[Jeff Pulera]

What Matthew said about manual exposure is a must for any stage event! Something else I do is set the white balance preset to “Incandescent” for stage events (plays, recitals, etc.)I don’t bother attempting a manual WB setting since the lighting is constantly changing, sometimes even being red or blue to set a mood for a certain scene. So using the incandescent setting provides a good baseline to work with and both cameras will be consistent at least if I do need to color correct in post.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

You can do a “manual override” of that section of video. Export JUST that area using a high quality intermediate codec, such as the Animation codec you mentioned. Export as “Video only”. Import the resulting short clip and place on higher track above original clips. Export entire sequence to desired output codec.

So basically, you are doing a pre-render of that segment to avoid whatever weird thing is happening. If the short render clip looks fine, then it ought to also export fine in the final video.

Sometimes there is no rhyme or reason as to why these things happen. Some folks will tell you to turn off GPU acceleration, maybe there is something not quite right with the source files in that area of the timeline, who knows?

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Hi Jamie,

Assuming you have one folder with all the sequentially-numbered stills in it, go to File > Import in Premiere, select FIRST of the stills, then check the box at bottom left of import window – I believe it says “Numbered Stills” or “Sequence” or whatever – and that will bring in the whole batch as a single CLIP to put in the Timeline.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Lengthen the audio clip on Premiere timeline BEFORE you click “Edit in Audition”. When you select that, it renders a new clip from the timeline clip, so that is the exact length you will be living with moving forward.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

HD DELIVERY formats use square pixels, 1.0. So get the anamorphic thing out of your head, barking up the wrong tree there.

Full HD is always going to be 1920×1080, 1.0 PAR, and if you want to deliver some other cinematic widescreen look, you’re simply adding black bars inside the 1920×1080. Nothing at all to do with Pixel Aspect Ratio.

With the black bars, you ARE changing the aspect ratio of the IMAGE, not the pixels, they remain square, just that the “picture” aspect ration is no longer 16:9 if you add black.

A lot of the movies I rent play with black letterboxing, so they are maintaining the original aspect ratio of the film (non-16:9), however it is still a square pixel video format.

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Hi Bruce,

Just create a PLAYLIST, which contains all 7 tracks, and the PLAY ALL button links to the PLAYLIST.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

I think when you see 1440×1080 anamorphic, you might be confusing that with some Hollywood films that are shot using an anamorphic lens, which I think allows wide video to be shot onto 4:3 film stock, or something like that.

1440×1080 is the standard for HDV tape cameras, basically to save space by recording less data than “full HD” at 1920×1080 pixels. It uses a pixel aspect ratio of 1.333, which uses rectangular pixels that are wider than they are tall.

When played back, if the playback device understands and respects PAR, then 1440×1.333 = 1920 in “square pixels” and therefore correctly displays as 16:9, even though 1440×1080 pixels is really 4:3 without accounting for PAR.

But anyway, you never want to export as 1440×1080 since many software players incorrectly assume a 1.0 PAR and your video will play back looking like 4:3 format! Plus, less resolution = less quality. Keep it at 1920×1080, or “Full Raster” as it is often called.

Hope this makes sense

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

While the USB 3.0 version of Intensity has compatibility issues, the internal PCI-e card version should work in any PC desktop. Current model is the Intensity Pro 4K. The downside of that model is that all connections are at the back of the computer, which may be easily accessible for many users.

The Matrox MXO2 Mini provides an aluminum breakout box that provides convenient access to audio and video ports on your desk. MXO2 Mini also provides some plug-ins for Premiere, offering Color Correction, Keying, and transitions, and I like using those tools.

That said, if you plan to also use the capture unit to feed various video streaming applications, the Intensity line is more broadly compatible than is MXO2. But either is ready for Premiere CC capture/monitoring.

As you mentioned, you CAN use some MiniDV cameras as an analog-to-DV converter and ingest footage as DV then via Firewire. The BMD and Matrox devices are capable of higher quality though, capturing to 4:2:2 codecs rather than DV with 4:1:1 color space. Plus you can increase the capture data rate (at least on Matrox, not sure if Intensity has that option).

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

The still image should be somewhat larger than the video frame size if you wish to pan and scale the image, as that will provide extra pixels to work with so that the source does not need to be “blown up”. The more you want to scale, the larger the source image should be to start with.

Next, you may still get flickering sometimes during motion on fine details of image. If you do, add a small amount of “Gaussian Blur” in Photoshop (using a COPY of the still, so as not to “ruin” the original). Using just 0.1 or 0.2 usually does the trick for perfectly smooth motion, without the viewer noticing any blur.

Thanks

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers

[Jeff Pulera]

Ryan,

I never said that the DVD looked better than HD. Just saying it doesn’t look like SD! It’s “as good as it’s going to get” starting with an HDV source. No argument that a Blu-ray would look even better (obviously), but that was not the original question. My point was that (in my opinion), doing a “Pepsi or Coke” blind test, many viewers might assume they were watching an HD source. I’m very fussy about quality, pixel peeping my own work constantly, and I’m amazed at what the third-party “HD2SD” apps can do.

Thank you

Jeff Pulera
Safe Harbor Computers