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I'm planning to buy digital video camera. This for general use but also to make short videos of my guitars being played. I want to host the videos on my website.

Anyone familar with all the trappings of such an adventure?

I'm looking at a this JVC. The problem is I'm not sure how to tell if it will do what I want to do.

Any help?

Thnx

Pretty much every single DV or MiniDV cam out there will do what you want, as will plenty of the direct-to-dvd recording cams (which I've never quite gotten the point of). Basically, armed with the cam, and a PC with a firewire port (or buy a pinnacle Firewire card with basic editing software, about 30 bucks at the local PC Hut), you plug in, press a button, download the digitized video data onto your machine, and you've got editable material.

All streaming solutions have their upsides and downsides; if you want to embed, WMV is a good option. For broadest compatibility but lousy file sizes, MPEG, and QuickTime's pretty common/good as well. I personally like Divx and Xvid codecs (MPEG4 implementations, like current WMV and QuickTime MOV), but that's also because there are plenty of free tools out there.

A good website that should help you along the way, plenty of tutorials, is http://www.videohelp.com. Lots there. I'm sort of assuming you're using a PC at this juncture; Macs have their own software end of things, and QuickTime's probably the way to go there, but the hardware requirements and basic modus operandi remains the same.

Mattia, a problem I see with your suggestions is that the only one that will
play on a mac is WMV.

For the web, I use quicktime and don't offer the option for anything else.
Quicktime's the most compatible, has excellent file sizes, and allows the
movie to start playing before the entire clip is downloaded. More than
that, go to apple.com/quicktime, pay $30, and you can get quicktime pro.
It allows you to edit all your cuts and compress it to custom settings, or a
handful of pre-set settings that are all optimized for the internet.

I edit with Final Cut HD. Know what? I can do the majority of what I do
with any basic editing software available to you. Don't get trapped into
thinking you need something sophisticated, because you likely don't.

Ouch, this seems a little harsh. I didn't intend it to, Mattia. I'm sorry
about that.

Seriously, no offence taken. I'm hardly an expert ;-)

However, all MPEG (regular flavour) and MPEG4 implementations (including DivX and Xvid) will play just fine on mac, based on all my Mac-owning friends and their playing options. May not play natively, but they'll play with realtively easy to find plugins.

QuickTime works pretty well, though, that's true.

With plug-in's, yeah, but when you have a video on your website, you
don't want people to need to go find a plug-in, download and install it,
just to see something; mostly because they probably won't. It's best to
be as broad as possible.

And Quicktime is not a plug-in on a PC?!?!

Windows Media VIdeo (WMV) is from Microsoft, hence more PC oriented. Quicktime (MOV) is from Apple so is more Apple oriented.

If I go to a website and all they offer is something I do not have, then no matter what they may have of value, I am not interested.

The majority of websites offer WMV and MPEG...

Another advantage of MPEG is that while you may have to download a plugin, it is not tied to a large company, neither Microsoft or Apple. MPEG is platform independent, vendor independent and runs on about every type of machine, old or new...

You're correct that quicktime is an apple developed product, but it comes
standard on PC's. And in real world use, it gets points because regardless
of the platform viewing a .mov file, and regardless of the codec that made
the file, both the audio and video will work. WMV isn't nearly as safe of a
format. 25% of the time, I'll get the video to work.    

I really couldn't care less which platform developed the format. Some
people like their PC, some people like their Apple. I'm not all that
comfortable with my self-image when I get into those arguments. All I
care about it whether or not it all the time, and if not, then most of the
time. My real recommendation is for the .flv format being played by a
Flash player, and for a number of reasons. Google Video and YouTube
use it for a reason, but it's not something the casual web programmer can
just do. James Orr38882.9477546296

mpeg is also a good format to use, but I've found the files to be just a bit
larger.       

Um, back to Ronn's questions --

About the JVC camcorder, it certainly appears to be a good deal at that price. I especially like the f/1.2 lens. Having such a fast lens is an unusual find in consumer-grade photo/video gear. It should make for excellent low-light work.

I looked for anything stating recording time with that 128mb card, however, and couldn't find anything. I suspect that, when using the recorder at max resolution, a 128mb card probably isn't good for more than a few minutes worth of video. But I've no experience with card-based camcorders. I'm still using 8mm video with mine.

This is something I've been looking into recently as well. I've been debating whether or not to go with a video capture card for my PC so that I could digitize not only recordings from my current camcorder, but also all the recordings I made on my old full-size VHS camcorder. Or whether to get a later model dvr like this one. Guess I'll still need the capture card regardless to digitize the old tapes anyway . . .

