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Hacking up a podcast functionality with the Behringer XENYX 1202FX.
There are two pieces of functionality which I need from the Behringer XENYX 1202 FX.

Our podcast requires the use of Skype which means:

Skype-out must go to an input on the mixer
Skype-in should hear the other microphones but not the channel delerving Skype-out

We should have the ability to playing the Music to the output, while silencing the microphones from the mix.

Solving problem 1  was rather simple all I had to do was make Skype-In FX Out and turn FX on the non-skype channels up (Skype channel turn FX Off). In this case I'm not using FX In at all.
The second one however is a little tricky. However, in the manual I see the following:

If you are recording a signal via the TAPE OUTPUT and wish to
  listen to this simultaneously via the CD/TAPE INPUT, do not use the
  CD/TAPE TO MIX switch. Doing this would create a feedback loop,
  since the signal would be routed, via the main mix, back to tape via the
  TAPE OUTPUT. To monitor the CD/TAPE INPUT, use the CD/TAPE TO CTRL
  switch to assign the tape signal to the monitor(s) or headphones.
  This will avoid the tape signal being routed to the TAPE OUTPUT.

I'm not sure I understand what they're saying. But, it sounds like it speaks to what I  want. Is there any way to accomplish my goal with the one 1202FX Mixer?

What is your music source? How many channels does your sound card have?

It sounds like you're doing a live web cast, not a recorded podcast.  Is that right?  Please provide more details of your setup.  How many participants?  Is there only one coming in via Skype?  Do you only have one computer or two (one for Skype and one for the cast)?

I'm not sure @Brian  I think I got working with 1202 FX, but ultimately I wanted a third bus for my cell phone or a Google Hangout, i ended up taking my hardware equipment up a huge notch and buying the X2442USB which I still run to this day with two Behringer USB DACs.

The X2442USB supports the mute button on the channels, has the option to send the channels to different buss pre-mix faders, and it supports Inserts which I now have hooked up to a 3632 compressor. In really has a ton of features at $320. I mounted it on a rack $100 rack, and it works great. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001KJF0BE/ref=wms_ohs_product?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Why don't you do the music as a post.. Then you can just add the music track in the background and make it 'Duck' behind the voices. And if you really need the music to keep the tempo of the podcast conversation, you can just have it play on another device (iPod) and have it mixed into just the headphones, but not record it at all.. Or am I missing something?

What do you mean by 'Duck' behind the voices. The important part of the functionality is that when the music is playing they can't hear the conversation we're having, until after the music is done playing.

"Duck" is generally an automated effect or track-attribute you can add on your DAW.. That will reduce the volume of a track when the other track has some sound, and will bring it back up when the other track has no sound. For example, in Garageband, it's the small up/down arrow in each track control.

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Best Digital recorder for use as a ‘body pack’ + good field recorder?
I'm looking at getting something to use as a 'body pack' as opposed to using a wireless setup when using a lavalier microphone.
I've looked into Tascam DR-08 vs. Zoom H1 or other.
I found a comparison of these two here (great blog for video):
http://cheesycam.com/tascam-dr-08-vs-zoom-h1-continued/
I've seen various information recommending both of these recorders along with the negatives including build quality and battery problems of the H1.
I thought that that the Zoom H1 with it's protective cover over the mics and the offset angles are great pluses for this device for this use.
What are people's thoughts on ultra compact digital recorders? Any suggestions or recommendations?

Found another contender: The Tascam DR-05 http://cheesycam.com/tascam-dr-05-review-video/

Does anyone have a Zoom H1 or used one. Or have any experience with anything else? What do people use?

Recorded with a Zoom H2: Robin M'aime. (The H2 is similar o the H1, but has four mics in a quadrophonic pattern.)

I use a Zoom H4n for other purposes, but have been very happy with the quality.

The specific feature set will determine if it is appropriate for you application, though from my experience most of the high end field recorders are very good quality.
The Zoom series have a great (well deserved) reputation for being relatively easy to use, and being kind to your wallet.
If you wish to supply your own mic, you may wish to find one without inbuilt microphones as it may be cheaper.
If you do not want to supply your own mic, my experience has been that the inbuilt mics are adequate for recording dialogue, in say an interview.
If you're planning to record with the device on the talent (and want the recorder to be as discreet as possible), I would suggest investing in lapel mic (just the mic not the transmitter), and plug that into the field recorder to get the mic as close as possible.

I have a Zoom H2 and I'm very impressed with the sound quality. It has 4 built-in mics giving it a 360° recording capability. Battery life is poor though so a couple of sets of high-capacity rechargeables is in order.

I use an H2 as well and love it. I used it in-between computers, to produce serviceable tracks.

I have a Marantz PMD620 & it works very nicely -- the builtin microphone sounds very clear, battery life is good, it has timestamping, and it takes SD cards. I'm not a professional or audio expert, but I'm very happy with it.

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How do I filter a voice recording to sound like a NES game sample?
The style that I am shooting for can be heard on this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZlPiehYpVM
at 2:18 ("Blades of Steel")
I have tried playing with equalization, hi-pass/low-pass, and various filters, but I can't seem to get anywhere close to this effect, where the "s" sounds come off as static, and the annunciation of consonants is muted (possibly an attack filter?). I can't find any documentation through Google search, either.
I know very little about the sound architecture of the NES, other than that music was composed with Square and Triangle waves, and the "samples" were presented through a separate sound channel. On NES sound emulators I use, this channel is usually labeled "PCM," (Pulse Code Modulation?) The NES system itself was 8-Bit, but I do not know if its sound system was.

You wont get that effect with just an EQ.
try using a bitcrusher effect to reduce the bit-depth to 8 or 16 bits, maybe some saturation and a lowpass at the end to tame some of the distortion.
The characteristics of these old game sounds come almost entirely from the crazy low resolution and data compression necessary at the time to get the samples onto the game cartridge.
good luck!

Like Shane said, use at most 8-bits resolution, but also [re-]sample it around 4kHz or less.  No lowpass filter necessary as you want the higher frequencies to wrap "poorly" while sampling at the low sample rate.  (Though, some re-sampling actions on audio editors may do that lowpass for you).

That sound is due to a combination of low sample rate and low bit depth.  Those are the 2 parameters you can control to diminish the data size on PCM data, which they had to do for the old game consoles because of their limited storage and processing power.  A very low sample rate without pre-filtering introduces strong aliasing, and a very low bit depth introduces distortion on the signal.
I was able to re-create that kind of effect using McDSP FutzBox LoFi module in Wwise.

Downsample: 4000 Hz
Bit depth: 4 bit

CMT Bitcrusher is a great tool for this. dBlue Glitch also has a bitcrusher module.

I know that FamiTracker can import WAV samples and they will play back in any emulator that supports the DPCM channel. You can get FamiTracker at http://famitracker.shoodot.net

Its possible that the reason that you are having problems recreating the sound you want is that the samples you are trying to recreate might have been recorded/played back using the NES sample channel's DCPM (differential pulse-code modulation) capabilities
This is where instead storing each audio sample directly the chip stores the first sample and then the delta's (how much the signal goes up or down between samples). I read a blog somewhere (I'll try to find it and link) where somebody analysed the behavior of this channel and found that it introduced lots of strange artifacts into the sounds
Not sure how you might emulate that without the hardware


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Indexing audio for video editing
What tools would you recommend to index the audio track for video editing? I'd like to be able to do a text search for words in the dialog to more easily locate video snippets. I'm using FC and/or Premiere.

Premiere CS4+ has a feature called Speech Search. I haven't used it personally, however, so I'm not sure of the quality. However, this site has a sample of video, and also a PDF of the transcription Speech Search provided (they describe it as "eh").

+1. I've used this feature and I must say it's very hit-or-miss. It can only handle specific accents, and identification takes a long time.


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Converting SECAM VHS to a digital format
A project I am part of would ideally require to incorporate extract of several hour longs video interviews from the 1980s. They are on VHS video tape, Stereo SECAM (French system). I have (good) master tapes and one or two copies of each tape for easy viewing. I wonder what kind of process I can use to convert them to a convenient digital format for importing and later editing while preserving the most of the original's quality.
I have also a working tape recorder/viewer for this format and a good monitor for its video output (SONY).
How can I obtain the best results?  Should I first go through PAL conversion, so I can use more conventional equipment?
Should I subcontract the converting part to a specialized company?
(Note: I do not have sufficient reputation yet to tag properly this question, please feel free to do it )

Personally, I would use a Video Capture Card that supports SECAM (such as the Hauppauge model 01087: WinTV-PVR-150 low profile with PAL/SECAM tuner) and simply record it on my PC/Mac/Linux box.  [I've actually done this from NTSC VHS tapes to MPEG-2 using a PVR-150 capture card on a Ubuntu Linux box.]

The ADVC-300 can take SECAM input: http://www.grassvalley.com/products/advc300
This will convert to DV format, which is quite sufficient for VHS quality.


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Problem exporting a mixture of PAL and ProRes 422 in FCP
I have a FCP sequence made of a mixture of ProRes 422 and PAL clips. As soon as I export it using "QuickTime Movie" (Apple ProRes 422 PAL 48KHz option), the quality of the ProRes clips is superb, but the PAL section look horrible (they look fine in the timeline). The same happens for the transitions effects, even if the transitions are between two ProRes clips. During the transitions, the quality of the exported movie drops dramatically.
What could be the issue?

Have you tried sending it to compressor and then using ProRes? The built in exporting functions in FCP7 are not the best

I'll bet it is a problem related to interlacing and frame rate. What frame rate is everything at (timeline, 422 clips, and PAL clips)?

@Colum: tried with send to compressor. Same result.

@Dave: Everything is at 25 fps.

Maybe link us to a sample clip?

Apparently, FCP recognizes the current size of some of the clips to be 477x357, even if none of them has that dimension. When exported to 720x576, these clips degrade. Apparently, I'm not the only one struggling with this issue: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2379503?start=0&tstart=0 Where does this 477x357 come from???

