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Are there any mathematical advantages for higher sampling rates?
Given that most people can't hear so many frequencies above 20kHz anyways, I've never understood the exact arguments for using sampling rates above 48kHz.  At 48kHz, I understand that it is easier to construct a lowpass filter with a bit of higher bandwidth to remove aliasing, but I don't understand why anybody would want to record at 96kHz.
For projects which are strictly digital, ie, using pure digital synthesis and not recording any material which would be converted from analog -> digital, is there any advantage to using sampling rates above 44.1kHz?
For everything else, is there any benefit at all to using 96kHz?  Is it beneficial when applying some particular type of DSP operation later on?  Or is it purely a placebo effect for the ear?
Note: There are other questions here asking about which sampling rates to use for various types of recording projects, but here I am asking for real, hard facts for any mathematical or DSP-related reasons supporting use of higher sampling rates.

I always use double sampling rates if possible, for two important reasons.
First reason: to get rid of the characteristics of the anti-imaging filter when working with analog sound sources. What is an anti-imaging filter?
Let's say I am recording on 44100 Hz.
If I would record a sine wave of less then 10 KHz, you could clearly see the sinewave when you plot the sample values in a graph.
If I sample a sine wave of 0dB FS with a 22,5KHz frequency, the samples read 1 and -1 alternately.
Now, here's the problem. If I record a sine wave of 0dB FS with a 30 KHz frequency, and plot the samples, each sample is taking more than half a sine period, and - if you would play back the samples - it would return an 11KHz sinewave. (If you don't believe me, just make a simple drawing.) This behaviour is called the 'imaging effect'.
This means that before sampling the signal, we have to be sure that there are NO frequencies present what so ever above the so-called "nyquist frequency" (which is half the sampling rate). When using digital sound sources that provide their sounds already sampled, this is not really that big a deal, since they can sometimes just be programmed to never generate a signal above half the sampling rate, or they can filter everything out using a linear-phase brickwall filter that has no effect on the rest.
But, if you are sampling signal from an analog source, this filtering is done before the signal is sampled. The only way to filter analog sound is by use of an electronical circuit. And since the filter is supposed to have a very steep curve, it will affect the frequencies within the audible range, even though the filter was not designed for it. Now there are quite some good filters inside A/D converters, so the problem is minimal, but it gets relatively irritating to listen to when you are working several days on 44.1 KHz audio, compared to using 96KHz. The filter that is going to be applied when you downsample 96 back to 44.1 is of course a digital filter, and is probably of a much better quality. And, it is only applied when you are completely done with all the work, so it won't bother you.
Second reason: to get rid of the characteristics of the dithering signal.
When you are recording in 24 bits resolution and you plan to have your master at 16 bits, you will need a dithering signal to mask away the rounding errors. Now noise is not a pretty thing to have in your recording and while broadband noise is best for masking rounding errors, noise shaping can be a big improvement applied to the dithering signal in order to make it less disturbing. Now if the recording was made using 96KHz, you can noise shape most of the dithering signal to frequencies higher than 24KHz, so nobody will hear them. The dithering noise is at the end of the recording finally filtered out, at the moment you downsample your project back to 44.1 KHz.
So, bottom lines:
Is it useful when recording analog stuff:

Yes, definitely. You have less disturbance from the anti-imaging filter and less disturbance from the dithering signal when used with proper noise shaping.

Is it useful when working with digital stuff that came right of my softsynth?

Yes, still useful if you plan to work with 24 bits, and mastering it down to 16 bits. You can gain a great deal with noise shaping the dithering signal.

"since they can sometimes just be programmed to never generate a signal above half the sampling rate"   Definitely true, however:  "or they can filter everything out using a linear-phase brickwall filter that has no effect on the rest"  I'm not sure that's possible.  In order to filter out ultrasound from a digitally-generated wave, you would need to generate it at a higher sampling frequency in the first place (which would still alias, but not as much in the audible band).  You cannot filter frequencies that are already aliased.

"Now if the recording was made using 96KHz, you can noise shape most of the dithering signal to frequencies higher than 24KHz, so nobody will hear them. The dithering noise is at the end of the recording finally filtered out, at the moment you downsample your project back to 44.1 KHz."  I don't think that's right, either.  If you filter out all of the dither, then your output doesn't have dither anymore?  It will go back to having quantization distortion?

Re first comment: You're absolutely right. I think what I meant to say is that when you're using a digital effect, you can expect the frequency range of its output to be taken care of. Put it this way, if the output comes out aliased in the first place, upping your own sample frequency isn't going to change that. As to your second comment: interesting; it totally depends on the filters used pre-downsampling. If the noise was imaged back, it would obviously mask away the quantisation noise, but it wouldn't sound exactly the same. I think I would shape my noise around the final nyquist freq.

Certain kinds of operations may turn frequency components above 24KHz into frequency components below 20KHz and vice versa.  If audio is not kept at a higher sampling rate between the first and last such operation, the information loss at the intermediate stages may have an audible effect on the final output.

For projects which are strictly digital, ie, using pure digital synthesis and not recording any material which would be converted from analog -> digital, is there any advantage to using sampling rates above 44.1kHz?

Yes.  Some examples:
Creation of frequencies you don't want
Aliasing from digital synthesis
Many square/sawtooth/triangle wave generators are naively-written, in that they produce an infinite number of harmonics, which are aliased and sound clearly bad. (..., +1, +1, +1, +1, −1, −1, −1, −1, ... is not a correct square wave, and the aliased harmonics will produce radio tuning sounds in the background during portamento.)
If the sampling frequency is higher, this effect is reduced, because the aliasing frequency is farther away from the audio band.
Of course it would be better if the generator were written in a way that completely eliminates aliasing, but you can't always control that as a user.  Even well-written ones are usually compromises, with "reduced" aliasing, not completely bandlimited, so higher sampling rate still helps.
Aliasing from digital distortion
Likewise, when you use any kind of digital non-linear distortion, it produces an infinite number of harmonics or intermodulation products.  The ones that would be produced above the Nyquist frequency are actually aliased back into the audible range.
Although it's theoretically possible to distort in a bandlimited way, it isn't common for plugin coders to actually do this.  Every guitar distortion plugin I've tested has aliasing, even processing at 96 kHz.
I'm not sure how much of a problem this is practically.  Lots of things cause small amounts of distortion, like a compressor or volume fade, but the amount is already negligible, so the aliased amount is even more negligible.  For heavy distortion, the aliased frequencies may also be not noticeable because they're buried in the noise.  Regardless, higher sampling rate will help to minimize any harmful effects.
Lack of frequencies you do want
Another possible concern is that synthesized ultrasonic frequencies might become useful later in processing, even though you can't hear them directly in the recording:
Frequency shift from time changes
If you resample a wave to slow it down, such as in a soundfont player, those ultrasonic frequencies will become audible frequencies.  If you had filtered them out to avoid aliasing at the lower sampling rate, the slowed-down sound would be missing the high end.
Distortion/Modulation
As said before, distortion will create new intermodulation frequencies at sum and difference locations from the frequencies in the original recording.  This time, we're concerned about desirable audible frequencies being produced by distortion/modulation of ultrasonic frequencies (not related to aliasing).  If those ultrasonic frequencies aren't in the recording before distortion, the output will be missing the audible frequencies they produce, and it won't exactly emulate an equivalent analog effect.
Again, I'm not sure if this is practically a problem, but it's at least plausible, and higher sampling rates that include ultrasound will improve it.
In general, working at higher sampling rates gives "headroom" to prevent problems with effects and stuff that may not be implemented correctly.  Like photocopying a photocopy, the better the quality of each copy, the less degradation there will be in the final product.
Useless for playback
This is not to say that higher sampling rates are a good idea for playback of the finished mix.  They're not.  As described above, distortion of ultrasound can produce audible sound, and loudspeakers are the least linear thing in the audio chain, so you want to eliminate any ultrasound from the final mix to prevent it from being distorted by the speaker.
There's no benefit to higher sampling rates for music playback; they should only be used in the recording and processing stages.  See 24/192 Music Downloads ...and why they make no sense.

+1 for mentioning incorrect square wave generators. Also, the same can be said for sawtooth and triangle waves...

Digital upsampling to a 96KHz or higher rate is often helpful for playback because the audio output can easily be kept free of any unwanted content in the 22Khz to 48KHz range.  Constructing an analog filter to kill anything about 48Khz without hurting anything below 22Khz is a lot easier than constructing one til kill everything above 26Khz without hurthing anything below 22Khz.  If audio will be converted to 96Khz for playback, and one has it at 96Khz, one may as well keep it at 96Khz rather than downconverting and upconverting it.

@supercat That's for recording, not playback.  It's easy to make a super steep digital filter to remove everything above 20 kHz before playback.  Making an analog filter to remove the ultrasound before sampling is difficult/expensive, which is why ADCs use oversampling at much higher rates (MHz) and then use digital filters to remove the ultrasound and convert back to a normal rate like 96 kHz.

