[Mike Smith]

Have you tried http://www.playkpm.com ?

[Mike Smith]

Hi Marc

Not totally sure I’ve understood here. If the glow were to be outside the frame, how would we see it ..?

[Mike Smith]

Having a bad day, Erik? Or is this you in normal mode? Bet your work’s a barrel of fun!

[Mike Smith]

Whatever suits. I find different jobs call for different ways of working. For me, the time saving in not waiting for the tape to wind back, find the inpoint, then replay for capture after each clip is logged can be substantial if there’s a lot of material to capture.

All best

[Mike Smith]

An alternative approach to Chris’s export via quicktime might be to select and copy the clips you want to work with on your PPro timeline, and then just paste them into an After Effects composition. The clips will open in AE in their original quality, which may produce a good enough result for your purposes. When you render out your AE composition, choose whatever codec the rest of your footage is in – probably DV.

There is a quality gain in using uncompressed footage rather than DV, and it’s particulayly likely to be apparent in colour correction, keying, and in graphics with sharp colour edges or large areas of near-flat tone … but for much work with a DVD or VHS output, the differences can be small. Given that yours is a domestic camcorder, it’s probably not an issue for you; if it is, just be aware that long clips in uncompressed video can eat disc space (around 90 Gigabytes per hour for standard definition, varying a little with 8 bit / 10 bit uncompressed, PAL or NTSC, compared to maybe 15 Gigabytes per hour for DV – again, this may vary a little between PAL and NTSC)

Hope it works out.

[Mike Smith]

In many ways, of course, parts of the UK broadcast sector have been perhaps “trailing-edge” when it comes to video production technology. Way behind the US on High Definition, and a little slow to bring in cheap, fast filming and editing kit as it emerges. Recent decisions, though, have seen major doc series commissioned on DVCAM format – and now the beeb’s migration to a more computer-savvy editing model with FCP. Interesting days.

Surely we’re grown up enough to be more interested in the programmes and what they have to say and show, if anything, than on which box they were made on? Shakespeare was rubbish, he didn’t use Final Draft …?

[Mike Smith]

The plus of batch capture is that it can help you view, log and capture more quickly, if you get used to the workflow, but you don’t have to load up your hard disc with – in your case – a sizeable percentage of 120 hours of material you don’t want.

If you mark ins and outs on the fly, and then choose the “log clip” option, you get to name and make any comments on the clip before capture, and can then go straight on. At the end of the reel you can use batch capture to gather all (or a subset of) of your logged clips, so you don’t have to return to that source reel unless you want to. You can do something els while the machine’s doing this, and I find total time view / log / capture is often less like this, compared to the method you outlined. On a (for me rare) project where I want to capture a whole reel, then Iv’e foudn scene detect to be good.

Batch capture seems pretty stable so long as source timecode is good (no breaks, like amateur DV often has) though sometimes I’ve found a shot or two is missed for some reason – then it’s reselect and retry capture, which for me has always worked so far.

[Mike Smith]

Hope you’re back, safe, and in good heart.

[Mike Smith]

Does File / Project settings not let you change time base .. to 25, for PAL world ..?

[Mike Smith]

I guess you really need to identify the facility that will / can make the computer to film transfer for you, and go and talk it over with them as early as possible.

Your client should be able to steer you towards a suitable (unless you’re expecting to arrange and pay for that?) as well as where the film will be projected (am I rash in presuming film and not Hi Def?)

There are a number of “standard” film definitions – they can help you to choose. You’ll also likely benefit greatly from what they can tell you / show you about how colour, contrast and movement translate to film; i.e. the difference from how it looks on your monitor to how it will look projected.