Best,

Michael

_________________
Live to Play, Play to Live

What does comes standard on PC's mean in regards to Quicktime? I have never bought a PC and had it installed as part of Windows. Just as I can download and install Quicktime for Windows, a Mac user can download and install Windows Media Player for Mac.

Other than the software that is shipped as part of the operating system PC vendors have complete freedom to ship whatever thrid party software they choose on their PC.

There is no standard software installed by any vendor...If I buy a Dell today will will come with alot of 3rd party software, some with license to use and alot that are only 3 month trial software in which the user will have to purchase the license to continue to use that program.

Even Windows Media Player does not ship as "standard" on PCs in that in Europe Real Networks and others started the law suit that got picked up by the EU so now in Europe a version of Windows is shipped without Windows Media Player!

Any PC vendor can choose to add Quicktime to a PC they package and sell but for the most part the way that someones "gets" Real Networks Player or Apple's Quicktime player is when they hit a website that uses that format and in order to view those files the user installs the player from a link, usually from that website.

What do you mean YouTube uses .flv as its format??? Here is text from YouTube's sites stating the preferred formats for people uploading videos...

What video file formats can I upload?
YouTube accepts video files from most digital cameras and camcorders, and cell phones in the .AVI, .MOV, and .MPG file formats.

What's the best format to upload for high quality?
We recommend the MPEG4 (Divx, Xvid) format at 320x240 resolution with MP3 audio. Resizing your video to these specifications before uploading will help your clips look better on YouTube.

What is correct is that Google Video and YouTube take videos that have been uploaded to them and format it for broadcast as .flv but as you say, not something for the casual web programmer...

Back to the original question...Ron did not say he wanted to be a casual web programmer, just to post videos of his guitars being played.

It still looks to me like everything that Mattia said was completely valid.

As for the video camera in question, yes this video camera will do what you want to do and be able to playback for either a PC or MAC but it is not the function of the video camera, it a matter of the software that either is shipped with the video camera or that you purchase additionally.

In the user manual of the video camera it states that it comes with CyberDVD's Power Producer Gold 2 which gives you all of the tools needed to edit your video and be able to save them as MPEG, AVI and other video formats (not specific).

Furthermore for playback of video's that have not been edited it states to use Windows Media Player on a PC or to install Windows Media Player for MAC w. link to download site. This does not mean that you are locked into WMF format, just that it loads that by default. Using the editing software it looks like you can save it as whatever format you want.

This really isn't something to get into a debate about, and I don't see how
it can be all that beneficial. In fact, it embarrasses me to participate. I
care about making things as easy as possible, not about supporting one
platform over another. I recommend quicktime as the best solution for
putting a video on the internet. If you don't, great.

[QUOTE=Shawn] What do you mean YouTube uses .flv as its format???
Here is text from YouTube's sites stating the preferred formats for people
uploading videos...

What is correct is that Google Video and YouTube take videos that have
been uploaded to them and format it for broadcast as .flv but as you say,
not something for the casual web programmer...[/QUOTE]

Exactly. What I mean is that in order to make the videos work on every
computer viewing them, they use the .flv format.

[QUOTE=Shawn]It still looks to me like everything that Mattia said was
completely valid.[/QUOTE]

If I said anything to suggest otherwise, I didn't mean to. Yes, you can
play divx files. Is it the best option? I don't believe it is. My original post
was in order to lend advice based on my experience. A year and a half
ago I completed this virtual tour
for Fresno Pacific University using more than 60 videos. They're all
quicktime. There's never been a report of not being able to see or hear
the video.

This is how I stack formats. I'm very interested if your experience has
been different. Other than a beneficial discussion on it, I'll likely not post
again on it. Like I said before, my concern is what's easy to use and likely
to work on every computer; not which platform came up with it.

.mov. Small files that will work on any computer with any version
of quicktime player. Get quicktime pro, say, "export for the web," and
you're good to go.

.mpg. Good quality movies. The downside is that they won't play
until the entire file is downloaded, and they're not optimized for the net.
But you can take them and burn a video cd that will play like a dvd.

.wmv. Good quality movies. The downside is that they work about
25% of the time on Macs, and not at all if you don't have a recent version
of windows media player.

Divx. It's a cool format, but will most likely send people looking for
a specialized plug-in. This technology is optimized for watching ripped
dvd's, not for internet playback. It's not user friendly. James Orr38883.9462731481