Recently in Video Hardware Category
If you haven't heard solid state recording devices are here and now! The new 32gb P2 cards are available now and the record times are now worth taking a serious look at. Panasonic's P2 card is a plug-in PC card utilizing ultra-reliable, solid-state memory. The lightweight P2 card consists of four high-performance SD cards, like those used in digital still cameras, packaged in a rugged die-cast frame. It is resistant to impact, vibration, shock, dust and environmental extremes, from intensely hot, humid weather to temperatures below zero. The P2 card is reusable and connects instantly with most laptops and major non-linear editing systems eliminating the digitizing process. The P2 card can also be easily connected to any recently-introduced laptops with the ExpressBus interface via an inexpensive adapter.
Recording time on a single 32GB P2 card:
- 32 minutes in DVCPRO HD or AVC-Intra 100
- 40 minutes AVC-Intra 100 at 1080/24p native
- 80 minutes in DVCPRO HD or AVC-Intra 100 at 720/24p native
- 64 minutes in DVCPRO50 or AVC-Intra 50
- 128 minutes in DVCPRO
In case you missed it, Paramount and Dreamworks announced that they will release their upcoming titles exclusively on the HD DVD format.
It looked like the Blu Ray format had the early lead, but now with Paramount and Dreamwork's announcement, it's anyone's guess.
Currently, Apple's DVD Studio Pro does not support burning of Blu Ray DVD's. It does support authoring for HD DVD's however. On a strange note, the DVD player included with Mac OS X can only play HD DVD's that were authored in DVD Studio Pro. This is true even if a compatible HD DVD player is connected to the system.
I hope the industry eventually decides on one format. Otherwise, things are going to be ugly in terms of compatibility issues. If one format doesn't win, the consumer will pay higher costs for players and burners. Just imagine, this would mean that you'd need to buy both a Blu Ray or HD DVD player in order to play both formats. Or, we'll pay a higher price for some sort of hybrid player that can handle both disks.
Imagine if you are working on your Mac using Final Cut Pro or Avid as you receive the dreaded error message 'Disk Not Readable on this computer' What do you do?
I reccommend that you keep a program called 'Disk Warrior' from AlSoft in your arsenal of troubleshooting tools. It will fix most disk directory problems. It will also fix most many OS X problems. You can download a full version directly from Alsoft's website.
I recently ran across a problem importing P2 files off a FireStore drive. I am unfamiliar with P2 files and when I tried to import them could not find anything to import so I blamed the cameraman for the error. Well come to find out Avid has a cure for this:
When attempting to import P2 media from a FireStore 100 drive, the Import P2 Clips to Bin or Import P2 Media commands do not find anything to import. The FireStore has an application command called "Organize P2;" this places all of your P2 media into a folder structure that most NLEs can understand. However, this command places the Contents folder on the root of the drive. When navigating to the drive through an Avid application, the application can not recognize the Contents folder as a P2 source, nor can it recognize the root level of the drive.
After running the "Organize P2" command on the FireStore, navigate into the drive through your OS and create a new folder on the root of the drive (the name of the folder can be anything you chose.) Place the entire Contents folder (and everything in it) inside this new folder. Now, when using the Import P2 commands in Avid, select this folder but do not navigate further into it. The application will recognize your clips and/or media and complete the import command.
This is very similar to how we had to handle the old OMF files on our first FireStore hard drive and it is a very simple fix!
