Technical stuff

liquid wrote on 9/20/2003, 10:30 AM
I'm a real newbie at video stuff, so I have a couple of questions that might seem obivous to all of you.

Firstly, when I import from my analogue cam corder into my pc, I'm wondering at what resolution it is imported....I'm a little confused about all this resolution stuff... my camera has a certain resolution, so does my capture card, then I edit at a lower resolution, and have to somehow decide on an out put resolution???? Also, when I play my video on my tv directly from my cam corder, it looks wonderful, but when I play it from my computer, it's pathetic!!!! And when I view a preview on my monitor, there's just no way that it can be considered professional quality...what am I doing wrong here?

I want to edit videos and make it look professionall......what do I need to do...does the lack of quality have more to do with the my capture card, the output to the tv, the way vegas handles video....????

Also, when I render stuff, it doesn't seem like vegas takes advantage of my dual processors? When rendering, the cpu use is never higher than 50%...why is that? Why doesn't it use as much as possible and reder it faster?

Any information about this would be helpful, especially if someone could point me in the direction of a good resolution tutorial.....

Comments

Trichome wrote on 9/20/2003, 10:57 AM
Vegas Options\Prefrences\video tab allows you to add more RAM for previews...
hope this helps.
rextilleon wrote on 9/20/2003, 11:15 AM
First thing you need to do is get yourself a digital camera---that will make a huge difference in the quality of the images you bring into your NLE. If your images look good on your TV, then dont worry about how they look in the preview window on your CRT---thats irrelevent--you can set your video preview window to best---The NLE doesn't play a huge roll in terms of quality of image--and the Vegas codec really does a great job.

Look to purchase a top of the line one chip camera, or if you can afford it, a 3 chip camera---people are using the Canon Gl2, XL1s the Sony VX2000, PD-150, and the Panasonic DVX-1000. THese cameras will cost you anywhere between 2000-3800 dollars. If you decide to go the one chip route you can get something much cheaper.

As far as rendering goes, get use to slow rendering times---although higher processor speeds do help. THe more you do with fx, transitions, color correcting etc, the longer it will take to render. Many in here render while sleeping--or have a machine dedicated to rendering.
jbrawn wrote on 9/21/2003, 1:34 AM
Your analog capture card is probably the main culprit for resolution mismatches.

When I first started using Vegas, I had an inexpensive analog to DV (firewire) external converter. When I purchased a DV camcorder (Sony DCR-PC101) I tried using it as my analog to DV converter. There was a world of difference in the quality of the video I got on the PC.

At least both of these were creating DV NTSC .avi files.

A friend's less expensive analog to PC capture gadget creates MPEG1 files in 320x240 resolution. It is a USB (1.1 I think) converter that essentially takes video and converts it to trash in real time.

In my experience, Vegas doesn't degrade the quality of the video you are starting with. You will get at least as good output as you have files captured on the PC. In some cases, Vegas will help you get noticably better looking output than what is in your source files.

You don't mention what your output to TV mechanism is. DV via firewire to a DV recorder or camcorder is probably the highest quality output mechanism available to us hobbyists. Second best is writing a DVD of a high bitrate MPEG 2 render. Playing the video full screen while using a video or s-video output on the PC is a very distant third.

The way to figure out how much affect on quality your output mechanism has it to compare it to another output mechanism for the same vegas project. Render to an .avi file with DV NTSC (or DV PAL) settings and write that file to a DV camcorder using firewire with your TV plugged into the S-video output on the camcorder. Compare that picture with whatever mechanism you are currently using.

I think Rextilleon has the essense of the problem. Start with a DV camcorder and see where you go from there.

Good Luck,

John.


JohnnyRoy wrote on 9/21/2003, 2:17 PM
I don’t think you necessarily need to buy a digital camera to get good quality. You do, however, need a good capture device to keep the quality you have. Your options depend on whether you want to go back to analog tape or make DVD’s. If you don’t need to go back to analog tape, the Canopus ADVC-50 ($199) is a good choice. If you need to go back to analog tape the Canopus ADVC-100 ($299) would be my next choice but it requires that you have a firewire card ($29). If these are too expensive and you’re thinking of using a cheaper USB solution or an integrated Video card that has capture, think again. This is why you’re not happy with the output you have.

With regard to your original questions: (assuming NTSC) analog tape should be captured at a minimal resolution of 320x480 or 640x480 with either an MJPEG or Huffyuv codec. MPEG1 or MPEG2 are not good codecs for video you want to edit. They are also not going to capture at a high enough bitrate in real-time without hardware assist. The Canopus ADVC-50 and ADVC-100 capture at 720x480 with the DV codec, which is the same resolution of a DVD. This is even better.

If you already have a video card that captures, try capturing at 640x480 using an MJPEG codec. Both PICVideo and Morgan Multimedia make an MJPEG codec if your video card didn’t come with one. Many of these video cards come with their own proprietary codec or capture in MPEG. Both are less attractive solutions as you have seen.

Feel free to ask more questions since this is neither simple nor obvious.

~jr
liquid wrote on 9/22/2003, 12:13 PM
These are wonderful answers...! Thank you so much to all of you for giving me a hand...I'm going to print them out and really try and figure out what the hell you're talking about, and if I have further questions I'll be sure to post....THANK YOU SO MUCH PEOPLE!
liquid wrote on 9/23/2003, 8:45 AM
Can i use the ADVC-100 to view video on my tv screan? Or do I still need a to buy a cam corder that supports this?
rmack350 wrote on 9/23/2003, 5:51 PM
The ADVC will output from 1394 to analog. It's great for output to a tv screen. And it's great for input to the computer from an analog source. If you eventually get a DV camera then you don't want it in between your camera and computer but it's still great for output to TV.

As far as all these resolutions go, they are ALL based on a sampling rate. DV samples the signal such that you get 720 samples per line. Other devices may sample at 640 or 320 samples per line. All are different ways of sampling the same raster (line) of video.

DV samples in such a way that your image will look a little wide on the computer monitor. If you ask Vegas to correct this it will make the image appear to be 655 px wide.

Rob Mack