[Mike Cohen]

Was there a disgruntled astronaut involved?

[Mike Cohen]

Keep it simple. I have found that the more information you pack into a document, the less likely it will be followed.

If clients are providing video, give them the minimum amount of detail, such as:

Video must be of DVD quality. Acceptable formats include:

DV tape
DVCAM tape
DVCPRO tape
Authored DVD
MPEG-2

Once you get into allowing DVD or QT/AVI files, you are bound to get any number of formats.

Let them call you and say “can I send you a Quicktime movie?”

As we know, “Quicktime movie” or “AVI” can mean anything from Cinepak to H.264 – always better to get into details on a case by case basis.

We get a lot of video made by others on their iMac or using Windows Movie Maker. Even these easy to use programs have too many options for exporting video.

Also, if you are using an intern or entry-level person for ingest of outside material, make sure they know what is acceptable, otherwise you could end up with a DV file transcoded from inferior original quality video (flv, digicam etc).

Mike Cohen

[Mike Cohen]

I agree there is no one definitive way to do it, always curious to hear other editors discuss their preferences.

I am sometimes pleasantly surprised that when I pick music (Firstcom in my case) and lay it in over my edit, it sometimes fits almost perfectly. Not from a cut-to-music point of view, rather the changes in the music sometimes match points in the video I want to emphasize. For example, some videos we make usually have about 30-45 seconds of introductory narration and visuals before the title sequence, which may be 15-20 seconds. If I pick a 3 minute music track, it sometimes fits pretty nicely with only a little tweaking.
Other times of course one is not so lucky.

Mike

[Mike Cohen]

we use external USB drives for Premiere projects with no major problems, can lay off to DV tape with smooth playback.
Sometimes when we move a drive from one computer to another, the audio files want to conform again – I think this has to do with drive letters.
Make sure your playback settings are correct from one machine to another. For example, if you have playback set to external DV device, but none is connected, that can make the timeline not play.
Also, if indeed the audio is conforming when you flop to another machine, the video may stutter until all the files are done processing.

[Mike Cohen]

I see this as one of the challenges of low budget filmmaking. I won’t call this independent filmmaking, because indy films often have decent budgets. Low budget filmmaking on the other hand seems to entail one person trying to shoot, direct, edit and not ask for help. Thus, people seem to not think things through.
There have been countless posts on the COW entitled “What camera should I buy?” whereas the better posts read “Does this workflow make sense?”

The original post of this thread is somewhere between these two – workflow not quite thought out, guy wants to do everything himself.

That being said, he did come to the right place for advice, however I agree that aside from specific questions, the “what do I do now, i’m clueless” approach is bound to get responses like those in this thread.

To the original post writer, take the advice and get some professional help. If you are aiming to make a HD master for film-out, you must have some budget available for this process. Spend the money and learn what you can from the people you hire. While it is satisfying to have the skills yourself, it is an expensive effort to learn by trial and error at this high level of technical work.
Good luck.

Mike Cohen

[Mike Cohen]

any new xdcam options?

[Mike Cohen]

What does your contract state? Most contracts for production work entail a net 30 or 50-50 payment schedule. A more detailed contract includes stipulations for the issues you are experiencing.
Certainly stop doing more work, and consult your attorney for your next move.

Mike

[Mike Cohen]

to sell ads your potential sponsors will want to see numbers of viewers. getting sponsors for a first effort/one episode will be unlikely

can we see the show?

[Mike Cohen]

As I said in my original post, I use plenty of PIP effects. Laparoscopic surgery has at least two cameras going (inside the body and overhead) and sometimes two outside cameras. When appropriate, I’ll show 2 or 3 shots at once.

When appropriate is the key.

All the time is overkill and not interesting – but there are of course exceptions to all rules.

[Mike Cohen]

It is funny that on pre-digital broadcast switchers, like the GVG 300 and so forth, there were buttons dedicated to wipe patterns. Granted you could assign preset motions or switcher presets to these buttons, but did Grass Valley think the Heart wipe was so useful that they needed a dedicated button for it?