Movie-making on a budget

Saving precious moments on film has long been a fascination for most people, and this was never more true when it came to moving images in the late 20th Century. Home 8mm cameras were the first mass market success, and then the likes of Betamax, VHS, Hi-8 and so on became more widespread, making an affordable method of preserving time more available.

However, while all these film and video technologies could preserve images, they didn't allow you to edit them. You had to take the good with the bad when it came to watching the likes of your uncle's home video.

Today, however, the advent of digital video has brought a change in how we capture and view our moving images in ways we never contemplated 10 years ago, let alone back in the heady days of 8mm in the 1960s and 1970s.

Digital video has several advantages over its analogue counterpart. First comes quality: you get far better resolution and colour than, for example VHS. Second, the quality doesn't deteriorate with playing or copying, and third - and this is the killer feature - you can edit digital video on your PC cheaply and easily.

Although shooting any kind of video is fun, viewing the raw results can be disappointing for your own videos, and tedious for that of others. Even professional film makers throw away most of the footage they have shot. Editing analogue video, even on an amateur level, is laborious and expensive: you need two VCRs, other equipment such as mixing desks, and a great deal of patience.

Editing digital video, on the other hand, is much easier, and as time-consuming as it is non-linear. The storyboard/timeline approach of digital video-editing software means you can jump to any point in your film instantly without the chore of rewinding or fast-forwarding.

You can drag and drop whole scenes, add sound, titles and effects and output the finished movie to anything from streaming website video to DVD.

If you've already got a reasonably specced PC, then you can set yourself up as a movie maker for less than £500. In this feature we'll be looking at what you need and how to choose it, how to set it up, as well as the basics of video editing and output.

We'll also explain the various video file formats, what you can do with them and, for those of you already into analogue video with Hi-8 or VHS, we'll look at ways that you too can join in the fun.

Buying a camcorder
If you want to dip your toes into the waters of digital video, then it is possible to do so for less than £100, but expect to get what you pay for. The cheapest way to capture video is with a webcam.

As the name implies, these are designed for sending video over the internet, from a website, by email or by instant messaging. Don't expect quality: typically these will give you 15 frames per second (fps) at a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels. You also have the disadvantage of being tethered to your PC, but Logitech's Quickcam cordless lets you film up to 20m away.

Another budget solution is a pocket camcorder, such as the Nisis DV2, reviewed on page 60 of our March issue. Again, resolution is a modest 320 x 240, and you won't get more than a couple of minutes of filming unless you buy additional Flash memory cards.

For good results you need a full-scale digital camcorder. There's a huge variety available from the big four manufacturers - Sony, JVC, Canon and Panasonic - with Sharp and Samsung offering smaller selections. You can pay anything from £300 to several thousands.

At the top of the range, you'll be paying for sophisticated optics, high build quality and professional luxuries such as genuine widescreen output. But even at entry level, you'll still be able to produce digital movies that are far superior in terms of colour, resolution and sound than their analogue counterparts.

Specifications can be bewildering, particularly at entry level, so here's what to look for. The most popular format is Mini DV - with cassettes about half the size of an audio cassette that can each hold an hour or more of footage.

In addition, Sony has its own standards - Digital8 uses the same tapes as the Hi-8 analogue system, and MicroMV uses tapes 30 per cent smaller than Mini-DV.

More recently launched are cameras that record onto built-in hard disks or 3in DVD-R, but you won't find these at the low end of the market.

Sony has also announced a new range of gigabyte memory card - enough to store 24 minutes of DVD-quality video, and rumours are also circulating of 'theoretical' sticks with a 32GB capacity. However, don't hold your breath waiting for this to become affordable.

The number of pixels - and so the amount of detail - a camcorder can capture is not nearly as important as in digital still cameras for creating prints. The digital video format itself sets the ceiling on resolution.

However, megapixel charge coupled devices (CCDs) are better at implementing digital zoom and stabilisation. More expensive cameras have a separate CCD for each primary colour.

Regulated DV cam limitations
All digital camcorders come with both analogue and digital (DV-out) outputs. Using the former you can hook up the camera to the TV, just as you can with an analogue camera, and view the contents of the tape.

Most cameras have either Composite video outlets, S-Video outlets or both. DV-out lets you output the contents of the tape in digital format to a computer. If you want to be able to get the edited footage back into the camera, then it needs to support DV-in as well.

Not all cameras - particularly in the budget spectrum - support this. This isn't because it costs money to implement the feature; but because of European Union regulations.

