Capturing HD from HDR-HC1E using Adobe Premier Pro CS4

[Beam]

G'day guys,

I am not having much luck capturing HD from my HDR-HC1E using Adobe Premier Pro CS4 (huge understatement). So I contacted Adobe for some Tech 'Support'... and ended up talking to people who not only could I not understand their version of 'English', but they were almost as incapable of understanding me; hey we've all been there!

After several attempts I finally after a month received this 3 rd answer:-

"Thank you for contacting Adobe Technical Support. In reference with the issue of Premiere Pro.

We did some research and found out that the issue that you face with capture is a known issue and is common on a mac computer.

If you have a windows computer then please try to capture on windows and use a third party softwae (their spelling not mine) that is HDV Split."

Now I'll point out a couple of things, firstly I bought a Adobe Master-suite CS4 for my Mac OS X... so I somehow doubt it will run on a PC even if I had one. Not only that, did Adobe not test the Mac version with the Sony HD cameras that were available at that time?

I bought my MacBook Pro (Unibody 2.93 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 8 gigs RAM and a 320 gig 7,200 drive) believing that Adobe and Mac had a long relationship and worked well with each other; I'd after 12 years of PC thought Mac would do it better.

The Sony HDR-HC1E camera I own predated the Adobe Master-suite CS4 I bought... so I reasonably figured there would be no problems there.

So who's fault is it, Sony, Apple or Adobe; I believe it's Adobe's, and more importantly, can anybody out there please help... is there a driver or something that will fix this problem?

Regards

Beam... from the beam me up Scotty, no signs of intelligence (there)

[edDV]

First test capture over Firewire to iMovie to establish the camcorder and Mac hardware are functional.

Capture to Apple Intermediate Codec (AIC) and see if that will import into Premiere CS4. I don't have CS4 on a Mac so I can't test it for you.

Another intermediate codec to try is Apple's ProRes 422.

If no one responds here, try this forum.
http://forums.creativecow.net/adobepremierepro


PS: Yes any Windows XP up machine with a Firewire port will capture to an MPeg2 m2t file using HDVsplit. You can import that file into CS4.

[Beam]

G'day edDV,

Thanks for your response, sorry I did not get back to you sooner, I've just had a killer flu.

Regarding your suggestion regarding Apple's ProRes 422 codec, apparently it's already installed?

I sent an email to Adobe's Sydney office complaining about being sent to a call center OS and trying to communicate with their Technical personnel whom not it seems understand my English nor I his version of English, I asked Adobe if these OS Call Centers are so good... why was it that Adobe did not run their sales through these OS Centers.

This was the broken 'English Tech Support' reply I got from Adobe, a reply incidentally that seemed unable to understand my detailed correspondence regarding my set up.:-

"Hi Arthur,

Hope you are doing fine. I am the Senior Technical consultant for Digital Video. I tried calling you on the number: xxxxxxxx, however I was not able to reach you, so I left a VM.

I checked the issue that you are facing with Sony cam with Premiere Pro CS4 and you are unable to with that. I have checked all the details regarding this. I have checked the camera details. This particular camera has not been tested with Premiere Pro CS4. So this is quite possible that this camera is not compatible with Premiere Pro CS4. I understand that this is working fine with iMovie, however Premiere Pro works on different set of resources.

However, as the camera is being detected by Premiere Pro, we can try the following steps to try make sure that it works with Premiere Pro.
1. Make sure you are using simple Firewire capture mode and not the iLink CONV mode. iLink is known to cause issues with capture with various professional editing software. Make sure that the iLink is turned OFF from camera.
2. Try setting the Device Control to None and then set the camera to VCR mode and then press Play to check if it captures then.
3. Reset the complete Premiere Pro Preferences to make sure that the Premiere Pro is not causing and errors. You can do this by:
<UserName>/Library/Preferences/Adobe/Premiere pro. Delete the the Premiere pro Folder.
Go to Location <UserName>/Library/Preferences. Delete all the .plist with the name “Premiere pro”
Go to Location <UserName>/Library/PreferencesPanes. Check for any Premiere pro files and delete them. In case there are none, skip the step.
Go to location <UserName>/Library/Caches. Delete all cache related to Premiere pro and Adobe.
Go to main Mac drive where you have installed Adobe Premiere pro. There go to the location: Library/Preferences/. Delete all the .plist with the name “Premiere pro” and in case Adobe Folder is also there, go to Adobe folder and delete the Premiere pro folder.
Go to location on main Mac drive: Library/PreferencePane/ Look for Premiere pro .plist files and delete them.
Go to location on main Mac drive: Library/Caches and delete all files related to Adobe Premiere pro. It will have Premiere pro mentioned in name.
If these steps also do not help, this means this camera is not compatible with Premier Pro CS4. In that case you will have to use iMovie or 3rd part application http://www.epiphan.com/solutions_new/other/recording-vga-or-dvi-signal-using-hacktvcarbon/ to capture the video from camera and then import it in Premiere Pro CS4. I understand this can cause lot of inconvenience, however as Premiere Pro CS4 design is more centered towards professional video editing rather than capturing only most commonly used and professional recommended cameras have been added to the list.
I really apologize for all the inconvenience.
Please feel free to contact me any time for queries as I am the Lead for Digital Video. I will try to give you a call back again.
Thanks"

The thing is, in the drop down list on Adobe CS4's Premier Pro Device Manager there is not (as far as I, nor the person from Sony whom I talked to) single Sony HDV camera... Adobe promoted the fact that it can edit and even write to Blu-ray, but it can not it seems capture footage from the world's biggest Camcorder producer!?


Hi I'm back.

I have put a considerable investment both in time and money into my Adobe Master Collection, and all I get from Adobe is a 'sorry we don't support'... I am speechless and very disappointed with Adobe's attitude to it's customers... and they have not heard the last from me.


If anybody can help me please do.


Regards

Beam

[Beam]

G'day again,

I thought I'd post Adobe's CS4 device control list of Sony Camcorders... the best I can do regarding figuring out which is HDV capable is probably the last few (but there's certainly no HDR-HC1E which was one of Sony's first HDV Camcorders), the rest seem to be either 8mm, Hi8 or earlier Digital models.

DCR-PC1
DCR-PC100
DCR-PC101
DCR-PC100
DCR-PC120BT
DCR-PC5
DCR-PC9
DCR-TRV10
DCR-TRV103
DCR-TRV11
DCR-TRV130
DCR-TRV17L
DCR-TRV18
DCR-TRV240
DCR-TRV25
DCR-TRV27
DCR-TRV30
DCR-TRV310
DCR-TRV330
DCR-TRV50
DCR-TRV530
DCR-TRV6
DCR-TRV70K
DCR-TRV720
DCR-TRV8
DCR-TRV9
DCR-TRV900
DCR-TRV950
DCR-VX1000
DCR-VX2000
DSR-PD100
DSR-PD150
DSR-PDX10

It's a rather strange list for the supposed Adobe's CS4 Premier Pro HDV editing software... or am I wrong, am I being a little tough on Adobe?


Regards

Beam

[edDV]

Those are all DV format camcorders.

HDV models have HDR prefix in the model number.

The issue is few people here will have Premiere CS4 on a Mac. I suggest you visit Premiere specific forums such as
http://forums.creativecow.net/adobepremierepro

or Adobe's support forums.