I've never encountered this problem, so unfortunately I can't give you advice on how to fix it. However, next time, I would suggest that you convert all your footage to the same format before you begin editing. Prores 422 is a great editing codec.
Go to this website and download MPEG Streamclip. It's a free program that converts your footage to different codecs. Much better than Compressor IMO.
I usually convert all my footage to Apple Prores 422 (HQ) and then, upon completion, export a Quicktime H.264.

The transitions going horrible tell us the problem is the sequence settings(when it renders, go ugly). Check codec and quality settings, you have a lot of work in sequence settings tab. For the "scale" 477x357 problem, I suggest to turn off in FCP preferences to (stupidly)auto-adjust size for sequences and manual reinsert clip (and manual make any scale/aspect ratio adjustments).
You can try export in None compression to see if it is only a codec problem. And finally, you can export just a small part of your timeline to make your tests faster. Tell us what it works!


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Music video lighting with small budget?
I'm shooting the main performance and possibly some other scenes of a music video for my band (I'm not in it) and the scene is like this:

In a field or in a forest (some variation thereof).
Guitarist singing and playing acoustic (not looking at the camera).
Lighting needs to be warm, dramatic and background to be quite dark (easily done at night with lower sensitivity). Almost "camp-fire" like.
I need to be able to hand hold at least one light as I want to constantly change the angle of the light on the subject during certain takes.
All lights obviously need to be similar for white balance / grading purposes.
Will be primarily shot on Canon 60D's with 50mm F/1.8 at 23.976fps 1080p with some slo-motion takes at 59.94fps (60p).

We can spend some money on lighting but as musicians we are dirt poor (shock horror). I understand lighting fully (being a photographer) but I fear our budget is probably going to make things... interesting.
Are there any DIY or basic solutions to lighting a video such as this? The main issue is that we'll be shooting in a field with no mains nearby so we'd need a generator or other power source to power the lights. I suspect it to be a few hours of shooting.

For this kind of lighting, I would recommend going down to your local Home Depot (or equivalent hardware super store) and looking for construction lights. They are generally cheep and some run on batteries. They are also generally small and portable. You could also try some MagLights on D batteries (the ones the 5-0 use)
These lights are generally not that "warm," so I would also recommend picking up a piece of plywood and some paint. You can use this as a DYI reflector, and modify the color. More information can be found at Wikipedia

This is what a friend of mine did for lighting. It worked, but it was not the best. You just have to play around, there are many different ways of doing dirt cheap lighting, and you have to find the best. Hell, headlights and a reflector would work.

I plan on going to Bunnings (said hardware super store) and seeing what they have. I have a reflector which I plan to use, potentially to provide some soft backlighting.

The other option is to hire some professional lighting gear. Appears pricing may not be such an issue.

I dont know where you live, but here in NY, there is 2-3 companies that you can rent lighting and camera from. And its cheap, $100-$150 for a week. You should see if you can find one in your area

In Brisbane, we might be looking at around $50-150 a weekend for some moderate lighting gear.

You could always buy a "flex-fill" as a reflector. They are getting pretty cheap now and are 10x more portable than a piece of painted plywood. Plus they usually come with white on one side and either reflective silver or reflective gold on the other. The gold side can give some beautiful warmth.

Oh, and as for the work lights from home depot, they are generally harsh and un-even so I'd consider buying some diffusion gels (actually, wax paper will probably do the trick too) and maybe even some 1/4 or 1/2 CTB gels to correct for daylight depending on the colour temperature of the bulbs. CTO if they are already very white/blueish.
Also, have you considered an actual campfire?

I would avoid campfire light as a sole source. The spectrum is extremely narrow, and it's not really bright enough to shoot below ISO 1600.

+1 for using CARS for lighting! It's kinda dramatic sometimes though :)

For shooting in the woods, away from power, I'd recommend getting yourself some LEDs. I picked up a couple of lights similar to these on eBay for around $35each with free shipping, Chinese manufacturing; not the best quality, but at that price, practically disposable.
http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=led+camera+light&oe=&safe=active&cid=3602064285463185100&ei=NyliT6KpN6TOsQff1Yy7Dg&ved=0CAwQrhI#
If you're electronically inclined, http://www.instructables.com/id/The-2-LED-Camera-Light-for-Video-and-Photos/ is a great instructable for a smaller light; you could modify it as needed.
Recently, I've been buying LEDs designed for automotive lighting applications (eBay again) and making my own light panels. I can power them from 12V batteries...two camping batteries in serial, or a 12V motorcycle or car battery. For convenience, I epoxied a standard power outlet to a car battery, wired it to the posts, and can attach a standard household cable and plug...lamp cord is fine...to the LEDs. Just don't make the mistake of plugging it in to 120V AC. Bad things will happen. :)
LED Lighting examples, but eBay is usually a better deal...
http://www.amazon.com/Light-Airplane-Aircraft-Interior-Cockpit/dp/B004VMI2E4
http://www.oznium.com/led-flex-strips
I find that strategy to be incredibly effective in creating portable, easy to power lights.
Color temperature can be squirrely, so make sure you white balance and have plenty of gel with you. One trick for warm is to white balance off of something slightly blue (or through a blue gel) or add CTO to the lights AFTER you've white balanced. Either way, your shot will be a little warmer.


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Best H.264 settings for low bit-rate streaming video
I'm looking to stream some video from Flash Media Live Encoder with a video bitrate of around 150 Kbit/sec and audio of 50 Kbit/sec. The video will contain quite a lot of movement which I want to try and represent as faithfully as possible. Is there a particular flavour of H.264 that I could use to optimise the results at a resolution of 384x216 i.e. which profile?
Thanks

I've never used that program but from the sounds of it, you've specified the codec, resolution and bit rate that you have/want to use, but aren't happy with the result? Don't think you can do much if you are set on those parameters...

This question seems more broadcast and compression specific than AV Production! There is 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.

What kind of videomaterial is it?

It also depends a lot on your target platform. High Profile will compress better than Main Profile, but not all devices can decode High Profile with large frame sizes. A few cannot decode High Profile at all.
I have had considerable success encoding motor racing in SD (852x480, actually) at 768kbps using High Profile. Even though you have a quarter the frame size, I suspect 150kpbs is extremely optimistic.

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.

If you are going for a lot of motion, make sure you set a higher I frame rate. An I frame is a whole frame that you are going to need with quick motion.
Also, check out this link http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flash/apps/flv_bitrate_calculator.html for some basic settings. That shows you that 150kb/s is way to slow to keep a good picture. For SD material, bitraters of around 500kb/s with fast motion is recommended.

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 is generally impossible to say what settings will produce the best output for a given situation, without simply trying various settings.  Most encoders (I have never used Flash Media Live Encoder specifically) have quite a number of settings that can be tweaked within a specific bitrate, frame rate, and frame size that will affect the final result.  Some settings will have better results for some types of video than others.
My best advice, without knowing anything about your specific software, is to try various settings and compare the results.  You may wish to encode the same 10-30 second clib (probably with a lot of movement in it, since that's one of your main concerns) with various settings, and compare the results.
Another thing I might suggest is lowering your audio bitrate so you have a little bit more video bandwidth.  Although whether that's a good idea may also depend a lot on what your audio stream is like.  If it's a music video, then you probably want to guard your audio bandwidth very jealously.  If it's an interview (unlikely since you're talking about a lot of movement, but who knows?) then you can probably get away with pretty low audio bandwidth.


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How to playback/convert a DV4 file?
I have two .dv4 files, taken from a CCTV and I cannot find a way to use them on either Windows or OS X.
I've tried to open them with several applications, but to no luck!
Does anyone have experience with this kind of files?
Any help will be really much appreciated.

How are you trying to use these files in your workflow?  Transcoding may be more difficult than usual since a proprietary video player may be part of the equation.

@clint torres Transcoding would be great! the thing is that youtube was able to receive, transcode the file :/

Check here: http://www.moviecodec.com/file-types/how-to-play-cctv-dv4-file-format-in-pc-85119/

Sorry, but I'm not quite standing your last comment @nuc. It sounds like you're saying that since YouTube, a service designed to handle users across the world, can understand the file, your system should be able to?  Quite literally, if any service can use the file, then the people running it have put in the effort to solve all the codec issues - it didn't just run on their system as-is.  If you're really looking to transcode for editing, then which program will you edit with, and which company made the equipment that recorded the files?

Try VLC or AvTech PlayLite (appears to be abandonware). However, from my cursory research, it seems that DV4 videos are supposed to be bundled with proprietary software (check this Bosch PDF, page 13), so if you're missing that, you might be out of luck.

Proprietary video files are one of the biggest issue for law enforcement investigating on video evidence. If you don't have the native player by the system producer, my company Amped Software has developed DVRConv a tool to convert most of the formats on the market. We support hundreds of video formats, included the DV4.


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Switching and Cutting Video and Audio Items Separately
In the Final Cut Pro 7 manual is explained how to switch and cut video and audio items separately. At the end, it says:

However, independently switching video or audio angles breaks linking
  relationships between a multiclip’s clip items in the Timeline. After
  you perform the switch, only the audio item whose angle you switched
  remains linked to the video item.

Which is exactly what happen in my case.
How can I switch angle for a piece of audio once the relationship is broken in the timeline?

You should be able to drag the original clip from the Browser into the timeline and replace the clip you're working with.
If you want to make sure not to mess up your edit, double-click the 'broken' clip in the timeline to bring it into the viewer, and make note of your in and out points.  Then open the original clip from the browser into the viewer and set the same in and out points. Now replace the 'broken' clip in the timeline with the new one from the viewer.
If you're asking how to switch audio and video independently without breaking the relationship, I'm not sure.


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Selecting all clips on the right of the playhead
In Final Cut Pro 7, is it possible to select all clips and transitions on the right of the playhead with a shortcut?

There's something close to it. If you press 't' you will be using the Select Track Forward Tool which selects every visual OR audio track after and including the track you click on. If you press 'tttt' you will be using the Select All Tracks Forward Tool which selects everything including audio and audio transitions after and including the track you click on.

