I've been studying the camcorder forums for several months trying to decide what HD cam to buy (my first). The big issue now for me is whether to go with a tape drive or HDD. The consensus seems to be that ACVHD is not quite ready for prime time (sorry for that dumb cliche). I love the convenience factor of a HDD cam, for quickly moving files to my PC and so that I can have direct access to the clips on the cam to review or delete (since I expect to do a lot of experimenting)- but all this talk about editing headaches is discouraging. I suppose by now most of the major NLEs have updated to AVCHD support- but how good is this new software? Will AVCHD files continue to be more difficult to edit than HDV?

Also, we hear that you need a more powerful computer to edit ACVHD- but how powerful is enough? Of course different NLEs will have different needs.

I hope some magazine writers or cam mfgs. will be reading this post and one of their pros will write a definitive study of the state of AVCHD at this time (Dec. '07)- discussing all the NLEs- so that those of us sitting on the fence can make a decision. Yes, I have read many articles in magazines and on the net on this issue but none seem to be current as far as software development is concerned.

woodsman

Woodsman:

You seem to have read up somewhat.

I also would love the convenience factor of a HDD camcorder but the extra requirements and time for extensive editing of AVCHD for me is enough to go with HDV. Since I have been using tape since it replaced film it is not a big of an issue for me as it appears to be for some people.

Yes, I have tried editing AVCHD and HDV on my systems. There is no doubt AVCHD requires more computer resources. Most people are talking Quad Core systems.

The NLE software which edits AVCHD is doing it quite well. It did take a while for it to appear on the market. But people are now editing AVCHD.

"Will AVCHD files continue to be more difficult to edit than HDV?" I would not say more difficult, but it will always require more computer resources. I use Sony Vegas 7 which edits AVCHD video created by Sony camcorders with no problems, it just takes longer than HDV, and AVCHD does not play smoothly on my systems.



Rich

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FireWire Survey

Poncho,

Here's a question that I have no clue about, regarding editing HDV vs AVCHD.

Let's say you've edited clips + sound, enough to produce an hour long HD video. In my case I have an Intel duel core 2.13 Ghz, 2 gigs of RAM. I have a Dell 24" flat screen and the video card is a NVIDIA, GeForce 7900 GS with 256 MB onboard. Now, roughly how long will it take my PC to "render" the hour long video- assuming I'm not doing anything else with the PC. Oh, I have Vista Ultimate. I just need a ballpark figure- 10 minutes? 3 hours?

And, for conrast, if I were to be rendering the same movie but starting with AVCHD format- how much longer will it take? Or, if I can predict the answer- by the time I'm ready for rendering, I've already had to convert the clips to some other format, thus "rendering" this question moot?

BTW, I'm very computer literate and have a good basic understanding of film photography- I have a Nikon F100 35 mm- but I'm starting from scratch with video.

woodsman

woodsman:

How long it takes to render can vary, there are a lot of factors involved:

1. What is the definition of rendering? Is it applying editing commands to a video file (like adding fades, titles etc). Is it encoding a video file to a different format (like DV AVI to MPEG-2)? Or is it both?

2. Certain applied effects can have great effects on rendering speed, like doing color correction to a whole video.

3, Different NLE and encoders can have various effects on the time to process changes to the files. The computer can make a difference.

4. Editing can not only be using an NLE to edit a video but the editing can use an intermediate file/codec rather than editing native HD. Here is a better explanation http://www.vasst.com/hdv/hdv-FAQ.htm#intermediate

5. I have only done a little High Definition editing, just tests from available samples. HDV does render faster than AVCHD. I can't find my notes.

6. There as a render test of HDV "NEW Rendertest-HDV.veg" http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com...essageID=544857 which can give you an idea of the difference in speeds of various systems. I am 'Rich S' on 9/4/2007 4:00:17 PM




Not sure if that helps you, had hoped some people would chime in with some actual times.




Rich

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Rich, thanks for your comments- I'm just trying to learn as much as possible before I buy my first camcorder. I'm still stuck on whether to go with a Canon HV-20 or the HG-10.

