Updated 9 September 2002 WELCOMING FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQ) for rec.video.desktop Welcome to the rec.video.desktop Usenet newsgroup. Before you rush off to post, read this small document. It attempts to answer the most Frequently Asked Questions about the rec.video.desktop newsgroup. This is not a full-blown group FAQ. Instead, this welcome note should help guide you to the information you need and are looking for. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. CHARTER OF REC.VIDEO.DESKTOP 2. GENERAL COURTESY AND NEWSGROUP SPECIFIC CONVENTIONS How to post so that you don't look foolish or upset people 3. MOST FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT DESKTOP VIDEO 1. Which video camera/video card should I buy? 2. Which software should I use for...? 3. How do I transfer home videos and TV shows to my computer? 4. How do I burn DVDs and VCDs?/Will it work with my player? 5. How do I avoid dropped frames? 6. Which is better...? 7. Is 'company-name' a good online retailer? 4. NEWSGROUP RESOURCES 1. The Adam Wilt DV FAQ 2. VCDhelp.com 3. Jim Taylor's DVD Demystified DVD FAQ 5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS --------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. CHARTER OF REC.VIDEO.DESKTOP "This group will exist to serve as a forum for users of the increasingly affordable computer-based video editing systems. It will cover all platforms' lower-end (say, under $10-15,000) desktop video setups, including hardware, software, peripherals, and resources, as well as information concerning submittals to and schedules of any amateur video contests and film festivals. This would, for instance, exclude the Avid Media Composer, as it is largely a professional package, but would not exclude Avid's lower-end offerings. The purpose of this limit is to focus the discussion into a price range reasonable for amateurs -- high-end users should consult rec.video.production. Advocates for particular platforms will be encouraged to develop platform-specific FAQs; no r.v.d FAQ, however, shall ever list a contact address for "America's Funniest Home Videos." About this group: The rec.video.desktop Usenet newsgroup offers a forum in which to discuss past, current and future desktop video solutions, devices and software. Feel free to ask for help or advice on how best to perform capture, editing and production tasks using cameras and other related hardware such as converters, cards, DVD/CD burners, etc. This group does not permit commercial posts. Do not sell your hardware, your business or your site on this group. Regarding America's Funniest Home Videos: P.O. Box 4333/Hollywood, CA 90078 2. GENERAL COURTESY AND NEWSGROUP SPECIFIC CONVENTIONS Please use standard Usenet netiquette when posting on r.v.d. Treat other posters with courtesy and follow standard conventions when replying to posts. Please trim the posts you reply to, retaining only the significant portions in your follow up. Preserve attributions (the bits that specify who wrote what in each post) and limit your signature to 4 lines or less. To ensure readability, do not use HTML in your posts and keep your line lengths to the Usenet standard of 80 characters. You can read more about netiquette at many sites, such as http://www.pbs.org/uti/guide/netiquette.html ** Do recall that this is Usenet. No one can "police" this group. ** We rely on individual courtesy to help this group function properly. 3. MOST FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT DIGITAL VIDEO Before posting, spend some time reading through the group, and searching google for previously answered questions. Point your Web browser at http://groups.google.com and search through the Google News archives of rec.video.desktop to find previously posted answers. To find recent articles, use the advanced search option and sort results by date. Nevertheless, there are a few questions that arise again and again, and to save you some time, we've included them here in this mini-FAQ. 1. Which video camera/video card should I buy? Of course, the answer to this will depend greatly on your personal needs and budget. Please search google groups to find previous discussions. You may also wish to search the main google.com engine for "video camera" review comparison For cameras, many people look for the following features: * External Microphone ports * Analog-video pass-through (allows your camera to convert video to a digital form, from VCRs, TVs, etc) * Cameras with 3-CCDs (higher quality video) Both miniDV and Digital-8 provide excellent quality digital video. Digital-8 systems tend to be a little less expensive. miniDV cameras tend to be smaller and lighter. Many Digital-8 cameras are "backwards compatible", and will play back and digitize Hi-8, etc. For digitizer cards, many people look for hardware MPEG-1/MPEG-2 encoding and hardware-based special effects. For IEEE-1394, many people seem to like the PYRO brand. 