Under EU law, an imported camcorder with DV-in is classed as a VCR and attracts 14 per cent duty. Without DV-in, it's just a camcorder and the rate of duty is 4.9 per cent - and no, that doesn't make sense to us either.

So, in order to remain competitive, manufacturers disable the DV-in on camcorders destined for the European market. Until fairly recently it was possible to enable DV-in on most camcorders by means of a third-party 'widget' or a software patch - albeit at the risk of invalidating the guarantee.

However, the EU tightened up the regulations, and DV-in on more recent models is physically disabled.

The upshot is that if you want DV-in - and we'll see later why this is a desirable feature - you are going to have to pay a premium for it. For example, if you search for the Panasonic NV-DS29 on a price-comparison site such as www.kelkoo.co.uk, you should be able to find it for well under £400. The NV-DS30 - identical apart from having DV-in - is at least £50 more.

Technical aspects
Practically all consumer cameras come with auto-focus, auto-exposure and auto-white balance. The first two should require no explanation - they work in a similar way to still cameras. However, it can sometimes be necessary to override these.

If your subject is at the edge of the picture, for example, or you are shooting through a window, you may find the auto-focus is locking onto the distant background in the first case, or the frame of the window in the second.

Similarly, when filming a subject with very contrasting highlights and shadows, you may find you want to concentrate on detail in just the light or just the dark areas, rather than averaging out the exposure.

White balance needs a little more explanation. Every light source has a colour temperature. A filament light bulb, for example, has a colour temperature of around 3,000 degrees Kelvin, whereas daylight has a colour temperature of around 6,000 degrees.

A camera has to have its white balance set according to the lighting conditions: if it's set for daylight, then indoor scenes will appear too red and if set for artificial light, outdoor scenes will have a blue cast. Again, in some situations, such as filming indoors near a window, you may want to override the automatic settings.

Even some budget cameras allow manual override, as well as having presets for filming, say, snow scenes or fast-moving subjects.

Most digital camcorders will let you apply all sorts of special effects 'on the fly', such as strobe or mosaic effects, or fades and wipes between scenes. Do not be impressed.

In practice these are tricky to use and involve digging down through the on-screen menus - it's far easier to apply effects and transitions in an editing program after you've shot the footage. In addition, unlike in the editing environment, once you've added an 'in-camera' effect, you're stuck with it.

The majority of digital camcorders offer both optical and digital zoom, typically 10x in the former and 500x in the latter. Whereas optical zoom is useful - though perhaps over-used by many amateur film makers - the latter is largely a waste of time.

For a start, image quality drops alarmingly, as the camera is recording the output of fewer sensors. Second, at a zoom level of 500, you won't be able to hold the camera still enough to get any kind of picture at all without a very solid tripod and/or powerful sedation.

Another feature that can come in optical or digital options is image stabilisation, which compensates for camera shake while recording. Here again, optical is better, but you won't find this on a budget camcorder.

Digital stabilisation works by using fewer pixels to capture the image, comparing the position of objects between frames and mapping the output accordingly. Although this can show a noticeable improvement in the shakes, there is some degradation of image quality - for serious work consider using a tripod instead.

Some cameras come with built-in lights: these won't be as powerful as a separate unit and will shorten battery life but, again, they are better than nothing. Some cameras also have built-in infra-red lighting to let you take monochrome footage in the dark. A

ll camcorders have a built-in microphone, but don't expect too much of this. For high-quality live sound you will need a separate microphone, so make sure the camcorder has a socket for this.

Finally, if possible try out the camcorder. Make sure it's comfortable to hold and the controls are easy to manipulate, especially if you are left-handed. If you're planning to use a tripod, make sure the tapes load from the side, rather than underneath, otherwise you'll have to dismount the camcorder to change tapes.

The other bits you need
Next, you need a way of getting the video out of your camcorder and into your PC for editing. Some of the latest camcorders use a USB2 link, which comes as standard on most recent PCs, and others are available with a wireless Bluetooth connection.

The vast majority, however, use an IEEE 1394 link, more commonly known as FireWire (an Apple trademark), or I-link (a Sony trademark). Although Macintoshes come equipped with FireWire ports as standard, most PCs don't, though we're starting to see them on the latest motherboards.

However, it's easy enough to rectify that - you can buy a FireWire card that fits into a PCI expansion slot inside your PC. Shop around and you should be able to find a bundle comprising the card, a six-pin to four-pin cable and a 'light' version of a video-editing program for under £40.

