Continue reading »]]> “I just received the neat Sony HDR-TD10 camera and I’m trying to figure out the particulars of the MTS files that it shoots. Now I’d like to merge multiple Sony HDR-TD10 .MTS without losing quality, so that I can stream the result AVCHD footage smoothly over Wi-Fi to PS3 in full HD quality. The HDR-TD10 also shoots in 3D mode, so I’d prefer some tool that let me merge 3D .mts video as well. I’m working on iMac with OS X Mountain Lion. Thanks. ”

There are some MTS converters that can convert your media (HDR-TD10 MTS video) in mp4 file as I read in previous posts, but you will definitely loose a lot of details doing it. This Mac MTS Converter can encode 3D MTS to MP4, if you don’t mind. For lossless merging of Sony HDR-TD10 MTS clips, I find the Media Magician for Mac a best solution. Using the software, you can merge m2ts/mts files (2D or 3D) together without losing quality. Overall, this is a best solution to easily re-mux m2ts/mts files produced by Sony HDR-TD10 or other similar camcoders in order to stream them smoothly over Wi-Fi to PS3 in full HD quality. Below is a guide for your reference.

Tutorial: Remux AVCHD MTS/M2TS camera videos without recompression on Mac

1. Import source files into Media Magician for Mac Run Pavtube Media Magician for Mac, load source videos into it.

Learn the details on How to import source videos into Media Magician for Mac

2. Drag and drop Sony HDR-TD10 MTS video to timeline

In the Timeline panel of Pavtube Media Magician for Mac, you can copy a video clip by “Duplicate This Clip” in the Timeline. You can also change the start time and end time of a clip to trim/cut off unwanted parts in a movie clip. To remove clips, select one or more clips in the sequence and press “Delete”. You can also change the order of clips once they are there in the Timeline. If you would like to split a clip into two parts, you can drag the cursor/pointer to the right place and click the “Cut” button to cut off the clip.

Read More: How to Duplicate, Trim, Split and Delete a Clip with Media Magician for Mac.

3. Remux Sony HDR-TD10 MTS videos with no conversion on Mac

Choose “Output” in the main interface, then switch to “Lossless” > “original” or “Lossless” > “original”. Click “Plus” icon to add conversion task, and click “Start” to begin merging and remuxing Sony TD 10 MTS without recompression on Mac.

Soon after the rewrapping task is finished by Media Magician for Mac, you can add the generated MTS file to your Mac media server and play the 2D/3D MTS video to PS3 over Wi-Fi. Enjoy it!

Continue reading »]]> Have you ever met the similar issue? And do you know the reason? Have you find what is the best way to solved the problem and get Panasonic GH3 50p AVCHD to Avid Media Composer? The Media Magician will help you.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3 Reviews

They are really pushing the combination high-quality still and video in one camera. They have really helped their cause by adding a headphone jack for monitoring to the camera along with a flip-out 3-inch LCD screen. This is the cheapest camera available to offer this feature.

The Panasonic GH3 once again focuses on video as much as photo performance. From the specs we can see that the new Lumix DSLR records at much higher bitrate video. AVCHD capture is now at up to 1080/50p. However, the big news is a QuickTime mode that records at 1080/24p, 1080/25p or 720/50p using an unusually high 72Mbit/s bit rate and all-intra compression. Unlike normal AVC compression, this describes each frame from scratch rather than updating areas that have changes since the last frame. It should give less compression artifacts than the heavily compressed AVCHD output from the GH2, particularly for fast-moving scenes. QuickTime 1080/50p capture is at 50Mbit/s, and while it doesn’t use all-intra compression, it should still give better results than the GH2’s 24Mbit/s maximum bit rate. It supports several video recording formats:

• H.264 MOV: [Full HD] 1,920 x 1,080, 50p, 25p, 24p; [HD] 1,280 x 720, 50p
• AVCHD (MTS/M2TS): [Full HD] 1,920 x 1,080 50p/50i/24p
• MP4: [Full HD] 1080 25p; [HD] 720 25p; [VGA] 480 25p

The 1080/50p shooting mode brings Full HD 1920x1080p video with best possible quality, but it could be a problem if you’re working AVCHD footage in Avid Media Composer. Avid does not support the 50p footage. So far I am still not able to import the 1080/50p from my Panasonic DHC-TM900. But still the 50i AVCHD is very good to see on a 42 inch plasma screen.

Here’s a solution for importing 1080/50p to Avid with the help of 3rd-party app Pavtube Media Magician for Avid, a nice camcorder assistant manager and AVCHD editor. When serving as an intermediate decoder, the software can convert 1080/50p AVCHD .mts/.m2ts video into Avid DNxHD .mov format, which is naturally supported by Avid Media Composer.

How to get Panasonic GH3 1080/50p video into Avid DNxHD .mov format?

Step 1: Import AVCHD clips from Panasonic GH3 to Media Magician.

