NCast Presentation Recorder Reference Manual
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Cleaning up a file by removing unneeded material at the beginning, end or in the middle of a
file.
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Converting archive files to another format (e.g. conversion to RealMedia or WindowsMedia
formats).
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More complex editing tasks such as adding titles, inserting other video sequences or
material that was not in the original presentation, selectively adding or deleting sequences or
scenes from the original file, rearranging the order of the presentation, adding fancier
transitions or wipes, and technical work such as fixing color balance.
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Creation of DVDs, VCR tapes, CDs etc. from the original material.
Obviously this could be a long list and the above items are only representative.
The nature of MPEG-4 files (one keyframe - I frame followed by many differential frames - P, B frames) is
hard for a video editor to deal with directly. Any type of more complex edit would require conversion of
the archive files to an I-frame only format (Motion JPEG or DV format, for example) where differential
frame interpolation is no longer required.
Quicktime Pro, an inexpensive add-on to Quicktime player for both MACs and Windows, is suitable for
taking the original files and exporting them to a variety of other formats for further editing or simple
playback in the new format. It is not a video editor and should be used just for straight export of the
original files to the new format.
Adobe Premiere, a well know and very popular video editor from Adobe.
Adobe After Effects (available on PCs and MACs) is a high powered, full-featured video editor, which is
very popular with professional videographers and which can do almost any video editing or rendering
task known to man. It is, however, expensive in both cost and time-to-learn. This package can import the
archive files directly.
Final Cut Express and Final Cut Pro are two popular video editors used with Apple computers.
Squared 5 MPEG Streamclip is an application for editing Presentation Recorder MPEG-4 files, setting
In/Out points, and converting to different formats such as AVI and DV.
The archive files are at the ultra-high-end in terms of resolution and frame rate, and that processing
times for these files are not trivial, with rendering times often being 3 to 7 times real-time (one minute of
material may take three minutes to export, for example).
A high-powered PC is absolutely essential, with something like a 3 GHz. Pentium with 1.5 GB of RAM
being the required hardware. A 1 GHz laptop with 256 MB of memory will not do the job.
Customers should carefully assess what their target audience requirements are, and make recordings in
reduced resolution or reduced frame rates if a lot of down-conversion is contemplated. Keeping
everything at the highest resolution and highest frame rates will be very costly in terms of video-editing
post processing.
NCast Corporation
Revision 1.0
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