[Perrone Ford]

I know the women. They won’t be wearing glasses for this. There is nothing for them to read or see.

[Perrone Ford]

I don’t cut XDCamHD, but do with XDCam EX in both Vegas 8.1 and 8.0b and 8.0c.

My workflow is

Shoot > Clipbrowser export MXF > Open clips in Vegas

From there, it’s editing as with any other kind of file. If I need to do significant correction I will transcode the footage to something I can push around, like Cineform, or a 10 bit codec. Then I cut, color correct, grade, effect, and render to my master format. Once the master is made, I offload it, and then cut my deliverables. Usually web based mp4 or DVD.

[Perrone Ford]

Let me answer a couple of questions.

1. Filters. Yes, I can’t use any because I don’t have any. Unfortunately, I don’t have resources to go buy pro diffusion either but I have been using some fabrics in 4×4 screens that’s been working nicely for me. The trouble of course is that in the 2-shot, if the light is off camera, then one person is going to be more lit than the other. This may work in the context of shot though because One will likely receive more key and the other more fill.

2. Panythose trick. Since I am shooting a video camera here and not film and not a 35mm adapter, I can’t use anything behind the lens. I’ll have to soften in post. Magic Bullet Looks offers a skin softening setting that I’ve tested and found works well.

3. Butterfly lighting. I’d seen this setup in the past and forgotten about it. Not sure I’ll be going that direction but looks interesting nonetheless.

I guess the question at hand is do I key off-center or do I key flat from the front. If I use the 8ft board to key from the front, I can add a bit of lighting from one side or the other to add a bit of interest. I don’t want to blast them with frontal lighting, but just use enough to get my exposure and fill in some lines.

I’ll try to find a crafty way to take some shadow off the neck, but I think a reflector on a table out of frame will do the trick just fine.

In terms of the video, it’s a training video. We have essentially three sources for this thing. One is the 1-up or 2-up interview, one is generated text over motion backgrounds, and the third will be short skits with voice over. The script is not mine, but I’ve had a bit of creative freedom with it, but it needs to be simple. I’m not making a movie, just a training video. 🙂 So although I want to make these women look good, I don’t have a Hollywood budget. I’ve built up my lighting, audio, and camera package at the office over time and simply have not accumulated everything yet.

I appreciate all the ideas. Let me know if you have more.

[Perrone Ford]

Both resolutions are included in the Rec 709 spec. There is only a war in marketing!

[Perrone Ford]

Yes,

Uncompressed isn’t too helpful!

You have a couple of choices:

1. Render lossless AVI *use Sony YUV*
2. Render lossless MOV *use MJpegA or PNG Best*
3. Render to smaller but slightly lossy format like AVCHD/MP4

Any of those will improve your situation immensely.

[Perrone Ford]

Thanks Del,

I had a nice conversation with a premier vendor in this area regarding this technology. They do sell a box that seems to address all my needs though it is a sizable investment. It can take HD or SD video in over separate SDI interfaces, and it can output over SDI. The output depends on what is being input. It also has the ability to accept captioning via built-in modem, or via internet connection.

So the question now, is simply how to record that SDI signal on the far end, post-captioning. This unit did not offer any type of analog out, and I fear I may well not find a unit that does.

I have some ideas, but nothing concrete yet.