HD to what for storage?

[learner]

NEED ADVISE:
I bought a Sanyo HD 1000 recorder and since then I am only experiencing troubles.
First of all after downloading the HDfiles to my PC, I have difficulties in editing as I only have the Pinnacle Studio 9 and Ulead DVD Movie factory.

The ST9 does not open the files and Ulead is too slow to work with. What I do is first rough edit on Ulead, then I convert with Media Coder to Mpeg2/DVD or AVI and then edit it on Pinnacle ST9 and then burn a DVD, as I dont have a HD player/TV facility. End result is that parts of the movie is on a diferent aspect ratio 4:3 or 16:9, which I still have to figure why.

I know that ideally I should buy a new HD editing program and system which cost: "mucho dinero" but for what if I dont have yet the facilities.

Bottom line: I still have the converted AVI files and the original Mpeg4 files and would like to store it on a hard drive to edit it better at a later stage.

Question: Am I correct on wat I am doing, and how should I store the files for further editing: on AVI, DVD or HD/Mpeg4 or what?

Any related advise would be greatly appeciated.

[UncasMS]

what format and codec are those streams in?

since you said HD i assume it should be something like AVCHD//H/X264?

older video editing software do not work decent or at all with avchd material so you might want to download and test NEW trialversions of ulead(now corel iirc) video studio or sony or pinnacle

converting your input material too often will significantly decrease its quality so try to limit it to as as little as necessary

[learner]

After downloading from the video camera into my PC, converts to Mpeg4 and with the use of GSpot reads: the HD is AVC1, CH.264/MPEG-4 AVC.
Very large files that I should reduce by first editing them, make a DVD to play and show it and then would like to still keep the files stored on high quality for a later stage when I decide to buy a HD player/TV.
If I get a more modern software, would I be able to keep it in the original quality of HD?
Do I make sense?

[UncasMS]

download a trial of sony's VEGAS and see if it does what you want

and you should keep the original HD resolution at all costs because the next tv/player you might want to buy will show you very clearly how poor dvd material can look

[MilesAhead]

I've only used HandBrake a few times but you may want to take a look at it. From my trials it seems like if it doesn't like the input file, it kicks out an error within the first minute or so. If you make it past that it seems to compress quite well while maintaining quality in a reasonable amount of time using the 1 pass option.

If you have more storage than time then I guess you'd just keep the source files.

[learner]

[download a trial of sony's VEGAS and see if it does what you want
and you should keep the original HD resolution at all costs because the next tv/player you might want to buy will show you very clearly how poor dvd material can look[/QUOTE]


I have downloaded the Vegas and it is very good although not as user friendly as Pinnacle. However, I will continue learning on how to use it.
I have a video camera: Sanyo VPC-HD1000GX and is now set at Full-HD (1920x1080 (60 field/s)
I will try to use Vegas to edit the HD files (Mpeg4 files), make a movie altogether and then store it on my hardrive, but, on what quality do I save it? and as I intend buying a HD player/TV soon, how do I then get to play the HD movie, do I need to cut a DVD disc?
Please advise.
Many thanks

[UncasMS]

an HD player would be: Blu-ray
these blu-ray player will/should be able to play AVCHD material, which is HD format burned to DVD media in most cases.

almost all those video editing tools should be able to output to AVCHD
whatever output you generate can be burned to dvd or dvd-dl (for more space) and played on most blu-ray player but not on a dvd player

so better make sure not to delete your HD cam material but keep it until you got yourself a new player and tv - you will see it makes a difference

and before you buy just any bd-player do yourself a favour and create a so called AVCHD disc and take this material into the next shop in order to test a blu-ray player before you buy it - not all may handle the avchd disc alike

i have a Samsung BD P 1600 and as long as i use +R as a booktypesetting when burning dvd-dl this player works like a charm with any avchd material i burn

sony 350/360 are other players well known for playing almost any such formats and discs and maybe the lg 370/390 as well

concerning panasonics 30/60 i have no idea of how good they may react to AVCHD material burned to dvd - i think they are not that cooperative

should you have friends with bd players try one or two of your selfmade avchd disc at their places and note what player you have tested

[learner]

Excellent information, thanks:
I have a Samsung Plasma TV mod. PS-42C91H and apparently can do a resolution up to 1024x768. If it is good enough, then I may just purchase the BR's: Samsung 1600 costing here some 324 USD, there is also: AKAI RD100: 243 USD and Philips BDP3000: 270 USD.
And another question: If I can edit HD on my PC, could I transfer the HD ready movies to my Laptop or memory card, HDD, etc, and then use it as a HD player instead of having to buy a HD player?

[UncasMS]

$324 for a 1600 is way too much - c.f. here

your tv has a higher resolution than standard dvd (720x480) but Full HD resolution would be 1920x1080 so i'm not that sure that it will make a big difference if you feed dvd or avchd material to your tv

still i'd consider it the better option to record in hd and edit to hd format and have a blu-ray player for playback because some time in the future you may get yourself a full hd tv and than you'll see that 1920x1080 is a different league compared to 720x480 pixel.

converting your hd cam material down to dvd size would be a waste of time for me - go hd!


concerning your laptop:
- since your tv isn't even hd ready you should be able to connect the laptop with your tv without a problem

in case you have DVI out, a dvi => hdmi cable should do the job to connect laptop and tv

another cable will be necessary for the audio stream

[learner]

Hi again,
I just bought Studio HD Ultimate from Pinnacle to be able to edit my Mpeg 4 files from my video camera Sanyo HD 1000.
I am editing several video clips without a problem and so far I am saving them as projects and then I will put them altogether in one. Now if I want to save them as a movie, Pinnacle gives me facility to burn a HD DVD or a Blue Ray Disc, but if I want to create a file, only allowes me to create as a Full Screen DV or file type as AVI. Where is then the HD quality?
Note that the downloaded files from my camera read Mpeg4 and if I edit and change them to AVI or Full Screen DV, will this means I will loose the original quality?
or should I burn to HD DVD right away, or just keep as projects?
My idea was to edit a movie and burn it to HD quality and then keep the original edited files and store them, but not to loose quality on the files.
How do I do that?
Many thanks

[learner]

OK, I manage to solve the problem by asking Pinnacle themselves. It was just a matter of settings.
I have now burned a HD disc and took it to a shop to test it on a Samsung. the result is excellent quality.
Just need to decide if I buy the Samsung BD-P1600 or other.
I recommend Pinnacle Studio Ultimate HD14.
thanks for the advise.