ProKit 6.0.1 breaking Final Cut Studio

ProKit 6.0.1 came out last week with bug fixes for Logic and Aperture. No Final Cut Studio changes were mentioned, and in fact it would seem that a number of people have experienced problems after updating:

Apple Discussions - Installed Pro Kit 6.0.1... all Pro Apps down!

Apple Discussions - DVD Studio Pro 4.1.2/ProKit Update 6.0.1

LAFCPUG - WARNING - Just did Prokit update

Ken Stone - Last week's Pro Kit update 6.0.1-DVD studio Pro crashing

For the record, I know several people who have installed this update successfully with no problems whatsoever, but as this update doesn't specifically address anything in Final Cut Studio it's better to give it a miss.

Anyone experiencing issues should report the bug to Apple or leave feedback. There isn't a fix for this as of yet but some people have managed to repair it by restoring the old ProKit.framework file from their Time Machine backups or from another machine on their network.

(Note: FCS Remover won't help in this instance because ProKit is now integrated into OS X and FCS Remover never removes files that reside in the System directory for safety reasons.)

Update: Here's how to fix it.

FCP error: Project is unreadable or too new for this version

If you're getting the error message "Project is unreadable or may be too new for this version of Final Cut Pro" when you try to open a particular project, it may be due to one of three reasons:

1. The project was created with a newer version of Final Cut Pro. Make sure you have the latest version, or alternatively ask the person who gave you the project to export an XML file that you can import into an earlier version.

2. The project's metadata may be invalid. Use Project Repair to fix this.

3. The project is corrupt. There is unfortunately no fix for this. You will need to restore the project from a backup or autosave. Our FCP Versioner software automatically backs up your project every time you save it, and Autosave Cleaner can archive autosaves so that they are never automatically deleted by Final Cut Pro.

Removing the codec name from a Compressor destination

Whenever you export a Compressor batch, Compressor normally appends the name of the codec to the file, such as "-DV NTSC" for instance. This isn't always desirable.

Here's how to remove it:

1. Go to the Destinations tab.

2. Click the plus button (+) and select Local.



3. Browse to a location.

Important: Do not browse to the same directory as the source files otherwise the new files will overwrite the source media.

4. Under Output Filename Template, set it to Source Media Name. You can use the drop-down button to select template options.



5. Drag the new destination onto the clips in your batch.



6. If you want to use the new destination by default in all new batches, go to Preferences and set Default Destination to the destination you just created.

Final Cut Pro bug - Long delays with extended markers

There's a bug in Final Cut Pro 7 that causes the application to beachball when you load transitions into the Viewer. This seems to occur if you have long clips with long extended markers in them (i.e. markers with a duration longer than one frame).

Here's how to replicate:
1. Go to the Effects tab and drag a Bars & Tone generator into the Viewer.
2. Change the duration to 30 minutes (00:30:00;00) and bring it into the timeline. Repeat this step to add a second clip next to the first.
4. Select the first clip, press M to add a marker and then press M again to open up the marker settings dialog.
5. Set the marker duration to 15 minutes (00:15:00;00).
5. Add a cross-dissolve transition between the two clips.
6. Double-click the transition to open it in the Viewer. It will take several seconds to open and will probably beachball.

Observations:
* The extended marker does not need to pass through the transition in order for this to occur.
* Shortening the marker to 20 seconds only causes a brief delay.
* The effect still occurs with short master clips but it was lessened and did not beachball on my system.
* The effect is exacerbated if both clips on either side of a transition use long extended markers.
* This only seems to occur when you use the default transition length or values close to it (00:00:08;28 for NTSC). If you lengthen the transition significantly, it loads much faster. I'm not sure why this is - perhaps it was an anomaly on my system.
* The quantity of markers makes a difference. Loading the transition for a clip with ten 30-second markers takes significantly longer than loading one for a clip with just a single 30-second marker.
* The length of the clip on the timeline is irrelevant. It is the length of the master clip that makes the difference. This explains why even relatively short markers can experience this effect, as there may be a large number of them within a single master clip.

