Hello again Ed.

Yeah, got the new PC. Don’t know about the monitor yet. This is due to the fact that the Radeon 9200 needs an adapter for the second monitor (which I don’t have until sometime this week)

Adobe was installed before the DV500. Instructions off the Pinnacle site were followed exactly.

There is nothing running in the background. The new PC has no connection to the Internet and it has no other programmes (except DVD player software and other bits).

The comp crashes at the editing point. It can be when clicking on virtually anything or rendering. Or even just dragging a clip to the preview monitor.

The settings are Pinnacle DV PAL.

Audio Changes
 

I've been having this problem with Premiere (v6.5)... what happens is I'll get my project exactly how I want it, but when I export the project all the audio levels turn down for some reason. So I have to go into the project and turn up all the levels which sound like crap in the project just so it sounds good when I export it. Its really annoying because I have to export clips over and over again until I find the right sounding levels for everything.

Has anyones else had this problem or know how to resolve it?

Thanks.

Hi Will,

I have heard of problems where in P6/6.5 if you made a fade, and you went to preview it, it would not fade like it was supposed to.

A reset to default (Shift+Ctrl while opening premiere, if I remember rightly) normally solved the problem. Or closing the audio mixer if it is open.

What are you expoting to? Is it AVI, QT or to tape?
How are you previewing the audio? though PC speakers or TV?
Are you using any hardware assistants (DV500, RTX100 etc)?

Thanks,

Hi Sean,

That one had me puzzled for a while. But a bit of fidderling around I think I might have found what you are after.

Rather than right clicking on a clip in the timeline (like you used to do in any other version of premiere), this time it is done on a per clip basis from the project bin.

1 On the clip you wish to change aspect ratio, right click it in the project bin.
2 Then choose Interpret footage...
3 In the Interpret footage dialog box, select the conform to... radio button, and then from the drop down list select the aspect ratio you wish to use for the clip. Select OK when done.
4 The clip now has the aspect ratio you selected. Drag to timeline and edit as you wish.

5 To change the background colour, you will need to create a matte (File> New> Matte). Choose your colour and select OK.
6 Then place the matte below the clip in the timeline.

Hope that makes sense. Let us know how you get on,

Yep, that's the method I came up with too. Or, in the case of a textured background, you just have to lay it onto a lower track someplace and the do the "interpret Footage" to it. Problem is, what if the image I imported already has a bit of black around it, now I will need to crop it as well.

That's a lot of steps to take if I have 150 images in the timeline.

Seems like it was easier in 6.5 for some reason.

Sean

Exporting as AVI, previewing with computer speakers and no, I do not have any hardware assistants.

Capture Problem Premiere Pro 1.5
 

I Bought Pryo Professional with the Adobe Bundal, Premiere Pro 1.5 will not capture any footage. What is strange is that I can capture in Movie Star 5.

Specs...
Windows XP
Dual Processors 2.4GHz
1G of Ram
Firewire-Pyro Professional
Premiere Pro 1.5


Help Please.......

Hi Wayne,

A few things to check:

1 Are you pressing play before record?
2 Have you set your DV device control (found in preferences)?
3 Do you have control of the deck. i.e can you fastforward/ play/ rewind etc?

Thanks,

I can answer those questions for you Ed
 

1. Only the record and pause buttons light up, the play button does not work.

2. It is set at:
NTSC
Canon
DM-GL2A
Status is On-Line

3. No I don't have control of the deck.

I have tried the same firewire cable and camera to a XP labtop and it worked perfectly.

By the way I'm Wayne's son.

Try pressing the "Tape" button in the Capture Box (lower right corner of the Capture Window)

How do make Premiere Pro files portable?
 

I'm trying to move it between computers and it seems like that the file requires that everything be in the same exact location in terms of path. Any way around this? quite annoying...

Yes it would like that. I solve the problem with Vegas by mapping
my work drives to the same drive letters and paths.

Loading the project should give you the option to locate the files
manually. That's the only way, basically.

Dang, that really sucks...so many files to remap :(

does Final Cut HD have any feature like this?

