Using FCPX for Live Events

Anyone here used or using FCPX for live events. I produce live events for my day job and I was interested if anyone has used FCPX for live event playback. The software I use now is ok but I like the idea of using an editor so I can adjust specific variables of a video. Specifically audio, I am given lots of different videos to playback at a live show and they are usually all over the map when it comes to master audio mix. Any thoughts or pitfalls that the forum knows about would be appreciated.

Thanks for any input. Love the website.

We do a fair bit of live show video playback and I would be nervous playing back from FCPX. There are too many things that could go wrong and one bad playback could ruin a client's experience.

If I were you, I would have FCPX on site to do the tweaks you need and then encode to H.264 and play back using PlaybackPro. It's rock solid and you know it will work smoothly every time.

---> Jarrod

I am a Big Screen producer for V8 Supercars events here in Australia and whilst we prioritise using the main TV PGM feed and EVS facilities dedicated to us as well - I do use my MacBook Pro laptop to drive some content out via FCPX.

The biggest strength of FCPX is frankly its media management so I can quickly build VT compiles using clips that I have assembled using Keyword collections etc.

I use a LACIE Rugged RAID that I have setup as RAID 1 (2TB) for some redundancy.

I would consider using PlaybackPro...however it doesn't support the Blackmagic Ultratudio device I use to play out across Thunderbolt to SDI.

In any case, I can always fall back to another feed/shot if I ever struck any issues with this setup during an event.

Dean...

Now I should have offered one caveat with my setup...

In true Blackmagic style - their hardware is always impressive - however the software support for the ultra studio device is frankly... crap.

At the moment, I assemble video packages in FCPX, export to ProRes LT, then play out on Blackmagic Media Express.

The reason I did that is whenever I play natively out in FCPX using AV output to the Blackmagic device, I get frequent FCPX crashes during playback. That's no good for a live layout environment.

Its not good full stop.

The support community are aware of this issue and suggest installing OLDER Blackmagic drivers and I am about to test that this week...

Apparently the other option is to use something like PPro or FCP 7... but that would be a shame.

Unless anyone has any other ideas. I would use Playback pro but their site expressly mentions they don't support Ultrastudio which also... sucks!

Thanks for all the feedback. I have been using a product called Pro Presenter - www.renewedvision.com - It is targeted to the religious market but it is overall very useful for live media playback. It does have it's limitations, specifically with audio control. I think the Blackmagic Media Express option will work well. I had forgotten about that option. The workflow presented worked well. Thanks again for all the input.

Deano wrote: Now I should have offered one caveat with my setup...

In true Blackmagic style - their hardware is always impressive - however the software support for the ultra studio device is frankly... crap.

At the moment, I assemble video packages in FCPX, export to ProRes LT, then play out on Blackmagic Media Express.

The reason I did that is whenever I play natively out in FCPX using AV output to the Blackmagic device, I get frequent FCPX crashes during playback. That's no good for a live layout environment.

Its not good full stop.

The support community are aware of this issue and suggest installing OLDER Blackmagic drivers and I am about to test that this week...

Apparently the other option is to use something like PPro or FCP 7... but that would be a shame.

Unless anyone has any other ideas. I would use Playback pro but their site expressly mentions they don't support Ultrastudio which also... sucks!

I would suggest ProVideoPlayer. Great piece of software. Supports Ultrastudio (and more).

www.renewedvision.com/pvp.php

support.renewedvision.com/index.php?/Kno...vices-do-you-support