Leaf LC11 11.3.6 and Phaseone DF crashes, bugs, stalls and other mysteries

[robert zimmerman]

I'm having a hell of a time with LC 11.3.6 and a Phaseone DF with the latest firmware.
I'm shooting tethered with a powered fire wire repeater to a Macbook Pro 2.66GHz Intel Core i7 with 8 Gigs.

I'll skip day one. This is just a day two list:

I've had about 5  times when the camera has frozen up and tells me it can't find the DB. Sometimes I can shut down the camera, disconnect and reconnect the camera and it will start back up. Other times I have to shut everything down and reboot the whole system.

I've had another 3 times when the software crashed. Like totally gone, crash...not a frozen crash.

Another 3 times where the shutter of the 110mm LS frozen shut. I have to shut the camera down, remove the lens, reattach the lens and start the camera back up to get it to open again.

The Leaf DB folder in the individual shots folder appear and disappear. Currently about 3/4 of the shots folders have mos. and Leaf DB folders with Jpegs, the others just have the mos. files.

On several occasions the the RGB color information symbol on the bottom of the window disappear...only to reappear after a crash and restart.

When reviewing files in the individual shots folders, single shots of models in completely different folders will appear in other folders – sometimes only in the individual view window, but not in the overview window, sometimes in both. But the lost file will also disappear sometimes.

All the equipment is new. Three different Leaf  firewire cables, the powered hub, the Phase body and lens, the batteries and the back (Aptus II7).
I've tested all the equipment several times with no hickups. Only now, during a 4 day shoot, it's screwing me.

That's a lot of shit to deal with on a high volume fashion job and I still have two days to go...any suggestions on how I can get things stable will be much appreciated.

Thanks, Kipling

[Frank Doorhof]

How Does capture one perform ?
I've switched from leaf capture to capture one and in the newest version it's in my opinion working better than lc, although I still hate the fact that it delivers files that only capture one can read.
But that can be fixed by leaf raw convertor.

Leaf capture normally was solid as can be.
I did have some problems with Afds and sometimes a DF shut down, often just removing the batteries very quickly works.

[robert zimmerman]

Capture One is a whole different can of worms and I don't want to switch everything in the middle of the shoot...retouching has started, 500Gigs of files have already been run through, flagged and selected with LC. It would cost me a day just to reorganize everything...not an option.
Is there a different version of LC (other than 11.3.6) that runs more stable?

Thanks
 

[yaya]

Kipling I've opened a support case for you so you should have already received an email,

Please reply to the case with as much info as possible and we will follow it up. I suggest that we focus on the crashes first and my first suggestion would be to try without the repeater (and thus eliminate one possible fault). I use a similar combo (with an older laptop) on a regular base and do not experience any of the issues you've mentioned so we need to investigate...

Thanks

yair

[UlfKrentz]

Hi Kipling,

the first part of your story sounds like a FW issue to me. If you start LC and connect the FW cable to the camera after LC has completely started does the back perform a proper autoconnect? We found this to be a good sign for a stable FW-connection. Make sure all FW connectors and the power supply connector from your repeater cannot move (use some velcro), you may also try to use the repeater unpowered (like we do) or try a different brand repeater. I assume your laptop is AC powered? For your remaining two days you might better use one single 4.5m cable if possible.

AFAIK the leaf DB folders are created in the background as long as the folder is the active shooting folder, so this behaviour might be normal. Mixing images from different folders never happened to us and I have no explanation for this, I am not sure if I understand you correct.

We run LC 11.3.6 without problems when shooting tethered. (We also always use two 4.5m cables and a repeater) During selection and flagging it has some issues from time to time, especially when done while still shooting or receiving data from the back and we felt 11.3.4 to be more stable. (I do not suggest to, but if you should decide to downgrade you will upload an older firmware to the back when it is connected for the first time, this will take a few minutes, be patient and don´t use any repeater or extra long cable for it, don´t move camera or computer.)

Good luck, Ulf

[robert zimmerman]

Hi Ulf,
thanks for the tips.
I also agree, it is a FW and or connection issue, but I'm not certain if the problem lies within my computers FW port, the cables, the repeater, the backs port or a combination of the above. The connection problems are sometimes there although the software isn't aware of it and thinks the back is still connected. Sometimes it's the other way around and the software breaks the connection.
Believe me, every connection is firmly and meticulously taped.
The Leaf DB folders aren't a problem, because I don't use them, but I just noticed them being there, and then not being there and thought it a bit strange.
Actually I could live with the smaller bugs, I just would like to get the connection stable to stop the constant breaks.

I'll try using just the short cable tomorrow, allthough that is a major pita being chained to a tethered station.

Thanks for the tips.

Best, Kipling

[robert zimmerman]

Just a quick update on day three:

I took the FW repeater out of the chain and used just the long Leaf cable and retaped everything today.
I had only one crash. That's really good considering we shot 20 sets and over 100 gigs today.
The shutter freeze thing happened twice and is quickly solved by removing the camera batteries and putting them back in.
Other than that, no problems.
There were still a few bugs with LC, but fewer than yesterday and it does run nice and fast when it's stable.

Thanks for the help and the speedy replies.

Best, Kipling

[Fritzer]

Just for the record, I had some weird FW issues with 11.3.5 on a MacPro ; external FW drives dropped left and right, hard time connecting to my A75, etc..

I can't do more testing right now, but I hope it was an insulated incident.

11.2.9 was my former LC version, and was solid as ever .

[Zachary Goulko]

Another person here with an Aptus 75, and Firewire issues.
I've had problems since I first got the back. Shorlty after buying the back, I did a live-view shoot, to a PC laptop via a powered Firewire repeater, the board on the Aptus fried. I'm pretty sure it had something to do with the repeater, and did not use it after the back was repaired.
We use all PCs in the studio, with a total of 3 desktop systems and a file server. Since the first failure over 2 years I have been shooting directly to a 32bit XP machine, without too many problems. About 2 months ago, all of a sudden the back would disconnect after taking the first shot, and would not reconnect again. I tried to tether it to the other systems (64bit) via Capture One, and kept getting error messages. So once again I sent it in for repair, and both the Firewire board and Ram board had to be replaced ($1250). A week after receiving the back from repair, it started doing the same exact thing. This time when I sent it for repair, I was told it's a PC issue, and since Leaf no longer supports the PC version of LC, I'm sh*t out of luck. At this point I got pretty fed up, and bought a MacBook pro, specifically for capturing the images and transferring them to the file server.
So far it has been running solid, with LC 11.3.6, on the Mac, but it's only been a week.
It is pretty sad however, that I have to spend $1,600+ just to be able to shoot tethered reliably. Not everyone in this business works on Macs!

[Frank Doorhof]

Why not get capture one for PC ?
it also tethers with leaf backs and it's cheaper than a mbp.

Although I know you will love the Mac