video editing software, digital cams, and microphones, ?

[fastbilly1]

I am not familiar with Samsons R11, but just play with at see what happens.

If you need help with sound effects or vocals I might be able to help you. I have no musical talent so you are on your own there. Keep me in the loop. I love stopmotion.

[Ziggy]

^ Yeah, stop motion is great. There's just something about it that's really charming, and funny. Any one remember the Action League NOW! segment from KaBlam! on Nickelodeon? Hopefully people wont think we're trying to straight up rip off Robot Chicken though, as most of our ideas for skits are spoofs. Maybe I'll upload some of the test clips we did, if any one cares to see. Even though they're just test clips, they're still pretty funny to watch. My brother just did a >30 clip of the T-800 blowing up a toilet with a grenade launcher.



Any one have any recommendations for budget monitors or headphones? Like I said, we're on a low budget for this. It's hard enough trying to convince my brother to get certain things (I wanna get a DSLR, he doesn't wanna spend that much). When I told him about monitors, he said desktop speakers will be "good enough," but I don't think I agree. Or will they be? Every desktop in my house has the common 2 speaker plus sub setup, and they're really too bassy.

I've seen the powered pair of Behringer monitors for like $75, but are monitors at that price even worth getting? I've seen other pairs of powered monitors between $75 and $100, brands like Alesis, M-Audio, and Tascam. The $100 Alesis have decent reviews.

I have a headphone amp, so using two identical headphones (so both my brother and I can hear the exact same thing) is an option, but I know headphones can get expensive. And on the other side of the spectrum, I know from experience, unfortunately, just how shitty headphones can be. Monitors will be so much easier to use, but if I can get some headphones that have a nice and level sound and only run about $25 or something, then I could save a little money.

[Nintendork666]

As far as editing software goes, nothing has ever clicked with me more than Sony Vegas. It's the best you can get, as far as I'm concerned.

Yeah, I was looking at Vegas too. From the YouTube videos I watched, I thought it looked like Corel's interface was a little more friendly. Heh, it's funny how one person will claim Sony Vegas is the best, another will say get nothing other than Adobe Premier (Elements). I'm sure both of those along with Corel are all capable though, no?

I know nothing about Corel. I've only tried Vegas, and AVID.

AVID and my thought process while editing clashed a lot, while the workflow of Vegas allows me to easily get done what I want to do. Any problem I come across, I am able to solve after less than a minute on my own or a quick Google search for anything peskier.

You're right though; asking, "Which video editing software is best?" isn't too far off from asking, "Which 16-bit console is best?" Everyone has their favorites and reasons why they prefer one over the other.

[fastbilly1]

I have a headphone amp, so using two identical headphones (so both my brother and I can hear the exact same thing) is an option, but I know headphones can get expensive. And on the other side of the spectrum, I know from experience, unfortunately, just how shitty headphones can be. Monitors will be so much easier to use, but if I can get some headphones that have a nice and level sound and only run about $25 or something, then I could save a little money.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Samson-CH700-He ... 33729a6da5

Those are the best sub $50 headphones I have ever owned. I got a pair free with my Zoom and they sound almost as good as my old Sony MDRs (just at a fraction of the price). Unique Squared is a company I have dealt with alot and have never had any issues - usually their prices are lower than B&H.

Above that I would go with Sony MDR 7506's - they are about $150 but are exquisite headphones and used by most sound techs.

[Ziggy]

Thanks, Fast! I looked around and the link you gave me seems to be by far the best price for those headphones. I'll probably be picking up a few sets of them soon.



So I bought the Tascam US-200, and it came in today! Of course, I had to try it out...

http://s59.photobucket.com/albums/g295/ ... Groove.mp4

I just wanted to get a feel for this interface, so I just put that together real fast (mostly improvised). I just edited together some drum samples that came with my midi notation software, then recorded bass and guitar direct into the Tascam. I haven't used any mics with it yet, but judging from how smooth the instrument direct in sounds, I would think it should be pretty good.

One of the main reasons I choose this unit over others is because it came with Cubase LE 5. The funny thing is though, I haven't even used Cubase yet. I was trying to install it and it kept giving me errors. When I tried Googling what the problem was, I found out that apparently there's some hardcore DRM involved. You have to install some kind of DRM software before you can even install Cubase! I read that legit users will opt to use a crack for it, that's how annoying the DRM is. My friend's old Tascam that came with an old version of Cubase, you could easily install everything. You just needed the Tascam to be plugged in to launch Cubase. So, you can't launch Cubase with out the device, I don't know why they had to take it any further than that. Luckily the Tascam works great with Adobe Audition (what I've been using for a while now). I was kinda looking forward to using Cubase, checking out nice new effects and whatnot, but I might not ever use it now.

edit: Oh yeah, by the way, about the whistle in the song... at the begining of tracks, or during a break, I'll usually put some clicks in to keep the beat (makes it easier to record other instruments). After I get all the parts down, I'll take the clicks out. When I was making the drum tracks for this, instead of click I randomly put the whistle instead. It made me laugh, so I ended up leaving it in. Reminds me of Super Mario Kart.

[Cronozilla]

Adobe Premier is ass. Lightworks is open source, free to use, and professional quality (without the nonsense). It's been used in some commercial films editing also, like Shutter's Island and The Departed.

It has Chroma selection, and all that crap. Pretty easy to use, lots of tutorials online. Check it out. All you have to do is register and download.

