PFClean Preferences
The preferences dialogue box allows you to change certain aspects of the application's behaviour. Click on the Preferences button:
in the upper right-hand corner of the GUI to access the preferences dialogue box.
There are two distinct types of preferences in PFClean, System preferences and User preferences.
System preferences apply to the local machine. These settings are identical for all PFClean users on this computer.
User preferences apply to the current user. Each user can have their own preferred settings on the same machine.
The Caching section provides control over the memory cache used to speed up playback.
The maximum size of the memory cache used in Playblast. The cache size is specified in gigabytes.
Default value: 75% of physical memory.
The Export section controls various aspects of clip export with the File Out node.
The default directory where exports are written to.
Default value: project:/export, i.e. in the export sub-directory of the project.
The default image file format used to export clips.
Default value: TIF.
The default QuickTime codec used to export clips (only active if QuickTime is chosen as the Default Format above).
Default value: depends on what codecs are installed on your system.
The default QuickTime codec quality used to export clips (only active if QuickTime is chosen as the Default Format above).
Default value: Normal.
The default amount of padding in the filename's frame number when exporting.
Default value: 4.
Default Format, Default QuickTime Codec and Default QuickTime Quality are only applicable if you wish to change the format upon export. The default export action is to preserve these factors, and it is only if you override this behaviour do these 3 parameters come into play by initially defining what format you wish to export.
The Default number padding setting is used in cases where a padding cannot be established automatically, for example when exporting to an image sequence from a movie or when exporting a Remaster sequence. For the typical case of exporting one image sequence to another, the frame padding is preserved.
When selected, DPX sequences are exported without an alpha channel, when un-ticked an alpha channel is present.
Default value: selected.
When selected, as much header information as possible is preserved when a clip is exported, including internal low-level fields such as the offsets to the image data in the case of DPX files. Else, some of the internal header information, such as the offsets, may be lost but never important external fields such as timecode and keycode.
Default value: not selected.
When selected, an XML formatted file is written out which details information about the exported clip. This file is written to the same directory as the exported clip, has the same name as the clip with a .xml file extension. The purpose of this information file is to aid integration with other systems.
Default value: selected.
When selected, a summary file is written out to the export path directory detailing information about the exported clips. The purpose of this file is to provide a convenient report of exported clips and/or to aid integration with other systems. The format and contents of the summary file are controlled by the various checkboxes and pulldowns.
The different formats of summary file currently supported are: XML, XLSX (Office Open XML Spreadsheet file), and HTML. The XML format file is intended to as human-readable and self-explanatory as possible. The only field that needs explanation is the "thumbnail" tag. The data in this field is a base-64 encoding of a JPEG image.
Default value: selected.
When selected, frames are exported in a sequential manner. Else, frames are exported in a non-sequential manner which is potentially faster, but may lead to frames becoming fragmented on disk which could impact on subsequent playback performance of the image sequence.
Default value: selected.
When selected, File Out preserves the original inode number of the source file. This is useful when overwriting images on export which are referenced by other applications by means of a hard link.
Disabling this option will result in a new inode number being assigned to the exported file, breaking any hard links.
Default value: not selected.
When selected, frames are exported with 4x code value scaling applied to 16-bit ADX source files. Source files tagged as 16-bit ADX in the file header (encoded using the lower 25% of the 16-bit range) are automatically scaled by default in PFClean to use the full 16-bit range for display purposes only. This look will be burnt into exported filed when this option is selected; else, the frames are exported with the code values of the original 16-bit ADX source files (the lower 25% of the 16-bit range).
Note: If the Apply ADX16 Scaling on export option is selected, the Export Source Header option should not be selected for consistency.
If both are selected, the output files will be labelled as ADX16, but will include values over the whole 16-bit code value range, which would cause confusion when further processing the files.
Default value: not selected.
The General systems preferences section is a collection of miscellaneous settings that do not warrant their own category.
The method to determine the format standard of a clip. Options are:
Default value: Using metadata.
When selected, the start frame of a Quicktime file is numbered 0, else the start frame number will be 1. Note that when changing this preference, you must restart PFClean before the change will take affect.
Default value: not selected, so QuickTime frame numbers start at 1.
When selected, the path the project stores to the footage is made relative to the project itself. Else an absolute path is stored.
Relative paths can help in making the project more transferable between machines.
Default value: not selected.
When selected, image sequences with non-consecutive frame numbers will be considered separate clips.
For example, a directory on disk contains image files for frames 0-100 and 105-200. This could either represent a single image sequence where frames 101-104 are currently missing (but they maybe present at some point in the future), or it could be 2 separate, independent image sequences. This setting controls how the application deals with this ambiguity.
Default value: not selected, i.e. treated as a single image sequence with missing frames.
The Import edit section controls various aspects of importing edits (EDL, Final Cut Pro, etc...)