To have headroom for effects is a theoretically (and practically) valid reason to have a higher sampling rate than twice the human hearing limit.
The reason for this is easily visualised by comparing with image editing – if you only have say 800x600 px image with an overall shot of a high contrast brick wall, fishnet, striped textiles, or other finely spaced high contrast texture, you can only rotate in 45° multiples without causing a moiré effect and blurring the details. With audio, the distortions that occur with editing have different terms, but the same Nyquist-Shannon sampling theorem principles apply. Aliasing is a more commonly used term than "imaging effect", for the event that the sampled sound has frequency content above half the sampling rate (called Nyquist frequency).
In practise, like Pelle ten Cate already explained, a brick wall low pass filter is not achievable, but there is always some gradient (slope) on the cut off.
Another good reason to record with higher sampling rates is to achieve a more precise stereo image, as human hearing in large part relies on small time differences (about 5-20 ms, and physically these are phase differences) between ears to localise sound sources. The heads "shadow" and other aspects also play a part.
With the audio CD sampling rate  of 44100 Hz, each sample represents 22,6 microseconds, and for example one period of a 882 Hz frequency has 50 samples. Also, a rather long delay of 20 ms delay lasts 50 samples. So, only 25 samples at that middle frequency means a 180° phase cancellation.
So, 44,1 KHz sampling rate is just good enough, but does not really have much headroom for editing.
Another thing that should be kept in mind is to use dithering (just as in image editing) to prevent quantization noise. And next you will ask, should I use 24 bit quantization instead of 16 bits...?

Has it been shown that ultrasound still has an effect on our stereo perception even though we can't consciously hear it?

No, the effect of interaural time differences on stereo image has most effect on low frequencies (below 1500 Hz), where the distance of ears is shorter than the wavelength, so there is a phase difference. On higher frequencies, the difference in sound level has more effect on sound localization. See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interaural_time_difference#Duplex_theory

Another good reason to use a higher sampling rate is to work around deficiencies of plugin implementations.  Many plugin writers do not properly take into account the bandwidth-expanding effects of nonlinear signal operations, and as a result you can get aliasing effects  before you leave the box.
For example, a compressor is basically a voltage-controlled amplifier... it multiplies one signal (the audio signal) by another signal (the gain).  Multiplication of 2 signals is also known as ring modulation or heterodyning; it has the effect of producing sum and difference signals of the 2 inputs.  If you multiply a 15 kHz sine by a 10 kHz sine, you get an output signal that has a 5 kHz and a 25 kHz component.  If your compressor's gain has a very fast attack, and the input signal has a wide bandwidth, the "sum" component signal could easily go over the Fs/2 limit on a transient basis, resulting in spurious aliased low-frequency junk in your output signal.
The real fix for this is for the plugin to be implemented using oversampling internally, but if you can't get that the next best thing is to run the system at as high a Fs as you can.  You won't have any actual audio content up in the stratosphere but you are protected against some plugin blowing past the boundary.

For what it's worth, the mathematical rationale, at least to the needs of the audio world, is generally described by the Nyquist-Shannon sampling theorem, sometimes just referred to as the Nyquist theorem, which in basic language just states that to fully reproduce a waveform with a max frequency n Hz, you need 2n samples per second.

Yes, but Nyquist-Shannon uses brickwall filters, which are physically impossible.

When recording with multiple tracks, I believe the bit depth is more important than the sampling rate.
So for example, 24bit would be better that 16bit. This has to do with the way that your tracks are mixed down together and something called "rounding errors" when there are not sufficient bits.
Most hardware and software can now easily support 96k & 24bit, so there isn't a real need to settle for less.
That said, you can obviously make a high quality recording using older 16/44.1 equipment.
It's more about the talent than it is the equipment.

While this is not 'untrue', working with 24 bits introduces the drawback that you have to use dithering if you want to go back to 16 bits. Dithering noise can be reduced hugely if applied to a 96 KHz signal when using noise shaping. (see other answer for details)

All professional audio software works with 32 or 64 bit floating-point internally during the mix, regardless of the bit depth used during recording.

@PelletenCate if you work with 16 bits, you are already screwed, because you add quantization noise at each non-trivial editing step. This is very wrong to imply that working with 24 or more bits introduces such drawback.

I +1'd that. I should not be describing that as a drawback, because it's not. I should however say that both quantisation noise and unshaped dithering noise are audible on a 44/16 mix. My point is that by switching to 24 bits you give yourself the opportunity to change one issue (quantisation noise) for another (dithering noise) that can effectively be diminished by recording in a higher sampling rate.

"... real, hard facts for any mathematical or DSP-related reasons supporting use of higher sampling rates.".

So called real facts come from real Audio Engineers, there's a possibility of finding several here but it's likely faster to search on the Internet for Articles written by actual Engineers. Asking here means you settle for us, I am not an Audio Engineer but I can use Search Tools.
Something to consider is your noise floor. Other answers mention how you might add noise and mention dithering and quantization error but the closest any other answer came to mentioning the floor was this tidbit: "... the aliased frequencies may also be not noticeable because they're buried in the noise.".
If you're recording at a Construction Site, Train Station or Shipyard you can be cheap and record at 44.1if you are not seeking perfection - otherwise just like Video is 4:2:2 and not 4:2:0 so it is for Audio more Bits but not more than 32 (for YOU, internally in the Software more than 32) and higher sample rate but not more than 96kHz (again, for you, internally use Software and Hardware that operates at a higher sample rate).
Try these Articles to get you started searching for Engineer's Advice - you wouldn't visit legaladvice. stackexchange for critical info so learn to learn, ultimately  it's how much you care, how much your audience cares, your skill level and what you can afford.
Why 88.2 - http://www.soundonsound.com/sound-advice/q-why-882khz-best-sample-rate-recording
Why 24/96? - http://www.premiersoundfactory.com/modules/pico/content0035.html
Lots of places on the Internet, including free online courses.
Short version is yes there's a reason and that's a hard fact - don't toss in errors at the beginning and hope to crop them out later, you wouldn't want someone talking while you're trying to record or strangers running through the Shot - yet there are Videos that have both that and many Thumbs Up.
The hack to remember is record loud without clipping at as high rates you can afford (time, storage space, skill, money, and type of input (IE: Construction Site), audience) and chop the quietest nuances with Noise Removal to rid the lousy quantization and dithering noise (that you may have never noticed until we mentioned it).
[Written with the intent to be a simple answer without factual errors and not intended to offend Audio Aficionados or Professional Audio Engineers]


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What is the name of that color test in video production with the beep?
What is the name of those colour test screens at the beginning of videos? I've used it before in Final Cut Pro but I forget what it's called.
Thanks.

Never mind. Found the answer. It's called "Color Bars".
To be precise...
SMPTE Color Bars
SMPTE Bars are "split field" bars composed of:
**Frame Height (Approx)**       **Type of Bars**
Top 67%                     Standard EIA 75% amplitude white bars
Next 8%                     Reverse blue bars
Lower 25%                       Pluge signal

source

bipbop Test Video
https://devstreaming-cdn.apple.com/videos/streaming/examples/bipbop_adv_example_hevc/master.m3u8[enter link description here]1
For more info check https://developer.apple.com/streaming/examples/

Also sometimes called a test card (famously the BBC one had a kid with a clown where the X on the board was approximately the centre of the screen)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test_Card_F

source: Stack Exchange

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sort: votes


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Creating a "finger using device" effect like in iPhone app ads
I have been searching for quite a while on a tutorial of how to create the rotating phone ad with the finger coming in to interact with the app once in a while.
There is an example of this effect in this ad starting around 8 seconds in...
Can anyone please point me to a tutorial of how to achieve this effect or perhaps just explain how if they can't find one?

+1 for an interesting question. I'd be interested to know how this is done.

ok.
lets start:
we need a 3d model of a phone, lets say, an iphone (properly modeled, textured), then we need a shot of a moving finger which we will use later on. lets say we have everything.
after we have the idea, what we should do with the finger(adequately having this shots on green screen so we can remove the background) we animate the phone in a 3d package, after we are satisfied with the result, we render the phone sequence out from the package (properly lighten and rendered with alpha channel - ready for compositing)
Open after effects or any other compositing software, we put the a white background as solid, then we put the phone sequence on top of the background, the sequence goes, we put the finger where we want him to interact with the phone, since our phone has no animations on it, we can put them in 3d or we can add them in after effects, a little bit of tweaking and there you are, you got your 3d rotating phone with a finger and a hand interacting with it.
if we want to comp anything with the phone in aftereffects, we need the rotation and camera information from the 3d package, lets say cinema4d, we can export ae proj file out, with all the info wee need, and later use that data in after effects to have the perfect sync. Other way around is to have a properly UV for the phone, and put in animation sequence on the screen material, the render it out, then we have just to sync the figer with the animation.
hope this reveals some magic ;)

Sounds simple enough thanks. I'm not quite sure I understand how the camera movement will help me place the video on the screen

when you do stuff like this, you break it into little pieces and think them trough. You need the position and rotation of the phone if you want to put an animation on top of the phone screen in aftereffects. camera is just a plus!

Ah sorry I misread, Is I was not aware there is a way to export the rotation and position of object. Is there a way you know of to do this in 3ds max perhaps?

i think you must use the rpf file format from max...make sure you have some geometry inside the scene..

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QoS for video streaming
What are the most used metrics to evaluate the QoS of a video streaming session? I am looking for tutorials, papers, lecture notes, ppt, anything of that kind, or your own answer.

This subject is better handled in a the new site proposal that should take Codecs and Compression  algorithms/products in great depths. Participate in Area51 proposal site Broadcast and Media Technologies.

