With great sadness I realized that music purchased at the music store cannot be converted to AIFF. What this means to me is that apparently I cannot import that music into FCP (even though there is a way around this - burn it to cd and rip it back as AIFF works, but I believe only with iTunes 4.0.1, not the newer version). Is this correct ? I have FCP 3.xx. Do you know whether this is still the case with FCP 4 ? It really sux !
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music store protected AAC format
- Thread starter windwaves
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iTunes will be able to burn/rip. It's not limited to any particular version.
Toast will also let you convert protected AAC's into AIFF's without burning. Just drag into an audio playlist and export or save as...
I don't know about FCP... but if FCP can support MP3's or regular AAC's, it would likely use quicktime to decode them -- in which case, it would be able to read in protected AACs as well.
arn
Toast will also let you convert protected AAC's into AIFF's without burning. Just drag into an audio playlist and export or save as...
I don't know about FCP... but if FCP can support MP3's or regular AAC's, it would likely use quicktime to decode them -- in which case, it would be able to read in protected AACs as well.
arn
Sorry, I did not mean to ask whether iTunes can burn/rip. My problem is that FCP3 cannot import music in formats other than AIFF - it just does not let you. And this is a problem with purchased music at the music store, which really sux. Now I was just imagining that may be the newer version of FCP allows such import, since it clearly makes sense.
I do get around this currently by first burning purchased music and then import it back as AIFF. But I believe this is no longer possible with the current version of iTunes. You can still burn and rip of course, but I recall reading somewhere that when you rip back from the cd it will have to be in AAC. That is why I still have iTunes 4.0.1
I do get around this currently by first burning purchased music and then import it back as AIFF. But I believe this is no longer possible with the current version of iTunes. You can still burn and rip of course, but I recall reading somewhere that when you rip back from the cd it will have to be in AAC. That is why I still have iTunes 4.0.1
I use iTunes 4.0.1. I burned all my protected AAC files to CD and then ripped them as mp3 with no problem at all. I would imagine if you could rip as mp3 you could also rip as aiff.
I read somewhere that if you open a new project in iMovie and add an m4p file, iMovie stores an AIFF of it in the media folder of the project. I'm in a non-iTunes Music Store country, so I don't have access to any m4ps to verify this for you.
There will invariably be quality degridation and in some cases it can be quite severe. A lossy codec run through a lossy codec = a very messy file.
pnw
i've successfully used mp3s in FCP 3... there was a slight problem when i previewed the audio, though... it sounded like the mp3 skipped somewhat... so i just used quicktime pro to create an aiff.
i'm pretty sure fcp isn't just limited to aiffs... heck i've used wavs before... i know i have.
i'm pretty sure fcp isn't just limited to aiffs... heck i've used wavs before... i know i have.
-kishba
FCP was - and still is, designed to work with uncompressed audio - .snd, .au, .aiff, and .wav. You can do it, but you really shouldn't - FCP is designed for broadcast quality, not compression or maximization of disk space (boy ain't that the truth), so stick with the highest-quality, e.g. as uncompressed as you can get.
To synch video to an audio stream that is compressed is just not a good idea anyway.
I was having the same issue a week or so ago - I bought a song from the iTMS for the sole purpose of putting it into a Final Cut 3.0 Project, but couldn't get the protected AAC to import to Final Cut. I ended up having to open iMovie 3, which will let you use protected AAC in your project. I then just exported the audio-only movie as AIFF, and had a usable file.
Kind of a pain, but at least it worked.
Davis
Kind of a pain, but at least it worked.
Davis
I'd just like to note a few things to clear up some of the confusion.
First of all, when ripping to AAC format in iTunes from a CD, you are *NOT* ripping to protected AAC format. The only files which are ever in protected AAC format are the ones that you download from the iTunes Music Store. If you rip from a bought CD or even a burned CD, they will rip into regular AAC files that are unprotected.
As for using the protected AAC files in FCP 3, I was under the impression that it should work if you have installed QuickTime 6.3 which is required (I think) for the iTMS and which includes FairPlay. I think I remember hearing that FairPlay allows any application that you run on your Mac to access protected AAC files just like any other files, so as long as FCP 3 supports QT 6.3, it should be able to import protected AAC files.
Of course, it seems that that's probably not the case, here. What does it do when you try to import a protected AAC file?
This is true. There is some loss but on my burned/re-ripped stuff it wasn't too bad. I did some regular AACs in iTunes using the "convert selection to mp3" deal and they sounded pretty bad. The only reason I even needed the mp3s was to stream them to Tivo. Tivo won't play AACs (yet).
Patrick, you got it right - thx !
SimX, I did not mean to say one would rip from cd in pAAC (what sense would it make anyway !). I must have not been too clear, sorry.
As to what FCP3 does when importing pAAC files, no way of telling, it simply does not let you do that. When you do import file it does not see pAAC files (greyed out) only AIFF ones.
Arn, thank you for the good news, I guess I don't have to be afraid of updating iTunes. But then again, are you sure ? I certainly am not sure when I said that the latest update to iTunes would no longer let you do that (vague memory from a reading at the time of the update) - however, it makes lots of sense. the protection scheme is incredibly weak if one can simply eliminate it entirely by ripping to cd and back as AIFF.
best to all
SimX, I did not mean to say one would rip from cd in pAAC (what sense would it make anyway !). I must have not been too clear, sorry.
As to what FCP3 does when importing pAAC files, no way of telling, it simply does not let you do that. When you do import file it does not see pAAC files (greyed out) only AIFF ones.
Arn, thank you for the good news, I guess I don't have to be afraid of updating iTunes. But then again, are you sure ? I certainly am not sure when I said that the latest update to iTunes would no longer let you do that (vague memory from a reading at the time of the update) - however, it makes lots of sense. the protection scheme is incredibly weak if one can simply eliminate it entirely by ripping to cd and back as AIFF.
best to all
