Hello-

This is my first post. Even though I live in Greece my English is good because I grew up in Chicago.

I like what I've been reading about the Panny SDR-S100- I love the concept of solid state video- no moving parts to wear out, and no motor noise... but have a couple questions involving editing.

Basically what I do is record 5-7 hours of home movies a year and edit it down to a couple hours at year's end. I also sometimes do two-camera shoots at events in my local church (holiday concerts and conferences).

I'm wondering how hard it is to edit the MPEG2 files the SDR shoots in. Here's one take I found on the internet on trying to edit MPEG2:

"While MPEG2 may be an excellent compression and playback format (that's why it's on the DVDs your rent and buy), it's not so good for editing. This is because its file structure is just too complicated for your computer to plow through in "real time" while editing. Like trying to sprint through a molasses swamp..."

So how is editing in this format for those of you with the SDR-S100? I don't get too fancy in my editing: a few transitions and titles and I'm happy.

A second question is for those of you with cams in both MPEG2 format and MiniDV. HOw do you keep your home movies in chronological sequence? Let's say I'm using my miniDV cam in the house for events like birthday parties, family fights, etc., but I use the SDR for outdoor events like trips to the beach and anti-American demonstrations in the streets of Thessaloniki because the cam is portable and likes lots of light. Both of these indoor and outdoor events form part of my life for the year, and ideally should find themselves in chronological sequence in my end of the year home movie DVDs. My guess is that the two do not mix well at all, and that I would have to choose between one format and the other for my home movies, i.e., do my event videography at church in miniDV, and all the home stuff in MPEG2. Certainly I would assume that it would be totally impractical to do a two camera shoot using the two different formats, right?
Thanks for any input--

Hi
In general every mpeg2 file can be converted to DV-avi and then it can be edited(and mixed with other DV-avi files) as usual with the various editing programs. Disadvantage is that the final movie must be reencoded to mpeg2 again which will decrease the video quality. If you can live with that lower quality then you will not have any editing limitations.
To have best video quality you should avoid that your mpeg2 files will be reencoded. This can be done by using editing software that use smart encoders. These smart encoders will automatically detect mpeg2 material inside the whole movie and will just encode the remaining non-mpeg2 parts. This means that you can also mix mpeg2 material with DV-avi. It is important to know that every modification to a mpeg2 clip(adjusting color,brightness,contrast,etc) will automatically force the smart encoder to reencode. If you add transitions and titles then the smart encoder will just reencode these parts but leave the remaining mpeg2 parts untouched. Adding an additional sound track will result in reencoding the audio part only.
Software that I know which have smart encoders are Ulead Videostudio/Mediastudio and Womble mpeg video wizzard.
Hope that helps
Regards
Sektionschef

Yeah- interesting that about losing video quality every time mpeg2 is reencoded.

Do you know whether Adobe Encore DVD2 is an MPEG2 editing software? I mean, obviously it's a good DVD authoring program, but is Womble my only choice for editing MPEG2 video I've shot with the S-100? T
hanks

Hi
So far I know Adobe Encore can only be used for authoring a DVD, not for editing. As mentioned in my last post Ulead Videostudio is an alternative to Womble.
There may exist other editors with smart encoders but I just know these two.
You could try to get a video footage of the SDR-S100, convert it to DV-avi, edit it, reencode it to mpeg2, author a DVD and make your own opinion about the quality loss. Maybe it is acceptable for you then you can use any video editing sw you like.
I am sure many others do it in this way and are happy with their results and don't know that they could have had better video quality when using video editors with smart encoders .
Regards
Sektionschef

..for the valuable info...

I highly recommend Womble Video Wizard for editing the MPEG2 files from the SDR-S100. It's moderately priced and does a credible job.

www.womble.com

Bye.

Hi
For those who are interested I have put two mpeg2 files onto the web showing my little daughter:
SDR-S100original.mpg
SDR-S100reencoded.mpg
The first is the original mpeg2 file recorded with the SDR-S100 in SP mode. I have then converted this file to uncompressed AVI and then reencoded it back to mpeg2 using TMPGEnc V2.5(settings: 2passVBR,5Mbs max. bitrate).
Both files are PAL 704X576 25fps and 16:9 widescreen, each is about 15MB of size(duration about 25s).
Make your own opinion about the quality loss due to reencoding.
Regards
Sektionschef

A beautiful little girl, sektionschef!

When you say 'uncompressed AVI' do you mean truly uncompressed or DV-AVI. Full uncompressed video files are extremely large as compared to DV-AVI. Many people believe DV is uncompressed but it is actually compressed 5:1 over uncompressed video. So, an hour of uncompressed video would take up the same amount of space as 5 hours of DV depending on the codec used to create the uncompressed AVI.

Hi Guy
It was truly uncompressed, no DV compression.
The machine that I currently use does not have a DV-codec installed that's why I used uncompressed format instead.
In practice one would convert to DV-avi instead of uncompressed avi to minimize the filesizes.
At home I have a DV-codec from Panasonic which I think can be downloaded as freeware(no trail) from the internet.
If my baby gives me a little time then I will try to create another reencoded mpeg2 file from a DV-avi instead although I assume that there should't be a big difference.
Regards
Sektionschef

Ok, thanks. I wouldn't expect significant difference going to DV-AVI, either.

Good job Sektionschef! I almost feel like I know your daughter after all your posts since way before she was born

Viewing the video there does not appear to be any difference. If you do some good frame grabs, blow them up to 1690x1382 then you start to see the degradation. But it doesn't really matter and not visible when watching the video. You apparently did the shooting and re-encoding properly as for some people (including me) at times seem to just do something wrong along the way.

Trust me, the video quality will start to seem to improve in a year or so and continue to get better...

Again, good job, and thanks for posting the sample, I am sure you are enjoying the camera (and the cute daughter)

Rich

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Thanks Poncho

Don't understand what you mean with
"Trust me, the video quality will start to seem to improve in a year or so and continue to get better..."?

Another thing:
Unfortunately I can not store these two clips for a long time on my webspace. Can anyone else provide a longer lasting webspace for them?
I need to remove these files soon....
Regards
Sektionschef

You can put them on a file hosting service: http://www.pana3ccduser.com/showthread.php?t=3785

Or, you can create your own album and post them at www.fortvir.net. (It's ok, I know the admin.)

It's called memories. Your memory will start to fail. Looking at a photo or video a few years later you will be glad you took the time to capture those images, regardless of what equipment you used. Twenty years from now your daughter will smile when she watches that video. I wish I would have taken even more pictures of the houses I lived, the neighborhoods, the neighbors, friends, the cars my parents had etc 30 years ago. So the video quality will seem to improve over the years.



Rich

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I see. I could even think that in 20years, when we all use SHDV(super high definition ) I will ask myself:" how could I accept this lousy 704X576 PAL format at that time?

By the way, I am still looking for good backup-concept for my mpeg2 recordings that I AM able to watch these memories in 20-30years.
Do you know any good studys about longevity of digital media?
I still don't know what media I should use: Gold-DVD-R,DVD-RAM, or MOD(magneto-optical disks)?
regards
Sektionschef