I'm about to buy a new DVD403, and am curious about recommended accessories. I do plan to buy a 3-pack of mini DVD-RWs and a carrying case.

Do you recommend buying the extended life battery?

Are there any other accessories that are recommended?

Now onto editing software. I plan only the simplest types of edits (cutting out boring parts, and splicing together different clips to burn onto a regular-size DVD). Still, I would rather not buy editing software that doesn't support the Dolby 5.1 surround sound that comes with the camcorder.

It seems from my research that the only software that supports Dolby 5.1 to date is Pinnacle, but I have been deterred from Pinnacle by reports of bugginess and crashes. I am inclined to edit just using the OEM software that comes with the camcorder, and wait until Ulead or Sony Movie Studio come out with consumer-level editing software that includes support for Dolby 5.1.

In short, is the OEM software terrible for the basic type of editing that I want to do?

P.S. It looks like Nero 6.6 Reloaded also supports Dolby 5.1. Is this so much better than the OEM software for very basic editing?

The first thing I wanted to do was outfit my bag with all accessories available. So I bought the bag first.

I have realized after many devices in my life that I would buy one accessory at a time and see where I should stop instead of breaking the bank for unneeded items all at once.

Here is what I got (from B&H Photo - Video):
Sony VCT-D680RM Remote Control Tripod
Sony LCMDVDB Semi Soft Carrying Case
Sony VCL-HG0730X 30mm 0.7x High-Grade Wide Angle Converter Lens
Sony HVL-HIRL Combination Video and Infrared Light


From Adorama, I bought:
Sony VF30CPKS 30mm Filter Kit with Protection Filter, Circular Polarizer Filter & Case

From BestBuy, I bought the:

Sony BC-TRP wall-mount Battery Charger

From Power101 I bought:
2 NP-FP90 InfoLithium® P Series Rechargeable Battery Packs

The Sony NP-FP90's are $150.00 each. Power101.com sells a Chinese knock-off for $9.61.

The Sony brand is 2460 mAh maximum capacity
The knock-off is 2600 mAh maximum capacity.

When using the combo-IR/light, I will need the extra mA hours and the price is far better... and I have had no problems with the batteries.

You can buy some Cokin filters and lenses from Bestbuy, but I prefer the Sony ones as they come with covers and pouches where the Cokin does not. Cokin does have a nice selection of filters whose aspects can be previewed interactively online - it's pretty cool.

Although I am no fan of digital zoom, I doubt I will have any need for a telephoto lens. I tried one for a day and it has some vignetting around the edges which means you have to remove it if you want to pull back on the zoom. Even on a tripod, I couldn't hold the camera steady enough.

The Wide Angle by Sony is a MUST HAVE. If you are filming events indoors or trying to capture street/city scenes or landscape - you need this lens. Cokin's wide-angle lens is a 0.5x and the Sony is a 0.7x (with covers and pouch). Basically, (in 16:9) at a 15-foot distance without lens, I get a field of view 18-20 feet wide. With the wide angle lens, I get about a 25-27 foot FOV.

I did not care for the plastic Wide angle and spent a bit more for the aluminum.

The silver semi-soft carry case is also a must-have. I cannot carry around a huge camera bag just for the video camera and this thing reflects sun off it keeping the camera cool - just don't strap it to your waist in my presence... geek.

The remote control tripod is awesome! It has a real smooth motion to it and you can zoom, record and stand-by - all from the grip! I picked this tripod due to price and height. It is expandable from 19" to 57" and has a nice cordura-type carry case.

I just purchased the the HVL-HIRL Combination Video and Infrared Light and should receive it tomorrow. I have found that I do need this. We filmed some friends at a BBQ over July 4th and near sunset, I could see things in the viewfinder very easily, but found that during playback without any editing, it was very dark. My wife likes to film our cats now and then and they tend to become more active outside as it gets dark. I used my normal infra-red spotter light in conjuction with the camera and found it worked very well, so I hope this frees up one of my hands...