From the perceptual front (in the user point of view):

Quality:
Here we are evaluating quality of video and audio being streamed. Usually, higher the bit rate better the quality - but it also means more cost. The basic quality measure for Video is PSNR. However, more relevant matrices from the perceptual quality is blockiness and there are many other approaches like this.
Usually, choosing the codec and bit rate fixes the quality primarily, so network doesn't effect that much in that case.

Consistency (or lack of jerkiness):
This is a rough measure of times when the continually running stream got interrupted. Usually this is a measure of length and pauses that are caused due to unavailability or reduction of bandwidth during some time and player needs to wait for the data to arrive.
Usually, buffering is done to the optimal level in the receiver to minimize the effect on this.

Errors in pictures:
This is the indication of errors occurred during the transmission due to which patchy or blank screens. There are cases, where transmission could be error free, in which case, this won't be a problem.

Latency:
This refer to amount of time the service needs to begin the deliver and time the system gets reflected to screen. There are various elements of the system that contributes to this. Usually, for VoD type systems, some reasonable but it is a reasonable concern for the two systems.

End-to-end delay or so called guarantee:
The end-to-end delay is essentially same as round trip delay between two systems. For two way communications like telephony, end-to-end delay is of great importance.

Service guarantee:
Usually, this refers to probability with which the given service will be surely available to the end users. This is equivalent to probability of call drops or network blocking of calls.

Intrinsic parameters:
Here we can think of QoS metrics from the point of view of basic measures of the network which is reflects the QoS as perceived by user.

Bit rate guarantees:
This includes the maximum and minimum of available bandwidth during the entire session. Guarantees available for the network bandwidth is usually the single most

Error rate or Loss runs:
Usually, unlike satellite paths, in the internet there are no bit errors (above transport layer) - the errors get reflected in the form of packet losses. Basic metrics is hence packet error rate on the networks. More research has concluded that these can be modeled as loss lengths where typically, errors occur in some bursts. The packet loss and the length of the losses has a significant effect in terms of perceptions. This paper describes this metric in depth.

Latencies or Various delays:
This involves the delay between the path, setup delay, resource reservation delays and buffer delay that all contributes to initialization of display and latency. Many a times, efficient codecs collects various pictures together before encoding to optimize bit rates this allows more efficient compression (higher quality) but increases the latency.

System uptime and usage factor:
If either the systems is dysfunctional (down) or it is fully utilized (blocked) it will have

The paper below shows good relationship between various taxonomies.
Survey of QoS specifications : https://web.archive.org/web/20200930143001/https://hpdcs.github.io/pubs/Aur98.pdf


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What exactly does "Ethernet-capable HDMI cable" mean?
What exactly does "Ethernet-capable HDMI cable" mean?
Does this mean I can stream content wirelessly to my projector?

No it does not mean you can do anything wirelessly - it is a cable - and it isn't likely to help you stream anything to it either, unless you have a requirement for HDMI devices to share a network connection.
Version 1.4 of the HDMI standard allows for 100Mb ethernet to be transmitted along the cable between to HDMI 1.4 capable devices.
Check out the HDMI wikipedia page for some basic info

I've noted that the crop of current-gen TVs have an increasing amount of multimedia functionality. Taking this one step into the future, if (in theory) you had a display, NAS (or other storage medium) and an amp / switcher all supporting HDMI ethernet you could likely forego the requirement to have a separate network cable to connect them all together. Single cable streaming! I like the logical step of removing another cable, the final thing we we need is Power over Ethernet over HDMI (PoEoH... 'poweoh'? Sounds like Schwarzenegger trying to pronounce 'power' ;-) - THEN we're cooking with gas.


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What's a good, cheap, piece of gear to start with when adding lighting equpment to your toolset?
I now have a camera that I'm quite satisfied with, and also a couple of different microphones for recording audio that doesn't sound horrible. However, something I haven't paid attention to yet is lighting and I have the feeling I could improve the quality of my shots dramatically by starting to think a little more about this.
So, given that I'm on somewhat of a tight budget, is there some piece of equipment that would be great for all-round use when it comes to lighting, both indoors and outdoors, at day and at night? I realize that you will have to acquire a whole truckload of gear to actually perfect your shot, but given that you only can start out with one piece of equipment, something that might come in handy during many different scenarios (like duct tape is to the engineer), what should you invest in? Would a strong flashlight be of any use? A big piece of white cardboard to reflect already present light? A couple of logs and a lighter to create instant bonfires wherever you are?

If you're on a budget, look at getting some 250-500W work lights. They're less than $20 a pop, and coupled with some stands, some elbow grease in the workshop, you can build a barn-door lighting rig which will give you more control over the lights. Work lights, while cheap, are not as flexible and don't produce the same quality of light as dedicated video lights, but if you're smart with how you use them, they should fit the bill just fine. You'll likely want to have some reflectors and diffusers at the ready to modify the light. And determine the colour temperature of the lights (halogens are ~3000K) to get the correct white balance.
That being said, as a portrait photographer who works with a lot of strobist lighting already, I would probably advise you to learn everything you can about lighting, whether it's lighting a scene or lighting a subject. Learn where to place back lights, key lights, use gels to add coloured light to a scene etc. What makes a scene pop with the lighting.
Knowing how to control light in photography, both artificial and natural, definitely overlaps that of video and personally, it's probably what has made my own upcoming project possible in my eyes.  The main hurdle was moving to continuous light sources, which can be very expensive if you don't go the DIY route (which I did and it's working out just fine).

Lighting is not trivial and deserves attention and training to master. I certainly have lots to learn even after more than 25 years with working with studio lighting. There is no one thing you can buy that will work in every situation beyond understanding and mastering white balance and exposure. Nothing to invest in on this step. However, if you want to illuminate an outdoor subject that is silhouetted, then a round reflector held by a camera assistant will make a huge difference and this won't cost you much, under $75. Here you won't have to worry as much about color temperature as you are reflecting the same light as the sun provides to cast a fill in light on the subject.
For most studio lighting, you need to learn the basics of 3 point lighting. Here are three Vimeo School tutorials on basic lighting that I recommend you review before buying or making anything:
http://vimeo.com/videoschool/archive/lighting
While I shoot in my studio, I am generally shooting 1:12 scale subjects so my lighting can be somewhat small. I have two 100 watt tungsten lamps with big reflectors (available at Ace Hardware for about $12 each) mounted on vertical rails on my bench.
I have metal clips holding plastic diffusers made out of discarded computer plotter opaque plastic. I also have an array of smaller 40 watt tungsten lamps that I can place in strategic areas such as under a lift frame that has a diffuser on top for under neath lighting.

This is a great answer. Reflectors are the way to go it you are shooting outside on a budget. You can even kick it up a notch by getting a set with a reflector and a diffuser. That lets you sculpt the light even more.


text:
Reverse the blade tool (merge clips together)
I'm trying to make a transition to Final Cut Pro X from iMovie. Although I'm finding it quite simple and I'm in love with the more advanced features such as how easy keying is, I seem to have a problem I'm not sure how to get around.
I want to be able to "undo" the blade tool, in effect merging clips together. How can I do this?
I'm aware of the compound clip feature, but that lacks the "I'm done here, move on" feeling I get from a clip that doesn't have a bunch of visible edits to it.

ah completely didn't notice the X part - i'll delete my answer :p

If that's a cut within the same clip, you can move the right edge of the first clip to the end of the second clip, to restore the formerly length.
If you want to combine different clips to make some pivotal changes or append centrical effects. You have to create a compound clip.
If it was a cut within one clip, you can simply undo it. But i hope you know that.

I dont' know what you mean with "I'm-done-here-move-on-feeling", but a typical project has hundreds and thousands cuts. That's absolutely normal.


text:
Is there a standard resolution for Video Presentations?
A friend asked me to put together a video presentation for his companies national sales meeting.  I put it together in Premiere.  All of that went fine, but I'm not sure what resolution to make it.  They're obviously going to be using a projector to present it, but I'm not sure of the specs.  Is there a resolution you recommend using that would probably work best?  Would it probably be a widescreen format?  What questions should I be asking of them about the equipment?

If it's NTSC/standard def/4x3, 640x480 will be good. If it's HD/widescreen/16x9, 1920x1080 or 1280x720 (1080p and 720p, respectively). Premiere will likely have presets for all of these aspect ratios.
I would ask the projector owner for the pixel dimensions or pixel resolution. Likely, it'll match one of the above pixel dimensions. If the owner's not very projector savvy, ask for the model number and manufacturer, and look up the info you need on their website's support section or downloadable manuals.
The thing to keeop in mind is that the projection hardware is a fixed size...usually one of the pixel dimensions noted above, or something CLOSE to it for computer monitor resolution. Even if you feed a 1280x960 image to an NTSC display, it's going to interpolate it into a 640x480 display. On a projector, what makes it bigger is the lens projecting that tiny 640x480 pixel image to a 10' screen. My point is that if you know the maximum pixel resolution on the projector, you don't need to bother rendering anything MORE than that; it won't affect image quality.
good luck!


text:
Where to place a camera to record Swimming
Recently I've done a "mini-triathlon" event called WinchesterPPP and I was able to record the whole event by placing my GoPro camera on the helmet (You can see my video on that website). Next year I'm planning to do a proper triathlon and instead of kayak I'll be swimming. The thing is I would like to record that part too, but I don't know where to put the camera to get the best video

For the swim you really only have one option - to wear a light helmet of some kind to get the camera on the top of your head.
Anywhere else and it will not show anything useful (too much splash) or will cause drag (eg chest mounted) - look how much of the body is underwater:

If you think you are really good, point it backwards. You will get a better view, with less splash, and if you are in front, the shots you will get of the rest of the pack could be really good.

