Leaping to HD: What video/capture card for PPro 2.0?

[J.B. Soler]

Posted these questions on the PPro forum, but I thought I could get som eanswers here as well:

I am a multimedia producer, and have been using Adobe Premiere since 1995 (time flies!) Since 2001 I have used a Canopus DV Storm2 capture/editing board, which has allowed me to improve the speed of my SD DV productions. Things started to turn sour when Canopus decided to dump full support for Premiere Pro in favor of their new Edius editing software. Long time, faithful users of Adobe Premiere felt left out to dry. The Canopus DV Storm2 board still works well with PPro 1.5... but they no longer support PPro 2.0.

So now I am getting ready to plunge into HD and HDV with the new PPro 2.0 upgrade, and I am considering replacing my highly reliable yet obsolete DV Storm2 card with a faster, and newer HD-HDV card. I've read about the new generation of boards that work with PPro 2.0, and got very excited. Here are my questions, so maybe some of you fellows can point me in the right direction:

• HD capture/editing card. As I mentioned, I am very excited about the AJA Xena HS card. I have also read a bit about the Blackmagic Decklink HD card. Which one do you guys recommend? Which one is better for real-time editing in HD-HDV?
  
  
• HD and HDV capture: I’m fairly new to HDV (like most), and there’s something I am wondering about the capture process (please disregard my ignorance if this seems too trite). I am used to transferring my footage through Firewire. It’s a very clean and effective process. I’ve noticed that the new generation of HD capture cards do not have a Firewire input. Instead, they use BNC component inputs and an AES/EBU 15-pin D connection. Am I missing something?
  
  
• In addition, I will need a new video card, and I am considering one of the new nVidia Quadro cards, so I could work with other applications (e.g.: Magic Bullet) and defer most of the rendering from the software to this hardware card. Should I check the Quadro line or should I check other alternatives that would actually work with my video applications?

Thanks in advance, and I look forward to your advice.

[Steven Gotz]

You might want to skip a fancy card for now. Use Cineform Aspect HD to enhance the speed of editing with Premiere Pro 2.0 and get a Matrox Parhelia APVe so you can edit with two monitors and an external HDTV (or better ye, an HD monitor).

You could do with with the Quadro FX-540 if you need just one monitor plus a HDTV. Or get two FX-540 if your PC can handle two, and you'll have three PC monitors and a HDTV.

If you really want to go big, take a look at Cineform Prospect HD.

[Chris Barcellos]

Capture:

HDV, at least ala Sony FX1, Z1, A1 and HC1 all capture via firewire. In fact, as far as bitrate, it is the same size capture stream as in DV. In other words, if you can capture DV, you should be able to capture HDV. Where a problem will develop is in actually monotoring capture. HDV is hard on the CPU to decode and send to video card. Probably to solve the issue of that load, Premiere Pro doesn't even show a capture preview Window, and refers you to the video camera monitor to see whats currently being captured. Premiere Pro also does not do scene detect in HDV. HDVSplit is a free capture program that allows you to capture and scene detect. It also give the option to preview your capture live, but I note it will sometimes cause dropped frames. Therefore, I don't use it.

Editing Cards:

I don't use an editing card. I do successfully edit native HDV with my generic self built AMD 3800+ dual core system. With Premiere Pro and Cineform's HD Aspect, you can actually have a slower system to edit with. That system helps you capture and convert the hdv stream to an "intermediate" .avi file that is easily editable via Premiere Pro 1.5 or 2.0. The promise is that you will also have real time editing capability. Your file size will be 4 to 5 times that of the hdv file, so you will need plenty of hard drive space. You can get Apect trial version with full functionality at www.cineform.com.

It seems to me that because of the speed of current processors, the industry is moving away from editing in proprietary formats with editing cards. I am sure others would disagree, so be sure to research thoroughly.