Every so often, a project falls into your lap that is less than ideal. Perhaps you weren’t behind the camera, but a friend asks if you could edit a short video of their holiday party.  You accepted, of course, but within moments of viewing the poorly-lit, grainy footage, you wish you hadn’t. As an editor, you’re not always in control of the video you work with. Fortunately, you and your computer can salvage footage that is seemingly beyond help.

One of the reasons dark and grainy video looks bad is because the colors lack saturation. This leaves the images looking muddy. By removing the color information from the video, you are removing part of the problem. You can do this by using a black-and-white filter, or by using the color correction tool to remove the color saturation. This will help in minimizing the grainy look, as well as give the video a old-movie feel. If you can’t afford to go black and white, reducing color saturation will still aid your visuals. You can build upon the old-movie theme by using a strobe effect, which will add a flicker to the video.

As for the sound of your given footage, this may be the most important part to fix. Clean audio can save the day, and that’s exactly what you’ll want to do, clean up the audio. Most editing programs have low-cut or high-pass filters, and these can be used to automatically adjust the tones in the video. To adjust specific sounds, look for digital noise reduction. The process here is honing in on a sample of sound that you do not want, then the feature will recognize that frequency within the clip and lower it. The difference in your waveforms should be like the ones in the image above.

Don’t give up hope on bad footage just yet. Bad footage doesn’t mean your project is doomed. With the proper editing techniques and some creativity, you can turn a hopeless project into a video that doesn’t disappoint.

For more tips on how to work with bad footage check out Fix It in Post.

If you’ve been licking your chops for one of those editing suites with long lists of included programs, but you just need video and photo, make sure the Video & Photo Creative Collection from CyberLink Corp. is considered. The combination of video and photo editing software is the staple of many video producers, and both put professional level work at your fingertips. The process after production and through distribution is covered with the Creative Collection.

Fast video editing is the emphasis of PowerDirector 10 which utilizes TrueVelocity 2, a rendering engine designed to speed up editing. There are separate modes for editing including 3D, hundreds of features, professional plug-ins, free-hand paint tools, keyframing and TrueTheater enhancements.  Automatic functions and disc burning add to the host of features in PowerDirector 10. Notable additions from PowerDirector 9 are one-click audio normalizing, smart rendering technology, time-lapse and uploading to Vimeo and Dailymotion.

As for PhotoDirector 2011, those still images used in your Ken Burns effect will be well touched with features focused on manipulating camera functions. Your photos can stay as pristine as possible with native rendering of RAW files. Among the controls included are sharpness, noise, white balance and targeted regional adjustments. Both halves of the collection share well with social networking sites and connect you to upwards of 225,000 effects through DirectorZone. The supported file formats include the most popular ones such as AVCHD, FLV, MOV, MPEG, and WMV for video and for photos, MPO, JPS, RAW, GIF, BMP, JPG, TIF, and PNG.

Video & Photo Creative Collection is a complete package that is about the same cost as an upgrade for other software programs, but its features quickly add up to make it a very comparable option for consumers. Expect to get a lot done with this collection and outfit your productions to look their best with versatile and award winning software.

The Video & Photo Creative Collection is listed at $150.

TRON Legacy has been released in theaters across the nation. Surprisingly, there seems to be more acclaim for the sound design than any other element in the movie. How does one create a sound so specific to a story and audibly appealing to the movie-going masses? In The Sound of TRON LEGACY, by Michael Coleman, Sound Re-Recording Mixer Gary Rizzo, Supervising Sound Editor Gwen Yates Whittle, and Sound Designer Steve Boeddeker discuss building the movie’s overall “feel” through sound, the processes involved in designing these unique sounds and audio issues they were faced with.

A few highlights from the interviews…

– The sound of the light cycle engine was created by recording the engine of a Ducati motorcycle. The recording was then manipulated using filter sweeps and heavy processing in order to give the engine a “synthetic” feel.

–There was quite a bit of dialog clean-up and ADR involved during post-production due to the mics picking up a high-pitch whining from the character’s light suits.

–Through “audio delays, slaps, repeats, ambiance, and descreet reverbs”, sound was used to help sell the different environments within the film – from the expansive space in some scenes to the more intimate spaces in other scenes.

Watch the entire video (below) for more on how that distinct sound of TRON Legacy was created, and if you go see the movie this weekend, be sure to let us know what you thought!

Sony Creative Software Inc., a leading provider of professional video and audio editing applications, today announced Vegas™ Pro 9.0c software, the latest update to its award-winning nonlinear HD video and audio editing (NLE) application. Vegas Pro 9.0c software features Sony® XDCAM® EX MP4 file rendering and the ability to Smart Render MPEG-2 video across different containers for faster, more seamless editing. New audio features, including exclusive élastique Pro timestretching and Import Stereo Audio as Dual Mono, offer provide even more professional depth to this award-winning NLE. Additional support for media filmed with the RED ONE video camera streamlines file access and efficiency for editors working with footage up to 4K resolution. Vegas Pro 9.0c software also includes additional card support for capture and output via SDI, HD-SDI and HDMI™. Read the rest of this entry »