But don't you think that having a camera on the head every time you breath (in free style) the camera is going to swing a lot?

Have a drone follow you over head ;-)


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Which video editing software is best compatible with RTL languages?
I have to do some editing and add right to left text over a video, from past experience I've learned that some programs dont handle well RTL text, so if you can recommend from your experience about one that does it would be great. thanks.

If you can use images of the text, just about any program will handle it fine.  I would expect that any professional level product such as Premiere Pro should also handle it fine.  Even in software that doesn't support it, you can often fake it by entering the text and then doing the reveal backwards starting from the end of the line.

According to this Wiki there are a number of RTL (right to left) and bi-directional text editors.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_text_editors
First scroll down to the "Right to left (RTL) & bidirectional (bidi) support" chart, which is about 75% of the way down the page. Then compare other features with the other charts such as:
"Overview" (which has cost or free indicated)
"Protocol support"
"Natural language"
"Cross-platform"


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Is the high-framerate crop mode in the Red Scarlet camera practical?
I'm pretty excited by the new Red Scarlet, but one point seems very limiting about its (high-)framerate capacity:
It's actually cropping the image on the frame when shooting at framerates higher than 30fps  (see its tech specs
This of course will reduce the resolution, but that's acceptable. Even the Vision Research Phantoms do so - yes, starting with extremly higher resolution/framerate ratios of course!
The problem is that cropping means that if you have to match another scene angle of view you'll have to move your camera and/or change lens.
There's a nice graphic on the Red Forum that shows the cropping and I'm reading here:

The "usefull" motion modes on the Scarlet are 4K and 3K. 5K at 12fps
  max is for timelapse and stills. 4K uses less of the sensor, making
  your lenses, "longer." The ratio goes from 1.3 to 1.6. A 30mm lens
  goes from, effectively a 39mm to a 48mm.
But a lot of us want to use 3K to get raw capture without huge files.
  3K captures a 4.97MP frame using 36% of the 5K sensor area. The file
  size will be 56% the size of 4K.
However, the increasing crop factor makes a 35mm lens into a 70mm. So
  we are looking at options.
We need to know if S-16 glass is an option here. Some say it is. Some
  say some of it is, but not all.

I'd like to underline that 4K is the highest available resolution for video.
It might be also important to point out that the there is also a limitation in the extremely useful HDR-X as well explained on this phil bloom post. It's okay, I think I can live without it if I get a good camera for a decent price.
What I'd like somebody to shed a light about is to: clarify what lenses would reasonably work for high framerate modes, and what should be done to ensure normal speed vs. high speed shots for the same scene will edit nicely together..
Also would be nice to have a real hands-on in the answer not only theoretical, about quality of the cropped videos and practical issues with the cropping factor, but it's not mandatory!

I can't still create tags, that s*&ks there are very few tags yet in AVP!

If there are any tags you think we need, bring it up on meta or chat and we can create them if they make sense to us too.

This question is pretty obsolete by now. The new SCARLET-W cameras support 5K WS (2.4:1) video at 60 fps, 4K WS at 150 fps, and 2K WS at 300 fps.  Matching field of view is a simple matter of mathematics, not magic.  If you want to match a 50mm lens on a 6K RED camera using a 3K crop, a 25mm lens will do well.  And the price of the SCARLET-W is now below what the price of the original SCARLET was in 2011, so you get a lot more camera, as well as more sensor, for less money.
It is relatively well-known that when shooting slow-motion footage, it is often useful to use an even lower compression level than for normal motion footage, which is unfortunate.  But the DRAGON sensor, in a WEAPON body, makes SCARLET-W 10:1 as good as SCARLET DRAGON 8:1, which in turn has been estimated to be as good as SCARLET MX 6:1.  You will want to use special noise reduction techniques if you shoot at the limit of the SCARLET-W, but if you shoot 4K WS at 60 fps, the 6:1 REDCODE is really quite good.  And 5K WS at 60 fps REDCODE 9:1 is also not bad, either.

thanks @michael-tiemann, indeed the question is quite old :-) Your make a good point in that changing lens is a good solution to match a different crop! I hadn't thought about it at the time (and did not manage to buy a Scarlet after all :( ). And yes of course technology has evolved so much since!!!


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Animation over video
I have a video of a guy doing push ups. On that video I want to be able to draw some lines showing what angles the arms should be at when the guy is down and up. The lines should follow the guy on screen as he doing the exercise to show the viewers the correct way of doing the exercise.
Can anyone suggest any software that I will be able to use to achieve this effect? I have looked at Final Cut Pro but it is unclear if I can draw primitives (lines, circles etc.) with this package on screen.

Adobe After Effects is the go to program for motion graphics. There are a lot of resources available online in the form of tutorials and guides to help you get started. Something like you are describing is a simple enough task, but still requires a basic understanding of AE.

If you need a free application that can do this, it should be do-able in Wax without too much effort.
Tracking the arm movements will be a pretty manual process, but the modelling in Wax is good - you also have a lot of other useful effects to make the end result fit well.


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Batch processing individual frames into video
I’m new at video editing… and hoping someone can direct me to the best software for my needs.
Running on windows OS. I need to build a video from frames in tga format, convert them in different formats like .mov or .avi and sometimes with different compressions types (none, animation, jpeg).
I also need to be able to set the frame rate and add an audio track.
The software I’m looking for should be able to batch process the jobs as I have many frames in different scenes/folders.
From the reading I’ve been doing I would say virtualdub is the way to go but would like to know what other alternatives are out there.
Hoping I can gain I little more insight here.
Thanks.

Here are some options:

VirtualDub can join still images to videos. Just select the first
image, choose a compression, and save the video. That's some mouse
clicks per folder, but no automatic batch procession.
FFmpeg can do the same, but you need to write a command line for
each folder, which can then be automatically batch processed.

As for FFmpeg see How do I encode single pictures into movies? Additional info:

Use a recent ffmpeg build. Development is very active and online
documentation corresponds to recent FFmpeg code. Windows users
can acquire it from Zeranoe FFmpeg builds.
Declare your frame rate (-framerate option) as an input option. The output
will then use this same frame rate, or you can declare both an input
and output frame rate with -r; for example if you need to read the input
frames at a certain fps and need a standard output rate. Note that
frames will simply be dropped or duplicated for non-matching input
and output frame rates. Default is -framerate 25 if you do omit this option.
Additional streams (audio, video, subtitle, etc) are easy to add, and a complete command may look like:
ffmpeg -framerate 24 -pattern_type glob -i 'frames*.png' -i audio.aac -c:v libx264 -c:a copy -preset slower -crf 23 -movflags +faststart output.mp4

See Using ffmpeg with decimal wildcard for additional image to video examples, and FFmpeg Wiki: H.264 Encoding Guide and FFmpeg Wiki: AAC Encoding Guide to get a good quality output.

Probably good to use much higher than default quality for temp files you're going to feed to a NLE before making a final encode to publish.

@PeterCordes Good point, but I didn't see a reference to a NLE in the question, but if that's what the file is going to be used in then I recommend a compressed lossless format such as UT Video. ffmpeg can natively decode and encode it, and Premiere can after UT Video is installed.

How's support for lossless h.264 in the non-ffmpeg world of commercial software?  I'm working on a question+answer about good lossless formats for this job, with some benchmark tests.  So far lossless x264 and utvideo are the two good choices, as I suggested in my answer to this question.

@PeterCordes I'm not sure about the current situation. I haven't tested it in a NLE for ages and will be unable to do so for at least 10 days because of travel.

In the special case of jpeg input, you can do it losslessly by just muxing the data into an MJPEG stream, saving huge amounts of CPU time.
How to losslessly encode a jpg image sequence to a video in ffmpeg?
You're probably doing some kind of video editting on the results, so don't skimp on the quality of the files you make.  Prob. best to use lossless x264 (ffmpeg -i input -c:v libx264rgb -preset ultrafast -qp 0), or utvideo, for your non-jpeg inputs.

To expand upon Fred42vid's answer (I won't go into VirtualDub since 1. I don't know it and 2. it's a GUI tool, and so should be relatively easy to use): if the images are named image001.jpg, image002.jpg, etc, you can use ffmpeg like so:
ffmpeg -f image2 -r 16 -i image%03d.jpg -c:v libx264 output.mp4

Control the number of images per second by changing -r 16: as it is, that will give you 16 images per second (film uses 24 fps, PAL video uses 25, NTSC uses 29.97).
%03dmeans that ffmpeg will look for incremental images, starting at 001 and going up to 999. %02d would get you 01-99.
If you don't have the files named in this way, you can use the following:
ffmpeg -f image2 -pattern_type glob -r 16 -i '*.jpg' -c:v libx264 output.mp4

This will input the jpg files in alphanumeric order.
For information about encoding the video with x264, see this guide.