Software:

I bought and returned Adobe Premiere Elements - enough said. I bought and have kept Pinnacle Studio 9 plus. I will also buy some of the add-on music scores you can get. They are really nice sounding and don't have that gay tinny sound to it (I don't mean homosexual gay - I mean gay as the original adjective...). I like the fact that you can preview all of the scores before buying the package as well.

Please tell me if you have found ANY software where you can cut film "strips" I have not yet, and I have a DVD403 as well.

please send answer to my e-mail: jjensen@pt.lu

thanks a LOT in advance.
Jan

I've had my 403 now for about two weeks. I love it. All I wanted was to take my old home videos on VHS tape and camcorder tape, digitize them, and save them onto DVD so that I could easily copy the DVDs and share them with relatives. With a few small speedbumps, I've been able to achieve my goal.

For the camcorder's carrying case, a lot of the ones that are advertised with the accessories catalog are in fact much too large for this small camcorder. The smaller size cases seem to work much better.

For editing software, I never even bothered to install the OEM software provided with the camcorder. I did the 30-day trial of TMPGEnc, and am so happy with it that I just bought the software. I finalize my mini-DVD-RWs on the camcorder, put the mini-DVDs in my rewritable DVD drive on my computer, import them into TMPGEnc using the "Add DVD-Video" feature, and save the footage to my hard drive. I get the entire mini-DVD on my hard drive in about 10-15 minutes, and can then edit away to my heart's content.

Dubbing from VHS tapes or camcorder tape to the DVD camcorder has been completely painless, and I have been able to detect no loss of quality from the dubbing. Sony seems to have put a lot of effort into the dubbing capability, including the proprietary cable (which includes some type of filter to screen out electronic noise and vibration). At first, I wasn't sure whether I should edit the tapes during the dubbing process to the camcorder, versus dubbing the entire unedited tapes and doing the editing on the computer. In hindsight, there is no contest between the two. It is so much easier to dub the entire unedited tape, and do all the editing on the computer after the video footage is digitized.

There is no loss of either 5.1 surround or 16:9, if that is what has been recorded. Even basic stereo or mono is converted to Dolby 2 / AC3 (I think that's what it's called). TMPGEnc doesn't seem to convert the footage to any significant degree, meaning that the import times are minimal and the editing is very fast. The editing capability is stripped down, but it does all that it necessary for me and is again, remarkably fast. I recommend that anyone try it on the 30-day free trial. Once the DVD is fully edited on the hard drive, rendering the final version to a 2-hour DVD format can take about 30-40 minutes, plus the DVD burning can be an additional 45 minutes to 1 hour.

I gave up on using the burning program included with TMPGEnc. Too many coasters. I found that it's much better to use the native burning software that comes with the DVD burner, and copy the Audio_TS and Video_TS folders to the 12 cm DVD in the same way as if you were doing a data transfer to the DVD.

The only thing you miss from TMPGEnc is fades, voice overs and other video effects. None of these really matter for my purposes, so I'm quite happy with my current set-up.

What kind of burner do you have, what speed are burning at ?

I can do 2 hour movies at 12X in under 10 minutes (NEC 3520A) with riplock removed. You have to change the drives firmware, just make sure you get the correct firmware.

Post what type of drive you have and maybe I can assist you.

PS: Are you Cajun/French, I see the X on the end of your name, I'm Cajun .....

DW

Actually Acadian: My ancestors were the French-Canadians that were unlucky enough to move to chilly New England, rather than balmy Louisiana

For me, burning to a DVD-RW takes about 40 minutes at 2x speed, while burning to DVD-R is only about 10 minutes at 8x speed. My computer's DVD drive is much slower for -RWs versus -Rs. So I prefer DVD-Rs for that reason.

Yes, balmy LA, not there now, i'm in the western desert ..

I can burn 4.7 in about 6-7 mins at 12x using TYG01 (4x) or TYG02 (8x). As I mentioned previously, I removed the ripguard and use Ziggy & Dees firmware to acheive this. I might need to bring the speed down a little in making my own movies. I also prefer -R as well, but will use 1.4 -RW's in the camera just for transfering purposes, and being able to reuse it again after dumping the images/files on my HD.

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DW