Instead of doing "tttt", just do "tt" and then "Shift (⇧)". This will be the same as "tttt", but "much" faster.


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Combining multiple Videos
Does any one know about any free software for windows with which I can combine multiple videos and create a video like this?

Its a shame you didn't get a better answer.  What did you end up using?  I imagine this stuff can be done with Final Cut quite well.  Syncing the audio will be the hardest part, and may be better done separately in something like Pro Tools... But I agree, should be a single app to do this.  More info here. http://avp.stackexchange.com/questions/895/how-to-make-videosongs

I didn't get anything yet... Thanks for the link though... :)

On Windows, for free, your best (albeit complicated) bet might be Blender.
You could create a series of several plane meshes in the layout you wanted, in front of the camera. You'd then create a separate material for each of the planes, setting them to shadeless, and giving each a different video texture. You'd have to mix the audio separately (Windows Movie Maker, or Blender also has a built in video editor).
I'll note that using a 3D approach for something like this isn't ideal at all - a 2D compositing program like Adobe After Effects would be much better (Blender itself does have a 2D compositing component, but since it uses nodes instead of layers, it might actually be more difficult).

There are several free or cheap video editing programs for Windows; Microsoft themselves provide Windows Movie Maker, and then as an opensource alternative there's VirtualDub.


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Sources to learn more about Audio/Video compression, codecs, algorithms etc.
I was quite surprised when I learned the fact that the MP3 codec is extensively based on the Fourier Transform. I'd like to learn more about these topics in general. When I say more I mean the working principles of these technologies.
For even more clarity, I would prefer something like this video produced by Xiph.org

Compression codecs and methods are also based extensively in the field of Psychoacoustics.  For this, I thoroughly recommend the books available from the Focal Press, such as this one

If anyone else is interested, Coursera just started a "Fundamentals of Digital Image and Video Processing" in partnership with Northwestern University. From the syllabus, it looks like many relevant topics will be explored.
https://www.coursera.org/course/digital
The course started on March 31, 2014. Here is the general course outline:

Introduction, Image and Video Processing vs Image and Video
Analysis vs Computer Vision, the electromagnetic spectrum,
applications of image and video processing
2D and 3D signals and systems, linear and shift invariant systems (convolution) •    2D and 3D Fourier transform, 2D and 3D discrete-Fourier transform, uniform
sampling (rectangular, arbitrary geometry)
Motion estimation and
its applications
Image and video enhancement (e.g., edge detection,
noise filtering, histogram equalization, inpainting)
Image recovery
(restoration, super-resolution)
Video recovery (restoration,
super-resolution)
Lossless compression
Image compression
techniques and standards
Video compression techniques and standards
Image and video analysis (e.g., 2D and 3D segmentation, anomaly
detection, clustering)
Sparsity-based advances in image and video
processing

I'm also looking for a comprehensive resource on video/audio codecs.
Wikipedia article Comparison of video codecs is a good start.

I would recommend Wikipedia. They will have all the information you want, and have links to more information.

This answer is really general and doesn't really help the OP. Could you maybe edit it to make it more specific? Maybe add links to relevant Wikipedia pages.


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First steps in time lapse
I've always been fascinated by time-lapse videos, and i wanted to give it a try.
I don't have much, just a Canon Digital IXUS970, which can record up to 4GB of video. (and i think this is enought to start)
What kind of editing should i do after i registered my video? What are the best scene setups for lights, positioning etc? What software should i use to edit and create my video?
Basically, how do i start making timelapses?

You might also find helpful information here: http://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/tagged/timelapse

to answer your question:
basic setup: camera, scene, computer with editing suite (after effects, premiere, vegas, final cut express, quicktime)
You must trigger record frame every second or predifined interval of time, setup your editing timeline at 25 fps and import your footage.
if you are doing frames you must import frames interpet them and put it on timeline (depends on what software pack are you using)
so, if we want to capture/record every second per frame, that is 60 frames which is 2 seconds and 10 frames on PAL or 2 seconds straight on NTSC (25 fps PAL / 30 fps NTSC), that is, in 2 seconds you will see 1 minute of real time. and the mathematics goes on.
so this is the concept.
some cameras lets you get a movie out of record frames, some do it manualy.
after we have shot as many frames / time we wanted we can move on to assemble those frames and edit them.


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How to make a single video out of few pics of different resolution and videos of different resolution
We had a get-together party. I'm the most technically sound person in my group. I collected pictures & videos from all the friends who attended that party. Because, not all are taken using same camera. These pictures & videos are of different resolutions.
Now, I want to group all of them in to a single video and add some music etc. How can I achieve it? Which software would be better suited for my purpose?

Any basic editing program will do the job for you. Are you on PC or Mac? If you have a PC then Windows Movie Maker is a very good, simple option.
To get the footage to the same codec and resolution you should use this free program called mpeg streamclip. I can't recommend a compression setting because I don't know the specs of the footage and what you are aiming to do with the video once it's been made. But there are many tutorials online that you can find with a quick google search.


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How can I create a 1920x1080p25 preset in Premiere Pro CS4?
I need to edit some source material that comes in 1920x1080p25, with a pixel aspect ratio of 1.
However, I'm missing the presets for this, and the closest I can find is HDV 1080p25, which would be 1440x1080 at a pixel aspect ratio of 1.3333. When I try to customize it, I obviously can't just change the PAR or the frame size.
How do I create a sequence that handles my 1920x1080 content?

I don't use CS4 but in CS5.5 you can do it this way: Open the Composition dialog, open the Settings tab, and choose Custom as preset (this should be the first entry). Now you can change all parameters. To save you preset, click the button Change preset at the lefthand bottom.

If you're missing the presets (which is what it sounds like) I have a solution for it here.
It involves uninstalling the CS suite, then reinstallling premiere as a standalone OR you can just click on help>update (if that option is available for you). There are a few tools you need to download as well to clean it from your registry after uninstalling. The long answer is on my website, hope it helps!


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Sony DCR-TRV140E Digital 8 tape problem
I recently borrowed a Sony DCR-TRV140E (which stores footage on the Digital8 medium) from a church in order to shoot my friend's wedding that took place there. By the looks of things, the camera had not been used for a while prior to this. When I set it up to capture into Final Cut, the preview window within FC and the LCD display on the camcorder both showed the footage, but with equally spaced grey bars, as shown below.

This being the tell-tale sign of dirty heads, I subsequently bought this head cleaner, and put it in the camcorder bay, and attempted to run it as instructed. The camcorder refused to play it, and the 'eject' symbol flashed on the LCD. When I tried to eject it, the cleaner proved difficult to remove from the bay.
I then left the camcorder for a while to rest, and attempted the same  thing about 90 mins later. After I had the same experience, I inserted the original footage tape back into the bay, and attempted to play that, and the unit refused to display footage, displaying only the blue screen. After leaving it to rest again, I reinserted the footage tape, and now this causes the camcorder to beep and flash the eject symbol also.
My question is, is there anything I can do to either make the camcorder recognise the tape again, and make it play (and therefore capture) properly? I have consulted the manual for this type of problem, (with it only helpfully stating that the tape is recorded in Hi8/8mm analogue system as it's solution) but to no avail.
The only thing I can think of is that the head cleaner, even though it was advertised to work with Digital 8 systems, was not in fact compatible and has damaged an internal component.
Any suggestions would be much appreciated, thank you for your time.

Ok, so it turns out that after a large amount of research into error codes, the Error: e:31:23 means that there is a problem with the right hand side tape reel cog. It appears that the cog cannot move the spool, as it clicks a bit before displaying the error when I insert a tape. I think this can only be fixed by a specialist, but I included this answer to give someone in the same situation a resolution.


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Lag during clip playback in Premiere Pro CS5
I am using the 30 day trial of Premiere Pro CS5 trying to edit some clips of some game footage. The clips are in 1680x1050 and are roughly 3.5GB each.
All the clips are saved on to my external USB 3.0 hard drive, which I've also set as the scratch disk in Premiere.
The clips will usually lag for the first 3-4 seconds, and then play smoothly for the remainder of the clip. Sometimes it begins lagging briefly in other parts.
So I would like to know what the optimal set up for video editing would be.
Here are my computer specs:

CPU: AMD Phenom II x4 965 Quadcore, 3.4 GHz
GPU: ATI HiS IceXQ Radeon HD 6950 with 2GB DDR5 memory
RAM: 8GB G.SKILL Ripjaws RAM
OS: Windows 7 Ultimate x64 (On a 3GB/S Sata HDD)
Verbatim 1TB USB 3.0 External HDD (Scratch Disk, file source)

Does the initial 3-4 second lag always occur? Otherwise, it could just be that the hard drive have powered down and needs some time to start up again.

The trial, from memory, doesn't include all sequence profile/codec settings. So Premiere will be encoding on-the-fly in the background into preview files.

Have you rendered the work area? Unrendered clips can lead to lag in the playback.
If you have rendered your clips the bar above your clips in the timeline should light up green instead of red or yellow (see picture below).

If the bar isn't green, go to Sequence->Render Entire Work Area.
Done!

I'm actually talking about watching the clips in the source monitor. Doesn't lag for me after rendering.

Your hard drive is probably the bottleneck. Move your scratch to another disk, and move your video files to a faster disk. Keep them separate unless you're working on fiber optics ;)

I'm using an external hard drive (USB 2.0) for my raw material and I haven't experienced any problems except for when they power down. This held true even when I had an old MacBook with 2GB of RAM.

@Speldosa what codec you are using as your source footage has a lot to do with this. Using more heavy-duty bit rates will create a bottleneck, I guarantee you.


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Recording streaming video from my computer
How would you go about recording a WebEx session that's being played in the Network Recording Player (not browser)? I cannot save the WebEx session so I thought of having a screen capture software that will record as the WebEx session is playing and then I need to capture the audio part of the WebEx session too. So how would I go about setting it up such that I start the streaming video, then 2-3 hours later I have all that stuff in an AVI file or something of that sort?

I thought WebEx offered a download copy once the conference was finished?

