Proper P2 Procedure
Team Cinequip | July 20, 2009
P2 has quickly been making a return to form
P2 has quickly been making a return to form with the recent release of their new E series line card- More cost effective with faster speeds – and a load of authorized content, like scene files, and on-line tutorials; but one thing that still causes people to balk is the P2 work flow. Panasonic has decided to take a step in the right direction by releasing the P2CMS (Contents Management Software) for PC and Mac.
With this software users don’t have to worry while offloading footage. Dread no more the “Drag and drop” method (Which Panasonic does not approve of). By using this new software the user can easily pull the footage from the camera, re-name, and get it prepped for your NLE of choice.
Now, it does take a bit of work to understand all of the aspects of the CMS program, but it helps to clean up bad habits that may have been learned by dragging and dropping footage, thereby keeping your data safe.
If you are looking to download and get started with P2CMS click on this link. It will take you to the P2CMS download page, and then you are off to the races!
Happy shooting!
–Jonathan Stainton
Great post! A lot of people don’t know about the pitfalls of drag and drop or about the existence of this software.
That user manual is almost impossible to follow. How do I go about transferring p2 data using a usb 2.0 cable with P2cms? And if I have P2 folders that I have dragged and dropped already, can I ingest it too? Most importantly, how do I go about renaming my clips with names that make sense, not random numbers? Can someone please post a link with a p2cms forum or easy guidelines.
Well, you have some very valid questions. Metadata is one of the trickiest parts of the P2 workflow, of which I have gotten caught up in a great deal. Firstly, the most important step is to understand how to use the SD cards and user Presets. You can actually create user Presets that will change your MetaData names as you record. Its helpful for the poor guy in post who doesnt know how to catalogue the seemingly random letter and number combos that are used with the P2 recording.
Give us a call here, or drop by. I’d be happy to help out!