A set of directories that are recursively searched to locate footage that is referenced in the edit. These directories apply to all projects and are in addition to the project-specific ones that can be defined when importing an edit.
Default value: ., i.e. the directory containing the edit file.
The Locate button brings up a file browser for specifying the above and acts on the currently selected row of the table.
When selected, only the part that is actually referenced in the edit, is imported. Else the entire clip will be imported. This option is not relevant to Final Cut Pro import.
Default value: not selected.
This option is only relevant to Final Cut Pro import. When selected, the referenced QuickTime will be used before any image sequence, else the reverse situation applies.
When parsing a Final Cut Pro file either the referenced QuickTime movies could be imported, or the image sequences that represents the same clips, when the edit may have been generated using low-res QuickTime proxies to conform the edit using a hi-res image sequence.
Default value: not selected.
The above settings can be overridden on an import-edit-by-import-edit basis using the controls when actually specifying the edit file to import.
When selected, only version 1 files are parsed, else no check is made on the version number.
The Final Cut Pro parser was originally developed and rigorously tested on Apple Interchange File Format version 1. Preliminarily testing shows that it also appears to work on versions 2, 3 and 4 although this is not guaranteed. Use at your own discretion.
Default value: ticked.
The OpenColorIO section provides controls for colour space management with OpenColorIO.
The colour space that is assigned to a clip upon import. This can be controlled independently for different bit-depths. The clip default colour space can be overridden in Media Admin.
The colour space to use in the Cinema for displaying clips on the monitor.
The colour space to use for export. The default value is Pass through meaning no colour space conversion is applied upon export.
The Cinema section controls various aspects of the Cinema.
This controls what is displayed in the Cinema when dragging the playback head in the scrub bar.
Options are:
Changing this setting can aid interactivity when scrubbing if the clip and/or its effects are time consuming to render.
Default value: Base clip.
The transparency of the selection list overview displayed in the Cinema.
Default value: 0.5.
The transparency of the ROI overview displayed in the Cinema.
Default value: 1.0.
Scaling of the image displayed on an external display connected to the machine. If no external display has been detected, this option will not be available.
Options are:
Default value: Fixed 1:1
The background colour of the Cinema. The button is coloured with the currently selected colour. Clicking the button brings up a colour selection widget to specify a new colour.
Default value: Black.
The General user preferences section is a collection of miscellaneous settings that do not warrant their own category.
Controls which notification categories should be displayed when PFClean starts.
Default value: All
The number of undo levels that the application stores. Increasing this number gives a larger undo history but comes at the cost of increased memory usage.
Default value: 2.
Options are:
Default value: Workbench
If selected, a calculator icon is displayed in numeric entries fields. Clicking on this icon brings up a calculator interface where values may be entered using a mouse or pen and calculations performed. The calculator functionality can also be accessed using the context menu popup by right-clicking in the numeric entries field itself.
Default value: not selected.
When selected, hidden files, such as those starting with a dot on macOS or Linux, are displayed in the File Browser. Else, they remain hidden.
Default: not selected.
Conditions which will prevent a clip being deleted from the Media Admin. These are:
Default value: both conditions selected.
The Grading section controls various aspects of the viewer tools and grading in Film Grade and Remaster.
The graticule lines mark the black and white value for the Histogram and Waveform monitor in the Remaster node's grading panel and Workbench effects. high describes the white point and low the black point in Cineon code values.
Default values: high: 1023, low: 0.
When selected, the Cinema's zoom-to-width button will respect the viewer tools, such as Waveform Monitor and Histogram, (if active) when zooming the frame content, so that the viewer tools and image content won't overlap.
Default value: selected.
The incremental Cineon code value per printer light step as explained in the in the Workbench's Film Grade effect and Remaster node's grading panel.
Default value: 12.0.
The neutral value for the printer lights, where the printer lights have no effect.
Default value: 25.
The Keyboard/Mouse section allows the user to customise keyboard shortcuts and mouse interaction.
When selected, the mouse wheel can be used to zoom the image in the Cinema.
The angle, in degrees, the jog wheel has to turn in order to move one frame forwards or backwards.
Default value: 20.
The action is listed in the left-hand column, the shortcut in the right. To change a shortcut simply click in the right-hand column of the relevant action and type a new shortcut. Shortcuts are defined by typing them literally, e.g. to have a "Shift+A" shortcut you type the 7 letters S, h, i, f, t, + and A into the right-hand column - you do not hold down the Shift key and press the A key.
The default keyboard and mouse shortcuts are far too numerous to list here but they are included on their own in the Keyboard and Mouse Interactions guide for reference.
The currently active keyboard and mouse shortcuts can be printed out using the Print button; saved and loaded from file using the Save As and Load buttons respectively; and returned to their values when the application started using the Reset All button.