Getting Started
 

Gday Guys,

i'm an Aussie as you can probably tell by the accent ;-)

I do a bit of filming of 4WD competitions for TV but have not had to do any editing and know nothing about that side of it.

i had a bit of a play last week and made a movie using Windows movie maker ... after several goes i found a way that worked ok and gave me a full screen pic when played on the TV ok ... learnt a lot but its a long and involved process to get what i wanted to the screen.

My Aim is to make a DVD of my 4WD clubs competitions and make them available for the other members to play on their TVs.

I have a Panasonic NV-GS120 [native 4:3] and a Panasonic NV-GS300 [native 16:9] which use mini DV tapes
I have a firewire card and a dedicated 500Gb external drive which i have formatted as NTSC
was thinking of getting Adobe Premiere for editing

As i know nothing ... what settings do you use to download the images from the camera and what setting do you use to save the completed movie?

a step by step description would be pretty handy as if i'm going to make movies i may as well do it properly.

Thanks,

Shane

Shane... Welcome.

Wow. At the risk of sounding epically flip, what you ask seems like the equivalent of learning brain surgery by correspondence course. I don't want to scare you off, but there's a lot to learn to get where you want to go. It can be done and fairly quickly if you put your mind to it.

I'd recommend starting with a books that cover the fundamentals of shooting, editing and DVD creation. A search will give you lots of options like these.

My other suggestion is that you just go do it once you get a handle on the basics. As someone who was fairly self-taught nearly 20 years ago, I've learned a lot by doing and I think that anyone can. It won't start off looking like something from "Top Gear", but as you learn things will improve. But be careful. It can be addicting.

One suggestion - take a look at Sony Vegas as well. A lost of people find it easier to get their heads around than Premiere. There are also others - take a look at the appropriate sections of this forum. Lots of good choices out there, which is one of the problems. Lots of choices, not much way to know which works for you without trying, but in the beginning it isn't so easy to know if something is working for you or not - they all have learning curves.

Ah, so I'm not the ONLY one around here who had a fool for a teacher...

Shane: the nice thing about being in your position is that you don't have as much pressure on you to "get it right" the first time, as this isn't a paying gig for you. Enjoy, play around try things and see what works for YOU. There are many ways to remove the outer coat from a feline...

What i'm after is the basic work flow ...
no use learning all about WMV and finding out the image is too small to fit on the TV and having to go back and redo the whole thing right from the start again as i imported the images [or whatever you call the movie] at "best" setting but then find it too small.

there is a whole list of options but i have no idea what they are used for???

To make my first movie, this is what i did to be able to watch it from a DVD in my DVD recorder/player attached to my TV. it will also work on other peoples DVD players.
The Movie is of a 4WD competition set over three tracks with 25 vehicles driving over numerous obstacles on each track.

.attached Video camera to computer 1
.could not get it to be recognised by the computer
.changed cables
r.e did all the programs for firewire, camera etc

.attach video camera to computer 2
.download tapes to computer at best setting
.learn how to make the movie and titles etc
.play with transitions and decide theyre to much
.start again using fade out /fade in between different vehicles but no transitions between the clips of the different obstacles with the same vehicle
.add some titles in selected spots
. add results at the end
. add a short leader clip to start of movie
.save my completed movie as WMV
.burn a DVD
.find the image too small for the TV

START AGAIN
.attach video camera to computer 2
.download tapes to computer at AVI setting
.continue to learn how to make the movie and titles etc
.use fade out /fade in between different vehicles but no transitions between the clips of the different obstacles with the same vehicle
.add some titles in selected spots
. add results at the end
. add a short leader clip to start of movie
.save movie as AVI
.find movie won't fit on drive [used a dedicated drive for the video work]
.delete all files from drive
.reformat drive as NTFS
.save movie as AVI
.burn movie but find it won't fit on a DVD
.save movie back to tape on video camera
.play movie using the video camera and record to DVD using DVD recorder/player attached to TV.
.video is now a VIDEO-TS or something ?
.movie plays on the TV quite nicely :-)

I will probably get adobe premiere or elements as i can get them through a contact so the whole thing should be a bit easier but still need to know what formats to work in etc

thanks Tripp, its the basics i don't know about ... once i find out what they are i can play around in that area until i work it out.

just need to know the formats to use for my purpose

thanks Jim,

adobe seems to be the main one in use over here so its a bit easier to ask questions about it

your right there Shaun ... once i know the basic formats to work in i will enjoy playing around with it.

