Operation

PictureReady's primary function is to record video. The main window is a video preview window which will show the picture currently incoming, or being captured. The other 3 windows allow control of the Video capture characteristics, or of an attached 9-pin deck, and XML Hilite marking.

Capture Control Window.

This window allows access to the Preview function, which puts PictureReady into E-E mode, displaying incoming video. Once in this mode, you can select 'Video Setup' and 'Sound Setup' to change the parameters for the video devices you have available. For example to change the source selection, or video capture format. You can also initiate a free-capture Record from this window, which will record the duration of video specified in the preferences panel. When timestamping this capture, it will use either LTC timecode, 9-pin timecode or the CPU Clock time, as selected in the pop up menu at the top of the Video Control window. Note that video is captured to a folder which is specified via the 'Setup Record Destination' item in the 'Action' menu. LTC is fed into the PictureReady CPU via channel 1 of the Macintosh default sound input. During recording, the duration of the capture so far is displayed under the timecode. When changing the 'Video Setup' parameters, be sure to select the appropriate frame rate (25 or 29.97) rather than simply selecting 'best' since this rate is used by Pictureready during XML file generation. If you have selected 'MultiChannel Audio Architecture' in preferences you will also get the audio metering and arming panel to the right of the capture controls. Here you can select which audio tracks to capture, and see basic level metering. If you have chosen to use the AVSync pref, you should check for the Active AVSync display in this window as you start recording. If you do NOT see the AVSync Active message when recording, then check your prefs to turn on AVSync. If you still dont see this display, then contact the vendor of your Video capture device and report the problem. AVSync is a function of the QuickTime video capture card driver, and PictureReady merely turns it on and monitors the status.

Machine Control Window.

PictureReady! controls a 9-pin deck using standard Sony P2 protocol via the serial port selected in Preferences. Basic control including Stop, Play, FFwd and Rewd are available plus a shuttle slider. You can locate the machine to a specific timecode, by entering this into the Mark In field and pressing the GOTO button. When setting up for a capture from Video tape, you will want to navigate to the start time, then press the 'Mark In' button, shuttle forward to the end, then press 'Mark Out'. Alternatively you can simply type in the start and end times directly. After entering the In and Out times, you can press the 'Grab' button to perform a programmed capture from tape with the timestamp taken from the 9-pin timecode (set this option in the Video control window). If your deck has a different timecode on its audio track (compared to the timecode track or VITC) you can opt to use this as the timestamp source instead by selecting from the Video Control window popup.

Menus.

Setup Record Destination :

Before recording, you should set up the record destination, along with the default naming parameters. You can either store all files (audio, video, movie and XML) in the same folder, or if you prefer you can assign different folders and volumes to each. This may be important for highly optimized SAN storage infrastructure where you want to avoid mixing large and small files. The name for each recording will be automatically assigned based on these parameters, and automatically incrementing a numerical suffix. Holding the OPTION key as you press Record, or Grab, will allow you to manually name the next recorded file, or you can check the preference 'Prompt for Base Name on each record' to do this every time automatically. The Name prefix will determine the text which appears before the numerical portion, and an optional Name suffix will be appended. The Name suffix is useful, for example, for multi-cam recording, where each camera can be given a suffix. You can also enter Reel information which will appear inside Final Cut Pro. Finally, you can opt to have PictureReady add the recording's timestamp into the OSX Finder comment, which can be useful for later identifying files. You can also strip text from the XML PathURL parameter. This is useful in case your Pictureready recorder has a different share point on the storage to your edit systems. For example PictureReady may write to a SAN as ' SanStorageA/VideoData/thisProject/ ', however, your edit machines may be sharing this data via ethernet and mount the volume as 'thisProject/'. In this case, normally the XML files generated by PictureReady would create a PathURL error in FCP because the path in the XML is not available. To solve this, you would enter "SanStorageA/VideoData/" or "SanStorageA:VideoData:" into the 'Strip from XML' field and PictureReady would alter the created XML accordingly so they will work on the different share point FCP systems.

Mark ActionHilite XML Clip

ActionHilites are a revolutionary feature of PictureReady for workflows where Final Cut Pro is used for picture editorial. ActionHilites are XML clippings which exist as standalone XML Documents pointing to a section of your recorded movie. They are created on-the-fly in response to user actions as the movie is recorded, and form a short subclip based on the timecode at which the user marks the point. A preference allows the clip to span a region either side of the marked point, although since ActionHilite clips can be expanded in Final Cut Pro to the full extents of the recorded movie, this parameter is purely for convenience and does not restrict the handles on the clip. ActionHilite clips are very small files and do not contain any video media - they simply point into the master movie being recorded. Now, instead of a Final Cut Pro editor needing to import the entire movie into the timeline, and manually locating action points, the PictureReady operator can be logging events into XML files, simply by hitting a key and these XML files can be imported by the editor into FCP's bin with drag and drop, instantly identifying a point of interest as a short subclip. The ActionHilite XML files are created in the metadata folder with names reflecting the master movie clip, and the timecode of the clip.

For more precise control of Action Hilite metadata, using the Action Hilites window. This allows you to capture an event in time, then associate 2 fields of metadata to the clip before creating the XML file for Final Cut. When the even happens, press NOW to capture the point, then enter 2 items of metadata appropriate to the clip and press 'Send' to create the XML.

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