Standard screen-recording software such as Camtasia will work for this.

Quicktime Player X will take high-quality screen recording. The best thing is that it's free!! I'm on a Mac, and it will take screen recordings. If you are on a PC, I don't know if this feature works. Let me know if it doesn't work on a PC.

I used the Quicktime screen recorder to record some full-screen video art, and I noticed that it is very compressed, and I didn't see any options to change settings. The rich color of the art was squished into a smaller color space, and there were visible compression artifacts. But I'm sure it is fine for recording tutorials and such.


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Transfer Avid project from one machine to another
How can I transfer an Avid Media Composer project -- with all media -- from one computer to another?
Are there any issues with duplicating media when transferring media files?

Your best bet for transferring any type of media file will be to zip it along with any session files/data first to preserve the file types. Once you zip your files you can use any external hard drive to make the transfer from one machine to another.


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Is there a Jahshaka manual?
I downloaded Jahshaka, but I have no idea how to use it. Anybody know where to find a manual for it? Or even their website? I went to the SourceForge page, and clicked on the link to their website. The website never loaded.

All that jahshaka seems to have done in the last ten years or so is reorganise their website and change their logo. I'd love it to be an active project, but I'd say you'll get more out of investigating using something like blender for post: www.blender.org

The domain: http://www.jahshaka.com/ is online and should be working. The SourceForge site has a support page for the software but it's currently incomplete.

It isn't up yet, but I will check back later.


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Convolution matrix for converting 1080i to DVD?
It's pretty common to shoot in HD but deliver on DVD. This requires a reduction in resolution from 1920x1080 to 720x480 (for NTSC).  If you just interpolate and throw away pixels, you get bad aliasing artifacts such as shimmering lines.  The right way to do it is to first apply a low-pass filter, then get rid of the extra pixels.
Most of the popular video editing suites (Final Cut Pro, Premiere Pro, etc.) will convert the resolution but they don't do the low-pass filter step.  You have to do it yourself.  Many people approximate it with a Gaussian blur filter, but that is pretty crude, hard to control and can easily lead to loss of detail.
A better approach would be to apply a 3x3 convolution filter, with the parameters precisely tuned to the specifics of this conversion.  Someone skilled in DSP theory should be able to derive the optimal convolution matrix once and for all so we can all use it.  I'm hoping someone can do so in answer to this question.

A good idea, however the main problem with DVDs is their outdated MPEG-2 codec, for which it is probably rather benefitial to reduce detail through the somewhat crude gaussian filter step.

Really nice question, common problem.
After Effects, Autodesk Combustion and Autodesk Smoke can bring you a software downconversion(1920x1080 -> 720x480) with more quality than Final Cut Pro or Premiere Pro. Smoke can make it near perfectly.
You can use (buy/rent) hardware downconverters, like AJA Kona 3, or Blackmagic clones. Better results goes with AJA.
There are even more expensive/professionals solutions like Sonic and others which will make the MPEG-2 compression directly in hardware too.
If  you don't get your matrix filter from someone (not me, I'm not skilled for this kind of mission), best approach will be small tests with software and settings, tests, tests, tests, and then setup the workflow to not change forever!
Good Luck!

When working with progressive footage, Final Cut Pro, Premiere Pro, Encore, Adobe Media Encoder and Compressor have no problem scaling from 1920x1080 (or 1440x1080) to 720x480. The problem is with how they handle the scaling of interlaced frames.
Judging by how After Effects works (with its "Separate Fields" feature), the key to a good 1080i to 480i down-conversion is to de-interlace each field prior to scaling it, treating it as 1080p60, scaling it to 480p60, then re-interlacing that to 480i30.
After Effects does this down-conversion very quickly, too, especially compared to trying to get similar results from Compressor.

Interlace definitely adds another layer of complexity, but I can't agree that the programs you mention do a good job on progressive footage. They just don't handle the aliasing problem well and you can achieve dramatic improvements in quality by doing a lot of experiments to tweak a pre-filtering step.


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Need webcam presentation software for digital projectors
I am about to do a presentation of a mobile application at a conference. I have a good USB webcam to use, so I can point at the phone, but want to put it through my laptop and then through a projector for the audience to see. Can anyone recommend a simple a decent software package, (that is free to) ? Has to be compatible with Windows 7.

I'm a mac user, so haven't tried these out, but:
http://camdesk.sourceforge.net/ looks lightweight and may do the trick
http://www.screenmonkey.co.uk/ is more comprehensive live-presentation software, but should be able to get a webcam video-source full screen.


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Best approach to go through tv series, annote key scenes?
There's this great TV series that I am a fan of. I would like to go through each episode, available on DVD, and make note of interesting scenes, i.e. funnt stuff, reoccurring events, etc. Is there a good way to go about this? I know that shows such as The Daily show do something like this in order to find relevant clips for their show.

If you have a Mac, iPhone or iPad I would suggest Bento. It's a program based on FileMaker that allows you to organize all sorts of projects and data.  You could try this Film Library template from their template exchange or search for a different template.  Or maybe just download the program and start entering data.


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Hardware/software to project video wirelessly?
Anyone have any recommendations for ways to do screensharing of video on a Mac wirelessly over WiFi to a projector? In a solution that doesn't require plugging in some kind of USB dongle.

It sounds like you need a WiFi-enabled projector. I have no idea if these exist, but if they do, I'm sure they'll ship with the software you need to use them.

Meta discussion of this and questions like it here.

@Warrior Bob: Sounds like it has production qualities to me. I know I'm tired of running video cables to projectors whenever I'm doing a show that involves projection.

Wi-Fi enabled projectors have been around for several years, at least.
A cursory Google search for "wifi enabled projector" turns up that and several other articles, plus reviews and some product listings. The primary complaint seems to be bandwidth; however I did not find any reviews including more recent Wi-Fi standards like 802.11g/n.
That said, it was a cursory search. I saw lots of other results that I didn't have time to click on. Some of them looked a lot more current, and I did find something that looks like a present-day product listing of wireless projectors.
My advice would be to shop around, read reviews, and get a good return/exchange policy if you decide to buy one (so you can test it with relatively low risk).


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Software advice - for creating animations
I need to make a sort of animation. Not that I am going for same feel or style but I would like to make something that is sort of similar to the animated sequences in "Monty Pyhton's Flying Circus".
There is one catch though! I need to attach some collage/clip-art to something that can easily be distorted into a 3D-perspective - so I can move 'a virtual camera' around imported 2D-images(bitmap) in 3D-space (hope that's clear enough). Currently I am passing on Flash, I think.

If you are a starter go for after effects, check videocopilot.net for subject of interest..
short:
new project, import your prerpared files, create new camera, drag your footage to the timeline, mark the 3d layer switch, set up the positions of the layers(x y z) and roll the camera ;)


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Livestreaming Youtube
I have a Vlog on Youtube that I would like to stream live via LiveStream, but the quality looks like complete garbage. It's blocks and just all around not what it looks like in the browser. Does anyone know of a way I can boost the quality of these youtube uploaded recordings so I can stream them from LiveStream?

Do you have access to the original video file on your computer? If so, you can upload it directly to LiveStream for probably better results.

what do you mean by "It's blocks"?

This question doesn't really make sense as it is now--the quality of your YouTube videos should have nothing to do with livestreaming.
If your camera takes good video to begin with and the videos look fine on YouTube, then the problem with livestreaming is going to be the upload bandwidth of your internet connection. If you don't have the bandwidth, the stream has to be highly compressed, and will look pixelated (block-y) as a result.

LiveStream doesn't stream with as good of quality as youtube does. At least IMO

What you are asking is extremely difficult without some very expensive and complex software and video studio equipment. I learned some techniques in After Effects that were supposed to make an enlarged video look better (certain blurs and sharpeners, deinterlacing, etc) but I was NEVER satisfied with the results. Every technique made the enlarged version blurry or grainy. These techniques I just mentioned do improve the quality somewhat, but does not magically or vastly improve the quality like what everybody expects expects (not saying you do but in general).
It's would be easier for you just to stream from Youtube Live since it can be set to automatically record and upload your stream once its completed. It does so in HD or at least matches the quality of the stream.
I also find Youtubes general stream quality to be much better than LiveStream's.
Here is the official Youtube user guide on how to setup live streams. The guide little lengthy but it explains all the steps quite thoroughly.
http://support.google.com/youtube/bin/static.py?hl=en&page=guide.cs&guide=2474025
Notice Step 1, Part 8 with information about recording the live stream. Just remember that if your live stream is going to go over 4 hours, which in my opinion is tremendously long, you cannot use the recording feature. If this is one of the rare events or streams that would go over that time limit (maybe a huge concert or music festival) then a solution would be to have an "intermission" where you stop streaming at 3 hours and 50 minutes just to be safe. Then have a nice 10 minute break to do whatever you want!
One important thing to note when recording live streams with Youtube is that you can't edit the recorded stream once it exceeds two hours. This is kind of lame but I understand why it was necessary.
Additionally, it would be a good idea to record a local copy using an HD screen and audio recorder. In this answer I listed a few popular examples of screen recording software.


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Hardware/workflow for HD multicam shooting on a budget
I'm interested in doing some multicam shooting of my band's gigs.  (This is a personal, not commercial, motivation, so my constraints include budget and cargo space — i.e., minimal equipment bulk.  And I need to make shot decisions after the fact since I won't have someone who can switch between shots live.)
So far I've shot simultaneously with two or three consumer/prosumer HD camcorders, each recording to its own MiniDV tape or disk, then bringing all the content into FCP and manually syncing.
This works pretty well, except that the timecode is inconsistent — if I sync all the clips at the beginning of the show, an hour later they'll all be a second or two out of sync.  So far I've dealt with this by retiming the clips — after syncing at the beginning, I go to the end and adjust the playback rate for some of the clips by a very small amount (e.g., change one clip to speed 100.01%, another to 99.97%) until they're closely in sync.  This is tedious.
I'm wondering if there's a better way.  I've seen cameras in the 5,000 – 10,000 USD range which have external timecode inputs.  But that's above my price range, and would require a timecode generator and an extra cable running to each camera (which I think would violate my "minimal equipment bulk" constraint).
Are there less-expensive cameras and/or techniques that would work better for this purpose?  What should I be looking for?

