You’re shooting with your new HDV or HD camcorder, and the footage looks amazing! But are you really seeing the full picture?
Not unless you’re looking at a high definition monitor. But professional HD monitors are still expensive.
So, here’s an idea:
You can buy a LCD TV/computer monitor (the lines are being blurred more every day) that can be used for three different purposes:
1. While shooting, you can run component (like from the Canon XL H1 or XH A1) out of your camera into component input on the LCD to monitor what you’re shooting in full, pixel-for-pixel …
I have shot multicam concerts locking up timecode by beaming wireless audio SMPTE timecode to all cameras and recording it on Ch 2, but I can tell you it was a big hassle and a waste of time.
My recommendation for multi-camera shoots is to either:
1. Use TOD (Free Run) Timecode
TOD (Time of Day) timecode is a switchable option on some recent camcorders. With this option, you can synchronize multiple cameras, then each camera can start or stop at will, and the timecode always reflects the current time, not the tape position, so the …
It seems more and more common that editors are being asked to use content from a DVD- perhaps the client has provided you with last years annual report DVD… and wants you to redit it. (Remember, ripping off copyrighted content is a Federal offense with imprisonment and large fines possible!)
You can use MacTheRipper to get the content from a DVD on your hard drive (OS X only)
MPEG Streamclip is an application that converts MPEG files (including transport streams) into muxed, demuxed, QuickTime, AVI and DV files. http://www.squared5.com/
Here is a tutorial on extracting content with MPEG …
If you shot and edited a project in DV format, this is one recommendation:
- Check your edit to make sure luma (brightness) and chroma (color saturation) levels are within broadcast-legal ranges. Adjust if necessary.
- Check your project for audio clipping, and adjust levels if needed.
- Make sure you’re completely out a second before the time limit- that is, for a :30, all music tails and fades should be complete by :29, or you run the risk off getting cut off by the slop factor in broadcast sequencers.
- Add
…
One good option is dubbing your analog footage to a DV or HDV tape with the analog inputs of your camcorder. That way, your footage has been digitized and timecoded, and is ready to capture via FireWire into your system as if it had been shot on digital.
If you have Hi-8 footage, there are Sony “digital 8″ camcorders with Firewire that will transfer Hi-8 footage (no timecode, though) directly into your computer.
This method has a lot of advantages- your footage is more convenient if you wish to use it in other projects or re-edit your project, it will last longer …
When moving footage is not available, don’t forget about still photos! You can animate still photos with motion and scale, crop them, apply filters (like sepia, B & W, color tint) and sometimes stills can fill empty spots in your timeline as well or even better than a video clip. Also, many stock photos are automatically HD res!
http://tutorialblog.org/25-places-to-find-awesome-stock-photos-%E2%80%94-free-and-cheap/
Here is a monster list of sites with free photos:
Wikipedia Commons
Stock Exchange
Morguefile
Image After
Free Photos Bank
OpenPhoto
BigFoto
USDA
NASA
NOAA
NPS…
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