Sunday, June 26, 2011

When is a Camera not a Camera?

Here is an image of the fabulous Sony NEX VG 10E camcorder/DSLR camera. This camera has revolutionized filming for many independent producers because it gives us the opportunity to achieve 'depth of field' focus that used to be the province of the big boys who had the deep pockets to be able to afford these desirable things.

The camera above is not cheap but within range and for me the time had come to sadly say good bye to tape camcorders and join the HD digital brigade. Sometime progress can in fact be a step backwards. Video tape is still very, very useful especially in the realms of archiving. Tape lasts for years, hard drives give up at around four years old and have to be replaced. One of mine gave out last week!

As you know I am a 'mature' person. Most of my age have difficulty sending an email so being able to video edit at all is beyond them. Because of my preference for tape I have put off the change till the last minute and even now I shall use tape to save hours on rendering. My younger peers can't get their heds around this.

In the Sony shop I checked to see if the camera was compatible with Final Cut Pro. It was I saw it a happen so full of confidence I plugged my camera into the application and .........nothing! Could I get it to work? I had a list of choices as long as my arm. When this happens there is nobody to help. I tried the Sony Store and they did try but the person I wanted was 'not there today' so I had to go for the big boss.

Eventually I got the message. Silly me! I had thought the camera was a 'camera'. I mean it looks like a 'camera' and takes pictures like a 'camera' but it seems when talking to a computer this is an external hard drive! No why couldn't I work that out! I felt soooo stupid. Sadlly the boss who was sooo nice left me to it with advice to look at the specification page in the hand book, Now where did I put that?

On studying the File List I saw underneath 'Log & Capture' which is what I used in the past was a 'Log & transfer'. A click on this and Bingo problem solved. Images loaded up in a trice. Quicker than tape BUT it takes hours to sort them out. Hours in fact! With tape you just skim over and forget!

Still the HD images are splendid and that is the way I have to comply. Why couldn't somebody just have told me that!

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