AVCHD? Technology Ahead of Our Web Toolbox?

It’s fair to say that the technology is always ahead of the software. I mean, you can’t start editing a new file format… before it has been created.

I’ve had quite a time with my first months of high def, mts files. I take my shoots with Canon Vixia HF11.

What is AVCHD? It is a file format for recording and playback of high definition video.

AVCHD is a relatively new high definition video format. Beginning in 2005 Sony and Panasonic combined their efforts to create a high definition format for a tapeless camcorder. It was formally released in 2006.

Other companies such as JVC have released camcorders with a hard drive but it is literally hard to keep up with the capacity surge in memory devices and their corollary price reduction. This alone made the camera utilizing memory cards more attractive to me. My Canon Vixia HF11 has both hard drive capacity and memory card but in the 2 years since

As I reviewed before my Canon Vixia purchase, I was surprised at the lack good information, editorials, and feedback on the Internet and so many of the top ‘Google’ hits were published in 2007 and 2008. However a lot happens in a year and while I still find little good information, I found enough independent testimonials, professional reviews to support my choice of Canon.

The next hop was editing and while the software provided with the Canon Vixia is adequate for viewing, storing your videos, if your object is web development and taking advantage of the new format capabilities, you will need to purchase editing software.

I have an Adobe bias. I see there are other popular editors now. Pinnacle Studio gets a lot of attention. I have been very happy with my   Premiere   Pro /After Effects combination.

There are annoying things, like the operating system not recognizing your file type, and presenting that attractive familiar iconic tile when you are reviewing your files. It took a few sessions over many days before my pc’s decided to accept the association with  Premiere  Pro  and show that as the preferred editor/file type but still no tile image to rattle your memory a bit as to subject. The video files are very large and I’m still reading about different experiences with the different ‘high quality’ video options offered between 12, 15, and 24 mbps. I backed off 24 and am still experimenting with the difference between 12 and 15. 24 mbps could be a bit choppy, it seemed to overwhelm the software with too much information.

Other than that, I have been very happy with my  Premiere  Pro /After Effects combination. When my session produces very large files that have to be ‘reconnected’, I begin in  Premiere  Pro , place them together on timeline. The transition is seamless and I export ‘.avi’ or a flash type ‘.flv’ or new ‘.f4’.

If the sessions are much shorter and don’t need to be preprocessed, After Effects works quite well with the ‘.mts’ format. Both  Premiere  Pro  and After Effects work well as an avchd adobe editor but only release CS4.

I see many postings about  Premiere  Pro  CS3, solutions and plug-ins, but my observation is that upgrading to CS4 and having no other hoops to jump through would be much preferable (and about the same cost) to purchasing extra software. Their CS5 edition was released this summer and Windows7 actually reads ‘.mts’ files in ‘real time’ too, a great bonus!

I do believe the future is now. When your medium is little solid state memory cards, when there is no tape in your camera, when you realize you can read directly from these cards and begin editing right away, it is wonderful. I have issues about the ‘mts’ file type, but like any new technology, I’m sure it will become a well recognized format, maybe even have little tile previews on our directory listing soon.

When I do create a flash file or toned down Windows media that is a reasonable size for a Web site, I am very impressed that even after significant compression, the colors come through and so does the wide format if that is desirable. I like Microsoft ‘Zune video’ format, 30 fps for sites that will not accept Flash ‘.swf’ files. The Flash ‘swf’ version of comparable compression, wide display also retains so much of the original quality and resolution.

There is a lot to swallow. For the convenience of the memory storage and instant editing capability there are many other ‘learning curves’ and accommodations.

So is it worth it? Well, in a word, yes. These images are brilliant… there are editing challenges and our learning curve will continue while the editing capability improves with time.

Our audience has grown fond of wide screen display, and it has moved from the living room to the internet. And hey, it’s a little fun being on the development edge too.