How do you connect your computer to monitor?

Artbot wrote on 10/17/2002, 2:31 PM
I'm getting a bit of jerkiness during playback in my external monitor. I currently have a firewire out to a camera, then plain old phono cable to a regular old tv set. The computer is brand new, all scsi, running XP, so I don't think that's the weak link.

Can someone shine some light on the typical connector types used for external monitors? Forgive my ignorance, I'm new to this whole NTSC thing and need to build a decent editing setup for our project.

Thanks in advance.

Richard Green

Comments

HeeHee wrote on 10/17/2002, 3:07 PM
When does the jerkiness occur? If it is during stopped action or scrubbing frame by fram, the jerkiness is to be expected. If you are playing a preview, it should not be jerky at all.

The External monitor is not meant for editing purposes. It is meant to be a WYSIWYG approach for those whose projects will be displayed on TVs. If you can not tolerate the jerkiness during pauses, then I suggest you purchase a second video card or dual head video card and another monitor. This will enable you to move the preview window to the 2nd display and enlarge to project size for better editing.
John_Cline wrote on 10/17/2002, 3:43 PM
This has nothing to do with the type of cable used to hook up your camcorder to the monitor.

The way Vegas works is when you play the video from the timeline, it will try to play it at the full 29.97 frame per second rate. However, during transitions or on video footage which has motion, titles or any other type of filter applied, Vegas will still attempt to play it in real-time, but will drop frames and get jerky if the CPU can't process that much video in real-time. You can tell what's going on by looking at the bottom of the "Preview Window" at the line that says "Display." When you play the video, it will show you the instantaneous frame rate, as long as it says "29.97" Vegas is keeping up, if it says anything less than 29.97, Vegas is dropping frames in order to keep up. The trick is to "Selectively Prerender Video." This is under "Tools." This will prerender anything that needs rendering and, when you play the video from the timeline, the jerkiness should be gone.

Contrary to what HeeHee says, the external monitor can most certainly be used for editing.

John
Tyler.Durden wrote on 10/17/2002, 3:46 PM
Hi Richard,

JUst to make sure we're on the same page...

Vegas will output to NTSC setup just the way you have it. If you mean "jerky", like the framerate is low, that's because the computer is maybe processing an effect like a transition or title overlay. Vegas will reduce the framerate to display the look of the composited image.

You can prerender or RAMrender segments to see how they will play at full-framerate, or if you loop a segment for long enough, it will build a smooth preview too.

Setting the preview for "preview quality" will help keep the framerate up too.

A DV clip (captured in Vegas or Scenealyzer) that has no FX or transitions should play full framerate no problem. If it doesn't, you may need system/project tweeking.

Some of us do use the NTSC monitoring for editing, particularly with a client in session. But, as posted above, a dual-monitor is nice for having a larger preview window.

HTH, MPH

HeeHee wrote on 10/17/2002, 5:14 PM
<< Contrary to what HeeHee says, the external monitor can most certainly be used for editing. >>

FYI - I did not say that it couldn't be used for editing, it just was not meant for it. This is per Sonic Foundry. There was a great big thread on this. I believe it was SonicDennis who did a nice FAQ thread on this subject. The jerkiness when video is "paused" is caused by interlacing and can not be avoided. Normal playback should be smooth as long as transistions and effects are pre-rendered and the CPU can keep up. BTW, I use an external monitor for editing myself during rough edits, despite the jerkiness, but for detailed pan/crops and such I go back to preview on the computer display.
BillyBoy wrote on 10/17/2002, 5:23 PM
Apples and oranges. If you have the means to connect an external monitor through a firewire, BY ALL MEANS YOU CAN AND SHOULD use for video editing for color correction/levels, etc.. Assuming of course you have the monitor properly calibrated and the final destination of your video is for display off TV. The reason being TV color/levels are different than computer color/levels. If you adjust off your computer, then your result will be "off"...

BTY I was gone for a couple weeks due to my ISP going out of business. Now I got really fast broadband. Average 1300-1500 MBPS.. :-)
Artbot wrote on 10/17/2002, 5:59 PM
Thanks all - this helps a lot. I agree about using the monitor to get true tv colors, etc. That was my initial reason for using it since I don't trust the RGB monitor to give me an accurate idea of how it will appear on tv.

I guess my next question is do I need something other than a video camera as an A-D converter? Would something like a DAC-100 do the same thing? Is there any advantage of one over another?

Thanks again.

Richard
John_Cline wrote on 10/17/2002, 7:26 PM
Richard,

I suppose it depends on the quality of the D/A converter in your camcorder, but I have never seen a really bad converter in any camcorder. Obviously, some converters are going to look slightly better than others. You probably don't absolutely need an ADVC-100, but it is nice and it does look very, very good. Your call.

John