Workarounds:
* Give your markers a color that is not used for any other purpose, then go to Edit > Project Properties and hide markers for that particular color. This resolves the issue, and if you need to see them again, just go back to Project Properties and enable them. This is my recommended solution (thanks Nick).
* Use shorter or fewer markers.
* Split up master clips or export your timeline as a reference movie and put the markers on the exported clip. This workaround works better if your project is short.
* If you are using cross dissolves, consider emulating the effect with opacity keyframes instead.
* Instead of using extended markers, use single-frame markers with a color coding scheme - e.g. red for the beginning marker and green for the end marker.

Test Notes:
* I tested this on Final Cut Pro 7.0.2, OS X 10.6.4, QuickTime 7.6.6.
* Thanks to Thomas Berglund for his assistance in helping me replicate this.

Compressor error: "Unable to submit to queue"

If you're getting this error message when trying to submit a batch to Compressor, follow the steps listed here:

Compressor error: "Unable to connect to background process"

Aperture changes in Compressor 3.5

Have you noticed that movies compressed with Compressor 3.5 have a slightly different frame size when viewed in QuickTime Player?

Compressor 3.5 gives all QuickTime movies a Clean aperture by default (previous versions of Compressor set the aperture to None). This means that, although the actual frame size of the movie hasn't changed, when playing back, QuickTime scales and crops the movie to account for the non-square pixel aspect ratio of various video formats such as DV.

This has confused a lot of people because videos encoded with Compressor 3.5 are displayed differently to those encoded with Compressor 3.0. Although it is easy enough to change this within QuickTime Player, it needs to be done on a per-movie basis.

Luckily, Apple included an option in Compressor 3.5.2 (in the Pro Applications 2010-01 update) to switch this off. Just upgrade to Compressor 3.5.2 and deselect Add clean aperture information in the Encoder tab.

Pro Applications Update 2010-01

Apple released the second Pro Apps update for Final Cut Studio 3 yesterday. It includes Final Cut Pro 7.0.2, Motion 4.0.2, Color 1.5.2, Cinema Tools 4.5.1, Compressor 3.5.2 and Qmaster 3.5.2. There are a lot of fixes there, some for critical issues, and also some performance updates too.

Here's the complete list of changes:

Final Cut Pro 7.0.2
* Drag and drop of files from iTunes works as expected with supported file types.
* Fixes the "Preview Unsupported For This Format" message that would occur occasionally with P2 media recorded to a Firestore FS100 recording device from Panasonic cameras.
* Fixes an issue ingesting from P2 cards with spanned clips which contain more than 80 individual elements.
* Fixes a performance issue with transcoding AVCHD to ProRes on Mac systems using the GeForce 9400M graphics card.
* Fixes an issue with some third-party filters that would cause Final Cut Pro to quit unexpectedly on Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard.
* Markers on multi-cam clips are now preserved when edited into a sequence.
* Log and Transfer function is no longer disabled while using the Share function to export media.
* Media Manager will now copy ProRes media created by AJA Ki Pro.
* Multiple fixes to Change Speed functionality including:
* The term "Duration" in the Change Speed interface is replaced with "Smoothness" which describes the function better.
* Speed keyframes no longer snap to other speed key frames. This improves ease of use when dragging to change speed in the timeline.
* Fixes an issue in which removing a reverse speed change with Ripple Sequence enabled would cause a clip to become half its length.