More and more cameras are including GPS time sync now that they almost all use them for location information.  I am sure you can find a camera at any price range that includes this capability.  The GPS should keep your cameras within a few hundred milliseconds of each other.
Take them for a run at Best Buy or a similar store, letting them run for a while to see which keep in sync and which only sync on start-up.
The least expensive option is to put an AC quartz clock with a continuously sweeping hand on stage and occasionally have people "sync" by bringing it into view. :-)
I just looked on B&H for a reasonable camera and found this tip at http://www.bhphotovideo.com/find/newsLetter/Time-Code.jsp

Experienced videographers will "stripe" the video tape with time code
  prior to their shoots. To prepare the blank tape to be striped, they
  rewind the blank tape to its very beginning, and with the lens cap on
  the camera, press Record and record black from the very beginning to
  the very end of the tape. Striping the tape burns time code to the
  tape, and this time code will not change when recording your future
  video footage to that tape. This can alleviate possible time code
  inconsistencies that can be created by many types of camcorders.

This may be worth a shot with your current gear.

Thanks.  Good idea regarding GPS time sync — I'll investigate that.  (However I don't think timecode striping would help with syncing between multiple cameras.  It's typically used, I think, if you're going to be recording a bunch of clips on a tape nonsequentially.  Timecode striping is analogous to formatting a floppy disk before writing data on it — it just sets up the structure so the deck can find unique locations on the tape.)


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How does MKV segment linking work?
I downloaded a file vid1 that is in C:\dir1\ which links to another file vid2 in a subdirectory C:\dir1\dir2\ and it works if I move that file to dir1 (so both files are in dir1). I figure that it'll work as long as it's in the same directory or any subdirectory of dir1 but it also works if I move vid2 to C:\ or C:\dir3\ or C:\dir3\dir4..
So how does an MKV file look for other MKV file segments even when I move them all over the place in different directories?

It's not the container that 'knows' that, it is a player. And it is a good question how it managed to find the file in the different directory.
The only thing that the container does to help the player to identify the blocks is storing the Previous UID and Next UID for the files. It also stores the UID for the current file. So my guess would be that you have a player with some sort of 'library' capability, the player has scanned your drive and recorded the UIDs of the MKV files that it found, it then encounters the Next UID field in a file that it's playing and it will know where to look for the next one.

Like Volodya said its not the file but the player looking for files that have the same file name but a suffix that helps it to identify the correct order. In that case you have a number after the file name and the player knows file1 comes before file2. Many such players support alphabetic ordering aswell.

Oh, i didn't think about the suffix at all. I suppose it could be that as well.


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How Do I Film A Rotating Object With White Background?
I often need to rotate object when making video and rotating with hands is not convenient. I wish there was a helping rotational hand spehere that would rotate as i film object where i could set rotational angles and in the end get to see an object with white background as it rotates. I want to place smartphone instead of that globus in the middle:

People suggested to do it with chromakey in software without studio or special equipment but it will take a learning curve and time to get familiarized with basics.

You could use a revolving cake stand.

Thats the correct answer.

If you need to rotate large objects, you could try a Lazy Susan


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Ad Free Video Streaming to Web
I'm currently working with a charity that broadcasts our event to the web. The event is about a week long (24 hrs per day), and gets in excess of 2000 viewers at times during the stream.
I am wondering what the best free/low cost option is for streaming to the web that presents no ads to the viewers?

Wowza Media Server on Amazon EC2 is a really cost-effective way to do it, it's very popular among churches because of its on-demand nature and low cost. You spin up the server when you need it, pay a small hourly charge for it, pay for the bandwidth used, and shut it down.

You might try justin.tv
but since its a bigger thing you want to stream and streaming bandwith is very expensive it will end sooner or later in a paid solution.
livestream.com or watershed.ustream.tv could be interesting Hosts then.
But if you find some cheap to free alternative without (much) advertisement, let me know :)

bandwith is the only expensive thing in this setup. Setting up a streamingserver like wowaza or nginx and stream the data there is no big deal. but if you expect a greater amount of viewers you might think of a "small cdn" setup to distribute it.
since you wrote it's for a charity I would suggest to ask some companies for a sponsoring or special rates.


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What program can develop videos like ....?
What program can develop videos like this one:

Oh, look, Papirus font.

Almost any video editing package will do this. I'm pretty certain I could do it in Windows Movie Maker - there is nothing really happening here: a background image with some fade-ins and -outs.

I would say this was definitely made in Windows Movie Maker.


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Importing an unsupported file type into Premiere Pro CS5
I am trying to import some footage into Premiere CS5. The footage was recorded on a Sony Z1 as HDV 1080i. My camera man captured the video into a series of files for me. He claimed they were in "native HDV 1080i" files. The files play fine in VLC.
When I try to import them I get an error claiming the file is unsupported.
I used ffmpeg to get the information about the file. It claimes it is mpeg2video (Main) (hdv3 / 0x33766468):
Input #0, mov,mp4,m4a,3gp,3g2,mj2, from 'part i':
  Metadata:
    major_brand     : qt
    minor_version   : 537199360
    compatible_brands: qt
    creation_time   : 2011-10-26 07:09:12
  Duration: 00:15:05.36, start: 0.000000, bitrate: 26541 kb/s
    Stream #0:0(eng): Video: mpeg2video (Main) (hdv3 / 0x33766468), yuv420p, 144 0x1080 [SAR 4:3 DAR 16:9], 25000 kb/s, 25 fps, 25 tbr, 25 tbn, 50 tbc
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2011-10-26 07:09:12
    Stream #0:1(eng): Audio: pcm_s16le (sowt / 0x74776F73), 48000 Hz, 2 channels, s16, 1536 kb/s
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2011-10-26 07:09:12
    Stream #0:2(eng): Data: none (tmcd / 0x64636D74)
    Metadata:
      creation_time   : 2011-10-26 08:06:48

Obviously I am going to need to install a codec, or convert the videos. But I'm not sure how to d this.
I had a go at using ffmpeg to convert:
     ffmpeg -i "part i" -s 640x360 -sameq -acodec copy part_i.avi
That didn't work. It created a file that I could import as an audio file, but with no video.
Any help would be appreciated. If it turns out I need to re-encode it would be great if you could make a suggestion of what codec to use and what tool to use.
Thanks!

I can re-encode the file as a dvd, then I am able to import it. I don't think this is the optimal solution though. To do this I use the following command: ffmpeg -i "Part I" -target dvd -aspect 16:9 -sameq part_i.mpg

Your first ffmpeg command was audio only because you didn't specify a video codec (-vcodec).  Obviously "-vcodec copy" won't solve your problem - "ffmpeg -codecs" will list available codecs but they're probably all lossy so quality will be affected to some degree).

Thanks for that Darren. Not including a video codec, doh! I'm fairly new to all this. Could you suggest a not too lossy codec that works nicely with Premiere Pro? H.264 perhaps?

Reading through several sites it seems that I should not convert to H.264. This is because H.264 is designed for delivery and capture. If H.264 is used for editing it will be very slow. Instead I should use a codec designed for editing.. Apple's ProRes might be an option, but I'm not sure this will work on a PremierePro/Windows system.

Looks like ProRes is Apple only. So... what is a good codec to use for a Premiere Pro project. Lots of site say "it depends". I'm guessing it depends on Standerd vs. High definition, Film vs. Animation, processing speed of computer etc. Could anyone suggest a good all rounder codec to use for Premiere Pro projects?

I've only really used H.264 so not sure what's best - maybe you could ask as a new question on the site?

I've had a bit of account trouble, so I now have a different account and I can't log in to modify this question. So.. I'm going to answer my own question with what I have learned:
The video files I had were not supported by Premiere Pro. However I was able to play them (in VLC) and transcode them (in FFMpeg).
The real question I was asking above was: What codec should I transcode to? And How do I do the transcode?
After quite a bit of research it seems that the best editing codec for PP on Windows is DNxHD. This codec is not provided with Windows or PP, and must be downloaded here. There are other editing codecs out there, but they are either expensive (CineForm) or only work on Apple (ProRes).
It is important to note that files for editing should not e stored as H.264, even though you might capture them in this format, and you will probably release the video in this format. This is because H.264 is very slow for editing files, and with really thrash your hard drive and CPU.
I found a nice tutorial that describes how to do the transcode using free tools.

What file extension are you using?
I've had problems with CS5 rejecting a file then accepting it with a new file extension.
You could try renaming it to a .mov file (if it's not already).

Thanks for your input :) They were generated on a Mac, so they do not have a file extension like files on windows. However I did try renaming them; I tried .mov, .mp4, and .avi. None worked - so it must be a codec issue.


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Can you link an audio track to a video track in iMovie?
I am editing a video in iMovie. The video file is independent of the audio file; the video file's audio is what the camera picked up, and the audio file is what our lav mic picked up. After carefully listening/watching to the two tracks, I now have them synced in iMovie. Is there a way to link the two together so they act as one audio/video file in the timeline? Right now I'm exporting it as a movie file to re-import in as one file, but I hope there's a simpler way.

Nope! There's no simpler way. I'm running into the same problem right now, and it's very annoying! That's why I'm considering getting Premiere Pro or Final Cut X. It's silly to try to do any major editing in iMovie.

There is a way, but it is more work. You have to add the audio in another project and export in and reimport it or add it in other software. It is pointless. Just like Devin, get a better pice of software. If you want you can try Motion for 50 bucks on the Mac App Store.


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How do I take optically faithful videos of glow props in the dark?
I own a small business making LED glow props and though the technology is sound, taking good footage of them in use is proving to be far more difficult than I expected.
I've tried with all sorts of different cameras but they all seem to result in the same thing which is gaps (seems to happen if I shoot in non-interlaced mode) or overlaps (I get this when I shoot in interlaced mode) between frames e.g.

