Rendering High-Precision Requires A Graphics Card with More Capabilities

Have you ever seen that?

Without getting into great detail, with that Final Cut is telling you that it can't render what visual effect you want (have applied to a clip or nest) in high-precision because of one of two things (or both).

1. Your graphics card simply can't handle it. You'll need to upgrade.

2. If you're lucky you can adjust a setting and render in slightly less than "high-precision" with some caveats.

A: Highlight the sequence that has the troublesome clip & effect in it in the Browser and hit Command + 0 for Sequence Settings. Fortunately, in here, changes you make DO apply to the current sequence.

B: Click on the Video Processing tab and you'll see something like this:

See the four radio buttons on the left? Try setting your sequence settings to something other than it currently is. RGB is usually good for this problem.

But read the two paragraphs of text to the right there. Rendering with different Video Processing settings can cause colors to go all wonky.

C: Hit OK and test, test and test some more.

Toggle Range Check and Canvas Gamma and Brightness

You may notice that when you turn on Toggle Range Check (Control + Z) the gamma of your canvas will change, generally becoming darker with Toggle Range Check on. Why?

It has to do with FCP 6/7's insistence that it pretend it's a studio monitor. You'll see the same kind of shift when you go into System Settings… (Shift + Q) and click on the "Playback Control" and toggle Gamma Correction from "Approximate" to "Accurate".

FCP's Toggle Range Check is in effect emulating a Broadcast Monitor when Toggle Range Check is on, that's the main reason you'll see a gamma shift.

If you set Gamma Correction to Accurate, FCP will shift the gamma of the canvas to emulate a broadcast monitor and you'll see no change in gamma when toggling Toggle Range Check because it's already in "emulation" mode, as I like to call it.

Accurate is pseudo-emulation mode.
Approximate is semi-WYSIWYG.

Toggle Range Check is pseudo-emulation mode.

Btw, strange as it may sound, if you're not using a TV or studio monitor setting this option to Approximate is more accurate. You may see your footage look a bit less contrasty but that's likely more accurate in most cases. FCP won't apply a bit of gamma juju and jump from 1.8 to 2.2 because it won't assume everything is 1.8.

I like to keep this setting to Approximate because in my case, with my setup, it's more accurate to what's been actually loaded into FCP and more closely matches the raw footage. Exporting to Quicktime is another matter entirely.

None of this holds a candle to a real broadcast monitor or decent TV though for gamma/color grading/correction.

Final Cut Pro 6.x + Snow Leopard means your gamma is wrong

FCP's Viewer vs. Quicktime Player 7

If you use FCP 6.x and Snow Leopard your Gamma onscreen in the Canvas and Viewer is likely wrong. Here's some more info about it.

FCP corrects for viewing at 2.2 gamma, so when you're using Leopard or earlier which has 1.8 gamma everything is okay. But, since Snow Leopard defaults to 2.2 gamma, FCP is over correcting the gamma.

If you have FCP 6.x and Snow Leopard check it out yourself. Open up a file in FCP, then also open it in QT 7 and compare the images. Toggle "Enable FCP compatibility" in QT Player 7 as well. Compare the gamma of the images.

Bottom line, if at all possible correct your work on a broadcast/production monitor or just burn off a DVD and pop it into your player and take a look at it.

Conversely, you may see a similar issue with FCP7 and Leopard.

If you don't do anything else, at least learn to use the Vectorscope and Waveform Monitor and correct using those.

Just Two Scopes

FCP (6.0.6) doesn't provide a way to view just the two most important scopes Waveform Monitor and Vectorscope. So here's a way to just have those open that's simple but may be so simple it's overlooked.

In FCP hit Option + 9 to open up the scopes ("Tool Bench") then hit Option + 9 again to open another identical window as a tab in the first.

Set that tab to Waveform Monitor and drag it out of that window and put it where it works for you. Change the underlying window to Vectorscope and put it near the Waveform Monitor. This way you have the two most useful scopes onscreen simultaneously without scopes you don't need or which may eat up some CPU during playback.

Waveform Indicator Brightness Slider Bug

If you have a Mighty Mouse and you scroll left or right over the Video Scopes' Display and Scales brightness adjust slider the slider will move to the far left and right but the brightness of the actual Video Scopes won't be adjusted.

Just a quickie a friend noticed under 10.5.6 and FCP 6.0.6 and emailed me about.

Adjusting the Color Corrector Wheels

A quick one: You don't have to click on the tiny button to make adjustments. Clicking anywhere within the wheels is the same as clicking on the tiny button itself.

Also, holding Command lets you drag the button around faster.

Zoom In For Color Correction

Really this tip applies to any close up work but it's especially handy for color correcting.

Launch System Preferences and go to Universal Access. Under the Seeing tab (are they still called tabs?) hit the Options... button under Zoom.

At the bottom of this sheet you'll see "When zoomed in, the screen image shows:" and three options. Adjust these to your liking but under it make sure "Use scroll wheel with modifier keys to zoom" is checked. The text box there is for you to choose what key(s) you want to hold down to zoom in and out with your mouse.

Now, when you're working in FCP and need to hit that specific pixel for color correcting or just to get a better view of something hold down your modifier key and scroll up with your mouse's scrolling wheel or ball and you'll zoom into your screen. Scroll or wheel the other way to zoom out.

QuickTime Player's Color vs FCP's

You may have missed this but Apple added a helpful option to QuickTime Player's preferences. At the bottom of the player's prefs you'll see "Enable Final Cut Studio color compatibility" which does nothing more than show you video without ColorSync's correction so you'll end up seeing (in theory) the actual gamma of your file.

Try it on and off with some files and you'll see what it does.

Color Corrector & the Command Key

Usually when you hold down the Command key it "gears down" things so you can make finer adjustments. For example say you're lengthening or shortening a clip in the timeline, if you hold down Command you can adjust it frame by frame (if you're using the mouse that is).

But, it's the exact opposite if you're in the Color Corrector 3-Way filter. Normally when you drag around the indicator dot in the color wheel in this filter it moves fairly slowly. But if you want to drag it around to make broad changes in color almost in real-time with your mouse, hold down Command and in this rare instance it "gears up" the movement.