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Hi, Mike, CS and Tom!
Yeah, I came a cropper on Windows Movie Maker. I have set WMM up for capture(my capture card is labeled as USB 2861 Device) and it's set up for audio and video capture through this device, but, as yet I've not tried it.
Mike, that Dazzle capture card(from Pinnacle) will work with any capture/edit software, not just Pinnacle Studio, heck, it'll even work with Power Director!
CS, as I said earlier, a lot of your frame-dropping could be related to the(physical) condition of the tape, its age, how often it's been played, leading to some wearing(and tearing). You can't expect the tape to be in "pristine" condition, it loses that quality as soon as you take off the cellophane wrapper and insert it into your VCR or your camera to record on it for the first time. Transferring these old tapes now will get them before they've been allowed to deteriorate any further. Dropped frames may well be part and parcel of the process.
Cheers!
(a slightly less-embarrassed) Neil!
P.S. I have downloaded your JPEG image Tom, Thanks!
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Hi, all!
The behaviour of software companies toward the end-users of their "product" will see many more "pirated" versions of their software installed and used, with the result that there'll be hardly anyone "logging in" to their websites because hardly anyone will be using official copies of their product's installation discs. This is the reality of computer software, due to price of product and restrictive license conditions. If the recording industry applied the same licencing conditions to the use of their LPs or CDs(or even cassettes, for that matter), that industry would be "dead in the water". No-one's going to buy an LP, CD or cassette of their favourite music if they're going to be restricted to playing it on one turntable, CD player or cassette deck.
We are the end users of this software, we are the "life blood" of these software companies, thus it should be us, and us alone, who shall determine how we use the product! Once the software company has developed the product and put it out for sale, their job is done. We, the end users, buy the product(for anyting between $80 and $250, depending on exchange rates and other factors), not cheap! We get it home and install it on our computer. In doing so we're greeted with this "end user agreement" we must tick the "I Agree" box before the installation can proceed. No tick in the box, installation stops! How rude!
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Gordon!
Timeline marker moving backwards? Hmmmm..... I have a few other(third party) video editing programmes and I've not yet struck that feature in them, so that's a newie on me! Other programmes have this feature, you say? Not Roxio, Corel Video Studio or Pinnacle, they're the three main ones I have, apart from Power Director and, as I've said, I'd not seen this feature in them. Clearly you've had access to, and use of such a programme with this feature. Out of pure curiosity, I'd like to know what programme it was. Could you tell me, please?
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Tomasc and CS2014,
Excuse me a moment while I grab this towel to wipe the egg of my face! Yeah, I found the capture set-up hidden away in "Options - Audio/Video, but still haven't sussed out how to get the actual capture process going(usually a red button, or similar appears to initiate/stop the capture). Still, I'm not a "fan" of Windows Movie Maker. Would much rather use Power Director for such work as extracting content from older sources such as videocassettes(in whichever format).
Cheers!
(a slightly embarrassed) Neil.
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Quote:
Do you know the model number of that Dazzle device. I find that in the past pci connected devices worked better than the usb ones for signal strength and tracking. They did make video stabilizers exactly for your problem in the past. Try Windows Movie Maker as the capture device and make sure that the audio cable pairs are connected.
Let us know if this helps.
Sorry Tomasc, Windows Movie Maker has no provision for capture from devices like "Dazzle" or any other make of capture card, unless you go back to Windows Movie Maker for Windows XP. For Windows 7, 8, Vista(and likely 10) there is no such provision. As for "dropping frames", CS, the condition of the recording(the tape itself) has a lot to do with frame drops, particularly old tapes that are often-payed and are starting to wear out, so it's fortunate you're getting them converted now before your source tapes get completely "knackered". I know this from transferring old VHS and Video-8/Hi-8 tape content myself, the better the tape condition, the better the transfer(with less frame drops).
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Dan & Carl!
Ugh! So much grief and distress that could've been avoided if only Cyberlink hadn't "tinkered" with the activation process and carried on the same routine, from PD9 through to PD14. It would doubtless have saved a lot of problems for Dan and anyone else in the same or similar situations.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, everyone!