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What is the best way to capture PC footage?
I'm trying to capture footage from a Desktop PC, I don't want to use FRAPS as the quality isn't good enough for what I need and it adds a load of overhead.
I've tried a BlackMagic H.264 but when I click capture and click it to finish my clip doesn't appear to save (It seems the software is pretty unreliable).
Is there a better solution for this? I'd like to capture 1080p with multichannel audio.
Just to clarify, I am using the HDMI out of a Radeon HD5800 card so I'm looking for a hardware solution.

What is the footage from the Desktop PC? If it's just the desktop, CAMTASIA will do the work. If it's a game, like Skyrim, you'll need something more specific. Are you trying to capture with a second computer? Or the computer that is running the software is the same recording?

Bandicam works well for recording the desktop, has alot more options then fraps and will encode to any of several formats as you record if you want less disk use then frap's basically uncompressed recording

There are many applications which do this, some free, some not - FRAPS should certainly be able to cope if your CPU/GPU is powerful enough (and in fact this may be the limiting factor for whichever application you choose)
So your question title - "what is the best way" - is easy to answer: use a screen capture application, and ensure you have sufficient power to cope.
In the body of the question it looks like you are asking for recommendations on which application to use. This is not really an answerable question - it will vary depending on your exact needs, but many applications will do just fine, given the prerequisites mentioned above.
update - I have been using WeGame, and it works really well, and is lighter weight than FRAPS.

I've used CamStudio quite a bit in the past. It has worked well for me, though I can't quite know if it is what you are looking for.
Also, as was mentioned in @Johnny Bigoode's comment previously, Camtasia is probably the solution/application that will give you the most range. It has a lot of features and has been around for quite some time, so it is well-polished.
Good luck!


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What can I use to build a live video recording, streaming, marking application / platform?
I'd like to set up a platform such that I can record 2-4 video inputs into storage while also uploading it into a streaming cloud so that it can be viewed in near-live / real-time.  Further, I'd like the ability to mark the videos at specific times (or marked time = user input time less 5 seconds) so that they can be highlighted to the viewers (usually a memorable moment).
This would be used to capture and stream live events such as kids soccer games and things like that.

This question seems more broadcast and compression specific than AV Production! Inviting experts to a new site proposal Broadcast and Media Technologies which aims to capture more architectural and theoretical views around subjects like this. Join and invite others.

It's possible. What's your budget limit?

Check out Wowza - it should do what you want. The basic premise of Wowza is video in, video out. It can take multiple video streams into it's encoding engine, and spit them out in various formats, live.
If you've got 4 inputs (let's assume they're cameras with HDMI output), you need a computer with 4x HDMI input cards (or 2x computers with 2x cards, whatever), that then sends the 4x streams to a Wowza server, then the Wowza server can either be directly accessed by viewers, or pushed out to a cloud service (like Amazon S3 or EC2 for example) for viewing without bandwidth constraints.
Using Wowza will get you a live stream of your event without using a service like Livestream/UStream.
I'm not 100% sure on marking clips though. Using Wowza gives you the flexibility to use your own player, so if you wanted to add markers within the video timeline, that users can click on and see that specific moment in the video (even during a live broadcast), that would be how you'd do it. But how you'd get the player to read some sort of file for the markers, and how you'd publish the marker information to the player, is beyond me. It might just be easier to create a "highlights package" for people to view later, that's just a YouTube video of clips you've edited together from the live footage.

Get a decent computer. Then you just send it live over for example http://www.ustream.tv/. Then you set up for example Ableton Live to record it to a file/files. Ustream will also be able to save what you are streaming, even though it will be of reduced quality due to the fact that it has to be small to be live.


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What is this 5 second interval cut technique called?
This editing techniques seem very prevalent on YouTube (usually in the type of videos where the person is just talking to the screen/audience).
Basically they just make a small 1 second cut every 5 seconds or so.  Makes the video seem to go at a faster pace.  I remember seeing it from Philip DeFranco (

) years ago but now it looks like everyone is doing it.
Is there a name for this technique?

I've seen this nearly everywhere on TV. Many reality shows (true and fake) use it when the person is giving their monologue to the camera.

It's referred to as a jump cut.  I would guess that perhaps the Apple ads that used it might have made it popular again, but that's just a guess.  The idea behind it is to visually show a change in direction of thought since typically it matches up with the start of another phrase.  It jumps the viewer forward in time and makes them aware of a subtle change in action.
A similar technique is often used in interviews where clips are cross dissolved to produce a smooth flow where silence is eliminated.  The approach of replacing these dissolves with jumps gives more of a feel of rapid movement through time and has made appearances in recent culture as more "edgy."

Agree with AJ. Made famous originally by Godard in "A bout de souffle"

To whoever downvoted, if you could please comment as to what you think is inaccurate, it would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks.

I'd be careful how one uses the term 'jump cut'. Historically a jump cut meant a serious violation of continuity such as a cowboy holding a gun in his left hand and then in the next shot he is holding it in his right hand with no possible reason for the sudden change. Another example is when action might be moving from left to right and suddenly in the next shot everything is moving right to left, again for no reason. Errors in continuity cover a lot of area including wardrobe, make up, props including guns, where people are standing or sitting etc. In narrative film continuity is extremely important to keep what might have taken weeks to shoot appear to be happening right now.
On the other hand a jump cut where a cowboy holding a gun in one shot and it suddenly becomes a flower in the next shot would be a special case of a jump cut, called a 'magic cut'. Or another example of a magic cut is when people appear to beam up in Star Trek.
The example you have shown us uses what might be called 'jump-ahead-cutting' or 'fast forward cuts' wherein there is a reasonable amount of continuity (the background is the same, the guy hasn't changed his clothing) but to save time the editor is jumping ahead to get to the point or points. This works well with several successive discrete cuts to get rid of those awkward pauses.
Often in news interviews will use this technique and another version where instead of a cut the editor provides a 1/2 second or 1/4 second dissolve to the 'ahead' shot to smooth it over a bit.
UPDATE:
With all due respect to AJ Henderson, I don't believe that using the term 'jump cut' is accurate because it is too general. What I think is needed here is a new term for the example sited by Jack above. Something more specific. While 'jump-ahead-cutting' is not official but only my own description it may not fit the bill.
Perhaps if we think of the original clip in the example before editing like the path of a skipping stone on a still bed of water, cutting so only the parts where the stone actually touches the water or cutting when only the stone is gliding in the air is analogous to the example. Might we call this a 'skip-cut'?

What you describe is a badly done jump cut.  A jump cut is simply any cut in continuity where continuity is expected.  That applies here.  According to wikipedia "A jump cut is a cut in film editing in which two sequential shots of the same subject are taken from camera positions that vary only slightly. This type of edit gives the effect of jumping forwards in time. It is a manipulation of temporal space using the duration of a single shot, and fracturing the duration to move the audience ahead."

I also tried searching for "jump ahead cutting" or "fast forward cuts" but couldn't find anything about them.

"jump cut" historically was a bad thing for reasons stated, you neglect to take that into account, instead you are offering only a modern day 'wiki' interpretation which is ok, but it omits history and the context of how directors innovated cuts in general over the last 40 years.

Of course there is no official term "jump ahead cutting" but it exists nevertheless as I explained it.

I understand that the concept of a jump cut being used to forward time exists, but that is referred to as a jump cut by the editing field.  In the history of continuity errors, they are referred to as continuity errors.  This is a separate and distinct thing from a jump cut, though continuity errors did help lead to the development of the jump cut and magic cut as people realized that selective continuity errors could add rather than detract from a piece.

You also mentioned that a jump cut has been a bad thing historically, but it has been used as an intentional creative element since at least the 60s if not the 20s.  That's between 50 and almost 90 years of intentional use as a creative technique rather than simply a bad thing.

You are 100% right, jump cuts have been considered bad and good for a long time. That's why it's better to use a term that is specific and not confusing. By the mid 70's academics taught us to be careful about jump cuts as they were worried about continuity, however, by the this time the real world had already showed us creative and interesting ways to jump cut.


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Wirecast crashes when I attempt to authenticate to Youtube account
Wirecast 4.3.1 (Telestream) on OS X 10.9
After launching Wirecast, I select "Broadcast Settings" --> Authenticate.
Upon selecting my Youtube account and accepting the conditions, Wirecast crashes.
Does anyone know a solution to this problem?
I tried to re-install the application but the problem persists.

Have you tried talking to Wirecast's technical support?  While it probably is still on topic here, I've personally never heard of it and you will probably have better luck talking to people that are familiar with the software.  You might get a response here if someone happens to have used it though.


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TV resolution/compatibility
My TV is a Sanyo HDTV, 1080p. I heard that if shoot at 720p the quality of the video is the same.
Can anyone explain if there is a difference between the two resolutions, and in which case I use one or the other?

Whoever told you that was wrong.  "1080p" has 1920 horizontal pixels and 1080 vertical pixels.  "720p" has 1280 horizontal pixels and 720 vertical ones.  See this wikipedia page.  You would want to use 1080p whenever you want the highest quality your television is capable of reproducing.  The only reason you'd use 720p is if file size is a concern, or if your television doesn't really go up to 1080p.

If you shoot with a DSLR there could be another reason of using 720p. Most DSLR's support 50/60fps at 1280x720, but only 25/30fps at 1920x1080. So if you want to slow down footage and need the higher frame count then you would use 720p.

