AIR application 'Convert Final Cut Pro Markers to Flash Video Cue Points'

While not a problem for Premiere and AE users, Final Cut Pro markers don't work well as cue points in a Flash video file, while the UI for scrubbing and setting cues in Adobe's Flash CS3 Video Encoder is unwieldytiring of this, John Skidgel built an AIR utility to convert FCP XML to FLV XML, which you can import into Flash CS3 Video Encoder. You can pick up the app and check out the walk-through at Free AIR application: Convert Final Cut Pro Markers to Flash Video Cue Points.

John has also made available a few more tutorials from his Focal Press book Producing Flash CS3 Video: Techniques for Video Pros and Web Designers.

Gamma gamma QT

Mark Christiansen, whose new book Adobe After Effects CS 3 Professional Studio Techniques is nearing release, posted Fun with Gamma and Quicktime which briefly touches on file display issues in various apps. Hopefully Mark, as well as Trish and Chris Meyer, will have much more to say on the subject of color management in their new books and web postings.

An earlier post here, FreshDV notes Apple's 'color compatibility', attempted to summarize the same issue from the armchair.

Update: on the AE-List 3 Nov 2007, Chris Meyer alerted users to a not ready for primetime link to that should clarify things,
http://www.adobe.com/go/learn_ae_quicktimegamma
"... will be updated _significantly_ in the next week or two with specific instructions of what to do in various situations, and what to expect as a result."

Drag duplicate in Premiere

Option/Alt-dragging to duplicate an object seems to be an informal convention made popular by Adobe apps. The Option key modifier is used throughout Final Cut, where you can dupe clips with Option-drag in FCP timelines. You can't do this in Premiere Pro.

An easy work around is to drag the item from the timeline into the Program Monitor Panel -- though there a number of other ways to get this done, including a simple copy & paste. The new clip then appears in the target track where the CTI is parked. You still have to select the target track but instead of mousing, you can also toggle target video tracks with Ctrl + - (adding Shift changes the audio target track).

Trapcode in FCP tutorial

Red Giant Software and John Dickinson have a new Final Cut Pro motion graphics tutorial that uses Trapcode Shine, Starglow and 3D Stroke.

You can find a quick rundown of the new-old Trapcode filters in the review I did a few months ago for SF Cutters. In short, though similar filters (or Replicators or Behaviors) can be found in AE and Final Cut Studio, Trapcode's Shine, Starglow, and 3D Stroke offer more control, unique features, and probably faster results than the alternatives. The Trapcode website has numerous additional tutorials and examples for the same filters using AE.

When to stay in the native codec

Phillip Hodgetts runs down rules of thumb for codec choices in Final Cut Pro in When to stay in the native codec of the source, and when to convert to something else.

The Art of Wire Removal

Fxguide has a summary of The Art of Wire Removal and a podcast interview with Aaron Rhode, roto/paint supervisor at The Orphanage in San Francisco.

vfx blog notes many other recent similar items.

This is a close-up?

Duck Amuck (1951)



And coincidentally via Nack, Mel Blanc on David Letterman.