Aside from the editing issues- my main concern, as I think I mentioned in the first message in this thread- is that I like getting fast feedback on what I'm doing- that is, if I'm experimenting with the camera, with the hard drive cam, it's going to be easy to view clips right away, if I don't like them, I can delete them and try something different- that is, ajust the cam settings to see if I can improve the image. With a tape cam, that will be more difficult, right? In fact, I read somewhere yesterday that by backing up the tape to view a clip- it's possible that that when it's then advanced to where it should be for the next clip, if not done carefully, a flag might get set which will indicate the end of the tape- and anything recorded after that might not be possible to capture. Also, with tape, if a clip is deleted (not sure if anyone actually does that)- that space can't conveniently be reused without the danger of the next clip to use that space going too far into the next clip. It really seems that this work should all be done digitally. It's clearly the wave of the future once the cams, the formatting specs, and our PCs are more powerful.

Also, regarding any gaps that might be created on a hard drive cam, after deleting clips- presumably new clips will attempt to fill those gaps- just like our PCs do. Because of that, I wonder if the cam hard drives have a function for defragmenting?

Joe

I have the hv20 and so far I really like it.

I did have a pana h18 that had 30 gig hard drive but I thought the colors looked a little washed out for me.

With tape you don't have to worry about deleting files in the field because you don't do it , like you do with hard drive, because you don't have to worry about space, 1 tape lasts 60 minutes, and cost 3-4 dollars a piece and can be reusable for next shoot.

I can review the tape and set it up for continuous so, it will NEVER over-write past scenes I was shooting (if I have NEW tape in it... not sure if you use a old tape that has stuff from past, others can comment). Or you can set tape to over-ride, in which case it will start any place in tape you want and continue. 2 settings which is great.

Hard drive thinking and tape drive thinking 2 different things, with hard drive you have to worry about space which is limited, with tape there is NO limit!

When you hook up HMDI you see results immediately and would know if corrections need to me made either for hard drive or tape HD.

At this point I have computer firewire hooked up and I save to PC as I'm watching what I taped using HMDI on HDTV and after it finishes downloading ...then decide what footage to delete, then use Super to convert to AVI settings so I can burn to DVD or transfer to other media that look HD, as good as Discovery channel 720p/1080i. A raw 160meg gets converted to 30 megs and looks great on my 32 HDTV!

The converting process takes hours and hours on my computer to do 60 minutes of HDTV, and it sounds like Hard drive models take even longer to convert than tape based models using same computer and the quality of the picture is not as good ( i hear). With HD models they say use the Highest setting which is 15mps, ... with DV it's 25mps. And if a hard drive model had 25mps setting everyone would say use that setting only.

People told me when I got the Pana h18 that the colors wouldn't be as good as tape because of compression and they were right, after a week, you start to forget about the benefit of hard drive , and start looking at the footage and want a more realistic look. So tape is better, this site says it, the pro's say it, but a lot of us Hard drive guys really want the hard drive to kick tapes butt, but not yet. Maybe next year!

ok, rgtaa- thanks for your comments. I think you are in the mainstream on this issue. I always like to hear what the mainstream is thinking as it's usually right on most matters, though I also examine the fringe elements.

I also asked this question in the subforum on Canon AVCHD cams. I expect there, that the members will rave about the HG10. It's too bad that cam's hard drive is only 40 gigs, which is a joke- you can buy a 500 gig drive today for not much over $100- so why did Canon get so cheap with 40 gig drive, which probably cost them very little.

Joe

Probably/possibly

1. Power consumption.

2. Size.

3. Weight.

4. Heat.

5. Software considerations.

6. Cost.

Rich

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All I can say with respect to how long to render, is that rendering an AVCHD clip on my Core 2 Quad 2.4GHz system with 2GB RAM and Vista in a HD project down to SD DVD 4:3 took a little more than real-time. 35 minutes took some 40-45 minutes last time I tried. (Vegas Movie Studio Platinum 8)

leothelion,

I just checked out the web site for Pinnacle Studio Ultimate to see what the hardware requirements are for editing AVCHD. It turns out that your duel core 2.4 GHZ system is the minimum! Unfortunately I only have a 2.13 GHz system. Do you happen to know what the minimum is for Vegas Studio P.?

