Q&A: computer and accessories for making movies?
Question by spanky: computer and accessories for making movies?
If you wanted to make movies, not professional but good quality – what do I need to get started? Is Apple really the easiest and best? What kind of camcorder do I need?
Best answer:
Answer by Palladini
Consumer level HD camcorders have 4 problems. 1) Blurry, fuzzy, out of focus areas closely around people in videos taken by consumer level HD camcorders. 2) Any movement, even a wave or lifting an arm, while in front of a recording consumer level HD camcorder, results in screen ghosts and artifacts being left on the video track, following the movement. Makes for bad video, sports videos are unwatchable. 3) These Consumer level HD camcorders all have a habit of the transferred to computer files are something you need to convert, thus losing your HD quality, to work with your editing software. 4) Mandatory maximum record times – 1 hour, 30 minutes, 8 minutes, 3 minutes – four different times advertised as maximum record time for some consumer level HD camcorders. No event I have ever been to is that short. Either take multiple camcorders or pack up with out getting the end of the event on video.
With a MiniDV tape camcorder, record 60 or 90 minutes ( camcorder settings), 90 seconds or less to change a tape and record for 60 or 90 more and repeat till you run out of tapes.
You can get a Canon ZR960 for $ 250. It is a MiniDV tape camcorder, has a Mic jack. You will need a firewire (IEEE1394) card ($ 25 to 30) for the computer and a firewire cable (less than 10) to be able to transfer video to your computer. To say this is not HD, think about this. It would cost in excess of $ 3500 to get a HD camcorder that could equal the video Quality of a $ 250 Canon MiniDV tape camcorder.
Once you have the camcorder, for good sound quality you would need a mixer, some reflectors, some lights (Don’t think big money here). You could opt for a Digital Audio Recorder, but with this camcorder having a max record time of 90 minutes, I assume no single shot in your movie will be that long, so use the mic port instead and save a couple hours of trying to sync your audio and video if you had used a Digital Audio Recorder.
Get a Boom Pole, all kinds of help fro that one on youtube.
Get a good tripod, one that will stay put and not let the wind effect it.
That all said, throw a boom pole and a few reflectors and some lights ( I think no more than $ 50 in total cost for those items) and all the stuff on this page http://asimplelife.ca/boss.html and I could make a flick or two.
To back up my $ 50 statement, reflectors, foam core boards $ 5, Boom pole, $ 10 and lights $ 30 or more, to see what I mean, look at the bottom picture here http://asimplelife.ca/light2.html
What do you think? Answer below!
