PC Editing solutions

[AggieDave 6]

Did a search, couldn't really find anything relevant to my needs.

What I'm looking for is a complete solutions system that is PC based for video editing.

I've looked at DV Line, Sony and Dell thus far.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[LouDiamond 1]

Take a look at THIS It should do everything you are looking for and then some.

"It's just skydiving..additional drama is not required"
Some people dream about flying, I live my dream
SKYMONKEY PUBLISHING

[skydiver51 0]

I use to subscribe to Videomaker mag. and they advertised most turnkey systems as well as most editing software. It will tell you whats availble and then you can go from there.

[newshooter12 0]

Dave -
Try www.promax.com they have some reasonably priced solutions in all sorts of systems. At the least their page would be a good reference.
From a personal standpoint - My brother has a system and a number of other components, decks, DAs, hard disks, etc... from them. He's been really happy with their customer service. They're up to close to 1000 gigs (or a terrabyte, if i'm spelling it right) of media drive space for the production company, so they use it a lot for projects big and small...
hope this helps.
matt
PM if you need some more resources. I've got a few DV magazines laying around with all sorts of ads and systems in them.

[nacmacfeegle 0]

Hey Dave, define the task, then define the tools. What are you trying to achieve old pal?

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He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

[AggieDave 6]

Ok, the task.

We want a system that gives us the ability to edit student videos on the computer then burn to DVD, plus have the system ready to go to crop/clean up digitial stills to print and/or to burn to the same DVD for our students. Fairly basic stuff, really.

We're wanting to stay away from Apple for a number of reasons (mostly software related), and have been looking at some lower cost solutions from HP, Dell and especially Sony.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[PhreeZone 20]

Should be simple, any off the shelf PC with a firewire card, Studio 8, and Photoshop 7 with a DVD burner.

Yesterday is history
And tomorrow is a mystery

Parachutemanuals.com

[AggieDave 6]

Quote

Should be simple, any off the shelf PC with a firewire card, Studio 8, and Photoshop 7 with a DVD burner.

That was my thought. That's why we've been looking at systems in the $1200 range with those capabilities already on the PC, such as a couple that Sony offer that have everything we need right out of the box.

I was wanting to see if there were some lower end solutions that I didn't know about that someone here would know about.

--"When I die, may I be surrounded by scattered chrome and burning gasoline."

[skydiver51 0]

HP may have something in the 1.8 gighrz range with an 80 gig hard drive fire wire ready. You will need to add a 200 gig hard drive and dvd burner but should get in under the 1200.00. Mine was set up as mentioned and I configured it as above and beat the 1200.00 earlier this year so now you should be able to do better.

[nacmacfeegle 0]

"You will need to add a 200 gig"
Whatever for? On top of an 80 gig HD!
Thats enough storage for over 800 skydives, or 30 DVDs.

Dave, think about a basic spec pooter with firewire. You can get additional firwire storage, and even Firwire DVD burners if you need them. That way when it comes time to upgrade, you just sell the box.
The biggest additional cost would be the software. Unless you know someone who might be able to help...
Here's how I might manage this, have a stock leader all pre rendered, have stock titles to make it personal, have stock music. At a convenient moment in time, chuck the clients stuff onto the DVD then purge their footage, next customer please.....If someone wants to amass a huge amount of footage, say a 4 way team, or an outfit sucha s Deguello, then you could store there stuff comfortably, or stash it all on DV until they need it finalised.

I just bought my mum a 'std spec' pooter off the shelf which would easily piss all this stuff out for 600 quid, and that included a TFT screen, add 200 quid for the DVD burner, and your ready to rock.
There are about 1.4 bucks to the quid.

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He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

[skydiver51 0]

The 80 gig. I use for other software like mp3 to wave converter and nonediting software. The 200 gig is for editing software and storage. 15 minutes of video captured in full quality takes up over 3 gig. of space. I could capture in less quality but I use still from the video at the end as a photo album of the tandem skydive and it makes it easier to grab clear pics when it;s in full quality. I also store some 900 mp3s and wave music on this drive which takes up alot of space. Yes I have about half or less of the drive not filled but I won't have to worry about what to delete in a hurry if something needs to be removed. Big hard drives are very cheap now days. External drives cost alittle more than internal. Soon I will be moving tandem freefall clips to a dvd+rw for storage to clean up the drive. It fills up faster than you might think unless you only take about 5 mins. of video.

[nacmacfeegle 0]

"It fills up faster than you might think unless you only take about 5 mins. of video. "
Yes I know, a good rule of thumb is 4 minutes per gig.
The difference here is that Dave doesn't need a whole load of storage, I know he has a massive amount of MP3s, but you just don't need instant access to 900 tunes if you are running a commercial video service.
"Soon I will be moving tandem freefall clips to a dvd+rw for storage"

It makes much more sense to chuck them back onto DV tape. Its cheaper, and easier to store.

For what its worth, I've made a couple of 30 minute 'commercial' movies at full Mini DV resolution and CD quality sound (in my mind theres no point in working with lower res and crappy sound) with only about 20 gig for storage. You just have to be more selective at the footage acquisition stage....

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He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. Thomas Jefferson

[skydiver51 0]

I also wanted to add that our videos we produce contain a leader which shows our training methods with a clip of, staticline, aff, and tandem freefalls. Then the tandems video and then a trailer of skydiving clips I have taken like, a horny gorillas, sit trains, a 7 way, and some freeflying. This is about 1.5 gig. Add to that 1.5 to 2.5 gig for the complete video plus 3 to 4 gig for the captured video of just one tandem it will add up quick. I keep a tandem video on disc for about one month in case they want another copy after which I cut out everything except the freefall and landing and put it on dvd for my archives. This can all be done on a smaller hard drive but the cost are low enough now why not have the extra space for when you need it. I store on dvd since I have had tapes get damaged or lose quality plus it's ready to go into the computer when you need it. I have done editing with less and it works. I can now afford the extra bells and whistles and it does make it easier.