best settings for canon hv40

[flair4040]

I am pretty new to this so forgive all the newbe mistakes. I just bought a canon jv40 that I will be using to import video into premiere elements 7. Could someone help me out by recommending the best settings for my camcorder that would result in the clearest video once I have it into premiere elments. I appreicate all the help in advance.

P.S.- I am new to a lot of this so give your advice in real simple terms. Thanks.

[Chuck Engels]

Are you sure that isn't a Canon HV40? That would be a tape based High Definition camcorder, the same one that I have.

[flair4040]

Are you sure that isn't a Canon HV40? That would be a tape based High Definition camcorder, the same one that I have.

Chuck, it is. That is just how freaking new I am. I can't even get the model numbers right.

[Chuck Engels]

Not a problem, just wanted to make sure

Most people are setting it at CineMode, I have been playing around with various settings.
For now it is just set to HDV and Auto.

You will probably want to download HDVSplit to use as capturing software, must easier to use and in many ways better than the Premiere Elements HDV capture.

Have you checked out the camcorder manual at all? It is pretty good about explaining the basic stuff.

There are many Canon HV camcorder users here, 20, 30 and 40, so you have come to the right place.

[Bobby]

Hi flair4040 and welcome. I hate to sound like a sticker on detail, but you used the term "clearest". Could you define that further? Are you talking about focus under all conditions, or contrast, or resolution (number of pixels) or avoiding too high compression, or what? Unfortunately there is no one answer, and that is why they have all those options.

If this stuff is as yet unclear to you, I would just shoot some footage using the full auto mode and see what it looks like. When just shooting stuff like family get-togethers, I leave it in auto. Great results.

[flair4040]

Hi flair4040 and welcome. I hate to sound like a sticker on detail, but you used the term "clearest". Could you define that further? Are you talking about focus under all conditions, or contrast, or resolution (number of pixels) or avoiding too high compression, or what? Unfortunately there is no one answer, and that is why they have all those options.

If this stuff is as yet unclear to you, I would just shoot some footage using the full auto mode and see what it looks like. When just shooting stuff like family get-togethers, I leave it in auto. Great results.

Bobby,

What I am looking for is how to maintain a really clear and crisp picture once I edit the video using element 7. What I shoot looks great. How do I keep it looking tha good when I make my DVD?

[Chuck Engels]

Now we are getting somewhere

Are you shooting High Definition and then burning that onto a standard DVD? Or have you not burned anything at this point?
If that is the case it will never look as good as the original due to a conversion to standard definition. To get the same quality you need to burn the high definition to a blu ray disc and watch it on a HDTV. Even still, the converted video on the DVD will still look better than any other consumer standard definition camcorder out there.

[Neil]

Hi

Not sure if im too late to continue with this post, however it seems the most appropriate given the problem i have. Bit long winded but here goes.

I have a Cannon HV40, i bought this as it was recommended as the best camera within the price range to get v good quality video onto DVD. I recorded a video for my sisters company "presentation and explanation video regards artwork". There are many settings on this camera but went with the default and HDV.

I transferred the video into "corel video studio" and produced what looked like a really good simple video with few transitions and no special effects etc.. When I burnt this to DVD the quality was awful.

I have tried every setting in corel to get a good quality picture , ( and premier) used different DVD disks, Tried burning a small section of the video to avoid compression, however it is still grainy sometimes even blurred, basicly its terrible and im just about to throw it all in the bin out of sheer frustration. The strange thing is my old camera , Panasonic NV DS33 gives better results. Oh and the picture on the pc before transferring to DVD is brilliant using both cameras. So , I had the camera checked and its fine, bought new cables, bought some new disks, the best tapes for the camera and tried testing again, the resulting DVD ive played on 4 different players, cheaper £50 ones and a £600 up scaling blue ray all singing one, and guess what.... still poor quality..................... please if anyone can help i promise ill be grateful forever.......

[Bobby]

Neil, if it looks good in the PC after you upload it from the camera, then it is not a cam or cam settings problem. And since many of us have the HV-30/40 cams, unless yours is broken (doubtful) than excellent results can be achieved.

Also, all DVD blanks are essentially the same from a video quality standpoint. The only difference between blanks is some possible transient errors but that would not change the overall quality of the video and in most cases wouldn't even be noticeable. So, rule out the DVD blanks as an issue. Ditto with DVD writer drives in your PC - this is now a very mature segment of the industry and you shouldn't be seeing problems of that nature and again they wouldn't affect the video quality.

Although it may be a bit of work, I think you should detail your entire workflow - what steps you take, what programs you use, what settings in the program so we can try to find the weak link.

Have you tried getting the video from the cam both in HD (with HDVSplit) and SD (using PRE or WinDV) separately, creating two projects (one HD, one SD) and then writing a DVD from both projects and comparing? That would help us determine if it is an HD vs. SD issue.

[Neil]

Hi Bob

Many thanks for your reply, sorry should have been sooner. Ill give it a go and let you know as soon as I get a result, At least I know what direction to go in to start finding the problem so many thanks again as I didn't know where to start looking. results to follow shortly

[momoffduty]

Like Bob suggested that need to know more info on your workflow to better diagnose the problem. One thing I would look at is the file size burned onto the disc. There are different compression settings that will give you the best quality for the file size. I just burned a 66 min project with 1 motion menu and the file size was about 4.11 GB, a widescreen SD project.