Final Mate for Mac
Capture video footage from camcorder, join/split AVCHD without encoding, convert to Apple ProRes & AIC
If you are a HD Camcorder fans, you are definitely familiar with AVCHD files, AVCHD files or MTS/M2TS files shot by your HD Camcorder. And also, if you are an iMac lover as well, you will encounter a problem in this situation: how to get AVCHD files or MTS files to Mac compatible?
iMac users are bound to have apps, like iMovie, iDVD, FCP X or FCE installed on the iMac. But you will find that those apps will not support AVCHD files or MTS files very well. Rendering will become an unavoidable step if you try to import MTS files or AVCHD files.
Of course you can convert MTS files or AVCHD files into MPEG4 or other compatible formats. But that common format would not maintain the HD video quality of your MTS files or AVCHD files. You know, Full HD movie is in 1080P/60P or 1080P/50P; AVCHD Lite file will be in 720P/50P or 720P/60P. After converting to those common formats, a great loss in video quality will be easily detected in the output files. That's terrible enough!
What is the best format for FCP X, FCE, iMovie and iDVD? Well, Apple ProRes 422 or Apple Intermediate Codec, known as AIC, will be helpful. By Apple ProRes 422 or AIC, you can import the files directly into FCP X, FCE, iMovie or iDVD.
ProRes 422 is a standard-definition and high-definition lossy video compression format developed by Apple Inc. ProRes is an intermediate codec, which means it is intended for use during video editing, and not intended for practical or end-user viewing. The benefit of an intermediate codec is that it retains higher quality than end-user codecs while still requiring much less expensive disk systems compared to uncompressed video. So Apple ProRes 422 will keep the video quality best rather than any other video format.
But you have to install FCP X, as well as its codec pack so that you can encode and use ProRes 422. The annoying thing is that the latest version of Final Cut Pro, or called FCP X, does not integrate the codec pack following its downloading. Users have to download the codec pack in another step. And generally, for any ProRes 422 encoders, it takes a long time to finish ProRes 422 encoding.
So Apple Intermediate Codec would be better in certain situations. It is also a video codec designed by Apple Inc. to be an intermediate format in an HDV workflow. It features high performance and quality, being less processor intensive to work with than other editing formats. Unlike native MPEG-2 based HDV - and similar to the standard-definition DV codec - AIC does not use temporal compression, enabling every frame to be decoded immediately without decoding other frames.
Where to find such a encoding tool? By Google it, you will find a great amount of such conversion tools. But, such as ImTOO MTS Converter, many of them are really great piece of junk. It will use up the CPU and Memory resource of your iMac in the conversion, while a bad video output will be provided, video and audio is not sync for most of the time!
After trial many apps, I finally paid for Aunsoft Final Mate for Mac. It is not only a MTS/M2TS to Mac Converter, but also a good camcorder assistant tool. It will not only help you convert MTS to Mac file compatible, but also provide edit functions, such as lossless Merge, Cut/Split and Trim.
As far as the Apple ProRes 422 format is concerned, it will help you convert your MTS file or AVCHD file to ProRes 422 in Dolby 5.1 Channel. You will be able to edit the output ProRes 422 file in FCP X as a 5.1 channel file. No any other program can provide such a fantastic encoding.
Its conversion speed is fast, too. It will fast transcode 1080p/1080i/720p AVCHD footage to various Apple ProRes formats (ProRes 422/ProRes 422 HQ/ProRes 422 LT/ProRes 422 Proxy/ProRes 4444) for editing in FCP. All those options are listed in its profile list. What’s more, as the best Mac AVCHD Converter, it is able to convert MTS/M2T/M2TS videos to Apple Intermediate Codec (AIC)(*.mov), DV/DVCPRO(50)-PAL(*.mov), DV/DVCPRO(50)-NTSC(*.mov), HDV/DVCPRO HD 1080p/i(*.mov) or Avid DNxHD(*.mov), etc on Mac OS X compatible with Final Cut Express, iMovie, Avid Media Composer and more.
In shorts, it is great mate for your FCP X, iMovie and iDVD, etc.
