Video editing software help

[PhoKingGuy]

So....I got my parents a new iMac awhile back, they love it. Now they have a Canon HF200 video camera and want to upload the videos to the mac to edit and burn to dvds. Its easy as cake on my Win7 desktop using the Sony vegas software...but iMovie (and final cut pro) dont recognize the camera wtf? Ive tried just about everything, I can view the files and play with VLC, but thats about it. Ideas on how to make this work or software I could use?

It needs to be a one click (parent friendly) solution, none of this batch convert in handbrake, use CLI etc.

Thanks

 

[ChAoTiCpInOy]

What I'm getting from google is: either you have to be plugged in with power to the camcorder to start transferring or if you take the SD card out and plug into the iMac with a reader, you should be fine.

 

[PhoKingGuy]

What I'm getting from google is: either you have to be plugged in with power to the camcorder to start transferring or if you take the SD card out and plug into the iMac with a reader, you should be fine.

Yeah Ive gotten that far, but imovie/final cut pro dont recognize the video files. Its pretty useless unless I can get that step to work.

 

[Kaido]

Yeah Ive gotten that far, but imovie/final cut pro dont recognize the video files. Its pretty useless unless I can get that step to work.

The missing piece you're looking for is the Codecs (format) story. The HF200 records in the AVCHD Codec, inside of an MTS/M2T wrapper. AVCHD is a playback format, not an editing format. Thus, you need to convert AVCHD into an editing format that iMovie and FCP understand. I highly recommend VoltaicHD by ShedWorx:

http://www.shedworx.com/voltaichd

Sony Vegas is special in that it is one of the few editing software applications that can natively edit AVCHD. Apple doesn't support AVCHD out of the gate like that, unfortunately (I use an HF200 at work and use Vegas because I can pump out movies faster). You can read more about AVCHD here, if you want a bigger picture of how it all works:

http://www.shedworx.com/node/77

So the bottom line is that you have to convert your HF200 clips into something that Macs understand. It's annoying, but at least you can do it in batches thanks to VoltaicHD. There's a couple things you can do to ease the pain - first, you can use a video library system to import your HF200 clips, and second (if you don't want to use a library system), you can use a Quick Look plugin that lets you watch AVCHD clips without opening a program. Shedworx makes both of these programs. The library system is called Cosmos: (previously called FlamingoHD)

http://www.shedworx.com/flamingohd-features

The Quick Look plugin is called HD Quick Look:

http://shedworx.com/hdquicklook

The one you use depends on how you like to store your files. If you're okay with just dumping files into a folder and managing them in a basic director structure, HD Quick Look is pretty good because you can select the file, hit spacebar, and watch a quick preview of the clip to see if you want to convert it. If you'd prefer to have a centralized location for your movies (think iPhoto, but for HD movie clips), then Cosmos is a pretty good solution.

I haven't found anything as easy to use as the Cosmos/VoltaicHD combo for working with AVCHD clips. I know this sounds like an advertisement for Shedworx products, but I've been using them for a few years with good results and haven't found anything easier for AVCHD file management & conversion. There's some free-er options out there (MPEG Streamclip & such iirc), but if your parents are going to be using it on a regular basis, having an easy solution might be the right answer. So their workflow would go something like this:

1. Plug in the HF200 to the iMac
2. Import clips into Cosmos (aka iPhoto for movie clips)
3. Convert desired clips to work on to Mac-friendly format using VoltaicHD
4. Import clips into iMovie & edit
5. Export to iDVD & burn to DVD

Whew! See how easy editing on a Mac is? Another option, if they are set on using the OS X platform for editing, is to switch out their camera to something more Apple-friendly. iMovie in particular supports a special format called iFrame, which lets you shoot natively in an iMovie-friendly format. Sanyo makes some iFrame-compatible cameras:

http://us.sanyo.com/Dual-Cameras

Kind of a pain overall. Welcome to video editing! :awe: :thumbsup:

 

[Emulex]

hmm i have the same device. to get the "magic" you realize you must have the power brick connected unlike every other camcorder on the planet. YOU MUST HAVE THE power brick connected and on.

whats the point of using AVCHD if you are going to up it to youtube and have it transcoded again and again

 

[Kaido]

It needs to be a one click (parent friendly) solution, none of this batch convert in handbrake, use CLI etc.

Thanks

Oh and as far as 1-click conversion goes:

http://www.shedworx.com/flamingohd-user-guide#7

You have 2 options:

1. Send to VoltaicHD : "Any Asset or Album can be sent to VoltaicHD. This action will utilise the VoltaicHD Output Directory (as specified in your Preferences) as the location for all converted movies. Any movie format supported by VoltaicHD can be sent. This allows convenient conversion of all movies (not just AVCHD) to AIC if required. Since VoltaicHD supports conversion to all Quicktime-supported movie formats, you can easily send batches of movies for conversion to the same final format (e.g. AppleTV, iPhone, MPEG2, etc)"

2. Send to iMovie: "This option is only available to Albums. When sent to iMovie, a new iMovie event will be created using the Album name. Any AVCHD movies in the Album will be sent to VoltaicHD for conversion, while iMovie-supported assets will be copied straight to the new iMovie event."

So if they're going to work in iMovie the most, pick up Cosmos & VoltaicHD - import the footage into Cosmos, then export to iMovie from Cosmos. This is as close to a 1-click system as I've seen on a Mac for AVCHD, but at least you get a nice file manager and a fairly simple workflow. Still a pain because you have to transcode though.