do that.
Many of you want to go straight from Final Cut to the
Server to avoid going to tape and having to encode a
new file. Feedback from several customers, as well
as some recent work we have done in-house
to analyze files created with Final Cut have produced
mixed results. The MPEG2 files we have seen and
analyzed from Final Cut Pro are all missing key bits of
information in the file header. This causes the file to
display as an invalid MPEG2 file on an MPEG
analyzer. This does not mean the file that
Final Cut created is invalid but does mean the
decoder won't play the file reliably. It is possible
these files will play multiple times and then create
errors and not play for several events. We've also
seen these files create memory problems with the
Server that causes the stream to lock up and
eventually crash the Server.
To ensure that you create consistently reliable MPEG2
files we recommend that instead of trying to create an
MPEG2 file with Final Cut simply take the native output
or Quicktime and run it through Media Cleaner or Main
Concepts to create the final file. Both of these
transcoding programs produce reliable and valid
MPEG2 files. Media Cleaner provides the best
workflow because files can be moved, processed and
transferred to the server automatically, thus improving
workflow and saving time. If you would like to see the
settings necessary for Cleaner to properly transcode
files please download the file Cleaner XL Settings,
from the link below.
Changing your workflow to this format can also save
some time. From what we know it seems that Final
Cut Pro takes as much as 4X the program time to
create an MPEG2 file, while Cleaner can transcode
the file in 2X time. So, if you transfer the native output
to Cleaner you don't tie up your NLE longer than
necessary and the actual transcoding and file transfer
to the server are automatic.
If you don't have Cleaner you can purchase a
copy on your own and do this yourself or
contact us for information on ServerLINK. In
some cases the Cleaner product can also be
loaded on an encoder for dual use.
