SOT: Avid and a quiz

farss wrote on 10/11/2006, 2:15 PM
Here's your task:
A 60 minute program someone edited a few weeks ago is to go to air in 15 minutes. The producer has realised that there's a spelling mistake in the closing credits. He's seriously kicked some butt in the grahics department and now has a tape with the corrected closing credits and the master tape from the edit. Your task is to get those credits into that master tape. Remember the program is 60 minutes long and this has to be done in under 15 minutes.
Clue: You don't even need a computer to do this if you have two decks but let's assume you don't.

Comments

DataMeister wrote on 10/11/2006, 2:35 PM
Toss in a commercial break and swap tapes, then run the credits. Then you have an extra 50 minutes to plan the swap in your head.

Jay-Hancock wrote on 10/11/2006, 2:42 PM
Toss in a commercial break and swap tapes, then run the credits. Then you have an extra 50 minutes to plan the swap in your head.

Wouldn't you need to download the latest Avid patch first?
Former user wrote on 10/11/2006, 3:27 PM
Load the credits in the Avid and do an insert edit into the tape for the credits only.

One of the things unfortunately, Vegas cannot do.

Dave T2
richard-courtney wrote on 10/11/2006, 4:04 PM
1)
Don't bother fixing them......
Create a bump slide of next program and have downstream do a PIP with the original.
Nobody can read them anyway.

2)
Use scotch tape and do a mechanical splice.

Just kidding.
winrockpost wrote on 10/11/2006, 4:10 PM
insert edit
TheHappyFriar wrote on 10/11/2006, 5:43 PM
a) what I have actautly done when episodes re-fed corrected episodes:

put tape A in an over the air player. Play tape. While playing cue up the "fixed" credits. When tape A get to tape B start point, play tape A & hit hte video switcher to tape B. Simple, fast, no fuss. Why waste time "fixing" when all you need is a skilled controll room op? :)

b) what else I've done!

cue up tape A to the credits, jsut before (should take ~5 minutes on a 60 minute DV/DVCPro tape). Capture the "corrected" credits tape in Vegas (we can use vegas, right? You didn't say we must use avid). Now, put the captured clip in Vidcap to PTT. PTT over the bad credits. Rewind & play. It should only take ~15-30 seconds for a good controll room op to cue up a tape from the start (I've done it with SVHS, DVCPro & 3/4", even made time sheets on the fly!)

Don't tell me it can't be done, I've done it. :) I LIVE off this type of excitment in the control room/editing room. That's when you would stay out of my way. I dind't really mind if you got "shoved" over!
GlennChan wrote on 10/11/2006, 5:52 PM
Without having to use a second deck or a NLE, I think this is possible:

1- Turn pre-read on on the deck.
2- Feed the signal into a Chyron or equivalent titler (i.e. Inscriber). Feed that back into the deck.
3- Double-check everything to make sure you don't futz things up!
4- Do an insert edit.
5- Ditch Avid for Vegas. (Like, duh!)



Vegas can't do insert edits? (I haven't tried myself.)



Vegas should prompt you before doing an assemble edit or crash record onto the tape. When you're dealing with masters like this, such as edit will cause discontinuous timecode and screw up the whole master.
Some people might want to disable that prompt, so maybe put in an option to allow that (i.e. have checkbox for "don't prompt to confirm")
The prompt box should explain that assemble edits will cause a discontinuity in the TC track.
ForumAdmin wrote on 10/11/2006, 6:37 PM
If you have an SDI capable deck (DVCAM with SDI, IMX or Digibeta, any HDCam) + the appropriate Decklink or Aja card, insert editing of a new chunk of a,v, or a/v into a program is no problem in Vegas 7.

Frame accurate insert editing to a DV deck\ or camera over firewire/iLink/1394 is not supported by Vegas. Maybe some apps do that with frame accuracy- if you have actually done this successfully yourself it would be nice to know with what tools.
farss wrote on 10/11/2006, 7:13 PM
I've never done it myself but I've seen it done with nothing more than a Sony DSR 30 and another deck.
Ah yes, the clue here might be that it's using LANC to control the decks, not firewire.
Still one of my clients does it all the time with FCP, only because he can only PTT short sections of the program before FCP crashes. This is on DVCAM not DV though.

Good to see though this is now working over SDI, that's a big step up.

This wasn't meant to be a "let's rubbish Vegas" thing, rather to highlight the differences between the different toolsets.

Bob.
GlennChan wrote on 10/11/2006, 9:39 PM
On the mid/high-end Sony decks, the process for deck to deck edits is:

Feed both decks house sync.
Connect decks via 9-pin remote and SDI. Set control to remote.
Set the recorder to insert video.
Set your entry in and entry out points on the recorder. Set entry in on the player (if it's a still, you don't need to control the player and don't need entry in).
Preview your edit, and then hit auto edit.
farss wrote on 10/11/2006, 11:08 PM
Actually Glenn that kind of raises another interesting issue about Vegas. It's not alone in having this glitch and to my mind it's trivial but I have had a field this as an issue with other gear.

When Vegas goes into pause it feeds both fields to the external preview device and I'm told this is bad practice as the result is quite unviewable if there's any motion in the frame.

Bob.
GlennChan wrote on 10/11/2006, 11:37 PM
In some decks, you can toggle between:
--Show one field only. When you jog, a * on the timecode (i.e. 01.23:45.00*) indicates the second field.
--Show both fields.
If you ever need to insert a slate or credit from a source into a master tape, you want to see both fields (otherwise resolution is degraded).

For a non-linear editor, I don't mind seeing both fields at once. Of course, it might be annoying to some people.
I suppose Vegas could potentially offer a setting where it renders paused video as if the project were progressive. This way, progressive stills and generated media don't necessarily degrade in resolution. And interlaced stuff will look ok. The setting should also reference the interlaced method in project properties (because no de-interlacing causes problems).

On the other hand, the behaviour above may not be obvious if someone is trying to look at both fields, or just individual fields. There might be some material in the second field that's not in the first for example. One way around that would be to make that setting a button, which is lit or not lit (and drawn so that you can easily see this!).