Mann

I wonder what Bob is up to - if he's found some land and built that animal sanctuary he and Shannon wanted. I wonder if he's happy.

It was a lovely service. There was laughter, and there were tears, and there were stories. Lots and lots of stories =). I'd never known Dave the way his old skydiving buddies did and so grateful they shared some of that. Even the next day I smiled when I remembered "No guts, no glory" BASE jump and a fishtailing campervan with his friends splattered on the window, banging away. It was about the most poignant and wonderful way I can think of, to send him off like that. Basically, what I'm saying is: although the circumstances kind of suck, big time, it was a heartwarming service, and he was a great man, and I'm glad to have known him. * Photos I attached are from when he took me up on his 9997, 9998 and 9999th jumps - before he took his daughter Maye for his 10 000th =). The usual, resized to fit the max 100K limit.

I'm a student. I'll call myself that until I get A license.

For me, "smile!" instead of "relax!" worked its magic. Maybe there were other things involved as well, I don't know, but the time I left the plane with a sole purpose of SMILING my way down, spinning suddenly... stopped. Somehow, it had made me relax. Whereas constant repeating "relax!" just made me realise I've got tension in my body. And in order to get that tension out, I think, I just tensed up because I was trying so hard to relax.

Get a faster computer?

After a long (and often painful) process of going through pros and cons of pretty much every editing system we knew COULD work - to find what would work the best - we did finally settle on Sony Vegas. Reasons? It proved to be the fastest way of editing due to no import time (working straight from MS cards) and DVD burning straight from timeline (no need to render first and then burn). It's been a month since we gradually started to move all of our editing onto Vegas and truth be told, I, personally, haven't looked back. So, what we did, in short: We put Vegas on a 8-core 64-bit PC with Windows Professional. Hardcore-wise, I don't know what's inside it, since a technoguru-sort-of-a-guy set it up, but it's supposedly high-end "meant for editing" workhorse. (Also, it cost accordingly.) I spent a better part of 3 weeks in August testing Sony Vegas trial version to figure out the fastest and easiest workflow for our needs. When I finally landed with what I considered "a pretty good way of editing", it timed 4,5 minutes from inserting a video card to pressing "Burn DVD". And that's without Production Assistant. Now, a month into working fully on Sony Vegas, it takes me a comfortable and leisurely 4 minutes tops per edit: checking the footage, adding slow motions, working with sound, adding 3 sets of songs, checking that I like what I've made. So am I happy? Yes. It works, it looks good, it saves my time. Is our dropzone happy? Yes. But I do miss working on a Mac. Occasionally, Windows presents me with error messages I've learned to regard as purely something only Windows does and not always explaining me WHY it didn't like what I was doing - and what it needs me to change next time I do it. But over time and trial/error, we've made sort of a peace agreement with it: I do things patiently, let it take its time when it's "thinking" and in exchange, it lets me work without complaining. In overall, Vegas seems to have an array of functions I do not need (for tandem footage) and lacks only a few comfort-related shortcuts I'd love, but all in all, I'd say that in a hands of a good video editor, it is very much a powerful tool for a busy dropzone.

A month after starting this thread, this is what I've found: (I'm writing it down for future reference - or others facing the same issue. If anything needs correcting, I really appreciate your comments, cheers.) Software solutions basically came down to 2 options: * either Sony Vegas, which allows editing a project while another one is rendering, back-to-back (but will need a bloody powerful Windows computer) or * any other non-linear software (Final Cut, Premiere, Edius, iMovie etc) which can only work on 1 project at a time (and therefore needs a few computers, otherwise there would be idle time between each edit waiting for it to render) First, we considered getting Sony Vegas. I tested their trial version - its interface is quite different from Final Cut or iMovie that I've used before, but after getting used to it, it seems rather powerful: loads of effects and options. But after a while, Final Cut seems like a better option, because: * Sony Vegas only works with Windows, but we're keen on getting a Mac. Our other computers are Macs, they're reliable, easy to maintain and network, whereas with Windows we'd need a separate tech support, Sony Vegas' customer support doesn't have a phone in New Zealand, takes a week (in average) to answer any e-mails and when it does, it doesn't give straight answers, so it seems like a headache to begin with. * Also, if there's only 1 editing station - a mother-of-a-computer - then if anything on it fails, there's no backup. So if we're better off getting multiple editing stations anyway, then we might as well get Macs with their native software, as Sony Vegas wouldn't really offer any advantage in that case. So now we're considering Final Cut. It is Mac-based, with reliable tech and customer support and is likely to need 3 editing stations - to give each computer rendering time for preparing DVD files. Also, when exporting into High Definition Quicktime, there's virtually no rendering time necessary, so a customer can walk away with his USB pretty much straight after editing. As a lot of our customers are travellers, then they often have tiny laptops without CD/DVD slots and to them, having a DVD really isn't that convenient. Plus, my university-training was based on Final Cut and I'm pretty familiar with its interface and reasons why uni's video editing teachers preferred Apple/Final Cut to anything else. So that's it, in a nutshell, although it's still work in progress.

