I trust you all! :) Need recommendation!

[Ted]

Mark, might I suggest www.shop.com to see if they can be of help in finding a good price. As I said, I went with Best Buy and had them price match their own site.

Jack, thanks very much!

But I'm confused...when I was trying to edit a film in Premiere Elements 4, I thought I was seeing it in the preview? I don't recall rendering it first. I'm just not understanding you and probably should download the trial version.

Does it work with Elements 4 as well as its big brother Premiere?

Thanks!

[jackfalbey]

You probably didn't have to render first if it was standard DV and you were just trimming and arranging clips. When you're working with HDV and start doing things like color-correction, motion, layers, etc. even Premiere Pro CS3 on a fast PC will get bogged down. Cineform converts the HDV upon capture into a less-compressed lossless codec that is much easier on the CPU, allowing for an editing experience more like plain old DV.

I don't know if it works with PE4... but there's a thread just for Cineform over at dvinfo.net http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/forumdisplay.php?f=76 where David Newman, the CEO of Cineform, hangs out regularly to answer questions.

I should add that I don't use Cineform myself. Not that I don't like it; it's great software by all accounts. But I built a PC around the Matrox RT.X2 hardware accelerator card which does the same thing in a different way, so I don't need Cineform.

[Ted]

Haha, Jack... if you had spoken in medieval Latin, I'd have an equal chance of understanding you.

(Not a reflection on you! Completely my lack of understanding!)

I think my mind is getting so bogged down with all these forums and the information. Many professionals are on here and I'm basically an elementary school teacher who wants to shoot some video and have some fun.

I may be way over my head just VISITING these forums! Ha!

I appreciate your help, nonetheless.

[jackfalbey]

Just over a year ago, Ted, I was where you are now. I was a pizza-delivery driver just helping a friend shoot some comedy sketches, and I had a lot of questions. As a result of the help I received here at Muvipix, I started my own video production business. A few months later, I quit the pizza job to focus on growing my production company. Along the way, I was able to take what I had learned and start answering some questions posted by others, and eventually I was asked to become a Moderator by the Muvipix creators.

Point being... it seems like you'll never get it figured out, but if you stick with it you'll get where you want to be. Muvipix is a great community for advice and learning, and the vast majority of our members (even a few Moderators!) are not professionals in the video industry.

Now, to translate my Latin! I'll keep it basic (there are too many specific details to get lost in):

Video is made up of frames, or individual pictures that are played back-to-back so quickly that our eyes percieve it as motion. Each frame is made up of pixels, or individual units that represent one point of color and brightness in the frame. You can see them if you get up close to your TV screen. Here in the USA, there are basically 2 types of video: Standard Definition (SD) which has a frame size of 720x480 pixels (also called NTSC; what we've always had on our TVs) and High Definition (HD) which has a frame size of 1920x1080 pixels, 6x as many pixels as SD.

Raw video, even SD, contains a tremendous amount of data which would take up an enormous amount of space on your hard drive. When your camcorder records video, it compresses that data to make it possible to edit it on a home computer. The compression formula is called a "codec" and there are many different types, but the most common for SD video is called DV. The term AVI refers to a type of file that is standard among Windows-based PCs to store DV-compressed data.

With the advent of HD video, there were new codecs invented to compress it. HDV is one of those codecs. HDV compresses the video to the same size as DV, which means you have 6x as much data in the same file size. This requires a very fast multi-core processor to deal with that much compression when editing HDV. Even with a fast PC, you still have to wait for the computer to process the changes and effects you make to the video in your editing program.

Rendering is a process where the editing software applies all of the effects and changes you made, so that you can see the end result in your playback window as it will look when played on a TV. Depending on the amount of editing done, rendering can take quite a while. If you've ever seen a red bar across the top of your timeline in Premiere Elements and you had choppy or blurry playback in your playback window, that means you need to render by pressing the Enter key and waiting until it's done. The Cineform software uses their own codec which is easier for your computer to process, so you can see the results immediately instead of waiting for the rendering to finish. This is a huge timesaver, especially if you don't like the results and want to make additional changes.

[Ted]

Jack, if you ever get out to California, lunch is on me!

Thanks so much for giving me that elementary education! I will be printing out this post.

Do you happen to have a blog? If so, I'd love the link. If not, create one! You have a natural way of talking (without talking down) and it's appreciated!

Is it safe to say that since I'm really a hobbyist (even less than a hobbyist!) that CineForm may be more than what I need? (ie. I shouldn't even delve into it?)

I'm asking because basically my editing will consist of:

Removing clips/frames
Adding transitions
Adding captions/titles
Getting the movie ready to be viewed either by standard DVD, or YouTube, Vimeo, my blog, etc.

I won't be:
Adjusting colors/lighting
Burning it to a Blu-Ray.

While I'm interested in all this, I don't want to get in over my head (if that makes sense?)

I do appreciate your patience in helping me out.

Thanks so much!
Ted

[Rockdoc]

Ted,
One thing that I think you should think about here, is that you can shoot with the HV30 in HD, then downconvert to SD in the camera (this is what I do with my HV20). If your ultimate output is going to be the web, or SD dvds, then that is probably what you want to do at this point anyway. This also gives you the further advantage that you don't need a new computer or the cineform stuff to edit - PE4 will work just fine, as the input is SD video.

When you are ready to jump into the HD with your computer, then you have all your video already recorded in HD, and you can just reimport without the downconverting and go!

