HDV is the latest video format craze, but it isn’t like DV; or any other video format we are used to working with. This article explains how HDV is different and what you need to know to use it successfully.
We can shoot HD, we can edit HD, but we still can’t effectively distribute HD due to the market standoff surrounding HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. Recently, things just got worse, as this article explains.
Hard drives are essential to video editing. Which makes it really, REALLY aggravating when they stop working. Here are two techniques you can use to trouble-shoot hard drive problems: having too many disks attached, and not being able to boot from the system disk.
It is a long-known, but little-discussed secret that hard disks slowly lose their magnetic signal. If you archive your projects on hard disks, you need to read this article before all your carefully stored files… are gone!
As I was investigating how Final Cut Pro handles multiclip editing, it struck me that, after a certain point, the speed of your storage doesn’t really matter. Which means that we need to pay attention to more than just the raw speed of our storage systems.
Handles are critical for transitions and trimming. In this article, discover what handles are and why they are necessary.
This article is based on research done by William Aleman, who sent instructions and links on how to embed metadata into H.264 files. Some interesting reading!
This is a comprehensive look at how computer and video graphics are different and what you need to know to create great looking video text and graphics. This article can make your life a LOT easier!
Great looking chroma-keys start on set with how you light. However, once you’ve got the footage, what’s the best way to create a key. Here’s a quick sidebar that lists some other software you might want to try if you are not able to get the effect you want using the keyers that ship with Final Cut or Motion.
Have you ever wondered what that thin green line means at the top of some of your audio clips? Well, this short article let’s you in on the secret.
Gradients are a smooth ramp from one color, or shade of gray, to another. Gradients can be easily created in Final Cut Pro, but the button to do so is very hidden. In this article, I show you how to create a gradient, how to adjust it, and provide some ideas on what you can do with it.
Looking for different ways to add some excitement to your transitions? This article explains a little understood transition in Final Cut that provides some truly exciting, and unusual, transitions.
Creating good voice over recordings is part art, part craft, and part technology. In this short article, Ben Balser provides some suggestions on what kind of gear you need to make great-sounding recordings.
This tutorial shows you how to create a glowing lantern effect in Final Cut Pro using the Light-rays Glow filter and some video generators. It isn’t fine art, but this will show you how to create some amazing effects, easily, on your own system.Easy, I thought… use Light Rays.
A reader writes that his 10-year-old daughter is interested in editing and wants to know the best gear to buy and how to get trained in FCP. This is a great question, but the wrong question. This article explains that it isn’t the gear, its her interest. Fan that first, then buy gear second. You can read how here.
As we gear up for the 2010 NAB Show – where the Digital Production Buzz is the Official Podcast of the event – I thought you’d be interested in the gear we are using and how we are using it. Next month, I’ll report on what we did.
Garbage mattes are a fast way to exclude portions of a frame that you don’t want the viewer to see. This article shows an example of using garbage mattes to hide light stands in a music video.
I discovered this technique to be very useful when I want to make a shot-by-shot comparison between an existing movie and a sequence.
Gamma settings control the gray-scale midpoint. The reason this is significant is that Macs, video, and Windows all use slightly different settings. This means that video that looks good on one system, may look washed out or too dark on others. Snow Leopard, however, has changed the rules. In this article, I explain what gamma is, how to use it, and where to set it.
How do you capture the screens from a game. There are a number of screen capture utilities on the market. This article explains which works best on the Mac for capturing a game.