This is a never-ending saga, ain't it? The idea of "....alter(ing) the music speed or pitch by 6% in either direction or knocking the song out of phase" may fool Youtube for a while but they may cotton, fairly quickly to what's being done and come up with ways to counter these "tricks" but the underlying point is: Smartsound was created for the purpose of use in clips uploaded to Youtube to avoid hassles with copyright protection agencies around the world. Smartsound is a non-commercial "generic" music that fits in where required and Youtube should recognise this fact and stop giving grief to its users over their implementation of Smartsound tracks.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, All,
Whomever said: "Windows Movie Maker...pretty useless in real terms for editing video, so just ignore it.", I have to agree(was it me who said that?, I'm not sure. I've been looking for the quote in previous posts in this thread). Windows is not user-friendly, at least not the version in Windows 7. plus there's no provision I could find anywhere to capture from VCRs via a "capture card" device. so I tend to dismiss Windows Movie Maker as a lost cause. I have Power Director, versions 8 and 14(both"Ultra"), and while PD14 has some "innovations"(in Cyberlink's eyes) that I class as "design faults", nonetheless, Power Director is far superior to Windows Movie Maker, ease of use is the overall important feature that puts PD way ahead of WMM.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Quote:
I'm not a regular to this forum, but in my first post 4 years ago I suggested some some features to improve basic editing which have since been adopted. One that hasn't (not that I can find) is a tool to select freeform an area of a video scene (e.g. sky) to edit in Fix/Enhance, with feathering. It should be simple enough to add to basic editing.
Also useful would be:
Stop timeline marker jumping back at end of clip, (damned nuisance)
Reverse play in timeline,
Option to open output folder at end of a produce.
Hi, Gordon!
I most certainly agree with you on the timeline maker(scrubber), At the end of a clip, you want the marke to stay where it is, especially when you're adding new material to build up your movie. Reverse Play in timeline has been available since PD8(it's available in "Power Tools") As for option to open output folder, where you've directed the "produce" to be saved, that's simply a matter of keeping that folder present on the toolbar on the bottom of your monitor to click on when you've completed your "produce"(render) to see what the final length is, the size of the file and wow well it will play in Windown Media Player or VLC or even Power DVD).
Cheers!
Neil
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Hi, All!
Cyberlink has clearly blundered with their transitions! The insertion of a transition should automatically be accompanied by the audio component, but in PD14 you only get that if you have the "overlap" behaviour. If, in "preferences" you choose "cross"(in order to preserve the running time of your video), then the audio component of the transition is NOT automatically inserted. This is NOT innovation, it is, instead, a DESIGN FAULT!
In regards to deleting transitions in one click, if you've inserted, say, 100 transitions, then you could remove them, 20 at a time,
<ctrl-click> on 20 of them, hit delete, then <ctrl-click> on the next 20, hit delete and repeat the process until you've removed them all.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Quote:
Hi,
I have managed to add video transitions between all clips in a project. However, when I try to do the same with the audio transitions, it does not work. Nothing happens. When I add them manually to each clip, it works. But, I have hundreds of clips, so adding them manually is not an option.
Hi, Isak!
I noticed this some time ago when I tried to set transition behaviour in "Preferences". I was looking for a way to get my transitions to automatically go to crossfade, rather than overlap, and all be at 5 seconds duration. I got that, but when I tried it, I saw the audio component didn't automatically get inserted along with the video component. what I gained on the swings, I lost on the roundabout, so-to-speak. So it was back to "Preferences" and set the transition behaviour back to "overlap", that returned the auto insertion of the audiuo component of the transition, but it was still a backward step for me, as now I have to click on Modify and manually select "cross" for the transition behaviour so the video and audio are both of the same length and go from overlap to cross together. I see this new method with transitions, not as an innovation, but as a DESIGN FAULT! Cyberlink, you've really stuffed up there!
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Kyle!
While you have Winter up there in Cumbria, England, we here in NSW, Australia are in Mid-Summer. Some mildly-warm days and some absolute scorchers!
In relation to your question about NVidia GeForce, some of the posts you'd read on this forum have NVidia GeForce as "the villain of the piece". Quite a lot of people have had issues with it. The only real option is to read of others' experiences and decide from those.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Barry, Karab and OttoGa.
I posted a reply yesterday(my time) on this but my post didn't make it into the system, I was having issues with a sluggish internet service(in spite of a good signal on my wireless modem).
Barry, it isn't so much "frustration" at having to rely on an older Power Director version to author my DVDs, it's more the combination of the two versions lets me do a few more tricks, the two versions sort-of compliment each other so I don't think there's much of a conflict, I have a few other editing programmes also on my computer(third-party), no problems there either. It's just that Cyberlink should've retained the DVD-SP profile for DVD authoring in PD14.
Karab, It wasn't so much me who was interested in customised lens profile generation, but I'm happy you've found a way to do what you wanted.
Otto, I don't really see the difference higher framerates make. 25fps(PAL) or 30fps(NTSC) have served the industry well and it's really all about what the eye perceives as movement on the screen. Higher framerates are a bit like a fifth wheel.... "spare".
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Eric!
Yeah, I'm actually planning a trip to Sydney today(it's 12.56am, Wednesday, 20th January as I write.) I hit the sack last night just before 9.00pm but woke up at quarter-to-one, so I put in a bit of time answering posts, then a bit more snoozing, then at 4.30, I'll head off, drive down to Broadmeadow and catch the train from there. I've been planning a visit to the Tramway Museum at Loftus for some time, I've got my video camera battery juiced up for the day, so today's the day! As I finish this, it's now 1.03am.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, everybody!