Fitting this should simply be a matter of shutting down the PC, opening the case, sliding the card into an available PCI slot and starting up the PC again. With Windows XP you should find that the system installs the necessary drivers without further user intervention - on older systems you may be prompted for a disk.

Some manufacturers may require you to use their own drivers rather than the generic Windows ones, so do read the manual before installation.

As well as the camera, you are going to need some tapes: usually there are none in the box and these cost around £6 for a 60-minute tape. Once bitten by the DV bug, there's no limit to the money you can spend on lights, tripods, microphones and other goodies, but one extra you should buy at the outset is a spare battery.

There's not much point in going out for a day's filming with five hours of tape and one hour of battery. Normally the battery fits on the outside of the camera, so it's possible to fit a larger, higher-capacity battery.

Getting it in
So you've bought your camera, shot your film and want to get it into the PC. You still need software to edit the footage. There are several low-cost editing suites available, but if your credit is already maxed out, look no further than Microsoft Windows Movie Maker, which is free.

The latest version (Movie Maker 2) can be found here. For a free offering it isn't at all bad, especially for the beginner. Two other popular editors at around £50 are Pinnacle Studio 8 - which is also available in a variety of capture hardware bundles - and Ulead Videostudio 7.

Having installed the software, you need to spend some time and effort readying your PC for the task ahead. Video capturing and editing is intensive stuff, so first make sure your hardware is up to the task.

Movie Maker needs a minimum of a 600MHz processor, 128MB of Ram and 2GB of free disk space - this last part is very important. At the highest quality of capture, each minute of video will occupy around 200MB - the exact figure depends on the number of sound tracks.

You'll need the same again to 'render' the results of your edit to a file or the camera. So Microsoft's 2GB is only going to be enough for a five-minute movie. The most crucial part of the process is getting video on and off the hard disk.

The data needs to flow freely at 3.6MB per second, otherwise you'll get 'dropped frames' and other problems, or even no video at all.

Ideally, your video should be stored on a drive or partition of its own. With 7,200rpm UltraDMA disk drives being advertised in PCW for around £1 per GB, this isn't too heavy an investment.

You also need to make sure Direct Memory Access (DMA) is enabled for the hard disk. In Windows 98 or ME, go to Control Panel, System and click on the Device Manager tab.

Select the disk from the list of devices and click the Properties button, and you'll find a check box for DMA. In XP it's slightly different - the Device Manager is accessed from a button on the Hardware tab of Control Panel, System and you need to go to the Advanced tab of the properties of the IDE channel - not the drive itself.

Also bear in mind there is a file size limit of 4GB under Fat32 - the file system used by Windows 98 and ME. The NTFS file system used in Windows 2000 and XP doesn't have this limit. If you don't have 2000 or XP, editing programs (but not Movie Maker) will automatically split the incoming data into 4GB chunks.

So having allocated as much disk space as you can afford, and defragged the drive, the next step is to direct the software to use that space. Most editing software will default to recording into a subfolder of 'My Documents' - not a good idea - but you can easily change this.

There's a gotcha here in that editing software usually needs to create large temporary files, so make sure these are also created on the relevant drive rather than the default Windows Temp folder.

You are now almost ready to start capturing video, but first make things easier for your PC by eliminating the competition. You need to shut down all programs and processes that you don't absolutely need running.

Close your internet or network connection, disable virus scanners, the screensaver, Find Fast and any other utilities running in the System Tray. This will all help prevent dropped frames.

There is an excellent freeware utility named Enditall, which simplifies this and ensures that you don't shut down anything vital. Although designed for Windows 98, ME and 2000, it appears to work equally well in XP.

You're now ready to capture. Connect the camera to the FireWire port - usually the former has a four-pin connector and the latter a six-pin. Start the editing program and switch the camera on to VCR (playback) mode.

You'll find you have on-screen buttons to control the tape in the camera, together with a preview window, so you can cue the tape to the point from which you want to start capturing.

Alternatively you can put the capture in auto mode, which will rewind the tape to the start and begin the capture automatically.The capture wizard - or its equivalent in other systems - will offer you a choice of formats. Disk space permitting, it makes sense to choose DV-avi which will give you the best quality.

Having said that, there are other formats that take up a lot less disk space, and it really depends on the intended use of the movie. If you want to publish it on the web or view it on a PDA, then you can save space by importing at a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels or lower.

But there are no free lunches here - if you later re-export from 320 x 240 to DV-avi you'll get poor results.