Getting 24p with a DVC80 in premiere 1.5
 

Ok, i made a little test, but if you choose the 24p project settings, then you capture the video in 60i, and you use the premiere interlace method... you get 24p material right away... and really fast...

Tell me who else have tested this ...

Try using Network paths... like //computerNetName/Path/

Kinda easier if you keep all files in the same folder ... so you just remap 1 and premiere find the rest.

tried it
 

but no success,

thanks

In 6.5 when you opened a project and the files had been moved/ deleted, it would prompt you to find the new location for each file. Does this not happen in PP?

Remember the Premiere project file is basically a database which references the files and there locations. So by moving the location it will screw its references.

Thanks,

If you don't have control of the deck from premiere then it sounds as though premiere might need a re-install or that the drivers for the pyro card might need to be re-installed.

However before doing that you might want to try/ answer a few of these questions:

1) Try setting the dv device to generic
2) Do you get a picture in the capture window if you press play on your camcorder?
3) Turn the deck on before opening premiere

Cheers,

I think we'll have to try and re-install
 

1. Have tried generic, no success either
2. No picture, it's just black
3. I have tried this also - no luck

What is odd is when I turn the camera on and then start premiere, I will go to capture and at the top of the capture window it reads "playing" and there is nothing playing.

I'll let you know how the re-install goes,
thanks for your help.

Adam & Wayne

i am not familar with the pyro card...

is this a standard 1394 card?

maybe you should spend $35 on an adaptec 1394 card?

matthew

Are your speakers set an an exceptable level on your PC? If you are having to do it more often the you might want to try a re-install (If all else fails)?

Capture, avi files and workflow issues
 

OK, I'm missing something easy as usual:

I capture some footage using into Premiere 6.5 using the Pinnacle AVI compressor.

I them chop a bit of the footage so as to export it to an .avi file so I can do some additional work later. I thus export the clip. If I use the same compressor (or in fact any compressor), the footage gets, well, compressed again.

Since the way I've thought of setting up my work flow involves taking essentially random clips (they're nature clips so I never really know what I'm going to see) and then storing only those that seem interesting or at least half decent, then using those in a later project to annoy my friends and family, it would seem that I'm going to be compressing the files and subsequently losing some information multiple times during the process.

So, I can just not compress anything at the cost of hard disk space (not very expensive these days, but those clips do add up) or deal with the multiply compressed data or change my workflow. I've tried using the Pinnacle DV tools program to just catalog the tapes but found that pretty inconvenient.

Any suggestions?

Thanks as always.

So what you are doing is cutting clips to see and then output
that to a new file? This should not loose you quality / resolution
because it should not re-compress. It should just split out the
frames you kept to the new file without re-compression.

This is how it is supposed to work. There might be some way
to test this with compression tough content (I'm not sure what
would be best to test this with, perhaps make a picture in a
paint program with a white background and sharp 1 pixel black
lines on it?). Compress it to 60 second file or something. Then
load this file again and cut some places and make a 40 second
file. Then load that file and so on and forth. If multiple compressions
happen it should start to look worse and worse.

Of course I could do that, but it's work....

And your post hits at my confusion with Premiere - it would seem that since I'm just cutting the clip, no other wizardry or wierdness, I should just be able to "save" it clipped. But Premier 6.5 seems to insist that it gets rendered again into an .avi (or in fact, whatever I would like). Hence my confusion on the merits of compression and compressors etc.

I was hoping I was missing something obvious like I usually do.

RG

You might try changing your settings away from Pinnacle to see if an interaction between the DV500 and XP and it's attendant drivers and layers is the problem.

Had a similar problem with win 2K that was solved by reinstalling Service Pack 4 after uninstalling DV500 and manually clearing the registry of all Pinnacle references, then reinstalling the DV500.

Many entertaining hours.... You might also check the Pinnacle DV500 forum. Not a lot of folks on it, but they were rather supportive and I got the tip for the above fix from them.

There do seem to be a number of XP related issues with the DV500.

Just popped over to the Pinnacle forum. That reminded me of something - what version of the DV500 drivers are you using? It's pretty clear that the 4.5 version drivers is the only one that will work with Win2K or XP.