HD can be also saved on a USB stick - and not necessarily on a BluRay. Correct me if I'm wrong.

DSE, one day when we meet on a dropzone somewhere, I'm gonna bring you a case of beer =)

Now, I heard that Edius 5 should do the job of editing: * on-the-spot * without rendering * without "locking down" while importing/exporting There's virtually no information about Edius 5 on dropzone.com. Anybody have first hand experience?

DES, I watched your videos. When you write "my company developed this software for Sony", you're not talking about plug-ins for Sony Vegas, are you? Just an instructional DVD about using Sony Vegas, right? Or am I missing something?

While I think motorcycle trailers are really handy when it comes to riding... how was THAT link connected to video editing and Sony Vegas? =D

Cheers for that =). Will look into it.

I'm a video editor at a very busy (tandem) dropzone. At the moment, editing averages 8 minutes per footage, so a customer can walk out the door with a DVD in hand within, say, 20 minutes of landing. Pretty darn convenient. (DVD writer captures the footage straight from camera, transitions already added while filming, and I mix in some music through a soundboard. Editing time = video time + 2 min.) It has worked very well in an era of SD video. With the coming of HD, however, we're looking into setting up a new video editing system, because our cameramen are already filming in HD, but customers are still getting SD videos as we're burning everything onto DVD's. And that's not cool. Adamant that a customer needs to receive 1) HD footage in 2) very short time, here's my question of the past few months: how's the best way to do that? (I'm writing this partially because I'm looking for some input; partially because I want to share the road. I've seen other threads discuss general video editing, but nothing that would discuss specifically this: editing videos on back-to-back loads and giving out finished product within half an hour of landing, in HD.) So far, we've come up to this: if we want to give out 1) edited footage in HD and also 2) edited footage in YouTube-size (so that it can be uploaded straight from our dropzone computers), we need to switch to editing software like Final Cut, Premiere, Pinnacle or similar. That way, I'll edit footage once and "share" it into 2 different-quality videos. The problem, though: all editing softwares (that I'm aware of) "lock down" while footage is being imported or exported: I cannot do anything else while footage is being imported from a card into software or exported from software onto a destination drive. As a busy dropzone, though, there's no time for that: everything needs to be edited back-to-back. So: does anybody know if there's editing software that does NOT "lock down" while importing/exporting? *** Bringing down import/export time with a VERY powerful computer is an option, so we've considered getting a quad-core Mac. But: how fast would be fast? And does the latest version of any given software actually "know" how to use full capacity of a quad-core Mac? *** The other option is somehow working around the "lock down" problem. For example: 1) setting up a few Macs: while one computer is importing, I'm using the second for editing and third is exporting. That'd be a costly bugger, though. 2) using a few different softwares: while, say, Final Cut is importing, I'm editing something else on Premiere and so forth. That'd be a pain-in-the-butt for training up back-up editors. 3) setting up different users within the same Mac, so while Final Cut under one user is importing, I'm logged in as another user and editing. Both a guy from the Apple store and a local computer guy said: "Better not do that, love." =) *** Another idea is using iMovie for importing (it converts footage into .aic) and then throwing imported footage into Final Cut Express for actual editing. Has anybody used that option? Are there any other softwares that can import/export for one another *** *** *** Basically, it's a one long-winded topic. So far, our boys have had their say, our marketing people have had theirs, our owners have, our manifest has, I have, computer support has - and still there are so many options. What do you think?

Okay, I know that my reply is like 1,5 years late =P, but did you mean you actually had a couple of loads jump out over Dyea flats? Man, I wish I had seen that! Didn't notice any skydivers there during 2006 season...