I think I'm narrowing down the problem but I'm at a lost as to what I did wrong.

Working with Media Composer 7.0.2 on a HP Z400 workstation. 

I was asked to create a lead-in countdown for our students and faculty to use on their video edits.  Using the files provided with Media Composer I clipped in 10 seconds of color bars, 10 seconds of filler, and then using the marquee and title tool I created a 10 second countdown.  I then did a video mixdown to a nice clean single clip that everyone could easily edit into their project.

The clip plays fine inside MC.  But when it is edited into a sequence I can not Digital Cut it out.  It will actually crash Media Composer; it will either want to wait indefinately or close the program.  If physically press the stop button on the deck (a Panasonic AG-DV200P connected via firewier), I can get back to working in MC without closing it. If I uncheck the box in the Digital Cut tool for Entire Sequence and scroll forward past this lead-in I created I can digital cut the rest fo the sequence fine.  So I believe it has something to do with the way I made the countdown. 

Anyone have any suggestions?

Well, the thread has had some views but no replies yet.  I just wanted to add some more information.  I found I was able to do a Digital Cut of my lead-in/countdown if I used the sequence before the video mixdown.  This seems to imply that in the process of doing a video mixdown something happens to the clip that makes it unable to be Digitally Cut. 

You won't get many replies because digital cut is old school (is that an old school your at?:). Not many still use tape , but of course a lot of us remember.

1. Does the digitally cut sequence have a green dot on it?

2. What format did you mix down to? The same format you are going to tape with? It's a firewire deck so is it DV, did you mixdown DV 4:1:1 (NTSC) or DV 4:2:0 (PAL)?

3. Is the rest of the sequence in the same format? Do you get an error message or does it just not record, does it start the process of digital cut at all?

Start with media format and I think you'll find the answer

Yes, I realize that tape is really a thing of the past.  It's not that we're an old University, it's because we're a State University- a state that feels that funding technology is a waste of money. 

Anyways, to answer your questions:

1. No green dots.  All effects are rendered and the mixdown is one solid video clip.

2. The mixdown, I assume, is in my project format of 30i NTSC, 4:3.  I originally did the mixdown as a 1:1 and then as a DV50 with the same result.  I can try others if you think it will fix the problem. Trying to keep good quality and disk space isn't a problem.

3. I have tried cutting it out all on it own and with another sequence (and several other sequences) all with the same result.  The deck will kind of start buy putting the deck in Rec/pause mode, the digital cut tool might flash the red square to say that it's recording, the deck Record light goes out and Media Composer just sits there.  If I click anywhere on the screen MC crashes, but I can press Stop on the deck and MC will become useful again.

Thanks for the help.  I'll keep looking.

Tim:

Yes, I realize that tape is really a thing of the past.  It's not that we're an old University, it's because we're a State University- a state that feels that funding technology is a waste of money. 

clearly I have to work on my sense of humour as the old school thing was just a joke..

Ok you mentioned you rendered to 1:1 and DV 50 but not DV 25 which is your native format. Try that and unless you have corrupt media it should work.

You can also try to export the section you're trying to lay to tape out to a QT file. Then re-import it (dont AMA) and try to lay it into a sequence.  

I've seen MC just NOT want to deal with mixdowns before. That might clear the bugs out that seem to be hanging you up.