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Video Editors
4wd:
Normally I would advise against Vegas because I hate Sony.-Vurbal (March 06, 2014, 06:58 PM)
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If it helps, remember that they didn't create Vegas Video in the first place :)
Out of the NLE programs I've played with, (a few years ago now), it's still the one that was easiest to use and just worked without having to look at the manual.
Their DVD Architect program is a whole other animal though, I just could not wrap my head around how to do anything in it - DVD-Lab has it beaten hands down.
Referring back to the OP:
Anybody know of, or feel like writing a utility to scan video files MPEGs, AVIs etc for the gaps between "scenes".
The target market would be all amateur video photographers who tend to use their new toy more like a video snapshot camera and produce 90 minute tapes with loads of dross between the scenes.
That dross needs to be edited out and finding the stuff - almost frame by frame, takes an eternity.
These gaps are "normally" a few frames - or seconds, with the snowy interference pattern you get on a screen when the transmission ends but the TV is left on, or sometimes just black frames.
If the entire file could be scanned and an index built giving the position to within a couple of seconds, or frames - then it would make life so much easier.
-Happy Expat (March 05, 2014, 11:40 AM)
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This is exactly what Scenalyzer Live did for DV camcorders - originally US$35, it's now free.
You'd plug your DV camera into the firewire port on your computer, it'd scan the entire tape, (90min), in about 5 minutes at FF. At the end you'd have a window showing each clip on the tape, (date data is embedded in DV), you then select what clips you wanted and tell it to save them, (you could also join/split, trim out dropped frames, etc). It'd then control the camcorder to transfer every clip to your HDD.
A magic program and if you have a DV camcorder still, you really should be using it - it might even work with any newer solid state camcorder that has a firewire port. I honestly can't praise it enough.
Happy Expat:
4wd: Unfortunately, my camcorder is analogue and I don't have a TV card, thanks for your input anyway :Thmbsup:
Vurbal: New conundrum. Originally I captured on and old XP x32 and moved the files to my x64 Win8.1 box. When I thought I was finished I packed camcorder and tapes and filed them in the attic. If I'm going to start all over again would you recommend I:-
continue capture on the XP with a 32 bit version of VirtualDub
capture on the Win 8.1 utilising 32 bit VirtualDub
capture on the Win 8.1 with a 64bit version of VirtualDub
I understand from their site that the x32 version supports more CODECS than the x64
How did life ever get so complicated?
Vurbal:
There's no good reason not to stick with 32-bit for capturing since all it would get you is access to more memory you won't use. I haven't used Win 8.1 and never captured anything (or ran Vdub at all that I remember) on Win8. It can't hurt to try it out.
Vurbal:
Normally I would advise against Vegas because I hate Sony.-Vurbal (March 06, 2014, 06:58 PM)
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If it helps, remember that they didn't create Vegas Video in the first place :)
-4wd (March 07, 2014, 12:52 AM)
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I know - the first version I used was from the pre-Sony days. IIRC it was made by Sonic Foundry.
Mostly I just don't want to give Sony my money though.
Out of the NLE programs I've played with, (a few years ago now), it's still the one that was easiest to use and just worked without having to look at the manual.
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I looked at a few of the Sony versions just to see if they'd mess it up. I actually thought they would but they really haven't. And it's always been that good an interface too.
If I was going to buy that sort of all in one editor right now though I'd go with Magix Pro. The interface is probably a little more cluttered but I love that it has Matroska support. And no Sony. Yeah I really hate them that much.
What I'm actually using though is something a lot simpler and stripped down called Lightworks. It's the first PC version of the first NLE ever made. Previously it was exclusively something professional (mostly cinema) editors used. They still have some work to do on it and even they're dragging their feet on an open source release they promised long ago. OTOH it's free unless you want a couple licensed codecs and titling support. Those features cost something like $40 a year.
Normally I don't buy subscription based software but I might make an exception for Lightworks Pro. I love that they're really only charging you for the extra features and then the support packages (most of the cost) are split into their own thing as well.
Their DVD Architect program is a whole other animal though, I just could not wrap my head around how to do anything in it - DVD-Lab has it beaten hands down.
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DVD-Lab Pro is probably the second best software investment I ever made, behind Acronis TrueImage 9. What always impressed me was how it managed to be completely user friendly and still the most powerful prosumer authoring program available.
4wd:
4wd: Unfortunately, my camcorder is analogue and I don't have a TV card, thanks for your input anyway :Thmbsup:-Happy Expat (March 07, 2014, 05:17 AM)
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Your EzyCAP device is just a TV tuner without the tuner, it uses the same Philips chipset as a lot of analog TV cards, (I've got an EzyCAP lying around here somewhere - the internal TV card always performed better for me).
But here's a suggestion you may not have thought of to make capturing Hi8 ridiculously easy and if you have a lot of Hi8 tapes to do, it might be worthwhile.
Back when MiniDV camcorders were popular, (around 2000), Sony brought out the Digital8w camcorder format, this allowed the camcorder to record DV on to Hi8 tapes.
There was one very good side benefit of this - the camcorder, (model dependent), could convert analog recorded Hi8 tapes to digital output.
Put the tape in the camcorder, plug it into the firewire port, run Scenalyzer Live, scan tape, extract wanted clips. No fiddling with codecs, capture settings, etc and less prone to dropped video frames.
Sony Digital8 camcorders are still available on ebay, some at very cheap prices. I'm willing to bet that most of them these days are used for Hi8 -> DV conversion and when the job is done they are sold on.
Check the model number first - even better if you can find someone who still has one and will lend it to you.
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