On Jul 24, 2012, at 10:59 AM, Wilson Chao wrote:
> So when they said
> they could record DNxHD (which they'd never done before) they just
> sorta assumed
And cut to Felix Unger
http://youtu.be/KEP1acj29-Y?t=50s
> Many crews have
> minimal knowledge of these new machines, and from a post perspective,
> I see a surprisingly broad range of problems, from audio out of sync,
> to wrong frame rate, to camera originals erased in the field before
> they were copied.
>
> Wasn't this supposed to be easier than tape?
Some crews (or perhaps producers) seem to ASSUME that switching to a different recorder is as straightforward as switching to a different tape. Or more to my experience, we get clever but new stuff tossed at us shortly before we're expected to roll.
I'm as contentious about this stuff as the next guy, but a couple months ago, I was "asked" to use a new audio recorder that I said I wasn't really familiar with. Sure, I read the manual ahead of time, but that's hardly the same. Got a call from post; one file was missing. I sent them a file from my backup/transcription recorder. Phew; that would have been bad.
Wilson, thanks for your tale of warning.
Jim
On Jul 24, 2012, at 10:59 AM, Wilson Chao wrote:
> Here's my cautionary tale about recording DNxHD in the field.
>
> 2 months ago a producer asks me to approve the equipment list of a
> crew he's hired for a shoot in another city (I'm responsible for the
> post, so wisely he's been involving me in production). I see that
> they have a KiPro Mini, so I email the crew and ask if they can record
> DNxHD; they say "sure, no problem." So the producer flies off, and on
> the morning of the shoot I get a frantic call from the crew, saying
> that my hard drive isn't working, that they've just finished copying
> their first CF card of camera files to it, and it plays back the audio
> but the video isn't there.
>
> Say what?
>
> Turns out they had always recorded ProRes in the past, and they had
> always copied their CF cards using a stock MacBook. And it had never
> occurred to them to install any codecs like DNxHD; after all,
> everything had worked just fine up to then, right? So when they said
> they could record DNxHD (which they'd never done before) they just
> sorta assumed that they were all set for their tried-and-true
> workflow. When the producer flies back the next day, all the video is
> just fine, despite the big scare on location.
>
> A month after that, the same producer has another shoot with another
> crew, and again I look over the equipment list, and this time I see
> that they have a PIX 240. So I call up the crew and ask if they have
> ever recorded DNxHD, and they say no, but they sure can yessirree-Bob!
> But I, wiser now, say "never mind, just record ProRes like you
> always do, we'll deal with it."
>
> The choice of DNxHD versus ProRes is but one menu choice of dozens to
> be found in any modern file-based video recorder. Many crews have
> minimal knowledge of these new machines, and from a post perspective,
> I see a surprisingly broad range of problems, from audio out of sync,
> to wrong frame rate, to camera originals erased in the field before
> they were copied.
>
> Wasn't this supposed to be easier than tape?
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