footage fine but downloads dark ?????

[misti]

Hi Guys and Girlies, got one big problem which no one can solve for me so I brought it to you guys.

Okay here goes. I got a Sony HC35e I recorded a live gig which views fine on the LCD screen but when I download it via my firewire to imovie the recording is very dark. This has happened on two occasions the last time I blamed the roadie for being a little brams. I have the setting set to easy handycam and it looks fine on the screen so why is imovie bringing it in so dark. Other daytime footage shot via the same setting is fine in imovie.

Can anyone help me Pleasssssssssssse
i'm going crazy with this

[Frobozz]

Does the Sony have a IRE or black level adjustment? That may be the what you need to change.

[misti]

No it does not seem to have one as its quite a basic camcorder. If it views fine on the screen then surely could it be imovie thats at fault.

[rumplestiltskin]

Check your Display Prefs; it may be that you have your screen set to a darker-than-normal setting.

[misti]

Hi again, I have just put the camcorder directly to the T.V to rule out imovie and its blacker still. It's really strange because I have just viewed the whole thing on the lcd and it looks alot brighter.

I did shot this via easy cam on a tripod in low light at the time but I cannot seem to find the problem now as the cam looks fine.

[oldandinthe way]

My experience with SONY still digital cameras is that they consistantly underexpose. Images which appear fine on the LCD screens, look dark when viewed anywhere else.

We have had images from own own ancient Mavica and a variety of customers newer cameras with similar results.

Could this be true of their movie cameras too?

[misti]

Thanks for the input,
Where do you suggest I go from here?
How do I lighten up the image to compensate for the problem? Its footage I really need otherwise I would start again. but its nice to know i'm not alone.!

Thank you

[rumplestiltskin]

Two ways come to mind:

1. Within iMovie, there may be a "lighten" FX you may apply to the clips. (I'm going from memory here because my iMovie app is busy right now doing some exporting so I can't interrupt it.) I do know there are 3rd-party effects that will do this, as well. Here's a free one: http://www.imovieplugins.com/fxhome.html

2. With the iMovie project saved (assuming you haven't used #1, above), control-click on the project and "Show Package Contents". Open the folder named (IIRC) "iDVD" and you'll find the reference movie. Do not MOVE it anywhere. Drop it onto MPEG Streamclip, export to DV, and use the "Adjustments" dialog to brighten things up a bit. You might also increase saturation a bit to compensate for the blacks becoming grey.

Let us know how it goes.

[thecoalman]

edit, nevermind, didn't read the part about you hooking it to a TV...

But since I'm here I'll offer some davice... Having a lot of experience shooting in the same situation myself you need a cam with low light capability, there's really no substitute. A consumer cam like that is either going to produce very dark video or very grainy video in low light situations.

[misti]

Hi again Misti here, Guys I must thank you so much for all your help ! Rumplestiltskin I have downloaded a little plug in from your freebee site, called the cfx darken brighten. I will try it in the morning as overhere in England its late and I been on this all day. But hey thanks so much. I'm gonna follow your tutorial step by step and lets keep our fingers crossed all goes to plan.
Bye for now Misti.

[misti]

Hey guys, Thanks for all your help !! This is what I found all the filters in imovie 4 didn't render above 9sec, so I had to split them into parts and render small amounts at a time. The Freebee plugins really worked well thanks for that. But here's another problem, I then exported to idvd all looked fine and worked okay until I tried to play it on the dvd player via the t.v, all it keeps doing is jumping and stopping. I then tried to export via imovie to save as full dv.movie and drop onto toast, again its jumping. What am I doing wrong? I really cannot seem to understand why any idvd that I burn jumps? Any idea?

[rumplestiltskin]

What kind of media are you using? "+" or "-"?

[misti]

DVD - R

[rumplestiltskin]

Have you ever been able to burn from iDVD or Toast and have the disc play on your player?

[misti]

idvd yes but its a bit hit and miss not long films, Toast I use all the time for burning cds and file storage but this time it didn't like the imove file. The file is only three songs long and is 22.3mb long.
Tried using imovie again last night burn't direct from idvd at 2.00pm in the afternoon but 11.00pm at night it was still going so had to cancel it. Again its getting stuck and jumping. It does not seem to want to encode. Thanks for your help !!

[rumplestiltskin]

"three songs long"..."22.3MB"? (Do you really mean MB or GB?)

Is any of the audio mp3 or other compressed format? If so, use iTunes to convert the audio to AIFF first, then use the AIFF songs in your iMovie.

What versions of iMovie and iDVD are you using?

Have you tried the burned DVDs in someone else's DVD player (besides your own set-top box)?

[misti]

Not tried to burn via anyone else's only the G4's own burner, via toast 7.0 and imovie 4.
I also opened toast and save a disk image to burn later seeing if this would do the trick but no luck. I just tried it and its jumping again on the player via the t.v. Oh yes sorry I did mean 22.3GB and not MB.

[rumplestiltskin]

Have you tried playing the DVD in another DVD player (not another Mac)? Do that before assuming your Mac is bad. Maybe your DVD player is bad.

[misti]

I am about to I go and get another dvd player. Like you suggested it seems strange that all disks burnt on the Mac seem not to work. I have however found something that does help when burning from idvd I have to delete the Encoded Assets and resave the project . Then burn the disk via idvd. I have managed to do three disks out of five so I'm halfway there. Again trying them on the dvd player connected to the T.V.

Conclusion I must go and get another dvd player to rule out the mac as you suggested. Thank you sooooooooo much for your help over this week I would have pulling my hair out without your assistance. Thank You !
Best Regards Misti