Customer Reviews

Shoot Great Video with your MiniDV Camcorder

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Obviously for people completely new to using video camcorders. Good basic information. Covers lighting techniques, filters, plenty of tips/techniques. There's a whole section, at the end, that walks you through the installing a firewire card in a (Windows-based) PC.

There's a section on using video editing tools, which shows screen shots and illustrations of several programs. I'd prefer to have had this time allotted to more about the use of the camcorder. Taking this editing section, and the firewire card installation section, occupies about a quarter of the video.

Primarily filmed in Portland, Oregon. Total running time, abt 1 hour.

The sound quality is not that great. This is ironic (to me) because the video discusses sound and illustrates the difference between the audio coming from the camcorder's built-in mic, and the use of separate microphones (used in this video!). Still the audio quality of this production sounds like you're hearing it with a cardboard box on your head.

The beginning shots are amusing, in that the auto-focus bounces around a bit. You can see the narrator's face fade in and out of focus slightly, while he's talking.

Worth $20, or so, but begs for an "advanced techniques" version.

This is an Ok place to start if you really know nothing. That said there are some areas where the advice is poor, if not downright incorrect. (Using two mics to record speech and then "blending" them in the edit will cause the audio to be out-of-phase i.e. unlistenable)