Microphones aren't that much, you can get a nice one for $80-$120. The pros don't use $4000 mics either You'll primarily just want to ensure there isn't wind noise, and the audio quality should be good otherwise. I can't remember the type of mic you actually want though >_>

Pretty much any digital camera will do, you just need to make sure it's mounted properly. It might make sense to maybe to some work to set up an auto picture system. So, you pass your hand over some sensor and it takes the picture. It's one of the only ways for stop motion to be smooth. (If you don't touch the camera) The resolution on almost all current digital cameras is well above HD resolutions. You'll also want to use a graphics editor (Gimp is good and also free, though slightly obtuse in a couple areas, however the feature set is generally more powerful than in Photoshop) to touch up various images and scale them accordingly.

You can use a program like Blender to do any sort of effects needed. (And Lightworks can integrate several video feeds with layering and blending ... it also has color corrections and junk like that)

Audio editing can be done using Audacity, including the recording. It's strongly suggested you do everything raw, because you're going to be compressing it again when you export the actual movie.

You can use FFMPEG to do various quick and dirty audio conversions. So you can actually make a AC3 5.1 track if you wanted.

I didn't include any links because all this stuff is easily findable, just give them a search.

In terms of high quality headphones, honestly, headphone's main issue is noise reduction ... just get some construction quality hear protectors (some are very stylish and only about $8) and get a moderately not-shit pair of headphones (like ones that were packed in with a CD player), then remove the speakers from then and put them inside the construction headset. It'll sound amazing, because you don't need to turn it up very loud. Very quick and dirty. You can go a step further and solder on some higher quality cabling too. It's all very cheap to do.

Anyway, hope it helps. Make sure to get a lot of lights And when you use cloth at a small scale ... use thinner fabric. That shit looks ridiculous when it's all this 1/8" fabric. Looks like the characters are wearing insulation.

[KDub]

My audio suggestions

Alesis io2 Express: A good budget, but strong USB recording dock with phantom power
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/685448-REG/Alesis_IO2_EXPRESS_iO2_Express_USB_Audio.html

MXL 990/991: Great budget recording microphones. Very clear sound, plenty sensitive for voice over work. I also suggest grabbing a pop screen.
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pro-audio/mxl-990-991-recording-microphone-package

Software: Just get audacity!

Video editing software: I use Roxio Videowave for my video editing. Never used it for stop motion stuff or animation but it has good features for general video editing. Even has chroma key options (green screen) which a lot of budget stuff doesn't have. It is on the cheaper side and comes in the Roxio Studio package which gives you other editing and creating tools.

[Ziggy]

Clearly you two haven't read the entire thread.

I still really appreciate the input though. Let me try and bring you guys up to speed.

Adobe Premier is ass. Lightworks is open source, free to use, and professional quality (without the nonsense). It's been used in some commercial films editing also, like Shutter's Island and The Departed.

I haven't pulled the trigger yet, but I've pretty much decided I wanna get Dragonframe. Still, I'm always interested to hear about FREE software! I'll have to check Lightworks out, even if I don't end up using it.

Microphones aren't that much, you can get a nice one for $80-$120. The pros don't use $4000 mics either You'll primarily just want to ensure there isn't wind noise, and the audio quality should be good otherwise. I can't remember the type of mic you actually want though >_>

Fast and I decided that I should try out the mics I have now (Samson R11, SM57, some kind of vocal condensor) and see how they do. If not them, the SM58 will probably be the best vocal mic in that price range (they retail for $100).

I was rounding up with $4k. I did a lot of reading, and it seems like this is standard equipment in a studio: http://www.americanmusical.com/Item--i- ... ETZNI-LIST

Pretty much any digital camera will do, [...]

Well since I've decided to go with Dragonframe, I really wanna get a DSLR instead of another stupid point-and-click. The Canon EOS Rebel T2i seems to be affordable, as of now that's what I'm hoping to get. And that particular camera works well with Dragonframe.

You can use a program like Blender to do any sort of effects needed. (And Lightworks can integrate several video feeds with layering and blending ... it also has color corrections and junk like that)

Ah, cool. I'll have to look into Blender. Like I said, I'm always interested in free software!

Alesis io2 Express: A good budget, but strong USB recording dock with phantom power

But I just bought the Tascam US-200 (read my last post). I even posted a song I made to test the unit out!

Software: Just get audacity!

I might check out Audacity one day purely out of curiosity, and because it's free, but I've been using Audition for a while now. Even now that I have a legit copy of Cubase LE 5, I have no real desire to use it (kinda got turned off by it's hardcore DRM - read my last post).

But it's funny you recommend to use Audacity even though the USB interface you just recommended comes with a copy of Cubase. Were you unaware that it came with Cubase? Or do you actually recommend using Audacity over Cubase?

Video editing software:

Like I said above, I'm most likely going with Dragonframe.

[AppleQueso]

Honestly an SM57 with a pop filter in front of it will be virtually identical in sound to an SM58 anyway.

You have a 57, just use that.

[KDub]

Yeah sorry, I skimmed the thread a little but a lot of the posts were getting long and just figured it was everyone else's recommendations haha.

Anyway yes I did know the Alesis came with Cubase. I personally have tried it twice and didn't really care for it. The best way I could describe it is, awkward. The simple tasks of creating a new track and hitting record weren't as simple as they should be.

With Audacity I plug in the Alesis, open Audacity, hit record, and the track is added and the recording begins.

For voice over work, that is perfect. But I've used it for music recording and editing and it is good for that too.