Hello everyone,

I have recently purchased Adobe Master Collection CS4 and am going to be using Premiere to edit footage from my HV30. The problem is that I've never used Premiere and would like to know a bit about what the program is capable of before I begin capturing footage. I understand that there are different things I must understand about compression and file type before capturing footage and all of this is contingent upon the final product wether it be internet or DVD.

Primarialy I want to shoot in 24P, 1/48th shutter, Cine mode... (the ole film look..) and output to DVD.

I'd also like to get an idea of what these other applications do (Fireworks, Dreamweaver, Encore, Flash CS4 Professional, Indesign...the list goes on) and be able to use them properly.

What would you say is the best source for learning this program? There are a few training DVDs that I am aware of as well as books. I prefer DVDs given that I learn visually better than I can read and understand..

Thanks for your time,
Terry.

lynda.com I find the best online site. You can also order DVD's from them as well. From memory its about $20 - $25 per month.

Terry,
Adobe themselves have videos of how to use their products and a review of teir capability. I used Encore recently and their on-line help from within Encore (the Help button) took me to a list of different helps including the manual and a set of videos. The one I looked at gave a quick walkthrough of the typical workflow. I'm sure the videos would be on the Adobe site and can be viewed without loading up the software, but I haven't looked.

Cheers, Ian

Hey thanks for the suggestions! I took a look at the lynda.com site and it looked pretty good.

I have two technical questions that I am sure require a short answer..

1.) How do apply the letterboxing to my footage?

2.) What should I export my footage as to put on youtube? It seams that the files are so large that it is taking close to an hour to do 2 minutes and thus uploading to youtube takes about 4 hours. I have the footage shot in 30p from my HV30.

Thanks,
Terry.

Hi Terry,

not quite sure what you are trying to achieve with your letterboxing. I film in HD 60i and burn it to DVD as widescreen. When played on my DVD player to my SD TV, the video is letterboxed. All handled by CS4 via Encore.

For youtube, can't help, not been there.

Where are you predicting your problem with letterboxing will BE?

Cheers, Ian

Terry,

If you have CS4 go to File>Export and the Export Setting screen comes up. On format: H.264. Preset:YouTube Widescreen HD. (It's a preset in the pull down menu) and it sets the rest for you.

Not sure what your PC specs are but two minutes takes me less than 10 minutes over broadband at that setting. Hope this helps.

Also I'm a member at lynda.com and think it's great.

Dave

Currently I am working with a 22 inch HD monitor accompanied by my old 17 inch monitor. I have set my screens to theatre mode and it plays the exported file on my 17 with letterboxing due to the 4:3 aspect ratio but on my 22 inch it doesn't have that effect because its widescreen. I personally love the letterboxing effect and would like to keep it that way on whatever screen I play it on.

David - thanks alot for the tip :D I will probably become a member of Lynda.com