So firewire huh?

Is there a box or something I can use insted of my camera?

Yeah, the three good choices are the Canopus ADV100, . Hope this helps.

Thanks,

Shawn

There are also several vidio cards which can also output directly to TV. ATI comes to mind, but there are others. Do a search on this site for whatever brand you want to use and see if there are any complaints or problems.

How do you get the video into the computer if you don't have a camera or digital converter? Where do you get your video if you don't have a camera? If you are using video from the net you could view using Media Player. You also can make your screen bigger by selecting full preview in preview drop down menu. You can pull edges of windows until you screen is almost as large as your computer screen. You can also close other windows to give yourself more room. You are not restricted to small preview window. Also, if you are going to buy a digital converter box or a card that will allow you to output to analog, you might as well invest a few more bucks in a digital video cam and have use of the camera. Hope this helps.

normally, a preview bigger than 1/4 of my monitor gives me bad quality video with very low frame rate.
wobblyboy, can you preview with good quality in full screen?

djoni

RE: performance at increased video preview size in Vegas... I think this is a combo of your system's horsepower & the complexity of the codecs used plus the FX, sizing etc. that you're asking Vegas to perform. Vegas is extremely fast in this area, but still need to pre-render on occassion.

RE: video out... Most graphics cards with a TV out capability use the video overlay in windows, which (sigh) Vegas does not use so you'll normally get a clone of your desktop. ATI aiw cards further limit the situation - Matching the resolution for the TV monitor, your PC monitor display will often resize drastically, as in a very significant letterbox effect. It is possible to overcome this by readjusting your monitor, but as the main intention is to put your display (of a movie/DVD etc) on the TV screen, maybe not worth the bother.

Trivia: For those interested in firewire output to a TV monitor, if you don't want to use a DV camera, or if your camera doesn't offer this function, as Shawn mentioned there are several boxes out there. The Canopus adv100 seems the most popular, and is featured frequently on the clearance or countdown section at ecost.com for ~ $250 US. Please be aware though that there are quite a few complaints in their support forums - seems it doesn't work well with XP Pro SP1 or DX 9.

Alternatively, might be worth it to buy a lower end camera in a lot of situations, as for a little more cash you get the convertor plus a camera. I *think* that Samsung has a few with this capability that are being phased out for newer models, meaning you should be able to find one cheap. And there's the newer Canon Zr line which specifically include the convertor function (as opposed to an it'll work sort of thing) - the ZR 60 is $439 at the above mentioned site as I type this.

Ok, I tried firewire to my Canon ZR50 and then to the TV,

I saw a lot of lag and jumping plus the sound had some squeeking in it every now and then...


So what's the best way to go here?

TV out cards? and if so, what one is best for this? Yes, I am on Windows XP..


Or should I just get the Canopus adv100 and be done with it?

Just out of curiosity, how do you set up Vegas to preview on an external monitor using an ATI card?? I wasn't aware that you could do that, I thought you always had to go through firewire. I have a ATI all in wonder Radeon 7500.

If you want the colors to be accurate, you'll go through firewire.

But what if I just wanted to preview through my all in wonder card?? Can it really be done, I get sick of having to hook up my camcorder, then hook it to my monitor just to preview stuff on a TV monitor.

That's the reason for decks. My deck is connected to my TV and COMPUTER all the time allowing external preview with no connecting or disconnecting of wires. Plus, no wear and tear on the camera for capturing and printing to tape (a recent event had 9 tapes - way more than I want to run through my camera). Plus MUCH better shuttle/ff/rewind speeds.

But what about those of us who don't have $1000 to spend on a Mini DV Deck.

The ATI TV out method isn't unlike the Matrox G/P series cards.
It doesn't let you use the full screen overlay mode as just at this present time, Vegas doesn't fill the preview window using a frame based overlay layer. To get out of the DV port with a DV frame irrespective of what you have on the timeline isn't a processing dream, so maybe this will arrive someday.

What you can do, quite effectively is clone your VGA desktop onto your TV-out port. Some TVout cards also let you soom into a rectangle of the VGA desktop.

Just like preview, you won't get 100% frame accuracy. DV seems to get priority when external monitor is pressed, so if you are not watching the camcorder, perhaps turn this off to add some calculation time for the VGA preview window!

A few more options come with the FrameServer software, but only for cards that can insert their hooks into uncompressed codecs too I think, and again the extra software layer stops this from being realtime on my 1.8GHz RDRAM PC.

SPOT spoke of the BlackMagic SDI cards giving some sort of service within Vegas. Again, a $1000 solution if this receives the attention it deserves.

Sonic Foundry, please give us a directshow overlay layer through a dummy codec. So that such technology as Matrox DVDmax/PureVideo can be hooked into it. Theoretically giving animators RGB/YCrCb 4:2:2 uncompressed output, and even more to those using Bt878 SVIDEO 4:2:2 uncompressed attached cameras.

That'll stop folk saying that Vegas is limited to DV 4:1:1/4:2:0.

Ok, Just got back from Canopus,

I picked up the ADVC 100 and will give it a shot tonight.

I hope this is the ticket.....

Thanks for all the help in this matter..

I think I might have to pick up a DAC-100, looks identical in features to the Canopus ADVC-100 but it's almost half the price.

O.K., so now you got the ADVC100 ( or anyone else with ADVC100) Would you please tell us the connections (slowly, in great detail for us simpletons) you made and if you're happy with the display??? Thanks. Oh, do you have to set something in Vegas, too?
PH

Push the external monitor preview button just above the preview screen.

Doninez, As long as it's rendered it's great. However if I have much going on I need to use smaller preview with preview quality.

Just as you said, it needs to be rendered or it gets jumps and out of sync..

My external preview works fine if i have not added any effects to the project. But as soon as I add an effects, like color balance, it no longer lets me use the external preview feature. Is this normal? In premire i was able to preview color changes via firewire as i made them. It wouldnt show them in motion, but I could see the changes before i rendered them. Is this possible in Vegas? If not, what would the main advantage of using an external monitor be, if it's not going to save you rendering time?

Beardred, as soon as you use any effects the output has to be recompressed which would slow down the frame rate.

This can be seen at the bottom of the preview window where it will show the frame rate in realtime. Video with no effects will appear at the full frame rate 29.xx/25.

You will also notice the display in the preview window says recompressed in brackets/red.

If it stops the preview completely you need to look at the performance of you system (I would guess). Vegas drops the frame rate automatically to allow previews which is one of the key advantages of Vegas.


Connecting the ADVC-100 is very flexible, look at the manual at the web site as a graphic shows the permutations/flows of analogue to digital, it will also allow you to pass through digital from front to back.

I have my firewire on the PC connected to the 6pin at the back of the ADVC and the Red/Yellow/Black at the back of the unit connected to my TV/Monitor.

From my VCR I connect the RCA/Scart to the front of the Canopus Red/Yellow/Black connections.

If I need to connect to Cam I use the DV I/O 4pin at the front of the unit.

This allows me to use the Digital/Analogue button to switch between external monitor preview/analogue capture from VCR and DV Capture from the Cam.

Does that help?

Regards, PAW

PAW
Do i have to recompress the video after i add an effect in order to preview it? If so how would i do that?

I tried to lower the frame rate but it didn't work.