Hi Roger,

If I understand you correctly this is what you do:

Capture say a 1 hour tape in 1 big chunk, then you place this on the timeline and export the bits you like into separate AVI files? Is that correct?

There are a number of things that you can do:

1) Only capture the bits you plan to use. All though it might take a little bit longer you will save on disk space and you will only get the shots that you want. You would review your tape before hand, note the in and outpoints and then create a batch list in Premiere.

2) Capture the whole 1 hour, double click it when it is in the bin to bring up its preview monitor. then fastforward rewind until you find the bits you like, Mark an in point and an out point and then insert it to the timeline. This is commonly known as 3 point editing. All though it will take up more space on your HD, it should be slightly quicker.

3) Place the 1 hour clip into the timeline, and use the virtural sub clip creation tool. You basically use the tool to mark an in point to an outpoint and then drag it to some space in the timeline. This will then create a virtural clip. However you can not apply lots of effects to the sub clip, and it can fill up the timeline pretty quickly.

4) Do what you have been doing already.

Hope I have not got the wrong end of the stick.

Thanks,

Hi Ed:

Actually, what I'm doing is something like a cross between 1) and 2) - I scan the tape, look for things that I really don't want, capture the parts that I like then "clean them up" using scissors. In my mind's eye, all I am doing is creating a bunch of clips with reasonable start and end points so I can manipulate them further. For example, I have about 60 minutes of tape of a brown bear munching grass. Most of the time the bear is doing fantastically boring things (eating grass), some of the time the camera is bouncing around and I'm fiddling with things (it's shot at long range with a tripod for fairly obvious reasons). I would cut most of this out and have perhaps 5 minutes of a sequence that I would eventually work into a video. I do a lot of the rough cut at capture time but I don't spend an inordinate amount of time working on start / stop issues. Cutting the clip into smaller bits also allows me to name the clip in a useful fashion (eg Bear_rolling_on_grass_2.avi)

That works for me - but then I have to "export" them to another .avi clip using the standard Premiere tools. This creates the possibility of having the clip compressed at least twice. If I set Premiere up to use no compression, then the files are larger (duh...) and that's OK. I have lots of hard disk space. But it would seem that I could just cut the original .avi file and save it again.

What I'm beginning to think is that this concept is a bit too simplistic for Premiere since it really doesn't want to alter the original clip - for good reasons - and assumes that any changes would be done and then regenerated. The kind of "editing" I'm doing in this step is strictly limited to scissoring the original clip - much like you're first method. It just seems faster (and less wear and tear on the tape) to do it digitally. But maybe not.....

Thanks for your help.

RG

You are working like most who have to be judicous with drive space while retaining only useable material; a strategy some ignore during the planning stages, but lucky for you, you have the presence of mind to do so.
Since you mentioned that you are using the pinnacle compression, it would follow that the onboard tools that are installed look convenient. They often are not. The Pinnacle type 2 dv avi file can be transferred many times without loss. If you are using the dv500 toolset, the scene cutter filter is perfect for this, assuming scene changes, or start stops when recording. Once you have these trimmed clips in the timeline, you can export them and name them accordingly, then delete the source file. Best to make a psq capture log file when capturing, so that retreival from the source tape later if needed will be painless.
Another method is to use the project trimmer tool in premiere that makes an non recompressed image of everything present in the timeline and when finished, the source file is deleted.

Timecode Question
 

I have Total Training Video and I'm trying to do the multi cam tutorial but I'm stuck on this one part. I need to change the timecode of this one clip on track 2 so I make sure it's highlighted and go to File and go down to Timecode and click on it. The problem is it's not highlighted so I can't click on it. I did everything perfect and I did it a few different times in the tutorial but still get to that same point and can't go further. Does anyone have any suggestions, I would very much appreciate it. There has to be something that I'm doing wrong.

Thank's
Chad

After a few days I figured it out. The files I was using was on the DVD and I needed them to be put on the hard drive before I started the project.

That would be wise indeed. Thank you for responding with your
solution. It will help people in the future!

