[olug] Video Editing and Linux

[Carl Lundstedt]

Since no one else has responded, I'll jump in with my two cents and
anything ignorant I say will prompt a more knowledgeable person to
respond.  For the most part I've been doing my video editing in Windows
(Premier Pro Educational, Ulead Studio & DVDMaker), so I have a good
idea what hardware you need, but am shaky on what Linux software is
available.

On Wed, 2004-03-10 at 06:44, Joe Gulizia wrote:
> I'd like to edit videos using a program similar to
> Pinnacle Studio 8 and JASC Paintshop Pro for graphics.
>  I'd input VHS, SVHS, MiniDV or DVD along with stills.
>  I'd output to DVD, SVCD or VCD.
> 
> A.)  What type of machine and rough cost?

In order of importance:

A standard PC with the following extras/upgrades:

TV Capture Card.  You can get a pretty good secondary capture card in
the $50-70 range.  (Make sure it is linux compatible.)  Other options
are to get a "dazzle" or other outside Video->digital converter.  I have
a card that I got from DIT that works ok in Windows and is recognized by
Mandrake 9.2 and SuSE 9.0 but I haven't tried to use it in Linux to
capture (viewed some TV signal though).

DVD/CD Burner.  Try and get a multi format to ensure hardware
compatibility with the DVDs you make.  I got the LG Multi-drive (~$120)

LOTS AND LOTS OF HARDDRIVE SPACE.  I invested in a 120 GB harddrive on
its own IDE controller just for video file storage and swap space, and I
don't think I'm a "serious" video editor. (~$100)

LOTS AND LOTS OF RAM.  I upgraded to 1 gig of high speed crucial ram
just to get decent performance from Premier (but I'm doing large video
file conversion).  Small amounts of ram will work, but you'll be
constantly accessing swap space.  It will be slow and hard on your
computer. (~$???, $100-$300)

Fast Processor.  To encode a DVD file from an hour of edited movies
files my computer was taking on the order of 10 hours (Athlon XP 2000).
(Now I could have been doing something wrong, but I don't think so). 
Any processor will work, but I'd buy the fastest I could afford.
(~$???)

For a decent Video editing Linux PC, I'd wager a cost of about $1200 -
$1500.  You can certainly go cheaper (upgrade a stock Dell or the like),
but you'll probably regret it.

> 
> B.)  What Linux flavor software and other
> applications?

I use Mandrake almost exclusively (although I'm slowly moving away from
it to SuSE).  I'd wager the distro won't matter much, but the kernel
version might. You may need to recompile the kernel if you get a
hardcore do-it-yourself distro like Slackware or Gentoo to include
support for your "fancy-smancy" hardware (TV Card, video support, etc). 
SuSE would also be a good choice.  I saw that the boxed version of SuSE
at BestBuy listed video editing software as being included.  (Trial
version?)

I tried Cinelerra on my somewhat weak Workstation at my office. 
Cinelerra is a poor work-alike of Adobe Premier. It was HORRIBLY
unstable.  I haven't found a good (& Free) piece of linux software for
video editing.  There are commercial video editing software packages for
Linux but they seem quite costly. (Compared to the educational version
of Adobe Premier.)

Of course for graphics, GIMP is still king.  I even saw a Linux Journal
article on how to use GIMP to make menus for DVDs.

Here's my impression of the experience you will have trying to use Linux
for video editing.  Its going to have to be a labor of love.  There are
cheaper, cleaner editors for Windows and Mac.  My (limited) experience
with video editing on the PC has shown that unless you REALLY REALLY
need to use Linux...don't.  For a comparable amount of money you could
get an OK Mac with iMovie.

I'd love to be proven wrong on the above point.  If others know
something I'm missing I'd love to hear it.  I just purchased a used Dual
Athlon MP Motherboard/processors/Ram to use for video editing/authoring
and I'd love to use Linux with it.

Carl
> 
> Thanks in Advance.
> 
> CB_Joe 
> 
> 
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-- 
Carl Lundstedt <clundst at unlserve.unl.edu>
University of Nebraska