[The Wolf]

ARGGGHHHHHHH!!!

I am going crazy and I've spent/wasted the whole morning trying to find a way to add timecode to a quicktime movie. I don't have FCP only iMovie and QT Pro. Isn't there a way I can add some timecode directly to my movie?

It seems simple enough but all the solutions I've found are either from OS 9 (requiring an import of a txt file) or require knowledge of programming.

PLEASE HELP!

[The Wolf]

I found QT Sync but I can't find the application program once I download it. What gives...
Anyone?

[Uncle Skeleton]

What do you mean by timecode? An actual timecode track, or just a text overlay that you type in by hand? I thought that timecodes were pretty much useless unless they were added by the hardware that create the movie, which is why I don't see support for timecodes being a big feature in any software titles. But maybe I'm mistaken.

I see the application when I download QT Sync. It's called "QT Sync 0.3.1.app"

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

What do you mean by timecode? An actual timecode track, or just a text overlay that you type in by hand? I thought that timecodes were pretty much useless unless they were added by the hardware that create the movie, which is why I don't see support for timecodes being a big feature in any software titles. But maybe I'm mistaken.

I see the application when I download QT Sync. It's called "QT Sync 0.3.1.app"

Thanks for the response. What I need is (I guess) the actual time code track (or overlay) as long as it shows the time running overtop the video. Like this 00:00:00:01...
I am not sure if it is useless or not, but it is required for certain things (i.e., legal stuff b/c it's a serves as standardized way to ID a certain part of the tape you are about to play).

fwiw, QT Sync is a great app and I am able to insert the tc with it. However, it's not playing nice with iDVD. While it inserted the tc and was visible in QT, once I tried to send it to iDVD the tc disappeared. I am REALLY getting frustrated as this is a CRUCIAL feature for me to have.

Does anyone know if FCP will insert TC? I really don't want to spend that much cash, but I am desperately in need of a solution. Thanks, T.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Usually the timecode doesn't start at 0, it's a way to tell where on a long tape your short clip came from (for example so you can edit in low def and then redownload the original footage in high def once you're done working on it). If you just want the display of what time you're at in the movie, don't all DVD players and media players display this info on their own? Why does it need to be burned into the movie as well?

edit: You could probably just make a text track that says
"1
2
3
4
5"
etc and add it to the movie like any other text track. The question of why still remains...

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

...The question of why still remains...

It's required by Statute.

I saw some notes about how to add a "text" track to a QT movie, but the instruction didn't work for me. Does anyone have the correct language to insert into a text track that will give me the xx:xx:xx:xx tc format in QT 7.2?

Either that, or a way to make iDVD '08 recognize the TC text track created by QT Sync...

[Uncle Skeleton]

You don't have to add correct language to a text track if you don't know it. You can just open any text file in QTPlayer, and it will put each line in a different frame, of 2 seconds each. You can export it to text then, to fine tune the times, or you could just scale that movie to the movie you have (so start with a text file with the number of lines of the seconds in your movie, and then after scaling each text frame would be 1 second long. You can quickly make a formatted list of times in excel).

Sorry I don't know how to help you with the actual timecode track. You could try exporting a new movie from QTPlayer with the timecode displayed ("burn" the timecode into the video track), and then import that to iDVD. Unfortunately the iApps have a poor record for supporting oddball features like this between each other.

[The Wolf]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

You could try exporting a new movie from QTPlayer with the timecode displayed ("burn" the timecode into the video track), and then import that to iDVD. Unfortunately the iApps have a poor record for supporting oddball features like this between each other.

lol. that is EXACTLY what I was doing as I was reading your post Unfortunately, it has been working for an hour already and the progress bar is only about a 1/4 of the way done "pre-processing"...this is for a 16 minute clip! I am so pissed. I think I have to just break down and get FCP. gah! Thanks for trying to help.