New Breed going with MPG?

Grazie wrote on 8/18/2004, 1:31 AM
Just had a chat with a "Young-Un" ... she tells me that capturing MPEG is just great! Gives a really neat "look" and it is so small too! . . I don't know what programme she uses .. . I don't even know if she knows about or has used what I use and that is PAL-DV capture and edit . . . Am I missing something? Should I be considering MPEG as a source and editing option?

TIA,

Grazie

Comments

Jay Gladwell wrote on 8/18/2004, 3:57 AM
Hi, Grazie... To answer your question in one word -- "No." MPEG is not (yet) a viable option as a professional source and/or editing option.

Jay
Grazie wrote on 8/18/2004, 4:10 AM
I guessed as much .. But these sweet young things always/sometimes know what is "hot" on the streets ... Jay, go see my upload on Chienworks . . just a piece of my artwork with 3d stuff from V5b . . nothing serious . . nothing to do with clients . .

Grazie
Chienworks wrote on 8/18/2004, 5:03 AM
Lots of times when people say "capturing MPEG is just great!", it's because they are relatively new and simply enamored to have video on their desktop at all. They haven't experienced the lighter side of DV, so they don't realize they are flirting with the darker side yet.
rs170a wrote on 8/18/2004, 6:07 AM
What I'd like to know is how people expect to edit footage shot with the mini-DVD camcorders? To me, this lack of editing seems to be a huge step backwards (compared to mini-DV) for the average consumer.

Mike
farss wrote on 8/18/2004, 6:21 AM
Tell me about. I got given one of those little disks to 'do something with' but they hadn't 'finalised' it and the camera had been stolen.
And at about $30 per 20 mins versus $8 / 60 mins for DV it's a damn expensive way to record uneditable video!

Seem to see a lot fo these cameras as 'prizes' lately!
PeterWright wrote on 8/18/2004, 6:42 AM
Grazie -

First you tell us that you've been chatting with a "Young-Un" ...

Then you casually mention that it's a female Young-Un!

THEN you tell us she's an MPEG capturer.

Just how far out of the square are you prepared to go ?!!


Seriously - is she really editing, or, as many MPEG capturers are, just capturing movies and TV programmes?





Grazie wrote on 8/18/2004, 6:42 AM
Has ANYBODY seen the Sony MicroDV format? I was going to get a client, but due to their own situation I walked away from the job. But they did show me this .. I think it was MicroDm or Dmv or something like that. . NASTY tiny little postage sized tape cassette .. Seesh.. I thiought my miniDV was small, but these suckers . . I reckon you could lay at least 2 of them on top of my miniDV tape cassettes!

I'm really glad I walked . .. I also sourced a company that could have transfered this to my miniDV for £70 .. this for an hours tape .. . .

Grazie
Grazie wrote on 8/18/2004, 6:46 AM
Pete, "Seriously - is she really editing, or, as many MPEG capturers are, just capturing movies and TV programmes?" .. well, I believed she has "access" to video equipment while at art school.

As to being outta shape! Huh, that happened to me 20 years ago .. . .

Grazie

farss wrote on 8/18/2004, 7:11 AM
Last I heard Sony were going to kill the MicrMV format, and then they jumped onto the DVD Cam bandwagon.
There's nothing technically wrong with mpeg as a capture format and many high end cameras record in it and some high end systems edit it. However it's a very different beast to the low end stuff, heck digital SD and HD is broadcast in mpeg-2. But all these systems use a fearsome data rate.

Bob.
PeterWright wrote on 8/18/2004, 7:51 AM
Yes Bob - I assume there are "low end" improvements on the way, as HDV is I believe going to be MPEG2 recorded onto Mini DV tape. Either there will be improved software to allow us to edit this, or ........ new hardware??
farss wrote on 8/18/2004, 8:07 AM
Peter,
the HDV spec has been out for a while and yes it's mpeg-2. Vegas can edit it with the help of a plugin, well at least the stuff from the JVC cam, don't know if the chnages hammered out by the new consortium will affect that or not.
How it's done though is through conversion to mpeg-4 which leads me to wonder why the HDV cameras didn't record mpeg-4 to start with, maybe the silicon isn't fast enough YET.
Biggest thing that held the JVC camera back was it was a pretty poor consummer grade camera with lots of pixels on the front end of a HDV recording system. What it needed was much better CCDs and better optics.
One big plus to mpeg-2 is it's more robust than DV25. It can correct much larger errors so less risk of problems although from what I see with DVB when it does finally loose it it get real ugly.

Bob.
Spot|DSE wrote on 8/18/2004, 8:38 AM
MPEG is fine for editing in a lot of cases, especially when "capturing to MPEG" if they are using a hardware device. In fact, capturing MPEG with a hardware device *generally* provides a cleaner MPEG than a software encoder does, and in real time too. I suspect the "young un's" like MPEG because quality is secondary, but MPEG can be equalled to DV, even superior.
MPEG is not a viable option in Vegas because Vegas can't seek I-frames, which are needed for clean editing.
There is long there is short form GOP (group of pictures) FAST based their very famous Purple, Silver, and Liquid systems on the short GOP. We all might as well get used to editing long GOP, because HDV is long GOP MPEG information.
It's all in the bitrates, and MPEG can actually provide more information than DV. DV is simply more efficient overall. Remember, DV is compressed 5:1 anyway, so it too, is a compressed format. MPEG truly is a delivery format from most angles you view it, but it's not accurate to say it's not an editing format at any stage. Between MPEG 2, MPEG 4, and coming MPEG 7, we're all gonna be seeing more MPEG coming down the line from various cams in the near future.
BTW, you don't need the Cinefex plug for HDV in Vegas 5, it simply makes it more optimal, that's all.