1080p on a native 1080p TV will always be (much) higher quality than 720p on the same screen.  The only thing I can think of that they might have been thinking is that 1080i on some TVs is lower than 1080p if they have a particularly bad de-interlacer (drop one of the two frames).  This would result in a 540p video stream.  1080p is always higher quality than 720p as long as your TV supports 1080p natively.
If your TV only supports 720p, then 720p will be higher quality than a down-converted 1080p if 720p matches the pixel ratio of your screen.  This is because whenever an image is scaled(either up or down), it doesn't match up exactly with the pixels that physically make up your screen and some amount of approximation has to be done to figure out what color should be displayed for each pixel.  This results in a (slight) loss of sharpness in the image compared to a native resolution.
This is also why there is typically a (Recommended) setting in Windows on most LCD computer monitors.


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Fix timecode in merged vobs
I use mpeg streamclip to fix the timecodes in merged vobs. I would like a command line utility that does this without having to recode if possible.

Libav has the tool avconv, which allows you to do that with the video filter setpts=PTS-STARTPTS.
I haven't tried this, but the following should do the trick for you:
avconv -i in.vob -vf 'setpts=PTS-STARTPTS' -c:a copy -c:v copy out.vob

For more information you can check out http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/precise/man1/avconv.1.html

If a video filter is used, the stream has to be re-encoded.

I'd be guessing ffmpeg or ffmbc..?


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What is this device?
I was doing some cleaning today and found the device below, unopened, in its original plastic bag. I'm guessing it's an accessory for a photo or video camera from the 8mm jack, but anything more than that is beyond me.
Anyone else know what it is?
Top:

Interior:

Bottom:

please remove the space between the first two slashes in the URL so it works--edit wouldn't let me fix this b/c it wants me to edit 6 or more characters.

Useful clues would include how long this has been sitting around unopened, 2 years? 5 years? 10 years? also what Canon cameras have you owned in the past? Is there a part number stamped anywhere on this? any markings besides the Canon logo?

Does the white part come out? If so, does it have any electrical contacts on it?

The TRS connector has three data lines, so this could be stereo audio, plus video.  Maybe an external storage device?  Note the weird notches in the casing, it looks like it is supposed to be mounted on something specific.  It appears that the part that runs from side to side (one end is rounded, one flat) is a lock or release of some kind.

Aha! I found it. It's neither an audio nor a video device, but a Film Adapter Unit—a light source—for a CanoScan LiDE 700f. Misleading plug type.


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Converting from 8mm Video Tapes to Digital (PC)
Can you please assist with a recommendation about a good Video Capture Card / Device that can used to convert from 8mm Video Tapes to Digital (PC - Windows)?
I found a site with lots of such devices which are not expensive at all, but since I have ZERO background in this area I am not sure which of them will do the job and will give me the best quality.
Here are 2 examples, I will be more than glad to receive your feedback / suggestions.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=6659984&CatId=1428
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=612720&CatId=1428

Three years ago I purchased the DIAMOND One Touch Video Capture similar to the 2nd link you provided.:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815306013
This device worked perfectly for converting tons of old VHS tapes to a format suitable for DVDs, I must have converted over 50 tapes this way. I also discovered that I could use this device to capture live broadcasts using the following chain: Antenna --> Video Converter box --> Diamond...Capture --> USB Computer input --> capture software.
The main thing you have to remember is that the conversion is in real time and linear. I had to allow for the tape to play through the parts I wanted to capture at the normal playback speed. On the plus side, the USB interface allows quick and easy set up, no need to open up your computer and install another PCI card.

I have a Hauppage PVR-150 TV-Tuner PCI card (older analog version) that I have used to record from my Hi8 video camera.  I just plug the video from the camera into the card and the sound into my sound card.  The quality of the resulting video seemed to be just as good as the playback from the camera.
Hauppage makes several different products including USB video capture devices similar to the ones you have listed.  The products are good and not too expensive.
There are many other brands and devices, but this is the only brand/device I have personal experience with.


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What solution do you use to bring a udp, rtmp, ... stream back into the hd-sdi format
As a small independent TV Station we cooperate with festivals and congresses which want to broadcast their content live. Most of the times these partners send me a webstream.
Currently we have a very basic solution in place
A machine with a videocard which is capable of extended desktop is used to play the stream via VLC and then send out the signal via the Videocards SDI port.
What is your solution?

While I am pretty sure there are a few stand alone devices that can perform this process, they are effectively doing the same thing as you are doing by playing it back through the HD-SDI output of a computer.  RTMP is a very different type of signal than SDI and requires fairly complex translation to get it back to SDI.

I could only think of a more automated solution but if this isn't happening every other day your solution is probably the cheapest and easiest method.
I would only recommend to configure VLC a bit so you don't get any surprises while broadcasting. For example disable the interface showing when the player is in fullscreen so it cant pop up by accident and set it to exclusive fullscreen so another application isn't forcing it out of fullscreen.


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Live video processing
I was wondering if there was any software that can process video on the go. For example I need to merge few video inputs (see image) and then pass the processed video to software that streams video live.

Is this really possible?

I have used a freeware software program "VH Multi Camera Studio" to do something similar to what you describe. While it is still possible to find and download that program (just Google the name), it seems the developer no longer supports it.
The modern incarnation of the company exists as http://www.splitmedialabs.com/ but I have no experience with it in its new form.

I have seen similar things built with vvvv. I believe the current equivalent for Mac is Processing.

I'm sure that is possible.  I'm not aware of any software that does exactly that, but I work for a company that does something similar.  I am a developer at Isys Global, and we make a web-based solution kind of like that.  We capture multiple video feeds, process them in real-time, and can stream them online.  We do not merge the videos into a single video, but our web-based player allows you to watch the live videos simultaneously over the web.


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Understanding Video Formats and Attributes for use in FCP7
My question(s) for you today regard the converting of videos from various cameras for use in Final Cut Pro 7. I have footage of the same event from different angles all shot on different cameras (Sony DV Handycam, Sony Hard Disk Handycam, Panasonic Hard Disk camera) that all shoot to different frame sizes, and, inconveniently, different frame rates.
My first question is (while I know FCP can handle different frame rates within a project by frame skipping, it is not advisable) how should I convert my footage so that they are all same frame rate? Should I convert the Panasonic (that shoots at 50fps) down to 24fps that the Sonys record to, or should I upconvert those two up to 50fps? Obviously I would like to lose as little quality as possible, what is the best plan of action when it comes to this?
My second question is regarding converting formats. I use Compressor, and am very impressed with it, but what common format should I convert the footage from the two hard disk camcorders to? The DV tape is captured into DV by FCP, but what should I use for the others? HDV, Prores, DV?
My third is to do with frame size and aspect ratios: one of the camcorders records to 16:9 1080p, how will that work alongside the 576x720 4:3 footage from the other camcorders on the timeline?

The codec question is the easier one: use ProRes.  It preserves quality very well and FCP likes to edit it.
As for what frame rates, image dimensions, etc. the general approach should be to go to the highest resolution of any of the originals so you aren't discarding any data.  So, upconvert to 50 fps rather than downconvert to 24 fps.  Similarly for image dimensions, conform to 1080p rather than 720p.
But I might moderate the advice above depending on what output format you are targeting.  An alternative strategy is to conform everything to a format that more closely matches the output characteristics.

Thank you for your response! How will upconverting to 1080p and 50fps affect quality on some of the lower resolution clips? And, likewise for conforming to a lower fps rate for final output, how would down-converting to 24fps (for example) affect the footage? Thanks again

Convert the 50fps down to 24fps. You cannot convert it the other way around, the data is simply not there. Actually, I think there is a way to do it, but it's pointless. Think about it. You have 24 frames a second. That's what you recorded - that's what you have. By converting it to 50fps you are essentially doubling the information, but gaining no quality.
As for codecs, Apple ProRes or DV work well in FCP. I use ProRes when I'm handling DSLR footage (which is originally .MOV h264) and I use DV when I import footage off a miniDV tape. (These two formats are the only two I have experience with.) To convert the footage I use mpeg streamclip. It's free and very good. I prefer it over Compressor.
For your last question, I'm not exactly sure how to go about it. I would need more information to give a specific answer. However, it sounds like you have some HD footage and some SD. Inevitably you will have to downres the HD if you want to cut it alongside the SD footage.
For the aspect ratios you'll pretty much always want to go 16:9. You can get your 4:3 footage to 16:9 if it was shot anamorphic or if you letterbox it.
Hope that helps. I'm not an expert on any of this, just an amateur. The point I want to stress, mainly, is that converting from 24fps to 50fps is just wrong. The above two answers
have given you incorrect advice.

I have done this before a lot of times.
I don't prefer FCP to do that, I use Autodesk Combustion (or better), or After Effects to do ALL my conversion before start working.
Your question is all about: "What format/codec/media is the output of my video?"
So, I advice you to work in a HD timeline and upres low-resolution videos, even if the final product will be in SD format, and you have a extra work to go to SD resolution in the end of the job. This way you ensure best quality, in my opinion.
Question 1: Go to 50 fps. More frames, more area, more information, more quality.
Question 2: use Adobe After Effects(if you can't rent some Autodesk Station for this part of the job) to get best quality and control, not be impressed by well polished interface in Compression. But you can do there too as well, at your own risk.
Question 3: The 16:9 1080p footage will "work" alongside the 576x720 4:3 footage, as FCP auto-adjust the 1st to the 2nd. But I don't think this is the best way, so I advise small tests in After Effects, and playback in FCP to see if its all right, and then do the big job.


