[Chip Thome]

The slider might come more into play for you, if what you are doing is more “choreographed” than say, a live event would be. In those cases, IMO, a slider could add more “value” to what you create, giving you a payback because of it. For “one take” live events though, I think a slider basically adds “fluff” but not “value”.

So what is it you are shooting, seminars or other “one take” events, or something along the lines of “product” promotion demos etc ??? If it is more “product” based stuff, I would shove the slider toward the top and back down something else.

[Chip Thome]

Matt,

L glass is exceptionally fine quality and as gear goes, a solid investment as well.

When I began buying out my DSLR kit, I looked first to what I was shooting, who I was shooting it for, the delivery method and who the final audience would be. I then looked to my immediate competition and gauged what they were doing in relationship to where I would be after “gearing up”.

In MY situation, L glass would have been wasting money. The guys in this and other forums could rip my stuff to shreds if asked for their opinions. They also would be correct as there’s far better than I own that’s available. But my clients and the final audience are going to think, in comparison to what they know and have seen, that what I have is fantastic!

I would suggest looking at your gearing up projections through both a business perspective and then from a creative perspective as well. Both of those projections I would assume would have different items. It may help then when it comes time to “compromise”.

Good luck !!!!

[Chip Thome]

Mike you are comparing apples and oranges here, picking between these two. One is entry level and one is pro grade. If you have already experienced “the good stuff”, then yes, the entry level one probably will disappoint you.

[Chip Thome]

I tend to agree with everyone here that given you have:

Optimum Environment
Optimum Lighting
Optimum Camera Settings
Optimum Camera Operator
Optimum Focus Puller
Optimum Delivery Method to the Audience

Then the lens is going to make a difference.

Now for the reality check. 90+% of what I have done has had NONE of the above. So is the lens going to make the footage I shot any better/different ??? Hardly. So I can see the statement you reference being made. It just seems there was a caveat missing. 🙂

[Chip Thome]

Yes Alex my assumption was I may end up with Interlaced and Progressive formats as well as an off chance of SD format as well. I do not know for sure, but assumed Premiere may deal differently with each of these formats, as it renders out to that uniform size and format. So I felt it would be better to build out each project for each format I received. That way I set Premiere up to “know” it is to deal with, say, 1080 60i, and then rendering to 720p as the outcome. When you think about it, if there isn’t some variation, why would we declare what type project it is in the first place ???

[Chip Thome]

Thanks Alex for the input !!!

Last year I did a project for these people and we used Flips then, so I know they will fly through ok.

What I have to do is use uniform titles, frame rates and frame sizes to create the 15-20 end products from each of these 15-20 videos. The 15-20 that I will receive could be in .mp4, .mts, .mov or whatever the participants choice of camera spits out. These formats, again, could be in any of the standard rates and sizes too. As it stands right now, I won’t know what I will get until it all shows up.

I know I should be able to bring any of these into CS5 and spit it back out to a uniform format, size and frame rate without any problem. My assumption is I need to create various Premiere projects, to correspond to the various types of footage I get. I am not sure on what render times might be like, as Premiere “standardizes” whatever goes in, to whatever we select.

I have never transcoded before, but also never had the possibility of so many possible variations of footage being used at once.

So really curious to others thoughts on if transcoding is worth while, for overall time and quality aspects, or not.

[Chip Thome]

Adobe Production Premium is going to give you some of the very best software currently available. Audition for audio, After Effects for manipulation and Photoshop are all the top of their categories. What you gain from Adobe is all of their software is designed to be compatible with each other, meaning you can import and export from one to another. After a while it begins to feel like you are just using one insanely capable, all inclusive software program. There are quite a few other excellent offerings out there, but IMO, non that are anywhere near as complete. It sure isn’t cheap, but as the old saying goes “the bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price has been forgotten”.

[Chip Thome]

Way col Joe…thanks for the tip !!!

[Chip Thome]

This is off topic as far as audio goes Andrew. One thing you really should investigate first is the entire permission/legality aspect of recording children without their parents around. I honestly would check with your camp ahead of time and get their opinion/permission before going ahead and doing this.

[Chip Thome]

What were you planning on doing with the Rode ??? Put it on the cam, or a boom or going to go handheld ??? Going wireless into the Zoom, to me sounds a bit like a waste of money. If you are going wireless into the cam, then I’d look at a Senheiser G3 set up. If you can bury a recorder on the subject, a lav into a recorder works well too. I’ve done that with a Giant Squid mic into a Yamaha Pocketrak CX recorder and was very satisfied with the results.

Of course if you want real first rate Audio, Noah has dialed that in precisely for you, can’t argue at all with his description.