Thanks Roger. Thought everyone had given up on me.

I'm am using the 4.5 drivers form Pinnacle.

Sou you think that it could just be the case of having to re install everything?

Issues with codecs in Premeire pro
 

Hello all,

I'm new to the boards and have only one question about premiere, while I truely enjoy the program I have one issue: When I use [File>Adobe encoder] the videos look a little blocky especially for the size. When I use [File>export>movie>settings] everythign works fine until I open the video. The video has "tears" in it. The video is blocky and blurrs and mostion causes some groups of pixels to stay while the rest of the video moves on, creating a very uglt "buggy" look. it's hard to describe but basically looks like some parts of the frame are just staying on the screen longer. whyen there is no motion however the video is fine.

Sorry for lack of technical terms I'll try to come back with more info.

NTSC to PAL conversion
 

I take it from reading hereabouts that DV500 Premiere cannot convert (output) my NTSC edit to a PAL Mini DV... Am i right?

Any conversion suggestion at minimal cost that would still protect the integrity of the 90mins video on my HD? Quality is so important.

Thanks.

There is indeed a serious lack of information in your post. But
that might be because you don't fully understand how it works.

Basically Adobe encoder and export movie are the same thing
only on a different approach. Encoder is used to help encode
movies to various platforms: web, dvd etc.

The export can do the same but is more like a low-level approach
and can also be used to just export to DV AVI and uncompressed
AVI.

AVI and QuickTime are container formats (MPEG, WMV and Real
to some degree as well). This means that the format is actually
a shell around the data. This data is encoded with a CODEC.
This CODEC is also used to decode the data when playing back.

How small the files will end up being and at what quality all
depends on the codec you choose. AVI and QuickTime both
support DV (format that comes off your camera) and uncompressed
which are both not compatible with DVD and too large for web
delivery.

Uncompressed is what we call a lossless format since it does not
throw away any information. The files are huge. DV is a 5:1 lossy
compression. It reduces filesizes 5 times but throws away
information (primarely information we cannot see with the eye,
depending on how much detail is in the scene).

MPEG (for (S)VCD & DVD) comes in two flavors. MPEG1 and MPEG2.
The former being for VCD And the latter for SVCD and DVD.

There is also MPEG4 but that can be encapsulated inside a
container format (like AVI & QuickTime) and is mostly found in
DiVX and XviD codecs.

So the first thing you need to do is choose a container format.
For DVD this is MPEG2, for web most people choose between
AVI, WMV and QuickTime. There are more options but these are
the most used ones.

After picking the format you usually need to pick a codec. Then
this codec has several parameters to control. For example with
MPEG2 encoding you can usually choose between CBR (Constant
Bitrate) and VBR (Variable Bitrate) encoding at different bitrates.
The higher the bitrate the larger the file and the better the quality.
VBR usually gives better results than CBR does.

For web delivery QuickTime is often used with a version of the
Sorenson codec or Animation in some cases. AVI uses DiVX a
a lot.

So there is a quite a lot to it in the end. Never ever use a default
setting because it will rarely give you want you want. Either a too
large a file or too low a quality.

Go into the options screens and see what you can change and
expirement with settings etc. Noting things like file size and quality.

Keep in mind that web delivery seldom uses the full resolution of
a file because the file will usually be too big. Web delivery usually
halves the resolution at least.

To the best of my knowledge that is WRONG. Just change the
project to PAL and load up your NTSC footage.

BUT, it would most probably give you results you won't be
pleased with. But it should work.

Things I didn't know I didn't know...
 

Reminds me of a saying I once heard.

You know the things you know,
And you know the things you don't know.
But then there are the things you don't know you don't know.

Thanks for helping me with the later :)

Your welcome, Ming! <g>

How to emulate Magic Bullet - Opticals?
 

Is there a way to, instead of using the boring cross-fade included in Premiere, have a fade transition between two clips that has a more filmic touch? Like the Magic Bullet Opticals plug-in can achieve?

I have tried the 'additive dissolve' transition, but that's not the effect I'm looking for.

Thankyou.