Connect your camera with your PC and launch Pavtube Media Magician for Windows (If you work on OS X, get Media Magician for Mac). The app will automatically detect your camera and ask “Camcorder is connected. Are you ready to launch wizard now?” Click “Yes” to confirm. Select the 1080/50p video files you’d like to import to AVID, and then press “Start” to import AVCHD to Media Magician library.

• Read More: How to batch manage AVCHD MTS/M2TS footage at One Time

Step 2: Organize and edit Panasonic GH3 1080/50p videos in timeline.

Drag and drop the AVCHD videos to timeline for editing from library. Here you can remove unwanted .mts/.m2ts clips, trim out unwanted frames from specific clip by frame-accurate, and put them into the right order for merging. Use the scissor icon to do frames trimming.

• Read More: How to edit movies on a timeline and frame selection control?

Step 3: Choose “Output” on the top of main interface to switch it to output interface.

In output interface you can set intermediate codec for editing software as well as common video format (AVI, MKV, MP4, MOV, MPG, etc) for compressing AVCHD.

Step 4: Choose Avid DNxHD codec as output format.

For importing Panasonic GH3 1080/50p video to AVID, follow the steps to set Avid DNxHD preset:

• Read More: Panasonic Column   |   MTS Column

1. Move your mouse to “Editor”, click on the tab.
2. Select “Avid Studio” group.
3. The default output format for AVID is “Avid DNxHD 720p(*.mov)”. To export 1080p full HD video, just select the “Avid DNxHD 1080p(*.mov)”from the drop-down list of “Format” bar. Set higher bitrate for better quality if necessary.

Step 5: Convert Panasonic GH3 1080/50p videos and export best format for AVID Studio

Press the plus sign (+) to add task for conversion. Select the task(s) and click on the triangle sign to start encoding Panasonic GH3 1080/50p videos to Avid DNxHD MOV.

After conversion you can refer to this post: How to Import Media contents to Avid Media Composer naturally without rendering/encoding.

Continue reading »]]> Sony HDR-CX520V Review

The good: Compact design; first-rate video quality and performance; geotagging videos is fun, if limited.

The bad: No SD card support; awkward control layout; no wind filter; no manual shutter speed, iris, or audio controls; expensive.

The bottom line: The geotagging capability remains mostly a novelty, but the top-notch video quality of the Sony Handycam HDR-CX500V and HDR-CX520V make them worthy options. Because internal memory is overpriced, the HDR-XR500V is the better deal of the two, though you may want to opt for a 2010 model that supports SD cards rather than Sony’s Memory Stick.

• Read More: CNET.com

How to Lossless Join, Cut, Edit Sony CX520V AVCHD MTS on Mac

“Urgent please! I am making a school video presentation but I recorded from a HD camera (Sony Handycam CX520V)…it captured in AVCHD format but I can’t play it on my Mac or convert it. Someone please help! It was such a good movie, and my school project is due in 8 hours!”

As a training consultant and media producer, I use lots of tools for multimedia processing. Adobe Premiere and Sony Vegas should be the top video editors for professionals, but for novice and people that want but cutting and encoding AVCHD contents, I would recommend the Pavtube Media Magician for Mac. It features basic video editing capacity and servers as a “nice camcorder assistant manager, lossless camcorder video joiner, MTS/ M2TS/ MXF/ MOV/ MKV/ TiVo/ WMV/ AVI/ MPG converter and editor, and efficient camcorder video uploader for YouTube”. Most important, it keeps perfect audio and video sync.

Here I demonstrate the simple steps for Sony CX520V AVCHD editing with Media Magician for Mac. Hope it helps video editing beginners get started with AVCHD clipping and editing for education presentation and home film. If you work on Windows, get Media Magician for your computer. The steps are almost the same.

Mac AVCHD Editing Guide: from Camera recordings to Presentation

• Read More: Top 5 iMovie Alternatives for Mac Novice and Movie lovers

Step 1. Connect your camcorder (say Sony Handycam CX520V) to Mac/PC with USB 2.0 cable, or use a card reader to connect Flash Memory card to computer. Download AVCHD videos from camcorder to computer with Media Magician. Run Pavtube Media Magician and the app will automatically detect your Sony Handycam CX520V AVHCD camcorder. Follow the wizard to import/back up AVCHD .m2ts video to Media Magician for Mac library.

Step 2. Edit videos in timeline. Drag and drop the AVCHD videos from library to timeline. Here you can remove unwanted .m2ts, trim AVHCD video by frame-accurate, put them into the right order for merging into one film and set special effects (3D effect included).

Step 3. Choose “Output” on the top of main interface to switch it to output interface. In output interface you can set common video format (AVI, WMV, MOV, etc) for using in presentation, authoring DVD, uploading to YouTube, and exporting to iPad, iPhone, Android tablets, etc. There are also intermediate codec for further editing in Adobe and Avid software, which I like.

Step 4. Choose a format for school presentation. For importing Sony Handycam footage to Keynote, follow the steps to use proper format:

1. Move your mouse to Common Format tab, click on it.
2. Select “AVI”, “MP4” or “MOV” format.
3. Set desired quality in av parameters. For instance, to export SD video, you can set Video “Size” to “640*480” and bitrate to “1000kbps”. For better quality, set “Size” to “1280*720” and “Bitrate”  “2000kbps” or above.