One very useful option is to split the footage into clips when finished. This takes a while, but is incredibly useful, as you end up with thumbnail clips of every scene you have shot, which can then be manipulated independently.

Click on any clip, and you'll be able to run it in the preview pane, where you also have the option of splitting it into smaller clips. Having captured your video, you can start to edit it. Most editing software offers two modes of editing: storyboard and timeline. You can drag clips onto the former and arrange their order - it's a good way to get started.

In timeline view you have much greater control. For a start you can trim clips and get rid of unwanted footage from either end of the clip - other editing programs may also let you do this directly in the preview pane.

When you save edited video in Movie Maker and most other video editors, you are saving a project file. This contains all the information about the order, start and end points of the clips, transitions, overdubbed sound and so on, but doesn't contain any video itself. The original capture file remains unchanged on the hard disk and the output file isn't created until you 'render' the video.

Having arranged and trimmed your clips, the fun starts when you add sounds, transitions and special effects.

Getting it out
As we mentioned earlier, it's important to have a clear idea of what you want to do with the finished movie before you start capturing: then you can choose the most suitable format. So let's take a quick look at the various formats and methods by which you can output your final masterpiece.

First, the file formats themselves. All digital video is compressed in one way or another using a compression algorithm known as a codec.

The Audio Visual Interleave (avi) format was originally developed by Microsoft over a decade ago for 'Video for Windows'. It's not a single standard, but provides a framework for various codecs, such as Cinepak, Indeo, and Microsoft Video 1. Originally avi offered just 160 x 120 pixels at 15fps, but it has since matured into an accepted standard for semi-professional video editing.

DV-avi is the native format of camcorders using Mini DV. Resolution is 720 x 576 pixels at 25fps. With a 12bit sound track it has a bit rate of 25Mbps, so each minute of video uses around 180MB. With a full 16bit soundtrack, this goes up to 216MB. This will also be the format used if you want to record back to the camcorder.

The next file type is from the Motion Picture Expert Group (mpeg). This is an independent international group of standards for compressing audio and video. Mpeg-1 takes a frame and compresses it using similar lossy compression to that used in jpeg still images. This is a reference or Intracoded frame (I-frame).

It then takes the next frame, compresses that, compares the difference with the I-frame and discards all the information common to the two frames. The result is a Predictive frame (P-frame).

To avoid cumulative errors, a new P-frame is created at intervals. The mpeg-1 codec is asymmetric - it takes much more processing power to encode than it does to decode, so can be played back on relatively modest hardware.

One problem with mpeg-1 is that it uses a constant bitrate so each frame may be compressed to a different level. This can cause loss of quality in 'difficult' scenes where there is a lot of change between frames - you may see 'blockiness' and other artefacts.

Mpeg-2, the codec used in DVD videos and set-top box digital TV, gives noticeable improvement over mpeg-1. For a start it uses a lower compression rate: around half that of mpeg-1. Second, it uses a variable bitrate when encoding, so it can allocate more bits to frames in fast-changing scenes. However, this also needs more powerful processing to decode.

Mpeg-3 doesn't exist. MP3, the format used in audio compression, is short for mpeg-1 layer 3. Proponents such as Apple claim mpeg-4 offers mpeg-2 quality at a tenth of the file size. In addition to video and audio it can be used to encode other content such as text, Shockwave and interactive elements.

Its principal purpose is to deliver multimedia content over restricted bandwidth, eg the internet. See samples on Apple's website. All these types of mpeg (and there are other versions) are problematic to edit.

Since a trim point, for example, may not fall on an I-frame, the codec has to decode and recode all the frames as editing is done. The lossiness of the re-encoding is progressive, so repeated editing in this format degrades the quality of the final product.

The third file format is Windows Media Video (wmv), a Microsoft standard which, according to its developers offers better quality-to-size ratios than mpeg. This goes all the way up to 1,280 x 720 pixels at 24fps, with 5.1 digital surround sound. Windows Movie Maker offers a variety of sizes in this format, ranging from 208 x 160 (for Pocket PCs) up to 720 x 576.

However, not all editing suites support the format and it's really designed for playback in Windows Media Player. There are, however, third-party utilities to convert wmv to avi or mpeg.

Then there are mov files - Apple's answer to Video for Windows was Quicktime, using the mov format. This offered several advantages over avi, including better quality, availability on both Macintosh and Windows platforms.

In addition it was the first format to support 'streaming', so you could view video over the internet without having to first download the entire file. Rm is RealNetworks' proprietary format. Like mov, its main use is to provide low-resolution streaming video, but for playback in Real Player rather than Quicktime.

