Editing HD footage

There are plenty of programs that convert video from one format into another, but at the time of writing most of those specifically designed for accelerating HD editing were aimed at the professional, or at least higher-end enthusiasts. As more consumer capture devices offer highly compressed HD, we can expect to see more affordable solutions arrive.

Cineform recently released Neo Scene, which costs $129 (approx £90) and converts AVCHD and HDV content into the company’s intermediary format for quicker and more responsive editing. The process is handled by the HD Link program, which can either convert existing files or capture new ones directly from the camera, converting them in real time. I’ve started trialling Neo Scene along with its bigger brother Neo HD and will report back in a future edition.

Converting while you capture footage from a camera is a convenient way to avoid a later conversion stage. Black Magic Design’s Intensity card, as featured in the March 2009 Performance column, captures footage over HDMI and stores it in the editing-friendly Motion JPEG format; the card costs $249 (approx £175) from www.blackmagic-design.com.

Applications that incorporate intermediary technologies include Apple’s Final Cut Pro 6 (for Macs only), which is one of the most effective with its Prores 422 format. Sony’s Vegas Pro is also reported to work well with AVCHD content.

It’s still early days for trouble-free editing of AVCHD and H.264 material, with many pros or enthusiasts continuing to rely on older tape-based HDV cameras for the best experience. HDV uses Mpeg2, which may also be less than ideal for editing, but it’s a great deal more acceptable than working with the newer formats.

Mpeg4 variants are here to stay and will soon dominate all consumer HD footage. Effective editing solutions will become common and the frustrations of early adopters should hopefully be a thing of the past.

I’ll be looking at the performance of various editing solutions in future columns, but if you’re successfully editing HD footage – ­ or need a shoulder to cry on ­ – drop us a line.