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From Avid Media Composer to DVD?
I have a 1920x1080i project (a 50 minute film) in Avid Media Composer (version 3).
How can I make a high-quality DVD from my project?
Specifically:

Can I export straight from Avid to a DVD format or should I use some intermediary software (Sorenson squezee etc.) to convert the output from Avid?
Do you have any specific workflow that gives good results? I.e. Avid (fill in export settings) => DVDit or Avid (fill in export settings) => DVD Studio Pro or other ...


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What applications can I film in and integrate photos, and narrating on iMac/iPhone/Maybe iPad
What applications can I film in and integrate photos, and narrating?
I've played with iMovie and don't get it (ADHD), and video apps on my iPhone seem puny for a series of youTube like documentary chapters. There is the iMac remote control, and I have Apple TV for Screening.
I know this sounds obvious but I want the final cut to be a little slick, as a tool to sell the idea of not quitting after 21 years, or to use in the slightly landmark divorce, (hope not).

Sorry, but I find it really hard to understand what is being asked here. Could I persuade you to tidy up/simplify your question a little bit? Make it more focused. Exactly what do you want an answer to?

I edited the question quite heavily to make it more universal.

iMovie is extremely easy to use - maybe you just need to find some local classes or a friend who can walk you through the process?
Alternately, try writing up the screenplay version of your story so you can shop it around to local producers. If you can write out a compelling story, you will have an easier to finding people to collaborate with you. And the written document may help you structure your recording and editing process.

I would still stick with iMovie - as it's probably going to be the easiest you'll find.
The process I would take is to first record the audio in a separate program. Audacity, QuickTime, whatever - just record it in a high quality format (16-bit, 48000hz, uncompressed, mono, AIFF/WAV, ideally. Record the audio in this app, whilst flicking through the photos in Preview or however else you view photos.
Once you've got the audio recorded, add it into a new iMovie project (should just be able to drag the audio file from the Finder into the iMovie timeline), then play through the iMovie project with your audio, pausing to add in the photos as per your narration, that you're now listening to. If your photos are in iPhoto, you can just use the media browser in iMovie to add in the photos directly from iPhoto.
At the end of that, you'll have a timeline in iMovie full of still photos, as well as your audio track. You can then add any transitions or effects (I probably wouldn't bother, but you may want to do the Ken Burns effect on your photos to get that zooming in/out effect, like, err, a Ken Burns documentary :p). iMovie has an export to YouTube function, so just use that to upload to YouTube. You can also export a higher quality version suitable for the Apple TV as well.


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Frame rate conversion during playback for maximal smoothness
So I watch my 25 fps DVD on my 60Hz LCD monitor...  For now lets assume everything is progressive scan.
It seems that current DVD programs (and all media players on PC's, like youtube, vlc, etc.) just show the exact frames from the source video, and don't do any frame rate conversion.
Surely this leads to unnecessary jumpiness?  Some frames show for 2/60 seconds, while others show for 3/60 seconds?  The effect seems even more noticeable when the frame rate is close to the monitor refresh rate, such as 29 fps, where noticeable jumps can be seen every minute or so.
Are there any media players that use temporal interpolation through motion estimation to convert the frame rate during playback?  (like this:  http://compression.ru/video/frame_rate_conversion/index_en_frcn.html)

How does this question relate to AV production?

I figured playback was a primary consideration during production...
Is there a more relevant StackExchange site to post on?

Frame rate conversion is computationally demanding. That is why you can find it in hardware but not in software.

The problem I think you are seeing is not because of the difference in framerate directly because this is inperceptable but how it is displayed.  You need to enable vsync to stop tearing and then it should play smoothly.


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merge and convert swf
I'm having major issues combining/merging(lossless) swf video files into a single file then converting to something more useful(mp4).
I've tried using premiere but no audio as it doesn't import the audio. I have many of these files(hundreds) and need a simple way to merge them and convert. I don't really want to convert these files then merge then convert as they are already low quality and they don't need any more artifacts.

to me it sounds like a codec problem.

One possible solution is: SQUARED 5 MPEG STREAMCLIP it's a freeware converter with basic editing functions. The Batch function should help you.
Other possible software solution: AviDemux

I'm using WinFF to first convert to mpg then copy /b to combine and streamclip to fix the timebreaks. With WinFF I just have to drag and drop all the swf files and let it go(i.e., batch). Only one that seems to properly convert the swf files.

The first thing you need to accomplish is to extract the video from the SWF. A SWF is not a video file. It is an application or small program. There is an "FLV video" compiled into it. Try SWF Decompiler. It might be able to extract the FLV from the SWF.
Once you have the FLV (the actual video file), there are numerous video editors that can read and edit it.

'Hundreds of files' sounds like you could go for automation, rather than a heavy GUI-based solution like a proper NLE. The command-line tool ffmpeg has an option you may find useful: the concat demuxer. To concatenate files with the same resolution, first create a file called inputs.txt, containing lines like:
file 'input1.swf'
file 'input2.swf'
file 'input3.swf'

One file per line. Then, using ffmpeg:
ffmpeg -f concat -i inputs.txt \
-c:v libx264 -crf 22 -preset veryfast \
-c:a libfdk_aac -q:a 3 output.mp4

For more information on the encoding options, look here and here.
For other concatenation options with ffmpeg, see here.


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Video Editing/After Effects Forum To Ask For Help
I was wondering if anyone could suggest a good/active forum for Adobe After Effects/Video Editing in general.
I require the forum to ask for help in editing a file/some HD video or finding someone who would be willing to do such a thing.
This is as this Q&A site would not allow me to such for such help.

http://media-motion.tv/ae-list.html

I recommend the Creative Cow web site, specifically, http://forums.creativecow.net/adobeaftereffects. This will serve your need for getting help on AE, but this is not a site for posting to find some one to do the work for you. Hope this helps.

Try Video Co-Pilot.  They have several tutorials and a forum.

The question was to recommend a forum, not a tutorial page. I might be mistaken, but Video Co-pilot posts great tutorials, but it's not a real forum.

Both Reading forums and tutorials is for you to know about after effects. They share the same purpose...to learn. Besides, Video Co-Pilot also recommends forums on After Effects, so better check it out.

Yes, they're both for learning purpooses. The question clearly states that the asker is looking for a place where he can pose a concrete question about a certain file. A tutorial page does not allow that. Feel free to add the recommendations of Video Co-pilot to improve your answer.

The link you have provided is for a studio, not for Video Co-Pilot.  Please correct your answer.

They have a forum that is very helpful at times

I've had good success with the Premiere forums in terms of getting my questions answered. I don't have any personal experience on the AE side of Adobe's site, but I would assume that community is active as well. Good luck!


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Question about using the DeShaker plug-in for VirtualDub
I've been using my Canon 7D primarily for photography and am starting to get into the video realm with it.
I tried using the Deshaker plug-in for VirtualDub on some of my shaky/not usable footage. I like the program but want to have as little quality loss as possible. Does anyone have suggested settings to use?
Also has anyone tried "streaming" the output of Deshaker into something like Sony Vegas?

Edit:
Although, I am still curious about this question I have since moved on to Sony Vegas 11. Wow this version is vastly superior to 9, especially for those using HD content... It also does include a built-in stabilizer. I am much happier with it and can work with files from a Canon 7D as well as an HD Sony Camcorder natively instead of having to pre-render everything.

The built-in stabilizer in Vegas Pro is very convenient, but some may still want to use Deshaker because it is more flexible.
It is available as an FX plug-in for Vegas Pro:
http://www.vegasvideo.de/plugins/104-deshaker-interface-for-sony-vegas-pro.html
Some people report having problems getting the plug-in to work, and continue to use the very handy script that calls out to VirtualDub:
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/a.edmiston/deshaker.htm
Some settings that are useful to fiddle with:

Remove pan/crop prior to rendering - unclick this if there are a lot of index marks in pan/crop and you want to smooth them out
Block size and scale - needs to be finer if there is a lot of black or walls or lack of things for Deshaker to lock onto.
Ignore pixels inside/outside - allows you to eliminate the moving things so that the whole smoothed video doesn't bounce up and down with the moving things.
Edge compensation: None
Yes to Use prev and future frames to fill borders
Yes to soft borders
Yes to Extrapolate colors into borders
Motion smoothness - all appropriate ones at 3000. Include Zoom only when appropriate (1500). Zero for Rotation if using a tripod.
Correction limits - all appropriate ones at 99. Zoom at 50 only when using.


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Reasonable hardware for basic video editing?
We have an old duo core Windows XP machine, and it seems to be the case that, when using Adobe Premiere Elements 9, we frequently have situations where the audio and video are out of sync. We will load a prores mov, or a new hi res mp4 and try to share a DVD version of the file, or do some minor trimming of a clip, and then have something that is clearly off.
So, if you have to do editing on this level (no special effects, just clips and transcoding) what is a reasonable processor, processor speed, RAM requirement? If we replace this machine, I will be looking at either Windows 7 or MacOS (long story, and I don't get to choose which), so my focus is on understanding the hardware requirements.

