OT: The State of Video Capture Spring 2007

[Sivakatirswami]

We are in the midst of our hard ware upgrade cycle
(once very two years we do major "enterprise" hardware upgrade here.)

And we are taking a hard look at "must have" equipment.

Some background: (Apple only, OSX....)

We are ramping up video production in a big way and getting from
a Keynote to a DVD is right now an incredible "jump thru hoops"
where, using SnapzPro on our biggest G5 dual processor desktop
production station (which we move into a "sound room") where
we run the Keynote with  a high end mic attached to the box
to get a humungous Apple Animation file which we can then
convert to full screen presentation quality for DVD etc.  It works.


We looked into converters before. Total Training production Manager
in New York (if you haven't seen Deke McClelens training videos
you are missing a treat!)  told me they  they used a $25,000
plus video converter for their work but that there were less expensive
models that would still do a good job in the $4,000-6,000 range.
Meanwhile another team member here was talking with Apple Education
dept who recommended a low end model $400.00 or something.
Well guess what, non-profit org bought the $400.00 model.. it was a disaster
we sent it back... Meanwhile we developed the SnapzPro work flow
and did a few productions with that.

So much for history:

SnapzPro recently announced an Intel version which should run on our new
intel machines when they arrive, but I wanted to query the list on hardware
options or software alternatives. We need to be able to dub over
during runtime play-recourd, voice input from an external mic.

All insights, past experience "wisdom" "best directions" etc welcome
email me off list unless you think everyone should hear what you have to
say.

Obviously the SnapzPro is "price is right" vs a $5M conversion box.. but 
I would
be interested to know what a hardware solution might offer that SnapzPro
cannot...

Thanks!


Sivakatirswami
www.himalayanacademy.com

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