[Douglas Spotted eagle]

That particular camcorder uses a proprietary codec. It’s packaged in an m2t stream, but that simply means “MPEG Transport Stream”
You can convert HDV m2t into any format you wish, you need to find what PowerDirector will accept. After spending a little time on the Cyberlink website, it appears that you can easily output an AVC file, or a BD compliant file (use BluPrint template) and it should accept the file. Their website however, claims it will open HDV anyway. I’m looking at the PowerDirector 6 software pages, no experience with it at all.

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Yes, you could use this for HD preview, but much like the SVid output, it’s not generally accurate to the signal. This varies with different cards, however. Use calibration tools to check it; it’s pretty easy to see what’s going on.
For HD monitoring, DVI/HDMI/SDI are the preferred methods for accuracy, and even then, you may not be seeing it 100% true.

https://www.vasst.com/training/OHCI.htm>tutorial that shows how to connect via a converter device for SD preview

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

While you can use an Svideo output from a graphics card, it’s not advisable for many reasons.
If you’re using DV as your source, or want to preview at an SD-quality, then you can use a camera, deck, Convergent Design or similar converter to use the 1394 bus on your computer as a video output, that will be converted from digital to analog. This is by far the most accurate and efficient way to see your image correctly scaled, colored, etc. from the Vegas timeline.

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Right click/Drag the new/replacing file to where the old file sits on the timeline. When you release the click, the menu will allow you to “Add as Take.” All of the properties of the old file are then applied to the new file. This doesn’t remove the old file from the timeline, it merely allows you to create takes, from which you can choose an active take.

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

After you’ve installed Ultimate S, go to Tools/Scripting and you’ll find all of the US3 tools there. A better option, IMO, is to double-click your toolbar, and this opens the “Customize” interface. Scroll down in the left side of that interface, find the small US3 icon (red with a U) and double click that icon. This loads the US 3 icon to the toolbar. This is where you invoke/use the plug in.
HTH

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Does the Adobe Premeiere CS Supports the scripting functionality to automate tasks in the work environment ?

No.
Creative Suite is a powerhouse package, no doubt. So is Vegas.
If you look at them as both from bullet-point viewpoints, Vegas can’t stand very tall, because it doesn’t have a Photoshop, After Effects, Illustrator, OnLocation, Ultra built in. It also doesn’t cost as much.
The bullet points aren’t where Vegas shines. Vegas is fast, intuitive, and exceptionally open-ended when it comes to ingest/output. These are subjective vs being quantifiable.

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Additionally be aware that with your preview window set to Preview/Auto may mean you’ve got low resolution frames going out to your ext monitor, depending on the size of your Preview Window.
If you need to work at a reasonable quality (you’ll especially notice the quality loss on titles/gen media) then be sure to work at least in Preview/Full. You might take a hit on framerate, depending on the CPU.

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Have I been wrong all these years or does the slow speed burn rule apply to audio CDs only?
Mike, Thanks for the welcome, nice to be able to participate here again.
I don’t know that the rule applies to anything any longer. I have had a couple discussions (read “arguments”) with engineers at a couple of replication plants when we’ve had serious errors show up in the past. Then we happened upon Evatone and they have a very good QC program and system. Started this discussion with them a couple years ago, and the head of QC asked me what speed I was burning. I told him 1/2x. He asked me to burn the same project at 8x. Same media, no failures/errors. Since that time, all our projects (CD and DVD) are burned at the highest speed the media or burners will allow whether they’re dual layer DDP discs/files or single DVD5 masters. The days of DLT are gone for us too, so everything goes out on DVD in some form or another. So…my feeling with no scientific support, is that burning at higher speeds reduces errors.

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Once you’ve started the editing process, there isn’t a lot of sense moving from one to the other. However, at this time FCP has a few advantages, such as 10bit for heavy color grading, and comes in a suite that has some very good compositing tools, titling tools, and some other goodies. As a personal-only editor, IMO it has a lot to be desired. In a multi-user workflow, it has some benefits.
All NLE’s today are pretty darn good, and only a fool discounts them against each other. They’re tools in the box. Vegas just happens to be my favorite hammer, screwdriver, paintbrush, and power saw. 🙂

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[Douglas Spotted eagle]

Were it me, I’d simply create the title at double resolution, with the dash either as part of the title, or as a separate component for which you would leave space in the title containing the other information. I just finished doing something along the same lines; I used a hypen in the titler, sized quite large, as a mask for moving media (clouds) beneath, which then zoomed out to place the moving media into clouds so the transition from the mask to the original shot was seamless.
HTH

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