Anyone else interested in a video forum?

Baldy

So I'm shelling out pretty big dollars :cry for video tripods, wireless mics, Sony XDCAMs that break the bank, video lights...and I feel so.....alone. No one to talk to except on some strange forums where I'm a stranger in a strange land.

Whose shoulder do I cry on when Final Cut Pro barfs?

Does anyone else feel like we need a video forum?

ChrisJ

We do a decent amount of video at our house, but it's mostly just home movies/vacations. We create a DVD every year to distribute to our geographically separated family. I've definitely had questions before which I've never gotten answered. Like what type of mic should I add to my hotshoe? Does anyone else have serious problems with DVD-R Dual Layer?

Anyway, one vote from me.

fiatsurf

I'm interested at this point but the cost to start up (with what I'd want to use/do) is a bit prohibitive and the still photo equipment I bought last year would get jealous. But if there were a forum at least I'd have a place to lurk and learn. So I think it's a very good idea.

leaforte

DgrinVid.com?

DavidTO

Baldy,

I'll always do my best to help you with FCP. I'm really bad with codecs and formats. We work in DV, and DV only, and the assistants bring in all the media for me.

But I've been cutting for 20 years, 5 of them on FCP. I think I know a thing or two.

patch29

A video forum would definitely be useful.

I have been wanting to get an HD videocamera, but I keep waiting for the prices to drop and features to increase.

Andy

leaforte wrote:

DgrinVid.com?

I think it'd be a forum here on Dgrin

ian408

I'm tempted to do the all red, giant text "Video Forum Now" thing. But how's
about starting here?

scwalter

Baldy wrote:

So I'm shelling out pretty big dollars :cry for video tripods, wireless mics, Sony XDCAMs that break the bank, video lights...and I feel so.....alone. No one to talk to except on some strange forums where I'm a stranger in a strange land.

Whose shoulder do I cry on when Final Cut Pro barfs?

Does anyone else feel like we need a video forum?

I'm definitely interested. I think there is actually room for at least two video forums, one under "support" for general encoding questions, uploading, etc. and another for the artsy side (composition, editing, effects).

-Scott

mike_k

I would love to see a video forum. I visit dvinfo.net for video information. Just like photography can be broken down into many, many forums, so too can video. It seems like it would be hard to replicate something like DV Info. Would you have a single forum, or a separate forum each for Sony, Canon, other makes, software (or even forums for Final Cut, Vegas, etc.), accessories, etc...

I think it would be great to start out with a photography to video forum. Sort of a video forum for photographers. It wouldn't necessarily help with issues of picking the best Sony cam, or the best video tripod, but could cover formatting photos to use for video, making video slide shows, etc. I'm sure these topics exist in other Dgrin forums, but having a separate forum might be a good way to start moving into video. Then it could be expanded as needed to cover other specific video topics of interest.

As a photographer, I've made 6 or 7 DVD videos this past year based on photos. I found some good info from DV Info, but it would be great to have a resource here at Dgrin that is specific to this type of project.

Buildit

Baldy wrote:

So I'm shelling out pretty big dollars :cry for video tripods, wireless mics, Sony XDCAMs that break the bank, video lights...and I feel so.....alone. No one to talk to except on some strange forums where I'm a stranger in a strange land.

Whose shoulder do I cry on when Final Cut Pro barfs?

Does anyone else feel like we need a video forum?

As the most worthless video noob ever I say, "yeah"! I need all the help I can get on everything from finding good equipment that will preform the way I want, to finding products that will allow me to edit the video on my old PC. Not to mention doing it on a Nikon coolpix budget.

BradfordBenn

I'll offer what I can in terms of the audio questions and I know just enough video to be dangerous.

I am still trying to figure out why it is always "Audio follows Video"?

ian408

BradfordBenn wrote:

I am still trying to figure out why it is always "Audio follows Video"?

Because they are arteeests and you are a engineer

Skippy

Oooooooooooohhhh I'm interested, hoping to get a new cam later this year,
but been searching in other forums for some info and tips over the past few months.

Been drooling over cams for months too, but Reno's come first
....but I'm still keenly interested I am, I am ..... Skippy
.

Buildit

BradfordBenn wrote:

I'll offer what I can in terms of the audio questions and I know just enough video to be dangerous.

I am still trying to figure out why it is always "Audio follows Video"?

I've searched the web with one question. What is the diffrence from an engineering/programing standpoint of the diffrent formats? Why does the same video take up 10X as much space in AVI as it does in MOV? Things like that seem to be hard to find out.

jasonstone

good idea
I'm shooting a lot of miniDV film of the family and editing in iMovie and then creating DVDs in iDVD.

I've done over 30 so far and still have about 5 to catch up on to send to the family...

Only thing is - well video editing is so specific to the app you're using - so unless it's more about technique when taking the movie or equipment I'm not sure how you'll cope with all the different editing tools out there...

I'll do my best to help out where possible but my first answer tends to be "buy a mac and use iMovie"

Mind you 6 mates have taken the advice so far and are loving it!!!

Cheers all
Jase

Buildit

jasonstone wrote:

I'm shooting a lot of miniDV film of the family and editing in iMovie and then creating DVDs in iDVD.

I've done over 30 so far and still have about 5 to catch up on to send to the family...

Only thing is - well video editing is so specific to the app you're using - so unless it's more about technique when taking the movie or equipment I'm not sure how you'll cope with all the different editing tools out there...

I'll do my best to help out where possible but my first answer tends to be "buy a mac and use iMovie"

Mind you 6 mates have taken the advice so far and are loving it!!!