Motion 4.0.2
* Fixes rendering and performance issues that could occur when using Motion projects in a Final Cut Pro timeline.
* Motion is now more stable when operating in low system memory or low graphic card memory situations.
* The default project setting is now set to PAL or NTSC depending on the operating system localization.
* Addresses an issue that impacted the reliability of the Undo command.
* Corrects the rendering of the Checkerboard Generator to the proper orientation when rendering from a 3D camera.
* Fixes an image usability issue that could be encountered on complex projects when rendered in 32-bit float with Motion Blur turned on.
* Exclusively exporting the alpha channel of a Motion project using the Share feature now returns the proper alpha channel.
* An issue with importing files named with dual-byte characters has been addressed.
* An issue with the importing of Japanese language text has been fixed.
* Fixes aspect ratio issues encountered with imported shapes and circle masks.
* A correction to the selection tool now makes it easier to select text.
* Fixes an issue related to the the rendering of soft shadows.
* Addresses issues that could produce significant artifacts when objects would intersect in 3D space in certain ways.
* Addresses issues that could be encountered with images of large resolution.
* A performance related fix was applied to the caustics generator.
* Adjusting paint stroke control points in 3D space is now more responsive.
* Corrects the rendering of anamorphic projects to the digital cinema desktop output.
* Changes were made to certain filters to match the output they produced in Motion 3.
* To address a user interaction issue, the selected animation curve in the keyframe editor now displays on top of other curves.
* Fixes were made that benefit some filters applied to images that are cropped.
* A performance issue with text flattened to a single plane was addressed.
* Fixes an issue that could have affected some third-party FxPlug plug-ins that perform temporal manipulations like retiming.
* Addresses issues which could appear to soften images, or flattened groups of images, of odd-sized resolutions.
* Manipulation issues that could occur with multiple duplicated and cloned objects or groups within a project have been addressed.

Color 1.5.2
* 3D Color Space Scope now allows zooming.
* Resolves an issue in which media would sometimes become disconnected after a save and restart.
* Fixes an issue with CFX nodes not being imported when choosing File > Import > Color Corrections.
* Addresses several issues with the loading and processing of motion trackers.
* Fixes an issue with the green channel on video scopes displaying an incorrect value.
* RED 2K renders from 4K media are no longer softened.

Cinema Tools 4.5.1
* Trying to save a Cinema Tools database to a read-only volume no longer closes the database.

Compressor 3.5.2
* Corrects disk size limitation messages when burning a project to an AVCHD dual-layer disc.
* Fixes issues with long chapter names not appearing correctly in disc templates.
* Fixes issues when inserting a DVD-R or BD-RE disc with data already present.
* Provides warnings before a DVD or Blu-ray Disc is burned when the source will not fit on the media.
* Provides an option to cancel a disc burn when quitting Compressor.
* Fixes issues with burning a DVD using DTS audio.
* Fixes an issue with automatic bit rate so that the appropriate bit rate for a single or dual layer DVD-R is applied.
* Corrects an issue with the encoding of HD video when burning a Blu-ray disc with surround sound.
* Addresses issues with saving and changing audio channels and video using surround sound.
* Corrects a problem that caused Share to not work when switching to another user on the same machine.
* Fixes a MobileMe sharing issue when entering a single character in the "Viewable by Name" field.
* Fixes MobileMe upload for file names that contain the "+", "?", or "%" characters.
* Corrects an issue with uploading an IFF image sequence with an uppercase extension.
* Corrects the default bit rate for the iPod encoding setting from the Share menu.
* Corrects color shift when transcoding image sequences.
* Correct timecode is now displayed in the Preview window when sending a Final Cut Pro sequence to Compressor and applying a timecode generator.
* Job Action "Open Application" now works with multiple targets.
* Fixes an issue with creating a new job with Target Output from an image sequence to a cluster.
* Fixes an issue with source field order for Compressor plugins.
* Fixes a pixel aspect ratio issue with transcoding a duplicated image sequence to a custom TIFF setting.
* Corrects an issue that stopped a WAV file being associated with with an image sequence for output.
* Compressor preferences are now honored when submitting jobs from Final Cut Server.
* Corrects a field order issue with certain sources.
* Fixes an issue with the audio tab becoming inactive when moving between the video and audio tab on MPEG-2 targets.
* Addresses an issue with upload to MobileMe with files containing reserved characters.
* Improves file size estimation for H264 files produced for Blu-ray.
* Corrects an issue when burning a Blu-ray or DVD disc from a Final Cut Pro sequence with 5.1 Surround Sound.
* Fixes an issue with display of password-protected MobileMe movies on iPhone.
* Addresses a pixel aspect ratio compatibility issue.
* Improves stability when processing large batches.