Is there anything that can be done to combine the frames without the overlap?

That image doesn't really tell me very much. Is it a lightsaber type of thing that you are waving up and down?

It is difficult to assess what is going on in that image, but the shutter speed of your camera may be a factor: http://vimeo.com/videoschool/lesson/56/frame-rate-vs-shutter-speed-setting-the-record-straight

it's a light shining up a white cone which is then swung in one direction.. ...like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OwUFh_Fbp4&feature=player_embedded

Deciding whether or not to shoot interlaced is really a matter of matching your destination format.  If you're shooting video for the web, you should record it in progressive scan mode.  You can record interlaced, and then de-interlace it in software, but this will likely lead to video artifacts, especially considering your subject matter.
I think the picture you posted has misled many commenters into giving you the wrong advice.  Because the picture is blurry, they recommend a faster shutter speed, which will sharpen a moving object.  But, given the nature of the video you linked to, I think more motion blur will result in a smoother, more natural look.  So try recording progressive, with a slow shutter speed.  This will let more light into the lens, brightening the exposure and making longer motion trails.
Also, try to match the framerate with which you're recording to that of your destination.  If you are recording at 29.97 and vimeo or youtube is playing at 24fps, they're going to introduce some frame blending on their end, which you have no control over, and which is likely to introduce artifacts.


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Camcorder for use as a webcam
I've been looking into a camcorder for use as a webcam, since all the webcams I have found don't seem to be up to the task I have in mind.
My biggest issue is finding camcorders can can even be used as a webcam, either natively or through a 3rd party software such as DVDriver. DVDriver requires that the camera have an IEEE 1394 port, but it seems that this is not a common thing on camcorders now like it was years ago.
Capability to record in 1080p and a wide angle lens would also be useful.
Does anyone know of any camcorders that are capable of this, or a resource where I can find more information on camcorders?  My searches of the Sony, Canon and other manufactures websites has turned up very little in the way of useful information.

Hey, I am running into the same problem. Did you find any resolution ?

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to come to a resolution on this one.  After researching it quite a bit I found that it was going to be too expensive and too much hassle to be able to get a camcorder setup as a webcam, so I abandoned the project. The biggest issue I had was that without actually purchasing everything and trying it, I had no way of knowing if anything would actually work as expected. Seems this method of recording fell out of favor about 5-7 years ago. Kinda surprising given the lack of high quality webcams.

Well, i just bought stuff from best buy. Plan to return it if things dont work :-). I am begining to figure things out. will update this post once i do.

I'd be interested to hear how it goes, if you figure something out that works make sure to post it as an answer.

I know one solution, but it's not cheap as webcams. Same time full hd quality is something that webcams usually doesn't deliver.
Device especially interesting for live shows recording and streaming.
http://zoom.co.jp/products/q2hd
Webcam driver is provider by Zoom, so you still can use it as regular webcam delivering high quality video and audio to Skype for instance.
PS: there are plenty of reviews on youtube.

I'll have to check that out in the future. Definitely appears to beat any webcam I'd looked at in the past, and it seems simple enough to connect.  All the old methods I had researched required tons of conversion. Thanks for the link.


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Decoding and Using VITC?
Can any one give me more explanation on VITC? I need to identify the VITC code presented in the VBI signal. How does it's format work? how does one extract it? How are VITC embedded in a video signal?
I need solution both for Analog Composite video as well as Digital MPEG TS file.


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Can't figure out which projector fits these features
What I need:

reasonable resolution (not 640x480, maybe 1024x768 minimum, but I'm willing to budge on this)
long life, no need to change parts
connects to a standard computer VGA out

What I don't need

SD/USB port
speakers
color depth
absolute smoothness
portability
HDMI video input
S-video input
any other sort of input than VGA

In other words, minimally I need to be able to project in grayscale and without worrying about changing a bulb. So which flavor of digital projector should I be buying?

What type of environment will this be used in?  Does it need to be portable?

I wrote that it didn't.

I see that now.

I would look on Ebay and Craigslist since your requirements would be met by most projectors produced in the last 10+ years. Find one that suits you, and invest in a spare bulb (or two) while you're at it, since you might be buying a used item.
Also, check out Slickdeals for clearance items, such as this BenQ DLP projector that meets your requirements: http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=3634482


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How to preserve new audio when importing Premiere projects into After Effects?
I am working on a project in Adobe Premiere consisting of many small clips. For some of the clips I replaced the audio by unlinking the original videoclip from the original audioclip, cutting the audioclip from the timeline, replacing it with the new audiofile and relinking the original videoclip with the new audioclip.
When I import this Premiere project into After Effects however, all clips have their original audio again and while the new audiofiles appear in the new project view, they are nowhere to be found on the timeline.
How can I make sure the videoclips will be correctly imported with the new associated audioclip instead of their original audio?


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H.264 encoder with CLEAR options for specifying minimum & maximum video bitrate?
I almost never get stuck with things like this and kinda figure things out myself... but I'm at a complete loss here.
I've used Handbrake, X-Media Recode, and lots of other encoders and they're great.. but they just don't have clearly defined options for maximum and minimum bitrate control in VBR. That, or I just can't find the options. Is there a GUI I could use for this? Or is it only possible through command-line in x264 core? I've only been able to work with constant bitrate so far and I REALLY need to use variable bitrate.
I found these extra options and I think they might be for variable bitrate.. but experimenting and encoding with that still produces a result with constant bitrate:
VBV buffer size, VBV maximum bitrate, VBV initial buffer and Bitrate variance.
Any help would be appreciated.

What you are looking for is a way to achieve the "Bitrate range" I suppose?

From http://ffmpeg.org/ffmpeg.html , you can do this in CLI.. not sure about GUI.

‘-maxrate bitrate’
Set max video bitrate (in bit/s). Requires -bufsize to be set.
‘-minrate bitrate’
Set min video bitrate (in bit/s). Most useful in setting up a CBR encode

Eg: "ffmpeg -i myfile.avi -b:v 4000k -minrate 4000k -maxrate 4000k -bufsize 1835k out.m2v"


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Screen-record tablet ink drawing on top of recorded video?
Is there software that allows me to 'screen record' tablet wacom ink drawing on top of a video being played back, and then output a new file with the drawing being part of the video?
A wacom overlay, for instance, only sends input commands to what you currently have on screen, it doesn't create 'ink' on the screen (like in say, Windows Journal or Onenote). To make a wacom overlay create ink, you open a drawing program. But then I can't have the video playback on the same screen, so I think I'd need a screen recorder software with actual inking support built-in so it creates the ink on top of video. Is there such a thing?
A use case would be annotating a screencast with inking to point to and mark things up.


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Is it possible to make changes over several clips at the same time when color correcting?
Let's say I have 30 clips. The first 10 clips are filmed outside at day, the next 10 clips are filmed outside at night and the last 10 clips are filmed indoors. This means that I want to use three different color corrections (I could of course use more, but let's say this is enough).
One way to do this would be to apply a color correction to one of the clips and then copy and paste this one to all the clips with the same lightning conditions. However, what if you later find out you should have nudged the blacks a little bit more toward the red? Then you have to go in and make individual changes to every single clip. This quickly gets very time consuming.
Is there any way to set global variables that gets applied to several clips at the same time? For example, when programming, one can specify a certain variable, let's say a<=20, use this variable on several places in the code, and then, if one want a to be 25 instead, one only has to change this on one place instead on every place in the code. Can I do something similar in Premiere?

What program do you use to color correct?

I color correct directly in Premiere.

Use an adjustment layer. That should be the best way.

2 ideas for Premiere CC 2015:

Apply effects to the source clip instead of just the part on the timeline. If you're targeting clips from more than one camera original, you could nest the camera originals into a sequence, use that sequence as your source, and apply color effects to the source clip. That should populate your changes to one clip to all the rest from that source sequence.
Use an adjustment layer to apply the same effect to a series of adjacent clips.

+1 to adjusting source. That way you can still mess with the edit without needing to dive into sequences and see how your edits effect your master time line.

There isn't a way to do it per se but there is an easy workaround:

Select all clips with the outdated effect
Right click and remove attributes
Select the effect you want to update and remove it.
Then copy the clip with the updated effect and right click all other clips again to paste attributes.

The only reasonable way in premiere is to nest the footages and use the nested comp to edit. if you open the original footage in the nested comp you can change every bit of the fotage in one go.
The other way is to use davinci resolve, it can do this, and it is amazing.

There is a way to do it in Premiere (at least in CS5) using the "Sequence Embedding/Stacking" capability.
1) Create a master sequence (I usually label this sequence "Name of Scene - Raw") of video from your clips. Put all the clips into the timeline of this sequence. Once you have the timeline/sequence locked
2) Create a new sequence, call it "Name of Scene - Color Corrected"
3) Drag the "Name of Scene - Raw" sequence from your Bin onto the "Name of Scene - Color Corrected" timeline.
4) Now you can apply any effect onto the "Name of Scene - Color Corrected" sequence as you would do an individual clip. This is the method I use to do all types of adjustments to a large number of individual clips at one time.
I don't know what Adobe calls this ability in the help files, but I call it Sequence Embedding or Stacking. You can embed layers of sequences onto other sequences as long as your computer has the horse-power. I never actually embed/stack more than two to three sequences unless I render each of the stacked sequences first.

Can you apply different effects to different parts of the sequence with this method (for example, one certain color grading for the first half and another for the second)?

No, but you could use the same method to create two sequences.

I think that there is no program (or a script) to lessen the processes involved in adjusting the levels. If I understand you right, I think you can copy the adjusted effect and paste it to other clips. I think there is no "universal" button to change an element in the effect of a clip and applying it to other clips simultaneously. In after effects, this is possible with the parent tool.

As far as I know there isn't a way to do a 'master' color grade that you can edit which will subsequently effect all the clips it's applied to. Best way to do it would be to copy and paste the new grade onto each clip.
Typically, the way you color grade is to go through shot by shot and not move on until you are happy with how it looks and satisfied that it matches the previous shot. If you grade this way there would be no need to apply minor changes on a large scale.