2. Which software should I use for...? There's an awful lot of software out there and people certainly have their favorites. Here are some that get mentioned a lot. Editing : Premiere (Mac, PC, www.adobe.com, $$-$$$) Media Studio/VideoStudio (PC, www.ulead.com, $$) iMovie (Mac, www.apple.com/iMovie, on new Macs) Vegas Video (PC, www.sonicfoundry.com, $$) Final Cut Pro (Mac, www.apple.com, $$$) Avid XPress DV (Mac,PC, www.avid.com, $$$) Encoding/ : TMPGEnc (PC, www.tmpgenc.net/e_main.html, free) Processing VCD Gear (PC, Mac, etc, www.vcdgear.com, free) VirtualDub (PC, www.virtualdub.org, free) Cleaner (PC, Mac, www.terran.com, $$$) Real Producer (PC, Mac, www.real.com, free) Windows Media Encoder (PC, www.microsoft.com, free) QuickTime Pro (Mac, www.apple.com/quicktime, $30) Burning : Nero (PC, www.ahead.de, $) Toast (Mac, www.roxio.com, $$) Authoring : Ulead DVD Factory & Wkshop (PC, www.ulead.com, $/$$) Sonic DVD Titles (PC/Mac, www.sonic.com, $-$$$) iDVD (Mac, www.apple.com, $) More titles appear daily Special : After Effects (Mac, PC, www.adobe.com, $$$) Effects Boris FX, Red (Mac, PC, www.borisfx.com, $$$) Although most of the following Audio software is unfamiliar to me, Rob (orb.tellis.net) recommends these: Audio Compositing: ProTools Free (Mac, PC, www.digidesign.com/ptfree/) ProTools (Mac, PC, www.digidesign.com, $$$) Nuendo (PC, Mac, www.nuendo.com, $$) Acid (PC, www.sonicfoundry.com, $$) Audio Editing: sonicWORX Basic (Mac, www.sonicworx.com, free) SparkME (Mac, www.tcworks.de, free) Sound Forge (PC Sound Editor, www.sonicfoundry.com, $$) Wavelab (PC Sound Editor, www.steinberg.com, $$) Bias Peak (Mac Sound Editor, www.bias-inc.com, $$) Audio FX Libraries: Samplenet (www.samplenet.co.uk, free) Sound Dogs (www.sounddogs.com, $) Acid Loops (www.sonicfoundry.com/loop_libraries, $) Video Helper (www.videohelper.com, $-$$) Hollywood Edge (www.hollywoodedge.com, $$) Find Sounds (search engine, www.findsounds.com) Thanks, Rob. And let me add (from my own experience): Royalty Free Music: FreePlayMusic (www.freeplaymusic.com, free) 3. How do I transfer home videos and TV shows to my computer? You can transfer your analog footage to your computer in a number of ways. Once transferred, you can edit and then compress them. * Use a digitizing board (typically a PCI card) * Use a USB digitizer (NOT recommended unless you're using USB-2. Older units can produce low-rez AVI files) * Use a digitizing box or digital camcorder with analog pass-through to convert analog to IEEE-1394-compliant digital video. Some programs, such as Cyberlink's PowerVCR allow you to connect directly to cable and record your shows on a timer. 4. How do I burn DVDs and VCDs?/Will it work with my player? Many DVD Recordable units are now available, including both DVD-R and DVD+RW styles. DVD-R drives remain less expensive and more ubiquitous. Debate continues on which standard will emerge victorious. I own a DVD-R myself. Software is now easily found to work with your DVD-R/DVD+RW burner. Prices range from $50 to over $1000 depending on the power and flexibility of the software involved. Blank discs now cost under a dollar in bulk. Both DVD-R's and DVD+RW's play back in about 80-90% of DVD players. You must convert your footage to compliant MPEG-2 before you can burn it on a DVD. As with VCDs, which use MPEG-1, this can take a lot of time. For how-to tips and specific help, please check out the marvelous www.vcdhelp.com Do note that VCDs come in several varieties, including SVCD and XVCD. As a rule of thumb, a VCD can store about an hour of so-so quality video. SVCDs can store about a half-hour of okay-quality video. MiniDVDs (DVD video stored on a CD) can store about 15-20 minutes of good quality video. Discover the formats your DVD player supports and what types of discs (CD-R, CD-RW, brand, etc) your player works with at the vcdhelp site. Recordable DVDs (4.7g) store from one to two hours depending on the encoding used. DVDs also come in double-sided (9.4) formats. It used to be that you needed to provide digital linear tape or glass master DVDs for reproduction, but more service bureaus are now accepting home authored discs for at least small production runs. Use http://www.vcdhelp.com/dvdplayers.php to determine player compatibility. 5. How do I avoid dropped frames? Use a fast disk, turn off background processes where possible and (possibly) enable DMA for your hard drive. (System/Device Manager/Disk Drives/your drive/Settings) Where possible, capture to a master disk (not slave) that is very empty and thoroughly defragged. 6. Which is better...? Whether comparing the merits of miniDV or digital-8, Mac versus PC, etc, do remember that each technology offers both pro's and con's. Stop by google to search for old debates before starting your own. 7. Is 'company-name' a good online retailer? Before posting, make sure to check previous posts with google. Then you may wish to stop by www.resellerratings.com, www.bizrate.com and the Better Business Bureau (www.bbb.org). Other consumer sites include * The Consumer Information Center http://www.pueblo.gsa.gov/ * The FTC Consumer Line http://www.ftc.gov/ftc/consumer.htm * The National Consumer Complaint Center http://www.alexanderlaw.com/nccc/index.html * Consumer World: http://www.consumerworld.org/ * The American Bar Association's Safe Shopping Site http://www.safeshopping.org/ 4. NEWSGROUP RESOURCES 1. Adam Wilt's DV FAQ You can find the latest version of the Adam Wilt FAQ at http://www.adamwilt.com/dV.html 2. VCDhelp.com If you want to know everything about VCD and DVD-R, stop by http://www.vcdhelp.com. It offers all the info you need to know, including DVD compatibility, how-to, tips and so forth. Be aware that VCDhelp.com is now experiencing bandwidth overload--many features are available only intermittently. 3. Jim Taylor's DVD Demystified DVD FAQ Promoting the DVD Demystified Book, this site, found at http://www.dvddemystified.com/dvdfaq.html offers a wide range of DVD and VCD help topics. 5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This FAQ owes much to John Novak of rec.arts.sf.written.robert-jordan. Parts of this FAQ have been extracted and osterized from the rec.photo.digital welcome FAQ. Thanks also to John Beale, David Bruce Murray, Avery Lee and Rob (orb@telus.net). Thanks too for those who made suggestions anonymously. Please send any updates, corrections and suggestions for this R.V.D. Welcoming FAQ to Erica Sadun, erica@mindspring.com