Then we have DivX. This is a proprietary codec, based on mpeg-4, developed to permit the downloading of full-length, full-screen films in, according to its owners, 'about the time it takes to have a pizza delivered'. You can find out more here. Just to confuse matters, there's another, unrelated Divx, without the last capital.

This is a now-defunct technology for marketing 'play-once' DVDs of commercial films, with online billing. The idea was that hired DivX discs didn't have to be returned after viewing. The system passed away in June 2001, and any DivX discs remaining are no longer playable.

Getting physical
So, having dealt with the main file formats, you may encounter in digital video, let's take a look at the physical media you can use to get a finished video out of the PC for general consumption.

If you're lucky enough to have a DVD burner, then you can create your own DVDs which will play back on a domestic DVD player, or a PC with a suitable software player. Note that Windows Media Player 9 doesn't play DVDs unassisted - you have to buy a third-party plug-in. Although you won't be able to do this in Movie Maker, Ulead Videostudio and Pinnacle Studio both come with software to create DVDs and VCDs.

If you don't have a DVD writer, but do have a CD burner, then you can create VCDs (Video Compact Discs) which will play back on VCD players, some domestic DVD players and PCs equipped with a suitable player, such as Windows Media Player 9.

Again, you'll need something meatier than Movie Maker to create them. VCD uses mpeg-1 compression, and quality is better than VHS (though inferior to DVD), with around an hour of video on each disc. SVCD, like DVD, uses the mpeg-2 format which gives better quality, but larger files, so you'll typically get 30-40 minutes of video per disc.

Again SVCDs will play on a VCD player, some DVD players or a PC. Recording the finished film back into the camera uses the same DV-avi format that the original footage was shot with, so there's no sacrifice of quality, and you can take advantage of the low cost of storage on DV tape.

However, as mentioned earlier, you will need a camcorder with DV-in for this. You'll then be able to play the finished tape back through the camera's S-Video or A/V port to a television or record to a domestic VCR.

S-Video uses a four-pin Din connector at each end. The A/V cable has a jack plug on the camera end and three RCA plugs (audio left, audio right and video) on the other. If your TV has neither of these inputs, then you can get an adaptor that will connect the three plugs to a Scart connector.

Using your VCR
As we've stressed, the easiest way to create films on your PC is to make a clean start with a DV camcorder and an inexpensive FireWire card. But what if you already have an analogue camcorder and tapes? 'Legacy' equipment and media - so called because you can spend a legacy maintaining it - need not be a problem.

If you are upgrading your camcorder to a digital model, then one solution is to look for a backwards-compatible model. The Sony DCR-TRV250, for example, can read Hi-8 analogue tapes as well as Digital-8. It also lets you input video from other sources, such as a VCR, and transfer the footage to digital media.

The other way is to buy an analogue video capture card. Though more expensive than a FireWire-only package, Pinnacle Studio 8 Deluxe, at around £200, comes with all you need to input, edit and output both analogue and digital video. This includes an external breakout box for hooking up analogue input/output and DVD/VCD burning software.

There are less expensive ways - Dazzle Digital Video Creator, for example, offers analogue-only capture (via USB) and editing for around £60. Note that you can't control analogue camcorders from your PC. This needs Open Host Controller Interface support, which is part of the FireWire specification, so you'll have to use the controls on the camcorder itself to play and rewind the tape.

Lights, camera ...

• If you plan to add more sound to your video at editing time - say a music track or commentary, make sure when filming that sound recording is set to 12bit.

• When filming a moving subject - such as a person walking - leave plenty of space in the frame for them to 'walk into'. This will avoid the viewer's apprehension that the subject is about to disappear out of frame or collide with an unseen obstacle.

• Set up your shot before you press the Record button - switch on the camera, point it at the scene and let it find the focus and exposure. In addition, resist the temptation to use the zoom while filming: your film will look better if you zoom and frame your shot before recording.

• The camera writes a timecode to the tape as you film, which can be useful in editing. However, if there are gaps between filming, the timecode may restart from zero. One way to avoid this is to shoot a few seconds of 'junk' footage at the end of each scene, then rewind to start the next scene over this.

• Another popular technique - though this may not work on all cameras - is to lay down or 'stripe' a timecode first, by recording through a tape with the lens cap on, then rewinding.

• Finally, you'll find using your camcorder will change the way you watch films. Watch lots, and learn from the masters. Shoot some film, edit and don't be afraid to experiment - remember, you are the one who is, literally, calling the shots.