Log And Capture - MOTU HD Express User Manual

Playback settings
Click the Setup tab (Figure 6-4 on page 27) to view
playback settings.
If you want Final Cut Pro to resolve to an external
video source during playback, choose Input Source
from the Clock Source menu (Figure 6-5 on
page 27); otherwise, leave it set to Internal.
For details on other playback settings, review
Chapter 6, "MOTU Video Setup" (page 25).

LOG AND CAPTURE

Once you've decided on a workflow, chosen the
corresponding Easy Setup preset for your Final Cut
Pro project and specified the video input you wish
to capture in MOTU Video Setup, you are ready to
log and capture video from the HD Express:
1 Choose Log and Capture from the File menu.
Figure 7-3: The Capture Settings tab with HD Express preset chosen.
2 Click the Capture Settings tab (Figure 7-3) and
check the Capture/Input setting.
This setting is pre-configured if you created your
Final Cut Pro project using a HD Express Easy
Setup.
3 Click the Now button to start the capture.
Refer to Part IV of the Final Cut Pro manual for
more information on advanced capture settings.
Figure 7-4: Click the 'Now' button to begin capture.
36
Video encoding and CPU performance during
capture
If you are capturing uncompressed HD or SD, the
uncompressed video stream goes straight to your
hard drive, with no compression or encoding
required along the way.
☛
The real-time capture of uncompressed HD
requires very fast disk storage, such as a disk RAID
array or fibre-optic drive array.
When you are capturing Apple ProRes 422, Final
Cut Pro performs the encoding in real time during
capture. Given today's Intel processor speeds,
ProRes requires approximately one Intel CPU core
to perform this task, depending on the ProRes
quality mode (standard or HQ), the speed of the
processors, and other related factors. Your
performance will vary, but generally speaking,
ProRes 422 standard quality capture requires a
computer with at least two Intel core processors;
four cores or more are recommended. ProRes 422
HQ quality requires a computer with four Intel
cores or more for reliable performance.
If you have chosen to capture to an HD codec other
than Apple ProRes, such as DVCPro, the situation
is similar to ProRes capture, described above. Final
Cut Pro does the work of compressing the video
stream, and so the computer's CPU performance
must be good enough to handle the real-time
encoding. Again, your performance will vary,
depending on the codec you have chosen, core
processor speeds, etc. If you have a four- or eight-
core machine, however, you should be able to
readily capture in just about any format you wish.
F I N A L C U T P R O