Qmaster 3.5.2
* Fixes a memory leak associated with transcoding to a YouTube destination.
* Fixes unexpected quitting when copying large numbers of image sequences to a destination.
* Corrects issues when copying AVI and reference movie media to a Wide Area Network cluster.
* Corrects an issue with Apple Qmaster command line preferences utility when a user is only logged in remotely.

Be aware, however, that people are already reporting issues with the new update.

Apple also posted the following known issues:
* Final Cut Studio (2009), Final Cut Pro 7.0.1, & 7.0.2 with Mac OS X v10.6: Final Cut may stop responding when capturing DVCPRO HD via FireWire
* Final Cut Studio (2009), Color 1.5: Upgrading a Color 1.0.x project to 1.5.x changes any existing Trackers
* Final Cut Studio (2009), Color 1.5.2: Video Output of REDCODE material clips at 97 IRE
* Final Cut Studio (2009), Color 1.5.2: Unrendered freeze frames in Color displays an unexpected frame

Speeding up Compressor

Is Compressor taking too long to encode? Here are some tips to speed it up.

Don't export directly to Compressor from Final Cut Pro

Although sending your timeline directly to Compressor may seem faster because it cuts out the step of exporting as a QuickTime movie, it is much slower overall because Compressor needs to request each frame one-by-one from Final Cut Pro instead of just reading the data out of the movie clip. It gets even slower if you're using Frame Controls or doing multi-pass encoding.

Just go to File > Export > QuickTime Movie (not QuickTime Conversion) and make sure Setting is set to Current Settings and Recompress All Frames is switched off. This ensures that the movie will not be recompressed unnecessarily.


Here's a tip - if most of your timeline is already rendered, deselect Make Movie Self-Contained. This creates a small reference movie that links to the render files on disk instead of writing the data into the file. This will be much quicker to export. If your timeline is not rendered, however, this setting is unlikely to offer any speed advantages over a self-contained movie.

Once the file is exported, drag it into Compressor and set up your batch as normal.

Only use Frame Controls where necessary

Frame Controls allow you to improve the quality of resizing, retiming and deinterlacing operations, however they should only be switched on when you are actually performing one of these operations.


In addition, you should use Better quality instead of Best, as Best is usually reserved for extreme circumstances and in most situations gives you a massive performance hit with no benefit.

Perform heaving-lifting in a separate pass to the encoding

Using Frame Controls with a multi-pass or long-GOP encoder can really slow things down because the Frame Controls processing will need to be reapplied to every frame each time it is read. Even if you're not using Frame Controls, compressing from a processor-intensive codec such as HDV or H.264 can seriously slow things down.

It makes sense, therefore, to perform all these processor-intensive operations on an intermediate movie clip (ProRes would be a suitable codec for this) and then drag in the intermediate clip and encode it to the desired format.

But there is an easier way. Job chaining is a little-used yet very powerful feature of Compressor that allows you to plug the output of one job into the input of another for additional processing.

Here's how to do it:
1. Drag your movie clip into Compressor.
2. Drag either the ProRes 422 for Interlaced Material or ProRes 422 for Progressive Material (depending on your source media) setting onto the job in the batch window.
3. Go to Job > New Job with Target Output. This will add a new job to the batch with a chain symbol to show it is linked to the job above it.
4. Drag your desired output setting onto the chained job and set up the destination as normal.
5. Submit the batch

Use a cluster

A cluster is a group of computers where each machine processes a portion of the movie simultaneously, potentially providing a massive speed boost. This service is provided by Qmaster and can be set up in the Qmaster section of System Preferences or the Apple Qadministrator utility.

You will need Qmaster set up on each computer in the cluster, and all computers should have the required codecs installed and have full access to the source media and cluster storage area.

If you have a multi-core computer, Qmaster can emulate the effects of a cluster by launching multiple copies of Compressor side-by-side to process the movie in a "virtual cluster". This can make a dramatic difference to encoding times. I wrote a tutorial on this a while back.

