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Entering the World of Digital Video Cameras
Gone are the days when you would need to employ a professional to take a video for your business projects. Whether you need it to provide training to your employees or students, you can do it yourself with the help of a digital video camera. In fact, with the advent of the Internet, and e-learning becoming so popular nowadays, a digital video camera has become essential equipment for all organizations, especially training or educational institutes. Digital video cameras are extremely simple to use. They are lightweight and compact. Also, the transfer of video data to your computer for editing is extremely simplified in a digital video camera using todays Firewire cables. So, now the question arises that how does one go about choosing a camera for himself/herself? Before you go shopping for a digital video camera, it is essential that you answer a few questions. These will help you to pick up the best camera which is most suitable to your needs. Since voice clarity is critical in a digital video camera, you need to know whether you will be shooting indoors or outdoors. Also, what kind of videos do you plan to take ? are they going to be of people shopping around in a mall or mostly of officers giving multimedia presentations in a conference room? What is the kind of lighting that you are going to get? Is the weight of the camera an issue? What is the battery life of the camera that you will need? Do you plan to shoot for a couple of hours together or only a few minutes? Do you plan to use any special effects while shooting? Once you have answered all these questions, you will be able to get a basic idea of the kind of camera that you need. Let's go over the types of digital video cameras for consumers and hobbyists. First there is DV, HDDV, Mini DV. Handheld palm size cameras, larger full featured cameras with great audio options, and finally cameras that rival professional quality and can be used to make some very professional looking video products. It is also important that you have the correct software for enhancing the images once you have loaded them onto your computer. These will help you to edit your work in the best possible manner and also easily load them for video conferencing, emailing etc. Many software programs for NLE editing (non linear editing) exist for the consumer and pro alike. Adobe makes it Premier line of editing software which has proven to be quite popular and effective over the years. This is more of a mid level software and is relatively expensive. I use it for my corporate editing needs. Other mid to high level software packages include Final Cut Pro (on the Mac platform), and DV Express (from Avid). Final Cut is an awesome product if you use the Apple computers. Hollywood uses it to edit movies nowdays, and it has tons of amazing features to it. However it is not user freindly to the novice. The learning curve is steep. On the cheaper side of things you can use the Imovie software on the Mac side of things, Pinnacle Studio 9, Ulead Video Studio 8, and My DVD5 from Sonic. These products will get you editing your DV in no time. Hence, if you do your homework in advance, you will be happy in the end. So, go and check out websites and shops for information on what you need, talk to shop keepers, and then simply zoom away! There are so many wonderful things you as a consumer can do today with digital video cameras. Don't wait for the next wave. Jump into digital video today and have some fun with it. Kevin Rockwell worked as a network TV cameraman for 20 years shooting news and sports. Now a devoted fan of digital photography and video he works to gather information, tips and news for digital camera users. Oh and he loves to shoot pictures of his kids playing sports. http://www.great-digital-cameras.com/gdcj.html
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Work flow Step 5: File Conversion Most cameras come with software specifically designed to convert the RAW image data from its native format into TIFF files, JPEG files, or some other format that is compatible with the popular image editing software. At our studio, we convert the RAW images into 16-bit TIFF files, because we like to have the maximum amount of data available for editing and processing. Your needs may vary. There are many articles on the Internet that deal with the different file formats and the pros and cons of each. For the purpose of this tutorial, we are going to assume that the files are being converted to 16-bit TIFF files. We now open the software that came with our camera and set it to convert our RAW image data to 16-bit TIFF files, and save them in the TIFF folder we created in Work flow Step 2. This step can be time consuming, so we often go out to eat while the images from a session are converting. Once the conversion is finished, you will have a folder of 16-bit TIFF files to do editing and retouching on. We use TIFF at our studio because it is a loss less format. That is, we can save the file as many times as we like without degrading the image quality. JPEG is a lossy format, every time you save a JPEG file, you lose a little more data to compression. Work flow Step 6: Editing and Retouching This step of our work flow is where the real work is done. You will open each TIFF file in the image editor of your choice and make sure your colors and exposure are correct, the crop is the way you want it, and the image is ready for printing. At this point you will make any edits to the image, such as changing the crop, converting it to black and white, or doing any needed retouching. If you use the TIFF file format, you can save as many times as you need to during this process without having to worry about losing image quality. Once editing and retouching is done, save your work file and move on to the next step. Work flow Step 7: Saving the Production File One of the cons to working with 16-bit TIFF files is that they take up an incredible amount of disk space. Once we have reviewed the images with the client and ensured that no further edits/retouching need to be made, we convert the TIFF file to a JPEG production file for archive purposes and sending to the lab. Open the TIFF file in your preferred image editor and save your file as a Baseline Level 10 JPEG in the JPEG folder we created earlier. Why not save as a Level 12 JPEG, you might ask. When printing your image, there is no discernible difference between a level 10 JPEG and a level 12 JPEG. Try it for yourself and see. Once your files are saved as JPEGs, move on the the next step. Work flow Step 8: Backup Your Production Files This is a good time to make a backup (either to CD/DVD, or to another hard disk) of your JPEG production files. This ensures that you have a copy of all your hard work and if something should happen to the original files, you know you have a good backup. Work flow Step 9: Cleaning Up the RAW and Work Files Once we know we have a good backup of our production JPEGs, we delete the entire WORK folder and the entire RAW. This frees up the large amount of space that TIFF files require and leaves us with a manageable set of files from the job. However, we have already made backup copies of the RAW files and the JPEG files, so if we ever need to re-edit an image, we have the materials to do so. Work flow Step 10: Final Touches At this point our production JPEG images are ready to print or send to the lab. Make any final adjustments to the image size and print or upload your images. Final Thoughts With an efficient digital work flow, handling large amounts of digital images is easy and relatively stress free. I hope this tutorial has given you some ideas on how to best setup your own RAW digital work flow.
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