Hmmm. We're now using current iMacs (64-bit) and Premiere Elements 10. Being a Mac, that means saving things to .mov (the Mac's version of a "wrapper" format) instead of avi.
Even given that, however, I am still finding that the audio and video get out of sync when writing a DVD. I also have a similar (but possibly not remotely related) problem where, when I define a clip and write the clip to a file, I lose the last ~3 seconds of the clip. In this case, no bad synccing, just that suddenly the conversation stops a few seconds before the action stops.
I really don't want to invest several hundred dollars in video editing software for the trivial editing that we do, but it drives me crazy how little control I have over settings, and how many weird glitches I am encountering.

This sounds more like an encoding issue than a hardware. Also, whats your RAM?

I'm not sure, because we've had problems even when not transcoding (e.g., I had some mp4 clips from which I trimmed the beginning and end and resaved). We have 4GB RAM, but this is 32-bit Windows XP, so that means that the OS can access only 3.2GB

Yeah, I think the general answer is "64-bit system" not 32-bit system at this point. Thanks.

I agree with @colum this is likely not a hardware issue at all, but a software one having to do with the encoding.

THE "many weird glitches" EXISTS TO MAKE YOU " invest several hundred dollars in video editing software for the trivial editing" . True hurts. But it's not a lie.

Adobe has tech specs on all of the software they sell on their website (www.adobe.com). I found the tech specs for [premier elements] 9 that you can look at.
(http://www.adobe.com/products/premiereel/systemreqs/)

Very interesting. We comfortably meet or exceed those specs on this machine. Now I am wondering if we changed something on the hard disk side. Most of the work is being done on a hard disk attached, not with firewire, but with usb 2.0. I wonder if that is introducing the problem?

@AriDavidow - the USB 2.0 connection is more likely to lead to slow performance than loss of sync.

Is it HD footage you're working with? To work efficiently, in editing, transcoding/rendering and exporting, something like a Intel i7 quad core processor is going to make things a lot smoother. Couple that with a minimum of 4-8GB of RAM (very cheap nowadays) and things will stop getting bogged down. Add a fairly capable video card to the mix (mid-high end NVIDIA / AMD card) and the system will fly if you're doing relatively straight forward HD editing.
I myself have been doing a lot of work with high-definition DSLR footage transcoded to ProRes 422 and my Core 2 Duo 2.53GHz MacBook Pro with NVIDIA 9400M video is really feeling the strain, despite having 8GB of ram installed.
Any well developed media editing application should be sufficiently multithreaded and a simple bump from dual to quad core will make a marked difference.

Your audio and video are probably drifting out of sync because the audio is 12-bit audio. 12-bit audio slowly drifts out of sync. The correct bit rate should be 16-bit, not 12-bit. There should be a setting in your camera to change it from 12-bit to 16-bit.

are the files out of sync while editing or when you render it out?
oh, youre editing mp4 files? you should transcode them to avi and check that out, if that has no issues, then you have problems with keyframes in the mp4 video...(probably set up by the encoder who transcoded mp4 files)

You are right--looking again at Adobe's site, it seems most likely that the problem is with Premiere Elements 10/Mac (we've migrated systems since Q orig. asked) not importing the MP4 gracefully--we can play the files w/Quicktime, fine. It's when in PE that they are out of sync. See new Q!

If your'e looking for a mac, I'd suggest anything from an iMac up. Currently the entry level iMac has 4GB RAM (expandable to 16GB), an Intel Core i5 and a sweet AMD Radeon HD 6750M graphics processor with 512MB of GDDR5 memory, all within a sleek computer with a full 1080p LED-backlit screen.
This is about what I'd recomend for video editing. Video editing apps nowadays need just not a good processor, but also a good graphics card for the best performance. Whichever computer your'e buying I'd say should stick to something similar to this, or better.


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How can I make the particular trail longer in After Effects CS4?
How can I make the particular trail longer?
Why when I animate the particular do I only have a trail when I parent it to an Object or Emitter?

You need to add more information to your question.  For starters, what software are you using?

after effects cs4

You need to change lifespan of the particle and move the emitter around.  The longer the lifespan of the particle the longer the trail will be because the trail is composed of ageing particles.

Agree with the previous answer. You could also add Wind or Turbulence in order to make the "tail" blow further away from the emitter.


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After Effects - How do I create animated coding
Are there any tutorials on how to create animated 'coding', where it looks like code is being typed in? I want to do something similar to this: http://footage.shutterstock.com/clip-1355773-stock-footage-a-d-animation-about-the-network-data-flow.html. In that video about half way through it pans to a section where it looks like code is being typed in.

I dont know of any tutorials off hand (you will need to do a google) but to animate text to make it look as if its typing on isnt too hard:

Create your text layer
Expand the later (clicking the white triangle next to the name)
Click on the animate button > select Opacity
Now you can use the range selectors to animate what is changed.

There is also a typewriter preset in the Effects and Presets panel which does the same thing.

There's some text animation effects you can use to automate it.
This tutorial http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/text_blur_titles/ uses the text animation blur, one of the others is text typing.

This may not be exactly what you are after, but the simplest way could be to use a screen recording tool to record you typing the code. Have a look at this question for guidance - it is very easy to do, and you can time it as you like, rather than have to worry about setting animation schedules etc.


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How can I create this 3D text video presentation?
I don't have much clue about 3D modeling or Animation. I'm good at programming & Graphic designing though. Thing is I want to do something like shown in this 15second video:

To be more specific, I need some 3D text as shown in the video as a slideshow. I need to create a 15-30 second video of that kind. Then I'll also have to record voice over it. That I can do in video editing.
If you know a quick tutorial of this kind, that would be a great help too. Kindly help.

I use the 3D Extruder plugin/script for After Effects CS5.5 to create the 3D text, then I'll create a camera to animate the movement.
The tutorials plus network has a lot of great tutorials. Though I've never actually watched any of the ones on 3D text...


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Problems with rendering a Windows Movie Maker video
I've used Windows Movie Maker plenty of times before and I've never had a problem with it... until now. I went to choose the "save to my computer" option so my video would render and after it was about 10% done this message popped up:

"Windows Movie Maker cannot save the movie to the specified location.
  Verify that the original source files in your movie are still
  available, the the saving location is still available, and that there
  is enough free disk space available."

My files I used in the video are exactly where they were when I imported them to Movie Maker, the folder I'm trying to save the video is just fine, and I have plenty of disk space available; and the problem still comes up the same way. I tried saving it to an other place and the same thing happened. I even tried saving it to my flash drive and the same thing happened. I even tried turning my computer off and back on and nothing changed. I've looked it up online and gotten no help. I did try making a BS video with other footage and it worked but when I tried making a BS video with the same footage in this video the problem came up again, so I think it has something to do with one of my video files but I don't know.

It seems it is one of your source videos that is causing the problem.
You can try making one test video out of half of them and another test out of the rest.  If one fails and the other succeeds, you can continue to split the failing source videos in half until you find the one that is causing the problem.

Yes, a binary search is faster. Good one.

This assumes that all the material, all the video clips are on your local disk and your telling Windows Movie Maker to save these in the same folder. Do all the clips have a suffix that is acceptable to Windows Movie Maker (see below for a complete list)? e.g. are these all .avi files?
How many clips are in the video? One or more clips may be at issue. To isolate, first save your project as it is, then remove one clip and save this as minus one. Test? if there is no change then remove another clip, save as minus 2. Test? If there is still issues then proceed to remove each clip one at a time and save each of these versions until you find the clip(s) that are having an issue.
Once you locate the offending clip(s) take these to another computer, and see if you get the same results. Report back.
MORE info from Microsoft:
You can import files with the following file name extensions into Windows Movie Maker to use in your project:
Video files: .asf, .avi, dvr-ms, .m1v, .mp2, .mp2v, .mpe, .mpeg, .mpg, .mpv2, .wm, and .wmv
Audio files: .aif, .aifc, .aiff, .asf, .au, .mp2, .mp3, .mpa, .snd, .wav, and .wma
Picture files: .bmp, .dib, .emf, .gif, .jfif, .jpe, .jpeg, .jpg, .png, .tif, .tiff, and .wmf


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What are some simple video editor with Masking capability?
I want to focus faces of an image and move that focus to each of the faces one by one with a delay.The other area of the image should be hidden/blurred
(btw this is called masking right?).
Is there any simple opensource(or just free) software for doing this?
A trial version would do because I need to make only one urgent video for now.
A good tutorial would be helpful as well.

An oldie question, but let's add an answer...
The answer depends on if the faces are moving through the frame.
If the faces are relative still, like a camera on a tripod and the persons sitting in front of the camera, any video editor with more than 1 video channel can do the trick. Just add a layer with something on it, a prepared semi-transparent PNG as a mask perhaps.
But more complex software is needed if the faces are moving or if you want a blur, instead of a semi-transparent mask.
If the faces are moving you need to track them, so the program needs to track it.
As @Shultc commented Both Blender and HitFilm can do this, and I would add Davinci Resolve.

Do Blender and HitFilm track faces, for instance?

All 3 can track stuff, I do not know if there is a specific feature to recognize faces and then track them.

Since you state a trial version will do,  Adobe CC Premiere Pro fits the bill.  It's full featured and affordable after the trial license ends.

Blender — Made for 3D, but can do video manipulations too. (open source, really hard)
HitFilm — Made for video. (have free version, easear)

natron is another option http://natron.fr/