[Ron Craig]

Faster is always better. Bigger (display, hard drive, etc.) is always better. Expandability and adaptability are always better. Your answer is clear from a video editing perspective: the 17″ is better. Period. But you are looking for a compromise computer; one that you can edit on and carry around for classes, etc. That’s understandable. But just realize that you really aren’t looking for what’s “best;” you’re looking for what is the best compromise.

Go with what works with your overall set of needs. Either computer will do the job for you. If you don’t want to spend the money for the 17″ and lug around its weight every day get the 15″. No matter which you choose, if you’re serious about editing, before long you’ll become frustrated with your machine and want a better one — whether you choose the 15″ or the 17″! All of us who have been doing this for a long time have been through a number of editing computers through the years.

[Ron Craig]

Woo-hoo! Good news for me. Thanks, Rafael!!

-Ron

[Ron Craig]

Thanks very much for your answers, Chris and Rafael. That gave me a BIG part of what I was looking for. I’m afraid, though, that I failed to ask a very key question in my first post:

These Super 8 films have mag stripe sound. Changing the frame rate of the video would obviously affect the pitch and quality of the audio. Do you have any advice about how I can deal with that? I’m wondering if there is a way for me to process the audio separately to match the length of the video without changing the pitch/quality of the sound. Perhaps some kind of re-recording? I will experiment with this but if you guys have any words on wisdom I sure would appreciate hearing them.

Cheers,

Ron

[Ron Craig]

Is it hot where you are today? I always keep a fan turned on directly in front of my Mac. Maybe it’s just mine but this machine is very sensitive to heat. I learned this a couple of years ago when I was getting a series of crashes that I couldn’t connect to any consistent cause. Neither could the local Apple Geniuses.

Then I thought about all the data centers I’ve been in and how much effort and expense those operations go to in order to keep all the servers cool. So, I tried the fan and my crashing problem went away. It wasn’t all that warm in my edit room but apparently it was just warm enough to make the Mac unhappy.

Here’s hoping your problem is just as easy to solve.

[Ron Craig]

Phil, there’s no need to be so defensive and self righteous.

Self-righteous? Can’t one express reasonable opinions here with conviction and passion without being personally criticized? If not, let’s start a forum where one can.

Your mileage may vary from mine

Now that’s better.

[Ron Craig]

Good one. I like the way they offer French, for example, in two or three different dialects.

I also found voiceoverdirectory.com, which looks interesting.

Thanks!

[Ron Craig]

And, there it is: The answer that taught me something.

Thanks, Paul!

[Ron Craig]

What a wonderful contributor to our FCP community Chris Poisson was. And for me, what a surprise to hear of his passing. I will miss reading his many contributions. Chris’ dedication of time to help many of us find our way through the ever-changing workflows of post production was a wonderful contribution to this online community that surely came from his heart as well as his head.

I’m sure he was a man that his family and friends feel lucky to have had in their lives.

So long, Chris.

[Ron Craig]

Have you Googled “flicker removal”? There are various plug-ins that purport to do this. I haven’t used them so perhaps others can chime in. But perhaps you can buy a quick fix…

[Ron Craig]

Is your client trying to compare the way the logo looks in print with the way it look on a monitor? My immediate flip response is to send him/her an apple and an orange and see if he/she understands. Print and video are simply two different things and there will never be a perfect match.

After all, what kind of monitor are they using to view this? How is that monitor set up? What happens when they try to view it on a different monitor? It won’t look the same on that second monitor, right? And this isn’t even taking into consideration the differences in color space and “resolution” that exist between print and video.

Bottom line: Do the very best you can to adjust color and saturation to make the client happy. But you have to teach the client that a perfect match is impossible.