Here's a thread that talks about good settings for the HV20 (and will probably close to or exactly the same on the HV30) to get the better-than-SD look from your downconverted HD video. This is actually Jack's work, so you can see that he really is a tremendous help around here!

I've only been playing with my HV20 for a little while, but I can offer some suggestions to get you started...

1) Set the power switch to CAMERA, press the FUNC button to bring upthe options. At the top left, there's an icon that lets you select various shooting profiles. There's one called CINE MODE that gives very nice image results out of the box. It takes care of many of the manually-adjustable settings for you, and looks prettty good too. I recommend shooting in CINE MODE at first.

2) Use the joystick to move down the left column to the MENU icon, then press the joystick in. This gives you options to set most of the camera's features. Move down 1 icon to the REC/IN SETUP, move right and set HD STANDARD to HDV (not HDV PF24). This will record the highest-quality HD video that the camera is capable of.

3) Switch the camera to PLAY. Press the FUNC button and move down to the MENU icon and press the joystick in. Move down 2 icons to PLAY/OUT SETUP2 and set DV OUTPUT to DV LOCKED. This will downconvert the HDV to standard DV right in the camera when capturing in PE4.

You will now be recording beautiful HDV 1440x1080i video and capturing in SD 720x480 NTSC. The advantage here is that HDV downconverted looks way better than recording in regular DV, and the tapes will still have the full HDV video on them if you want to use it in an HD project the future!

And Jack is right about sticking around here as well. I can pretty much guarantee the group here can help you get to where you want to be with your editing. This is the friendliest forum I have ever found, and it has made me a much better editor than I could have been without it (hey, I even got a prize in the last contest!), so keep asking your questions!

Jennifer

[Rockdoc]

Mark,
Here is a thread on dv tapes for HD camcorders. I used the Panasonic tapes suggested at this link (which was suggested in this thread), and have had no problems at all.

Discussion about dv tapes: http://muvipix.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=2538&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&hilit=tapes+hv20

Link to Panasonic tapes: http://www.tapestockonline.com/pan60minmin.html

Jennifer

[jackfalbey]

Ted,
I agree with Jennifer. If you aren't going to be editing in HD for delivery on Blu-Ray, then you don't need Cineform. You'll either be shooting regular DV video, which looks really good from the HV30, or you'll be shooting in HDV and downconverting in-camera to regular DV and then editing that. It'll still look great, and you won't need to upgrade your PC to do it. If you do shoot in HDV and downconvert, you'll still have the HDV on tape if you decide later on to get a faster PC and produce Blu-Ray discs.

So... get the HV30, shoot in HDV, downconvert in-camera to DV, and Premiere Elements will handle it just fine on your current PC.



Mark,
Check with www.pricegrabber.com and www.nextag.com for the best price on the HV30. They both search all the online retailers for their current prices. Just be sure to stick with a well-known retailer to avoid getting scammed. You can check out online retailers at www.resellerratings.com.

[Ted]

Dear Jack and Jennifer,

Thanks so much for your input. It makes perfect sense and you make perfect sense. However, I keep waddling on the fence about the entire HV30 vs. HF10 thing.

I just learned that the HF10 tapeless camera is MUCH faster to upload to the computer... and its clips are actually files. But then again I go back to the fear of AVCHD and back to square one.

You all have been great and I love this forum... so I shall no longer burden any of you with my indecisive hysteria! LOL!

I appreciate you both taking time to answer this nutcase.

Respectfully,
Ted

[jackfalbey]

Ted, I think I can solve your indecisive hysteria. You indicated that you will be making video for standard DVD and YouTube, etc. So the HF10 doesn't make much sense; the video isn't as good as the HV30 because AVCHD is much more highly compressed than even HDV which requires more PC power.

The real question is: do you want the best picture quality or do you want the convenience of flash-based recording? If quality is more important, get the HV30 (plus you have the added benefit of having HD video on tape for future use). If convenience is more important, look at the Canon FS10 & FS100... they shoot standard definition to flash cards, and your PC will be able to handle it because it isn't nearly as compressed as AVCHD. Plus, they're under $400.

[Ted]

Hi Jack,

Well... I went with the HV30.

I committed myself (or maybe I SHOULD be committed!) by ordering the Jumpstart training DVD for the HV30 from B&H (thanks to Bob's suggestion!)

I feel better now.

(At least for the next three or four years!)

Jack, as always, I thank you for your input!

[Bobby]

Ted, we're HV30 buddies into the future now! I know we made the right choice.

Bob

[Ted]

Ted, we're HV30 buddies into the future now! I know we made the right choice.

Bob

Bob,

I look forward to getting to know all of my fellow HV30 users as the time goes on.

One MAJOR factor (in the "PROs" column on my sheet) was the fact that I have a good support group here and on the HV20.com forums.

I think I'll need all the help I can get!

Thanks!
Ted

[mark hansen]

Well, I just ordered the HV30 with external mic and extra battery, now to wait until it comes in.

Thanks for everyone patients and help.

[jackfalbey]

These are some great accessories for the HV20 & HV30. They're not necessary, but I have them on my HV20 and they make a big difference... and they make the camera look really cool!

Raynox Wide-Angle lens (you'll need a step-up ring from 43mm to whatever size you order):
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/control ... &Q=*&bhs=t

Lens Hood for Raynox wide-angle lens:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/4 ... _Hood.html

Lens Hood (stock):
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1 ... _Lens.html

External Mic:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/2 ... phone.html

Long-life battery (3+hours):
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/control ... &Q=*&bhs=t