I am mainly a photography amateur but the only skill that seems to cross over is composition

Ouch!

Shane... I looked at your workflow and whilst you might eventually get something to work, it may not be a high quality result. It's like playing pin the tail on the donkey. It's hard to do if one has never seen a donkey, or any mammalian quadruped.

I my experience it's very important to understand the basics in order build knowledge on a solid basis. I'd still recommend a book, or search out what's available on the interwebs. it will really save you a lot of time and frustration.

Tripp, you do know the old adage about anyone who is self taught having a fool for a teacher, right? Nothing personal, just a bit of (self) deprecating humour... I'm mostly self taught as well.

i have searched the web but there is very little info out there for someone who know nothing ...

i just need a brief description to give me the formats to start my search for info

eg:
download from camera as a xxx file
edit using adobe xxxx
save as a xxxxx file at xx size
burn to DVD using XXXXXX

Shane,

There are several editing software packages that take you from "Capture" (bringing the video into the computer) through editing (with easy to use transitions) to various output with one output option being DVD.

One I recommend as being very easy to get started with and yet very much full featured is Pinnacle Studio 12 plus. They now have a download trial version so you can see if it can work for you.

If you have a firewire port on your computer, Studio controls your camcorder through the cable (I'd use the GS300 and stay in widescreen these days) in CAPTURE mode. In edit you can use the timeline format or storyboard, both are simple enough with everything including transitions being "drag 'n drop". There are "canned" titles you can edit, a titler you can use to create your own when ready (both fullscreen titles or overlay titles), canned menus (for your DVD), and a full range of options for output including DVD burning.

The "plus" version (recommended) adds a second video track for extremely simple "cutaways" leaving your audio track intact, and for a variety of post processing effects.

Music? Easy!!! ScoreFitter allows you to mark sequences and add music score from a small supplied "library", Studio 12 automatically "composes" the music to the specific length with a beginning passage, middle passages, and a smooth ending passage. Extra music albums are available, and if you prefer to use SmartSound music over ScoreFitter there is a "workaround" that allows you to do so or SmartSound includes their music software SonicFire Pro 5 Express Tracks with music orders.

If you look to move into HD in the future Studio 12 is already there ready to edit HDV and one of the first to handle AVCHD (if your computer can!).

This is the easiest to learn and use package I'm aware of, and I even use it for training and instructional videos I do.

Here's link to "Cinco & Mike", a 6 minute short done in Studio 11.1 from footage shot with a Panasonic PV GS500. Sorry about youtube's low quality on that, vimeo.com has a few samples of my HD work also edited in Studio 11.1 Search for videos by Bif.

YouTube - Cinco_and_Mike

Shane, you should start researching which editing program to use. Once you've chose an editing program the answers will come pretty fast. Here's a quick & dirty run down.

1. Transfer the video using firewire, this is an included feature of almost all editing programs. Sounds like you're all setup on the hardware side. For your camcorder we're talking about transferring DV using firewire.

2. Edit using one of the following: Adobe Premiere, Sony Vegas, Avid Media Composer, Canopus Edius, Final Cut (Mac only), Newtek Speed Edit - you'll have to try them to see which one suits you the best. For quick and simple editing the starter versions of Premiere, Vegas, and Final Cut (Mac only) are all designed to quickly make DVDs.

3. Output your edited video to an MPEG2 file, this is the standard file format for DVDs. For the best quality on a DVD -/+R, keep your video to an hour or less. It is possible to put more than an hour of video on a home made DVD, but the image quality starts to quickly degrade.

4. Burn to DVD using .... depends on which program you choose, all the editing programs mentioned above have this ability included.

Yeah, but it's a little too close to the truth. (Grin)