Digital Video and Editing
The timeline
The most basic form of video editing is putting together a number of scenes after one another. The way modern video editing programs are organized is to put scenes on a timeline. After importing the original video files into the program, pieces of video and audio are arranged in the desired sequence on such a timeline. The timeline will at least contain one track for video and one track for sound. More advanced video-edtiting programs have multiple video and audio tracks. Multiple tracks greatly enhance the possibilities for advanced editing techniques.
Basic techniques
This section will show a number of techniques, which at least should
be found in any modern video-editing program.
Transitions
The most common transition from one scene to the next is the hard cut:
a sudden jump from one scene to another. Another common transition is
the fade-in/fade-out: the first scene fades out and then the next scene
fades in. Modern video-editing programs contain a library of standard
transitions, which require an overlap between two successive scenes.
The most well known example is the cross-fade in which the next scenes
appears while the first scene fades away. There are basically two ways
in which this is implemented: single track editing in which the scenes
are placed on one track in the timeline and so-called A/B-track editing
in which the two scenes are placed with a certain overlap on two tracks.
The way transitions are usually applied is to open the library and drag
the desired transition to the required position on the timeline.
Image correction
Video editing programs at least contain offer image correction possibilities
for brightness, contrast and color. This comes in handy when you are
not satisfied with the parameters of the original footage or when different
scenes are shot in different lighting conditions. The way this is usually
implemented is by selecting the scene on the timeline and change the
settings using sliders.
Filters
Another way of changing the appearance of the video is by application of filters. Typical examples are black and white, blur, sharpen etc. but also all kinds of artistic filters can be found in video-editing programs .Implementation is usually similar as for transitions. Open a library of filters and drag one to the scene on the timeline.
Titles
A video-editing program is not complete without the possibility to
add titles. Titlers usually allow the use of a variety of fonts with
colors and styles. Many titlers can also be used to insert images. The
way this is implemented in video-editing programs, is by creating the
title in a separate window. When the design is ready, it can then be
saved in a separate file for use in other projects. By placing the title
on the timeline, it is incorporated in the final result. In order to
be able to overlay titles over the video the background of titles is
by default transparent and it is put on a separate track.
Sound
Beginning cinematographers often widely underestimate the importance of sound in a video production. However, sound can greatly enhance the quality of your final movie. The ability to handle sound in a video-editing program is therefore very important. Basic needs are the ability to change volume of sound and to add extra sound tracks, e.g. for music or comment.
Advanced techniques
The previous section explained some of the basic techniques found in
video-editing programs. Modern video-editing programs however tend to
become more and more professional and more advanced techniques become
standard in even the most basic programs. It is impossible to list all
of the advanced options, but here’s a short overview of some interesting
ones.
Picture in picture
Picture in PicturePrograms that contain more than just one video track
offer the possibility of putting a picture over the other. By resizing
the video which is on top smaller, you can create a picture in picture
effects. This picture can then also move across the screen. Another
option that multiple track video editing is the possibility to apply
transparency so that one scene is used as an overlay to another scene.
Keying
This is the technique in which certain colors or brightness levels in a picture are replaced or changed. There are many possibilities with this technique, but the best known is the so-called Blue Screen. An object is filmed in front of a blue background and in the edited video, the blue background is replaced by another footage.
Special effects
With the advent of digital video, special effects, which formerly could
only be created by professionals, have now become widely available on
the consumer market. Some video-editing programs contain a library of
special effects, with all kind of transitions, movements, flashes etc.
Since the number and possibilities grow every day, the tendency is that
they are created by specialized companies as plug-ins to existing video-editing
programs.
Image stabilization
Most amateur video footage is shot with a small handheld camera. This
very often results in unwanted movements of the camera. Algorithms have
been designed to analyze the sequence of images and to recognize objects
and background. Through interpolation, the image can then be stabilized.