"Typically, the way you color grade is to go through shot by shot and not move on until you are happy with how it looks and satisfied that it matches the previous shot." - Let's say that you, after a while decide to push the blacks a little more towards the green to get another feel. And later, after you've watched it a couple of times decides that it's a little to dark. And so on. I would say that this isn't just a possible scenario, but rather a likely scenario (it happens to me all the time).

Yeah, I guess if you don't have a deadline that could be the case. The only thing I could suggest is exporting a lossless video of all the shots that you want to have the exact same grade, grading that the way you want it and then re-cutting it. Possibly more effort than it's worth as copying and pasting a grade is very simple and can be done quickly with keyboard shortcuts.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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Why does media show up in Final Cut but errors when rendering in Compressor?
I am building a video using media all on my local hard drive. When I watch the video preview in Final Cut, there's no missing media clips. However, when I bring the project into Compressor, the clips are missing and there's some areas where there's a red screen and camera, signifying missing media.
My question is, why does the media have no problem showing up in the Final Cut preview window yet when I export to compressor, it doesn't work out. Are effects in Final Cut screwing up the media when it makes it to Compressor?
Thanks for the help - I'm in a crunch on this project, and can't figure out why Compressor says media is missing.

Do you go File > Send to > Compressor? Also, have you rendered all media in FCP before opening Compressor?

Is your Final Cut event using proxy media? It's possible the original media has been moved and Compressor can't find it.


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Importing an .fcp file into FCPX
A friend of mine created our wedding video in FCP and now that I've got the project I've been trying to import it into the trial copy of FCPX (off the App Store) but it doesn't like it.
I've read on Wikipedia that FCPX doesn't support FCP file formats, so what can I do?

I haven't used it but "7toX" can import FCP7 projects into FCP X:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/7tox-for-final-cut-pro/id496926258?mt=12

Export your FCP project as a self-contained quick time video file.
Then import the QT file into X.
You'll be good to go.

Open any 20y old PSD file with the latest version of PhotoshopCC on either windows or Mac - yes. Open any 10y old FCP file on a the latest version of FinalCut X on Mac - no. The developers best suited to address the issue - don't.

You cannot do anything, from what I understand they have added xml support so you may be able to import an xml from fcp7 but why, fcpx is awful, stay in fcp7

Not really an useful answer, as previous answers clearly show that there are ways to accomplish this.

No it is usefull, exporting a quicktime of your cut does not allow you to continue editing...fcpx is not a good program, i told him to try xml, however like I said before if you can keep fcp7 and use that, post houses are not fcpx compatible for this exact reason

Ok, but what about the "7toX" program? I haven't tried it, but that might work right? Saying "You cannot do anything" and "fcpx is awful" is not really helpful and does not add to the quality of this site.

7toX is the XML support for FCPX, however with FCPX you are going to be limited to having to buy updates to a software that is far from a pro-video editing software, I am trying to do the OP a favor by saving him headaches in the future by avoiding using FCPX all together, premiere is a much more pro software, and the old FCP 7 is also better, sure it looks nice, but it is not the way to learn how to edit...but when FCPX first came out, there was NO WAY to import an edit from FCP7 to FCPX, you cant make up a way to do it, it just didnt work


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How to get battery status of aftermarket battery on Canon camcorder
Is it possible to get battery status of an aftermarket battery on Canon camcorders, specifically Legria HF R26?
When I insert that battery, I get the message saying that the camcorder can't communicate with the battery pack, which is understandable since it says the same thing in the manual.
I'd just like to know if there's some kind of a workaround.

By aftermarket do you mean generic? I.e. a battery made by a company other than Canon?
To the best of my knowledge, generic batteries won't give you a charge reading in the camera. Only original batteries will. That's just the trade off you have to live with when choosing generic batteries.

I would say that any device you can get is not going to be able to give you charge percentage when the battery is in the camera. Doesn't the battery charger tell you the status of the charge?  I have a few cameras and they tell about it when you plug them in (they are Cannon). Maybe you can also ask in https://electronics.stackexchange.com/ and give you a solution there. Good luck.


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video bitrate - how large should my video be?
I created a video in movie maker from more videos I took using my canon 550d, but the file produced is an 11 minutes 806MB video. This is huge. Now, when I create the video using movie maker, it asks me for the bitrate and resolution.
What are the recommended setings?If I create a video from 10 pieces that have a bitrate of X, can I create a video which has a larger bitrate?

The bitrate that you choose determines the quality of your video and the file size. The standard units for bitrate is bits per second, or bps. Sometimes bitrates are expressed in Kbps (kilobits per second) or Mbps (megabits per second). Do not confuse Mbps and Kbps with MBps and KBps. A lowercase 'b' refers to bits, an uppercase 'B' refers to bytes.
From your question it seems you are more concerned about size than quality, so I recommend that you pick what is a reasonable file size and deduce the bitrate that achieves that size.
For example, let's say you want your file to be 200MB. First convert this size to bits:
200 x 1024 x 1024 x 8 = 1,677,721,600 bits

You also said that your video is 11 minutes, which is 660 seconds. So now we obtain the bits per second:
1,677,721,600 bits / 660 seconds = 2,542,002 bits per second (approximately)

From the above, you know that if you pick a bitrate of 2,500,000 bps (same as 2,500 Kbps or  2.5 Mbps) then your file will end up being about 200MB in size.
So now what's left is to pick a resolution and frame rate. Once you know your bitrate, you have set an allocation of bits for each second of your movie. To get the better quality you should now pick the smallest resolution and slowest frame rate that works for your needs, as that will assign the maximum number of bits to each frame, giving you the best possible quality.

If I create a video from 10 pieces that have a bitrate of X, can I create a video which has a larger bitrate?

You can use any bitrate you like, but if your source clips were encoded at some bitrate X in the camera, going to a higher bitrate will just waste space without increasing the quality, since you can't add detail that was not in the original recording.


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Is there a decent computer based, multiple video stream capture solution out there?
Recently, on a trip home to my dad's, I experienced some great conversations between him and my grandmother. I really wanted a way to record them.
Here's my thinking: using a laptop connected to two or more webcams, capture them both.
I've looked around a bit and I'm finding that the software out there is either clunky, doesn't capture with good video quality, or doesn't record audio. Virtualdub seems to work well.
I've had thoughts of just using multiple in-expensive camcorders but what appeals to me about the computer solution is that I already have a laptop and a webcam. Also, perhaps the clips will be easier to synchronize
I'm wondering if anyone has experience with this kind of thing.

You could just record the entire screen or at least the portion that shows the stream with a program designed to do just that.
One really popular one for Mac is iShowU HD.
One really popular one for PC is CamStudio.
CamStudio is free while iShowU HD isn't. A free one for Mac that is pretty good is Jing.


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Live Streaming and Recording Simultaneously
I will explain my situation first.  I am getting married in two months and have many family members that are in bad health.  They want to make the wedding, but just cant.  We had the idea of streaming the wedding over Skype, etc.  We had already planned on having a basic camcorder (non-professional) to record the wedding.
My question is, can we record the wedding and stream the video simultaneously using the same camcorder?  Or will we need a separate camcorder for each?
I'd love to make this possible without costing too much.

personally I think ustream or the like would be easier. assuming you dont mind the possibility of someone else watching

This is very straightforward - but you will need to install a 3rd party app to do it. I know of a couple:

Supertintin
Vodburner
Evaer
Pamela
imCapture for Skype

These will record the entire call to disk.


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What type of media server software do I need to transcode in near real time?
Can anyone help me find a software stack for doing near real time video encoding/transcoding?
I want to allow users to upload videos(wmv, avi, mov, flash video, other formats) to my website. As soon as the file is uploaded, I want to encode/transcode it into h.264 (preferably with an API so I can get progress percentage etc) so that I can then play it back via html5 or a flash player.
Anyone have any guidance for me on this?
Oh, and the server platform can be either windows or linux.

FFMPEG is what you're looking for.  You can use it to transcode most anything, it can easily be integrated via STDIO, and there are a handful of library versions of it you can use as well.
I'd recommend hopping over to StackOverflow.com, where this topic has been heavily discussed.

I am guessing that mplayer and vlc are where you want to start lookIng.

Encoding.com offers cloud-based high-speed conversion. Their standard plans aren't instant (up to 30 minute queue time), but they do offer encode-as-you-upload (meaning that they start encoding during the upload process, which is awesome).
You'll need to contact them for more info and pricing on that.
Be aware: What you're wanting to do is both complex and expensive unless you hire someone, in which case it's just expensive (assuming your website becomes anywhere near popular).

You could look into MediaTomb it runs on linux. I use it for real time transcoding to my direcTv box and PS3


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Encode MPEG-4 to DVD Format Without Doubling File Size
I want to encode a group of low-quality MPEG-4 video files to DVD format (to eventually burn to a DVD).
The problem is that when I encode the video, the resulting files are often 2-3x as large as the original video files.
How can I encode the video files so that they are in DVD format, roughly the same quality, and roughly the same file size as the originals?

Well, the short answer is, you can't.
The longer answer: DVD uses MPEG2 compression, which is a lot less efficient than MPEG4 (aka h.264). In other words it can't get the same quality from the same file size as MPEG4 does.
So you can choose: similar file size, or similar quality, but not both.

'MPEG4' is likely part 2 (xvid), rather than part 10 (h.264), but your point still stands


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Where can I publish a 50 fps video?
I've produced a video in 50 fps progressive. I am having a hard time getting anyone to actually see it: all popular online video players are artificially capped to 30 fps.
Is there any way I can publish this video without halving the framerate to 25 fps, which looks atrocious due to the fast shutter used?

I believe that dailymotion.com can have 50 fps videos, though the recommended is 25 fps. Here is an upload that says that it is in 50fps.
I am not completely sure, so you might have to just end up converting it to 25.

It looks like it's 25fps. The video was shot in 50fps and then slowed to 25fps.

Well @romkyns, the only place I could find to upload 50fps videos online is pinkbike, a Mountain Biking site (heh). It specifically says here that it can. Not that you would want to do that....


