Just got a Kodak ZX5.

Connected to the PC to view the vids, as they are MPEG4 I’m using quicktime, but the quality is terrible. I then used the Arcsoft programme, which was even worse – certainly not HD!

When I connected the camera to the TV with the HDMI cable, it was fine.

I hadn’t downloaded the files to the PC, just playing from the camera – would this make a difference?

Would it be something to do with my PC/video card? The box says I need 64MB of video RAM – whats this mean?

Any suggestions gratefully received.

I find that with the video format my camera puts out, it causes video editing software to grind to a halt despite a pretty powerful PC. After a bit of googling this is a pretty common problem with video cameras. I need to convert the videos to a different format first before bringing them into the editing software. Once I’ve done that I have no problems. I use Format Factory for the conversions as it’s free, easy to use and has loads of different output options

http://www.formatoz.com/

I assume I won’t lose any quality (as in what I should get!)in doing this?

I normally use the Windows Movie Maker for editing, but only because it was on the machine – hence the need to convert.

You usually need to copy the file from the camera to the HD of the PC to view it in full res. Depends on which program you are using but I presume you are only getting preview quality.
Then it is all down to codecs. There seems to be a different codec for every make and model of camera so make sure that you have installed all the software that came with the camera.
Your graphics card will have a certain amount of dedicated RAM and to edit HD video you need at least 256mb in my experience. Forget what they claim in the required specs unless you have days for rendering and editing a 5 minute clip.
HD Video editing is probably the most resource hungry thing you can do on a PC.

IIRC not all versions of Windows Movie Maker will handle HD video. I think some versions on Vista did but not sure about the shitty Live Movie Maker in Windows 7.

Might be worth grabbing a 30 day trial of Vegas to play with?

slainte 😀 rob

I assume I won’t lose any quality (as in what I should get!)in doing this?

No loss for me. Format Factory has a range of HD settings so the videos don’t get compressed during the conversion.

found this format conversion freeware pretty good – for each conversion option there is a pull down so you can choose quality to match processor capabilities (edit by trial and error)

as above don’t tbink windows movie maker will handle HD, from what i can tell and i’m running nothing fancy so probably have not enough processing power to edit HD need both a lot of processing power and a dedicated graphics card?? i just edit mine to be able to copy to DVD and keep the HD files for if ever can get fancy

http://www.freemake.com/

Cheers guys. I’ll have a play around and see what happens. Not overly bothered about HD at the mo, just something better than what my old MiniDV streamed onto the PC (like VGA!)

Just need to sort the DIY chest mount now!

mpeg streamclip will convert to an editing format.

Editing HD AVCHD footage direct is slow and will take forever even on a good machine.

Ingest the HD footage convert and Edit in an uncompressed format then output to your preferred distribution format.

Final cut and premiere will let you edit at low res for speed then output an HD version of the edit.

Couple of issues I’m not sure of still – sorry…..

Once downloaded from the camera – is it not possible just to watch the video file in HD without having to convert it?

It’s taken 15mins to convert a 1 min video into wmv format – if I have to do this everything to enable me to edit in Movie Maker, it’ll take ages. Would it be quicker to convert to avi first, then that to wmv?

Should I just get some new editing software that I can input the quicktime vid in, edit that and output what I want? If so what? Is this what final cut and premiere will do?

Sorry if these seem basic questions!

oh, just watched theis first 1min clip. Still not great quality, and now it’s jerky as anything (sound is fine) – it seems like the computer (graphics card?) isn’t up to much?

How do I know how much Ram my graphics card has? or even if I have one!!

Go into Device Manager click on Display Adapters then put the name of the graphics card into your search engine. This old lump that I use for web browsing only has 64mb of graphics RAM and although it served me well for years of SD video production it has no chance when it comes to HD.
My current editing laptop has 1024mb of graphics power, 8GB of RAM and am i7 Quad core processor and I would still like a bit more umph when editing AVCHD files.
A good way to check your machines video capabilities is to try and watch some HD content like http://vimeo.com/14604034
On my basic machine this is stutters all the way through but on my edit machine it is super smooth. These are still compressed images.

You should also make sure that you have the latest drivers for your graphics card.
If you are editing your footage for web display you are better off compressing it to a different format before editing.