To others here, how about other software? It would be nice if someone could compile the minimum CPU for each software for editing AVCHD. This issue alone will probably turn me away from buying a hard drive cam.

Joe

Here is a List of the major Video Editing Software, but it is too much trouble to update:
http://www.camcorderinfo.com/bbs/sh...89&postcount=28



Rich

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Joe,

I recently purchased Nero 8 Ultra Edition and it does a great job editing AVCHD and burning your edited AVCHD project to a AVCHD DVD that plays in full HD on a BDP or PS3. It's not real feature packed. but it will do titles, transitions, cuts, add music/sounds, and allow you to add a totally customizable multi page menu with selectable thumbnails of your choice. It's about all the editing program I need at this point in time. It may work well for you too. the system requirements are quite low. According to the Nero web site, here are the requirements;

Not bad for an AVCHD editor! My system is a HP Pavillion dv9000 with a Intel Centrino Duo T5500 @ 1.66GHz with 2GB RAM. It works just fine with it. I recently edited and burned a 38 min. AVCHD video and it took 4 hrs. 52 min. to transcode it and another 10 min. to burn the DVD. It plays beautifully in my BDP. It retained the 16:9 aspect ratio perfectly, and the Dolby 5.1 sound is perfectly intact.

Nero 8 Ultra Edition can be had for $100.00 or less.

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Ernie
Sony HDR-SR1 AVCHD HDD User

Ernie,

Good news that you found a workable system for your hard drive cam. Have you also owned a tape cam? If so, how do you compare the 2 for video quality and convenience?

Joe

Joe,

The last tape cam I owned was Hi8. And the cam I owned (and still own) before my HDD cam is a SD DVD cam.(Sony DCR-DVD403) I absolutely love the convenience the HDD affords me. You never have to worry about running out of media in the middle of an event. And you don't have to pack around extra media. I can't tell you how many times I've been caught off guard and been standing there saying, "come on, OPEN!" so I can replace the exhausted media in my camcorder. And while that's happening, something always really good is going on and I miss it. That is just never a problem with a HDD cam. I am also very happy with the video quality of the AVCHD on my SR1. I burn the AVCHD to standard DVD's and play them in a Blu-ray Disc Player (BDP) that's connected via HDMI to a 61" DLP HDTV. I think the HD video quality is gorgeous. But maybe I'm just easy to please. It easily outshines most of what I see in HD from my satellite HD system. I have never seen HDTV broadcast over the air because I'm 150 miles from the nearest HD broadcast tower. But I hear it's better.

The title of your thread is what I'm going to focus on now. Namely, the part that say's "at this time". Because recently in a discussion with a friend, I found myself saying, "Even though I absolutely love the convenience of the HDD in my SR1, if I had to do it over again, with what I know now and what’s available to buy on the market today, I would buy the Canon HV20". Why? Well, if I could have bought the HV20 before our last vacation (over a year ago) I wouldn’t have had to buy a new laptop ($1500.00) and been bothered with downloading video and burning DVD’s every night to clear the camcorder’s HDD for the next day’s shoot.(the SR1's HDD is only 30GB) I would have had to carry around extra tapes with me to get through each day. But when they were recorded to, I would have been done and wouldn't have had to deal with doing anything else with them at that time. Then I would just have to do any editing and disc burning when I got home. That would have freed up a lot of my evening. And the editing software is much easier to find to edit HDV than AVCHD. The only difference is that I would have to buy either a BD burner or HD DVD burner, depending on what kind of a HD player I decided to go with so that I could enjoy my edited HD video on my HDTV. But the HV20 can be had for about half of what I paid for my SR1. So that would easily cover the cost of a HD burner.

