best program to transfer/edit with?

HacksawEddie

hi
i have a mini dv attached to the comp with firewire.
i want to put the recorded tapes onto the pc, edit them a bit -
not too much, just split them up, maybe simple graphics-
and then burn them to dvd with some menus.
can anyone recommend any particular programs that may be most suitable or have the most options for this?

lodgepole

Pinnacle Studio 8 will do everything you need and is simple to use. It can also be reasonably powerful, especially given the price. It costs about €100 which is as cheap as you'll get if you're looking for quality.

Movie Maker for Windows XP will do the job as far as editing goes, though it's considerably more basic than Pinnacle. It's advantage is that it's free. I'm not sure of any good DVD authoring packages that are free though.

HacksawEddie

great thanks.
how about adobe premier 6?
i have a friend that has that i think, so i could borrow it off him to try it out.
or would pinnacle be pretty much the same in terms of capabilities?

lodgepole

Premiere 6 is a much more powerful editing program. It's also got a much higher learning curve, which is fine if you have experience in video editing. If you don't it could be quite daunting at first. Pinnacle assumes a certain level of inexperience and that's why it's simple to use. It's a great place to start because, like I said, it doesn't stop at being basic. But it doens't get as powerful as Premiere, nowhere even close. Premiere doesn't have inbuilt DVD authoring either, the equivalent software is Adobe Encore DVD. Even if money was no object, i'd probably recomend Pinnacle above an Adobe suite to a beginner. From what you described Premiere is probably too much, ie it's capable of far more than you need.

HacksawEddie

great!
i'll stick to pinnacle for now.
cheers

davmigil

Second that. Using Pinnacle Studio 7 for a while now. I've used Premiere too, but for editing up some home video, putting in a few fades etc. and maybe a title, Pinnacle is much handier.

The only thing I found with Pinnacle was that its mpeg2 encoder gave slightly blocky results. Spent $50 on Canopus Basic Encoder and amazed at improvement in quality (they do a watermarked trial if you want to try it).

Studio 7 doesn't have DVD authoring, so I am using Ulead DVD Factory. Like Pinnacle it mightn'd be the most sophisticated, but it does allow you to have customised menus with moving previews and background music. ie does the job fine.

-Toppy-

Me personally I like Sony Vegas, it seems pretty powerful but not as hard to figure out as Premiere, just my 2c
-Toppy-

Marcopolo85

davmigil wrote:

Second that. Using Pinnacle Studio 7 for a while now. I've used Premiere too, but for editing up some home video, putting in a few fades etc. and maybe a title, Pinnacle is much handier.

The only thing I found with Pinnacle was that its mpeg2 encoder gave slightly blocky results. Spent $50 on Canopus Basic Encoder and amazed at improvement in quality (they do a watermarked trial if you want to try it).

Studio 7 doesn't have DVD authoring, so I am using Ulead DVD Factory. Like Pinnacle it mightn'd be the most sophisticated, but it does allow you to have customised menus with moving previews and background music. ie does the job fine.

Your problem with Pinnacle could have been caused by your system resources. Pinnacle, like any good video editing program, is memory hungry.
I use Pinnacle Studio 9, which is vastly superior to 7/8, both of which suffer from synch (vision/sound) problems. Even when using 9, you need to download the patch from www.pinnaclesys.com You will need broadband for this, as it's 27 Mb in size.

I have completed three projects using S9, all without any problem. Only thing to watch for is that if you use the chapter menu, many copying programs will not recognise the finished product, aprt from Pinnacle's own Instant Copy.

I would certainly recommend, unless you're going into video production on a grand scale, against using Premiere. It is a truly staggering program, with facilities second to none - it also retails at stg£600!!

So, my advice (if you want to do it right without losing all your hair!) is to invest in a Pentium IV of at least 2.4GHz, at least 768 Megs of RAM, along with a second dedicated 7200 RPM Hard Drive.

You can buy Studion DV/AV 9 (which includes a breakout box for capturing analogue video, along with Sudio 9 software) in PC world for €269......not a lot when you pitch it against stg£600 for Premiere alone.

Unless you have a real time card (like the Matrox RT 100) installed, a two-hour video will take approximately 5 hours to render and burn using Studio 9.

daveg

If your capturing as an Mpeg check my post here --> http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=196608

davmigil

Anybody tried this yet? Any opinions?
I saw a review in this months PCW and it sounded interesting. Some interesting 'advanced' features, DVD authoring (alas no moving menues).

As stated before, I'm using Pinnacle 7 for home movie stuff. Like to keep it simple, nothing flashy. But option of going a bit more advanced for not too big a price appealing.

Sorry marcopolo, missed out on your post until now! Your minimum spec describes my PC exactly (Are you psychic? Cue twilight zone music), although it is an overclocked 1.8 P4 running happily at 2.4Ghz! Before that got by though on P3 500Mhz | 512Mb and one drive for a while though. House used to be lovely and warm after little PC was rendering all night and into the day!

Maybe Pinnacle's MPEG2 encoder has been improved for V8 or 9. I'm a total perfectionist and I just found that its rendering of stuff like fast moving water and action shots went a bit blocky.

As a test download the free Canopus encoder (puts in a watermark) and encode the same piece of film (lots of movement, camera shake, fast moving subjects, fast running streams or fountains, also frames of all grass and stuff) and see 1. How long each takes 2. Which gives clearer picture.

All the best,

Dave