Tip: For people who feel like compressing Sony AVCHD video to iPad or Android device, choose “Device” tab and select respective preset for your device. There are hundreds of presets for different tablets, smartphones and various kinds of media players.

Step 5. Convert educational videos to AVI/WMV for slideshow. Press the plus sign (+) to add task for conversion. Select the task(s) and click on the triangle sign to start encoding Sony Handycam CX520V M2TS video to AVI/WMV common file type.

After conversion, you can transfer videos to FCP, AVID, Youtube etc…

• How to uploading AVCHD/MTS videos to YouTube
• How to import Media contents to FCP X/iMovie/FCE/AVID
• How to stream MKV/M2TS to WD TV Live Plus for playback

Continue reading »]]> There are 2 ways to import footage from the Sony XDCAM camcorder to Final Cut Pro. You can directly import XDCAM-HD files by attaching your camcorder (with the memory cards still in it) to the computer via USB cable or by removing the cards from the camcorder and placing them in the express card slot of a MacBook Pro. Both methods require Final Cut Studio and Sony XDCAM Transfer Software (a free download from Sony).

Method 1: Express Slot and USB Cable to Camcorder

Step 1: Connect Cables

After shooting, remove the SxS card from camcorder and place it in the express slot of laptop; or attach the camcorder (with the SxS card still inside) to the computer via the supplied USB cable and turn the camera power switch to the Media position.

Step 2: Import Sony XDCAM MXF to Final Cut Pro

In Final Cut Pro, initiate the import by using the pull-down menu- File/Import/Sony XDCAM. This opens the Sony XDCAM Transfer software interface.

Step 3. Arrange Your Clips

Select the clip to view from the thumbnail images in the top half of the interface. Play the clip in the viewing window at the bottom of the interface. You can also mark “ins” and “outs” if you just want to import part of the clip. Add comments and other information to the clip in the lower right area of the interface.

Step 4: Import All Your Clips

Click on the Import button to ingest the clip to Final Cut Pro. You can import all the clips on the card by selecting all the clips and them clicking on Import.

• Read More: How to connect/transfer/copy Sony XDCAM Media to Mac?

Method 2: Ingest Sony XDCAM MXF videos and encode the MXF clips to FCP Compatible Codec

This method should work with most Mac computer. If you run into a problem when importing Sony XDCAM, XDCAM HD and XDCAM EX media to FCP, here’s an alternative workaround: use Media Magician for Mac to ingest Sony XDCAM MXF videos and encode the XDCAM MXF clips to Apple ProRes 422 codec, which is naturally supported by Final Cut Pro 6, 7 and FCP X. The app can also be used to cut and merge MXF files, or convert MXF to QuickTime codec for playing on Mac, iPad, iPhone and other iOS devices.

Step 1: Connect your Sony XDCAM camera to Mac and import MXF from Sony XDCAM to Media Magician for Mac.

Connect your Sony XDCAM camera to Mac computer and launch Pavtube Media Magician for Mac. The app will automatically detect your camera and ask “Camcorder is connected. Are you ready to launch wizard now?” Click “Yes” to confirm. Select the MXF files you’d like to import to FCP, and then press “Start” to import MXF to Media Magician library.

Step 2: Organize and edit Sony XDCAM MXF videos in timeline.

Drag and drop the Sony XDCAM MXF clip to timeline for editing from library. Here you can remove unwanted .mxf clips, trim out unwanted frames from specific clip by frame-accurate, and put them into the right order for merging. Use the scissor icon to do frames trimming.

Step 3: Choose “Output” on the top of main interface to switch it to output interface.

Step 4: Choose Apple ProRes codec as output format.

Here you can set common video format like AVI, MKV, MP4, MOV, MPG, etc as well as intermediate codec for editing software. For importing Sony XDCAM MXF to Final Cut Pro, follow the steps to set Apple ProRes 422 preset:

• 1. Move your mouse to Editor, click on the tab.
• 2. Select “Final Cut Pro” group.
• 3. The default output format for FCP is Apple ProRes 422. To use other codec in the ProRes family, just select the desire codec (ProRes LT, Pro, HD, ProRes 4444) from the drop-down list of “Format” bar. Set bitrate and frame rate if necessary.

Step 5: Export Apple ProRes video for FCP 7/FCP X

Press the plus sign (+) to add task for conversion. Select the task(s) and click on the triangle sign to start encoding Sony XDCAM MXF to Apple ProRes 422 MOV.

Step 6: Import Apple ProRes 422 MOV to Final Cut Pro

In Final Cut Pro, follow pull-down menu- File/Import/Files… to import converted Sony XDcam footage to FCP without rendering on Mac.

PS. If you have any problem, pls contact with macsupport@pavtube.com to get more information. You also can leave a message on Pavtube Community or Pavtube Facebook, we will answer your questions as soon as possilble.