 In order to achieve high-quality video commentaries that your audience will enjoy listening to, it is vital that you let the talent’s voice stand out loud and clear. But recording voice is more difficult than it may seem: sometimes it is too loud, and sometimes instead you can’t hear it well.
To overcome this issue, you need to understand and take advantage of one essential audio production technique: dynamic range compression. It does not need to be complex however: with a free software tool and no more additional work than a simple drag-and-drop, here is a practical tutorial to help you reach fantastic quality in your voice-overs. |
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 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License. |
Sony’s coming up with “Something BIG” in SIEL & SATIS trade show in Paris, Oct 20th, 2009… Should we expect a new XDCAM EX with the latest EXMOR R sensors? Handheld or shoulder-mount? This, and the price tag, is anybody’s guess.
I recently struggled to find a cheap voice-over solution with reasonable quality… My editing software has a voice-over feature which can take sound input from the PC sound card; all sound cards or motherboards have a microphone input; so I just figured I should buy a quality headset with a built-in microphone. The microphone, being closest to the mouth, would bring a beautifully sounding voice while rejecting side noise. Or so I thought — the results were pathetic. But there is a much better solution, at no additional cost. There’s a dreaded situation regarding colors and lighting, which happens when you mix sunlight with other color temperatures. For example:
Professionals would address such issue by color-balancing everything with 5500K-calibrated light sources, or setting some blue gel on the incandescent light source, or avoiding the situation altogether. That’s not practical for the casual videographer / hobbyist as you just can’t buy a whole set of lighting gear, let alone carry it around the world when travelling. Fortunately, there’s a work-around solution only a few clicks away if you have higher-end editing software such as Apple Final Cut Studio, EDIUS Pro, or Adobe Premiere Pro. September 3rd, 2008 | Category: Color Correction | Comments are closed |
Art Adams at ProVideo Coalition wrote a nice short article about White Balancing. Obviously I can’t carry a chip chart and a vectorscope when going out there and shooting, let alone own them, so I’ll essentially retain one simpler advice in Art’s experience – quote:
Okay! Sounds exactly like I did here! I checked the OUTDOOR WB preset in advance, determined what custom Picture Profile adjustment would make it closest to what I like best, and voilà – colors are much more predictable and gorgeous now with my FX7. We often learn things the hard way (like ruined footage), and after that it’s really nice to read one of the experts confirming this WB preset stuff. August 3rd, 2008 | Category: HDR-FX7 | Comments are closed |
Here comes the conclusion of my quest about getting colors right when shooting outdoors with the HDR-FX7E. After so many tests and color woes, the solution is so simple that – I think – it now calls for a comprehensive summary in one single post:
Many thanks to klenkfilm and 2mnyHCs of Sony HDV Info .com who gave this OUTDOOR preset tip and warned against using AWB (thread: FX7 and white balance: what is your opinion?). After all, AWB did a fair job on the HDR-HC3, and choosing a fixed preset instead seemed to go against the very nature of outdoors shooting where the color of light always seems to change ever so subtly. So why try to outsmart the machine’s auto program in the first place, that’s what I had first thought! Anyway, whatever the cause of this AWB behavior, whatever the reason for that wicked ‘AWB SENS’ feature, there’s now a simple solution for best colors when shooting outdoors. So here is my final complete recommendation for shooting outdoors with the HDR-FX7E (custom picture profile and other settings):
End of this quest, summer is vacation time – everybody move out there and record great memories! July 14th, 2008 | Category: HDR-FX7 | Comments are closed |
For anyone who would need further convincing, here are a few more examples of the random yellow evils caused by Auto White Balance. July 12th, 2008 | Category: HDR-FX7 | Comments are closed |
Based on previous tests and the growing feeling that something really is wrong with Auto White Balance, now is time for a real-life comparison of the OUTDOOR WB preset vs. AWB. A short trip to the remote countryside was a nice opportunity to check everything in a real-life outdoors situation, and get a final answer to the question which triggered this whole quest: how can we best capture the true colors of trees and grass, especially in these early days of spring, and avoid yellow casts… July 12th, 2008 | Category: HDR-FX7 | Comments are closed |
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Friends of HDV |
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Have you ever shot video at night, especially in cities, only to realize later on that your picture looks all red, orange, or yellow? This is due to the sodium vapor street lights, also known as broken spectrum lights.
After Sony teased the whole world with an 