Advanced sound editing
As said before, sound does play a major role in the overall experience
when watching a movie. Editing sound is an art by itself. Examples of
available sound techniques are simple frequency filtering, changing
the “color” of sound (like Chorus, Reverb etc.) and filtering background
noise by subtracting techniques. Like with special effects, also the
tendency here is to rely on specialized companies to supply audio editing
software. An interesting feature in the area of sound is the possibility
to create use of Smartsound which enables you to create your own composition.
Video editing cards
This is a topic that may confuse people at first. Every PC is equipped with a video card. The purpose of this card is to process video data and to output it to a monitor or a TV. This card has nothing to do with the video-editing process and actually has no influence whatsoever on the quality of your final movie.
So let me explain: what are these video-editing cards offered on the market?
First thing to understand is that when you are working on a timeline, you are not immediately creating a file that contains the final video. The timeline is merely a set of pointers to the original video files ordered in time and a set of instructions to apply certain effects. One of the things however you want to do while editing is to check your result once in a while. Video editing programs offer the possibility to play the result directly from the timeline. However, if the timeline contains a lot of edits (and specially if advanced special effects are used) the program has to create new video frames, a process called rendering. When playing directly from the timeline the rendering needs to be done in real time because it is then done simultaneously while sending the output to the monitor. This may be beyond the power of the PC’s processor.
There are a couple of ways to solve this problem. One is to render the frames in a limited quality level. Disadvantage is that the output is a lower quality video which may make it difficult to judge the final result. Another way is to render the edited frames and store them in temporary video files before playing back the timeline. This has the disadvantage that each time you make a small change on a section, that section needs to be rendered again which may take a lot of time.
This is where a dedicated video-editing cards kick in. They contain
hardware that is specialized in rendering video. They are able to render
the edited video in real time and taking away this burden from the PC’s
processor. This makes it possible to play the final result at full quality
without any delay, directly from the timeline. Other functions that
are usually combined on video editing cards are capturing and encoding
to other formats, like MPEG.
Some video editing packages
Editing packages come in various levels of sophistication and prices. And since it is still a relative young market, new products and updates on existing products are released almost every day. Even new players still appear on the market. Therefore it is somewhat risky to present a list of video editing packages. Nevertheless, below a list of the most well known (in alphabetical order):
Adobe. Just like it's photo editing program Photo shop, their video editing program Premiere is very advanced. It is used by many professional video editors but, despite it's hefty price tag also very popular with many amateur cinematographers. www.adobe.com
Cyberlink. This Taiwanese company, mainly known known for their DVD player PowerDVD, entered the video editing market with PowerDirector. It's an entrance level video editing package with a relatively low price. www.gocyberlink.com
Mainconcept. This German company is another long time player in the video editing market. They are quite active in all kinds of encoding solutions and other special video applications, but also offer a couple of decent video editing programs. MainActor is their video editing program and is comparable with Pinnacle's Studio. They also offer a version for the Linux O/S. www.mainconcept.com
Microsoft. Although they are not a specialist in video editing, they are in this list because the vast majority of today's PC's are sold with Windows XP, which includes their basic video editing program MovieMaker. www.microsoft.com
Pinnacle. This German company is a true specialist in video editing and offers a broad line of products. It's standard consumer video editing product is Studio. It offers very good editing possibilities at a reasonable price. Some years ago Pinnacle bought another well known brand in the video editing scene, Dazzle. www.pinnaclesys.com
Sony. This Japanese company is most well known for their consumer electronics products, including digital camcorders. Compared with most others in this list, they are a relative new on this market with their software product lineVegas. The product line contain various programs ranging form entry level to semi-professional solutions. mediasoftware.sonypictures.com
Ulead. Yet another long standing name in the industry. The strategy of this Taiwanese company is based on trying to make software that is very easy to use. This also results in somewhat limited possibilities of their product MediaStudio, but still quite sufficient for video editors who are not too demanding. www.ulead.com