Cheers all
Jase

Yeah, when the $$$ becomes available I will probably get a mac lap top. Most of my technical issues deal with getting good video to start with. Filming while riding a motorcycle takes on some interesting challenges.
I've tried to avoid the issues I've heard about by using SD cards vs dv or cd drives. Recording quality is hit and miss. I'm starting to see some trends in the format video is recorded and the quality you get. Moreover the ablitity to track moving objects smoothly and using the zoom is a challenge.

BradfordBenn

Buildit wrote:

I've searched the web with one question. What is the diffrence from an engineering/programing standpoint of the diffrent formats? Why does the same video take up 10X as much space in AVI as it does in MOV? Things like that seem to be hard to find out.

This one is really simplified comments, but hopefully it helps. You can find more out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_container_formats

It all depends on the settings that the operator uses. Typically AVI format is not compressed when encoding and it runs at 30frames per second. Like I said typically because the operator can change these setting. MOV or quicktime is compressed images with a typical run rate of 15 frames per second. However this can be changed. There are also things that the operator can set such as how often a key frame or iFrame (a non compressed frame) is included.

There are other things such as the audio bit rate and the resolution of the video and the like.

Buildit

So is it safe to assume that AVI at 30 FPS would record smoother than MOV or some other formats and the same rate? At least that is what I thought but to date that assumption has been wrong. My Nikon records in MOV and is infinitly clearer and smoother in recording than my Panasonic handcorder which records in mpeg. Or is it the equipment?

ian408

So I'm having some issues playing AVI files on my Mac--I've got most of them
worked out. But in dealing with this, I read that AVI isn't really a standard and
that it was more of a "container". Which I can believe since some will play and
others will not.

Anybody have a comment on that?

jayegirl

I am interested, although it is my husband who has the eye for filming. I am trying to figure out how to present short movies, the size that smugmug will accept, to share with distant family.

Buildit

ian408 wrote:

So I'm having some issues playing AVI files on my Mac--I've got most of them
worked out. But in dealing with this, I read that AVI isn't really a standard and
that it was more of a "container". Which I can believe since some will play and
others will not.

Anybody have a comment on that?

Using quicktime, the only issue I've had with AVI was size of the files. If I exported them into another format they worked fine. I often use AVI to transfer film clips between programs because it is so universally acceptable, so in that sense, yes, it does work well as a "container".

jasonstone

ian408 wrote:

So I'm having some issues playing AVI files on my Mac--I've got most of them
worked out. But in dealing with this, I read that AVI isn't really a standard and
that it was more of a "container". Which I can believe since some will play and
others will not.

Anybody have a comment on that?

To maximise your playback options on the mac install Perian v1.1 from http://www.perian.org/

It adds a lot of components to your Quicktime install which means you're increasing your compatibilitiy with all the different encoding formats that can be packaged within an AVI file.

Hope that helps

Cheers
Jase

jasonstone

Buildit wrote:

Yeah, when the $$$ becomes available I will probably get a mac lap top. Most of my technical issues deal with getting good video to start with. Filming while riding a motorcycle takes on some interesting challenges.
I've tried to avoid the issues I've heard about by using SD cards vs dv or cd drives. Recording quality is hit and miss. I'm starting to see some trends in the format video is recorded and the quality you get. Moreover the ablitity to track moving objects smoothly and using the zoom is a challenge.

Avoid the hard drive and SD based cameras as they tend to automatically save in MPEG2 or MPEG4 meaning compressed!

This means you're already throwing away a lot of the video image quality that you're going to need when editing later.

miniDV is about 12.6GB per 60mins of video.
It is uncompressed and therefore the best choice, for home users anyway, for editing and creating DVDs.

I've not used a HD camera so no comments there.

The thing is the DVD quality is proportional to the length of your film.
The shorter your film - the better quality you can achieve.

Rule of thumb is not more than 1hr of movie on a DVD to ensure you get the best quality. I'm not 100% sure where the cut off for the absolute best quality is... but everything I've heard points to less than 1hr.

Oh another thing - ensure you set your camera to 16bit audio. Most default to 12 bit to allow for a microphone to do voice over (or something like that). Well problem is 12 bit - over long recording times - will eventually lose synch. 16bit does not suffer from this problem.

If you do have 12 bit audio from your camera, or perhaps are using video from your canon powershot or other such digital camera, you can split the audio from the video (at least in iMovie) and this will avoid losing synch during the movie/dvd creation stage.

Cheers
Jase

Edit: btw this is only my opinion and from info i've gathered over the last 3-4 years - it may be there is new info i'm not aware of and changes something I've written - if so - well let me know!

DavidTO

I believe DV is compressed, is it not? It's certainly not as nice as the animation codec, for instance.....

Hindsight

Baldy wrote:

Does anyone else feel like we need a video forum?

Yesyesyes!!

jasonstone

DavidTO wrote:

I believe DV is compressed, is it not? It's certainly not as nice as the animation codec, for instance.....

My apologies - I stand corrected!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minidv

You are right and the wikipedia article goes on to say that MPEG2 HDV is better...

Learn something new every day!

DavidTO

jasonstone wrote:

My apologies - I stand corrected!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minidv

You are right and the wikipedia article goes on to say that MPEG2 HDV is better...

Learn something new every day!

There certainly is a lot to learn when it comes to codecs, that's for sure!

Buildit

So is this thread the new video forum? Seems that there are a lot of applications being discussed here. As well as curiosity about editing and presentation.

Andy

So um, what're you all waiting for

http://www.dgrin.com/forumdisplay.php?f=46

BradfordBenn

Well i did have to work the day job today....