Conclusion

Compressor is not the fastest encoder in the world but with these tricks you can make it a lot more bearable. One important trend to note is that the simplest method isn't always the fastest - with a little extra setup beforehand you can save a significant amount of time overall.

Why don't my old Preference Manager backups work on FCP 7?

One question we've been seeing a lot lately is from people who are wondering why the Preference Manager backups they previously created under Final Cut Pro 6 no longer work on Final Cut Pro 7.

There is a very simple reason for this - Final Cut Pro's main preference file is called Final Cut Pro x.0 Prefs.fcset, where x is the major version of the software. So when you updated to version 7, it created a new file called Final Cut Pro 7.0 Prefs.fcset and ignored all previous files.

So when you try to restore a backup created under Final Cut Pro 6, it will transfer the Final Cut Pro 6.0 Prefs.fcset file which will be ignored by the newer version, thereby having no apparent effect. You could just rename the file but there may well be side-effects to doing this. The solution, therefore, is to recreate your Preference Manager backups under Final Cut Pro 7.

(Incidentally, I've heard a lot of people complain about scratch disk locations resetting and favorites being lost upon upgrading. FCP 7 does not read the old preferences when creating the new file so your preferences are completely reset.)

How to run Final Cut Studio 3 on a MacBook

I've been meaning to post this for a while but haven't had the chance until now. I had to be an early adopter of Final Cut Studio 3 because I develop software that interfaces with it, but I had no desire to edit on a x.0 release so I decided to install it on my MacBook solely for testing.

The only problem is that, unlike FCS 2, the FCS 3 installer refuses to continue because it requires a 128 MB graphics card. Only Motion and Color are heavy on the graphics card, so the other applications in the suite will work just fine on a lesser machine. Luckily the block is easy to work around.

Here's how I got it working on my MacBook:

1. You will need to change one of the files on the DVD. As you cannot write directly to the DVD itself, you will need to create a writable copy of the disc. Put in the Final Cut Studio DVD and open up Disk Utility (located in /Applications/Utilities).

2. Select the disc in the left-hand pane and click New Image in the toolbar.



3. Set Image Format to Read/write and Encryption to None.



4. Type a relevant filename and click Save. It will take several minutes to process.

5. Open up the disk image and ctrl-click on Install Final Cut Studio. Select Show Original.



6. A new window will appear with the FinalCutStudio.mpkg file selected. Ctrl-click on this file and select Show Package Contents.



7. Navigate to Contents/Resources and ctrl-click on the Requirements Checker bundle. Select Show Package Contents.



8. Navigate to Contents/Resources and open up minsys.plist in Property List Editor (if you have the Apple developer tools installed) or TextEdit.



9. Under the heading AELMinimumVRAM change the number from 128 to a number lower than or equal to your current video memory. I changed mine to 32. Alternatively you could change block to warn and the installer will warn you but let you continue installation.



10. Save the file, close all the folders that appeared and double-click Install Final Cut Studio on the disk image. You should now be able to install Final Cut Studio without problems.

Some of the applications in the studio also contain a minsys.plist file that will need to be modified. These applications are Final Cut Pro, Motion, Color, Soundtrack Pro and DVD Studio Pro (even though the latter apparently has no changes from FCS 2).

If you have FCS Maintenance Pack installed, you can do this quickly and easily by checking the Low Minimum Requirements option in System Toolkit. Otherwise follow the steps below.

11. Ctrl-click on the application in question and select Show Package Contents.



12. Navigate to Contents/Resources and open minsys.plist in either Property List Editor (if you have the developer tools installed) or TextEdit.



13. Under the heading AELMinimumVRAM change the number from 128 to a number lower than or equal to your current video memory. I changed mine to 32. Alternatively you could change block to warn.



14. Color will still warn you about your screen resolution - however you can just select Never show again and continue.



That's it! You will need to repeat steps 11-14 whenever you update Final Cut Studio.

Note: Some people have suggested simply removing the Requirements Checker application but I do not advocate deleting files.