Having said all that now you would think that I am firm convert. But I'm not. The truth is, I'm still in a quandary over all of this. Because every time I pick up my SR1 I fall in love with it. It is just so convenient and easy to use. And I just love the fact that I never run out of media. It has a great feature set and feel to it. The HV20 feels like such a toy in comparison. And now that I have Nero 8, I can finally get down to some serious editing. (for me anyway) The only time it is inconvenient is when you're on a long vacation. But today, you can get AVCHD camcorders with HDD's as large as 100GB. (Sony HDR-SR8) If I had the SR8 when I was on my last 3 week vacation, I would'nt have needed the laptop for downloading. Because I only ended up shooting 80 gigs in 3 weeks as it was. And that was with shooting a lot of things and hour plus long shows and presentations. So I think 100 gigs would cover a pretty long vacation. And now that I have a Sony DVDirect VRD-MC5 stand alone DVD burner, I would just bring it along with a stack of DVD's and burn a few discs every night for backup. No need for the laptop in that scenerio. But I wouldn't delete the cam's HDD until I got home after downloading it to an external HDD as well.

AFAIC "at this time" there is no perfect consumer level camcorder out there. What would "I" consider to be the perfect consumer camcorder? It would be one with the feature set and build quality of the SR1. It would have a 100 gig HDD that is user upgradeable as the future offers larger HDD's. And it would have a slot for a Compact Flash Card with no built in size limitation. You would be able to record on either media, and be able to download files from the HDD to the memory card. It would also be able to download it's files to DVD, or a portable HDD without the need for a computer. Is this too much to ask for? I don't think so. We already have the technology to do all that right now. It's just not compiled yet into one convenient easy to use camcorder. Is cost the issue? No. All of these features could easily be compiled into one camcorder that would cost the same or less than the $1500.00 I paid for my SR1. It just boils down to the greed of the respective companies trying to keep you locked into "their" network of accessories. But I think the day will eventually come.

As for the future of AVCHD? My personal opinion is that it's going to stay at the consumer level. At least until they come out with a consumer camcorder that can record HDV to a HDD or Flash Drive.(they're already recording HDV to HDD's at the pro level) Then there would really be no need for AVCHD. I don't think it will ever make it to the Pro level. The quality is less than HDV and it takes more time to process. Those are both killers for somebody trying to make a living. AVCHD right now is all about convenience for the consumer with HD being made available on a tape less camcorder. Most consumers don't want to be bothered with editing. They just want to shoot the video, burn it to a disc, and watch it on their TV. That's why the DVD camcorders became so popular. You could just shoot it, take it out and put it in your DVD player, and you're done. With AVCHD, it just takes a little more coin to accomplish the same thing. But when HDV can finally be recorded to HDD's and Flash Drives, I personally think AVCHD will be finished. They might keep it around for a while for the AVCHD DVD camcorders. But I think Blu-ray or HD DVD camcorders will probably fill that niche. I still think AVCHD will be around for a while yet because I don't think the industry is ready to make the change yet. But as I said in the beginning, the quality is excellent. Certainly as good as any home movie needs to be. It's just not quite on the par with HDV. One thing about it, the AVCHD we record today can always be converted to an HD format that can be played on HD Players in the future.

In summary, If you're really into editing, don't mind buying an HD burner, and changing tapes in the middle of something doesn’t bother you, I say go HDV. But if changing tapes in the middle of something bothers you. You're sick of the linear FF and RW searches of tapes. You're not big into editing. You don't mind a slight loss of quality that it really takes a side by side comparison to notice. And you don't mind buying a BDP or PS3 to conveniently be able to view your AVCHD DVD's on. Then AVCHD may be the better choice "at this time".

I'm sure you're just as confused about this subject as I am now. LOL

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Ernie
Sony HDR-SR1 AVCHD HDD User

Ernie,

Thanks a million for that great overview of tape vs. AVCHD. I love convenience but I do intend to do a lot of editing and I do like the best possible video quality so I'll go with the HV-20 at this time.

Have you uploaded any of your videos to the net?

Joe