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Two questions regarding setting up a podcast with Behringer 1202fx mixer and a dual channel compressor limiter gate
I would like to know what is the proper way to connect the mixer to the compressor limiter gate to my Behringer1202fx mixer? any ideas?
Also, I would like to know if anyone has or knows how to set up at least one Skype call with  mix-minus into the same 1202 mixer.
Ideas much appreciated, Thanks in advance
Silas

Is that a separate hardware compressor/limiter/gate device or is that integrated in your 1202fx's onboard effects?

No it is separate Bob. I think I figured it out, I'm waiting on my cables to get here. I ordered them online instead of getting raped at Radio Shack. 2nd computer headphone out to Channel 3 on mixer, FX turned full left, FX send out to 2nd computer mic input.

Then main Out from mixer to CGL input on channel 1, out of CGL into a digital recorder then into 1st computer mic input. Out from 1st computer headphone jack into channel 4 on mixer for additional sound effects. Control OUT on mixer to monitor speakers. Microphones are on channels 1 & 2 of mixer. I think this should work , if any one sees something wrong with this set up Please let me know, Thanks in advance.

I have the 1204USB for a while a ended up throwing out the USB adapter and getting a Saffire PRO 24 Firewire interface. This mixer and the 1202 are great but if I had the chance I would have gotten the Mackie Onyx 1220i which has the Firewire built in.
However I did manage to make the mix minus work with this desk. You need to listen and monitor from the desk but record from the computer. Next you bring the audio back into the desk via the line out of the comp and into the 7/8 channel of the desk. Leave the POT panned down and listen to the the channel in PRE and make sure you live monitoring is also playing out the PRE to the headphones (PRE never goes out to main). Looking at the PDF for the deck: http://www.behringer.com/assets/1002FX_P0572_M_EN.pdf  I'm not sure if the 1202 has PRE setting but without it, you will not be able to do this.


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Canon 60 PC Adobe Premiere and After Effects Workflow
I have a Canon 60D, which obviously uses the h264 codec for capturing.  I am using Adobe Premiere and After Effects -- and I've already seen how both can handle h264 footage natively (Thank you Jason Levine).  However, I've also seen footage that has been transcoded to an intermediate codec for editing (as opposed to a capturing codec).  This footage, to me, looks like it runs smoother in Premiere and After Effects than allowing the footage to run natively.  Unfortunately, these videos always fail to mention the name of the particular intermediate codec being used.  So finally we arrive to my question:
What is a good intermediate codec to transcode h264 footage to, before running it on Premiere or After Effects?
I would appreciate a thoughtful answer to this question from someone who uses the Canon 60D (5D and 7D user input is also welcome) in a PC based Adobe workflow that incorporates Premiere and AE.
Thank you.

I've never noticed any codecs that run smoother in After Effects or Premiere. One thing I have noticed about Premiere is that if you don't have your source media in your main project folder (designated when you start the project), it lags. I assume the RAM gets overly taxed by searching all over the place to round up the referenced files. I haven't seen any documentation about this but have run extensive tests to prove it. I migrated recently from FCP.
Based on what you said, it sounds like you want to compress your footage before working with it in AE or Premiere. I think this is a bad idea. Your camera has already compressed it (using the h.264 codec). If you absolutely have to use another codec, I would go with:
quicktime animation
quicktime jpeg2000
They are uncompressed or the least compressed to my knowledge.
As I'm sure you know, when working with AE and Premiere, you want your raw material to be the highest quality possible and only compress it when you export your final project. For example you want to use AIFF (or something comparable) and not mp3 for audio. If you compress it before working with it in AE or PRE and then export it, you're compressing it twice and throwing away data twice. This will kill your quality.
Another factor may be your memory settings in the apps preferences.
Another possibility, if you're using an external scratch disk, make sure it's not USB. This will cause lag.
Finally, your graphics card and RAM need to be pretty hefty for a pleasant experience.
I run an imac with a 2.8 GHz Intel Core i7 with 16 GB of RAM and a great ATI Radeon HD 4850 512 MB graphics card. It pretty much flies with any codec I use.

Intermediate codecs are intra-frame. That means that each frame is compressed alone.  The movie is like lot of JPGs in one file.  When you move the play-head, After Effects just needs to load the requested frame.
H264 has lot of different formats in it, but most of them compress some frames like JPG, (they are called keyframes) and for the few other frames, it encodes just the difference relative to previous keyframe (movement, zoom, or other differences).
You may have seen the common bug in decoding an MPEG movie when a flashy green or purple stain spreads across the screen, until the stream reaches the next keyframe. Using this kind of codec in After Effects makes it less reactive because it is harder to get one precise frame. After effect must decode the previous keyframe and all the frames up to the one it really wants.


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How can I capture multiple computer screens and put them onto a single video stream?
We are looking to broadcast or record a single video stream of two desktop computers running Windows.  The software we are looking for would be able to capture the screens of the people working on it and composite them into a single video feed.
For audio, we would like to capture the computer's audio device but also ambient sounds from the room.
To summarize, we want one output feed that consists of the following:

Source video feed from computer #1 (in a 50% rectangle)
Source video feed #2 (in a 50% rectangle)
Environment noise from the room (mic in)
Source audio feed from computer #1
Source audio feed from computer #2

So far, we have attempted to use Google Hangout, but it's impossible to get two screen shares going on at the same time.

UStream has a great program that you can do that with. Your video will eighter be streamed over UStream or to a server you specify if you want that.

I clicked on the link in Google Chrome and received the warning: "www.ustream.tv contains malware. Your computer might catch a virus if you visit this site." WOT however say's the site is OK.

Somebody has probably set this up. http://safebrowsing.clients.google.com/safebrowsing/diagnostic?client=Firefox&hl=en-US&site=http://ustream.tv/

Maybe an ad did something it shouldn't. If it was, it isn't any more insecure to browse UStream than any other website with ads. Google just noted it, and thus you see the warning. It is safe.


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Adobe Premiere & Final Cut Pro project file standard?
Is there a standard for non-linear video project files? I want to create a slideshow of my life using jpg + mp3 files and want to be able to tweak it many years from now. My fear is that if I use Adobe Premiere, it will not be easy to migrate to Final Cut Pro or vice versa or whatever file format is used in the industry standard application in the future.
It's not like having txt files which you can be reasonably sure will still be editable 20 years from now.

FCP can export an XML file that contains the basics of your sequence. Premiere can then import this and create a native project file based on the contents of that XML. I'm pretty sure Premiere can also export a similar file for import/conversion into FCP (I haven't tried though).
It's worth noting that the formats are likely to change considerably years down the line, to the extent that a later version of the same software package may not be able to open it. You're best bet is to make sure all the individual files are archived so that if you're in that situation, you can just start over with the same files.

To be fully honest, it's impossible to tell.
Even now, there's a bit of an industry battle between FCP (which is dead following FCX), Premiere and AVID.
Your best bet would be to edit in Premiere and keep an ear out, upgrading every 3-4 years with Premiere and possible emigrating the project over to whatever NLE is the industry standard at that time.

Update 120703 @ 1604
Having reread the question, mp3 + jpg images - why not use PowerPoint?

7 years on, I just saw the PowerPoint question. I'd avoid non plaintext files because I can't tweak them with a text editor. Then again the pptx format has plaintext bit somehow I'm not comfortable with a multi file plaintext archive


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H.264, 1 FPS, 640x480 Resolution - What bit rate should I be using?
I need to transmit this video stream over satellite. So far, I have been able to send 1 fps, 320x240 with no problem. However, when I raise it to 640x480, the picture comes in once every few minutes and that's about it. Bandwidth is not an issue - we are using ~192 kbps and up. Any ideas?

That's something thats going to differ a fair bit based on picture complexity, implementation quality, profile used, etc. But going to low shouldn't cause the picture to stop, just fill with compression artifacts.
Often, video completely stopping means you've had transfer issues. If you remove the satellite link, does the video freeze still occur? Cheap satellite links (i.e., those costing less than $1000/mbit/mo) are notorious for dropping, reordering, and delaying packets. If the freezes occur without the satellite link, I'd guess your cameras have a deficient H.264 implementation, or at least one not designed for 1FPS.
Your camera's H.264 implementation may be taking 192kbps as 192kbps average, with a buffer of X bytes. So on the first frame it may generate a lot more than 192kbit, expecting to make it up later (buffer size may be assumed to be 1 megabyte or even larger). And then, the satellite link is pegged for a few seconds as it transmits that "buffered" amount.
Lowering framerate on H.264 doesn't save nearly as much bandwidth as you'd expect, due to there being large differences between each frame. But it degrades visual quality at least as much as you expect. So its often a bad trade-off. Also, various H.264 options can increase compression, but result in multi-frame decode delays. At 1FPS, that is really noticeable.
At 1FPS, who knows how often your camera is generating keyframes.
I'd suggest sending some data encoded with X264 (or ffmpeg, which uses it). See if that works. Its probably a better implementation than your cameras feature. It also lets you tweak buffer sizes (you probably want a low one, unless you're buffering on the receiving end).

The correct answer unfortunately is that there is no correct answer.
The need for bitrate really depends on the actual implementation. For example there can be anything from 20% to 40% difference in bit rate requirement between best and worst H.264 encoders.
Also, it grossly depends on what acceptable quality - do you really want broadcast quality or you don't mind blockiness than bit rate requirement can be drastic.
As a rough estimate - Very good hardware encoders can do good D1 resolution @ 25 FPS at 1 to 1.2 Mbps. Now if you reduce frame rate to 1 FPS the bit rate won't go down by 25 time low though. Since must of the resultant compression is due to temporal redundancy. So best bet is to have something around 1/4th of bit rate from above. So good encoder should be able to do your job below 200 to 300 kbps.  Though, this all depends on actual encoder.

We are using H.264 cameras. What do you mean by hardware encoder? Will I need an encoder if the cameras encode themselves? Also, 200 to 300 kbps seems extremely high. Are you sure I can't get by on 64 kbps?