This YouTube copyright saga, it's all a big pain in the whatsit!(backside, arse, rear end.... and so on) If YouTube keep going on the way they are, no-one's going to want to put anyhing up on their "channel", with or without music. YouTube will have scared off their contributors! Then they will be the losers.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, JuicyJackson!
I think customer support/relations is an area where Cyberlink really falls down badly! The company owns this Director Zone website, but leaves it entirely in the hands of volunteers, spread all round the world, to help with solving the technical problems arising from their product. Indeed, if it weren't for Dafydd B., Ynotfish, JL_JL and many more like them, there'd be no customer support/relations at all! So to all the volunteers on this site, give yourselves a "pat on the back"! You are appreciated by us, more than you could ever know!
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, All!
This is my second attempt to post today, my internet is giving me some grief so I'll make this short.
Carl, your comment: "All of Cyberlink's Powerdirector since about Powerdirector 9 require internet access to activate" sums it all up! Cyberlink seems to be bent on making life difficult for us end-users of their product by putting "road-blocks" in our way when we try to activate our software, when they should instead be making it easier! As I recall, from installing PD7(when I was yet to get the internet), at a given point in the installation(near the end of the process, I think), the CD Key had to be entered, then the process completed, and on first opening, you filled in the registration form, but had the option of posting it later. The CD Key had it up and running, and, most importantly, PERMANENT! The same with PD8! But I can see Richmond Dan's problem, not only did he not have the internet, out there in the wilderness, but no mobile phone service either....Ouch! The frustration would've had Dan pulling out his hair!, But he did get back home well before the 30-day expiry and was able to complete the installation process....Whew, what a relief!
Cheers!
Neil.
By the way, Dan, did the wig fit okay? Not too itchy, was it?
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Quote:
Great information, thanks Neil. I am using version 12 but I have still have some more editing to do to eliminate unwanted clips which should reduce the time quite a bit.
Eric
No, worries, Eric! Glad to help!
By the way, whereabouts in NSW are you? I'm in Port Stephens, just forty-or-so minutes drive north of Newcastle.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Eric!
I did not mean to sound pedantic on the subject, but I've come to value the ability of being able to hold the cursor over any video or MP3 music file and see its playing time, so that I can calculate how much I can squeeze onto a DVD or a music CD. To that end, I write down the playing times on a sheet of paper, then add them up. Counting the seconds, if you add 45 to 33, for instance, instead of 78(which is adding figures normally) what you end up with in counting time, is 1 minute, 18 seconds. likewise 45 + 33 minutes = 1 hour, 18 minutes. The trick in adding time is NOT to go by normal convention. Adding time goes from 1 to 59, the next number up, shifts from second to minute, or from minute to hour.
That should help when next you calculate how much video you "shoehorn" onto your next DVD. If you're using an earlier version of Power Director for the authoring, set the burn profile to DVD-SP and you can squeeze 2 hours, 25 minutes quite easily onto the disc.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hello Peter7769!
Sounds to me like you're trying to transcode the video from NTSC up to PAL, would(I think) be better to convert your clips from NTSC up to PAL individually, before you begin to edit them into a movie. or, convert your finished movie from NTSC up to PAL then save(render) that converted file under a silightly altered title, playing a portion of it to ensure it plays properly, before putting it onto disc. The reason I say "up to PAL" is bacause the PAL colour system was the vastly superior system for broadcasting in colour. Many of the bugs that plagued the NTSC system, and still plagued the woefully-inferior French SECAM system had been well-and-truly ironed out when the PAL system was introduced in around 1967. That's the reason why so many countries held off introducing colour TV. They were waiting for something better than NTSC to arrive.... and it did! SECAM was developed ahead of PAL but proved so gosh-damn awful in its use that the French TV stations had to(likely secretly at the time) kit themselves out with PAL-based equipment, then transcode to SECAM only at the final stage, at the transmitter. The SECAM debacle is why you never see SECAM in digital transcoding. It's always PAL or NTSC. SECAM has gone away into some corner and quietly died, and no-one missed its passing.
Cheers!
Neil.
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Hi, Dan!
Thereby hangs the problem with PD14! The requirement for internet access to complete an activation process which, in previous versions only required the typing in of the CD Key(and a few other details). I struck this upon installation of PD14 last November. I required the internet to complete the process because, with PD14, simply typing in the key is no longer enough(after filling out other details). PD7 and PD8 installed easily without the internet(When I first got PD7 I did not have the internet, when I got PD8 I had the net for only a year or so). That's something Cyberlink should get back to, ease of installation where internet access is unavailable. After all, the only real purpose of the registration is access to this website and forum. That can be gained at any time. I had PD7 for over a year(probably two years) before I had internet access and was finally able to register it, and all that did was give me access to this site and forum.
Cheers!
Neil.
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