Dual camera shooting and editing confusion

[Erik Kafrissen]

Hi All:

Well I am slowly making my way down the path of hd shooting/editing and keep running across roadblocks that I can't seem to find a suitable answer to.

I have a JVC HD100 as well as a Canon HV20.

When I capture the Canon footage to my Premiere Pro CS3 software, it comes in as 1440X1080 with a pixel aspect ratio of 1:33 and a frame rate of 29.97. OK easy enough.
Now, when I have my JVC HD100 set on 1080i HD 50/25 and then bring this footage into Premiere, it comes in as 1080 X 720 pixel aspect ratio of 1:00 and a frame rate of 25 fps.

So, I guess what I am asking is, is there a way to match up the settings on these two cameras so that they have all of the same functions and the footage is the same size, frame rate, etc. If not, do I have the JVC set at the optimal settings to get the highest quality footage out of it?

The reason I ask is that when I bring in a clip from each of the cameras and put them into the timeline, in the Program Sequence window in Premiere the two clips are different sizes and I either have to enlarge the JVC clip to match the Canon size or make the Canon Clip smaller. I don't know if I will end up losing quality when I enlarge the JVC clip, but I sure would like to find out.

Anyway as you can tell I am a novice at this stuff and I know most of you folks have spent years doing this so please excuse the dumb questions, but if you can help I will be forever grateful.

All the best,

Erik

[Stephen Self]

I can't really help you with the cameras, but I can suggest a completely different direction. It's probably not the way you want to go, but there are edit packages out there (NewTek Speed Edit is one) that allow you to set the framesize/framerate up front. when you add your clips to the timeline, it immediately sizes everything you put in to match. I use it here, and it works great with all the wacky stuff we routinely get in from our District Attorney's office. The best news of all is that it's not particularly expensive. I think it's PC-only right now, so that may be a deal-breaker for some. We love it here.