Making Fan Videos on an Old Computer
Do you assume that because you're on an old computer, that the art of making fan videos is beyond your reach? Not necessarily!
Most of the in-depth information you need for making fan videos can be found on our sister site, foolishpassion.org. There's no need to repeat all the same information here! To learn the essential nuts-and-bolts of making videos, you should be reading the tutorials on that site. This small page will serve as a supplement, focusing on the unique needs of those with an old computer (as well as those stuck on dial-up).
General Advice | Minimum Hardware Requirements | Recommended Software | Converting clips for editing | Optimizing Video Quality for Vidders on Dial-up
General Advice on Editing on an Old Computer
Don't be put off of fan video editing if your computer is older and slower! The main thing to remember is that everything will take longer. Be patient.
You may also find that some techniques and methods used by other vidders will be too torturously slow for you, so you may have to adapt. One HUGE recommendation for Mac users is to NOT NOT NOT try to rip your DVD using the free converter Handbrake (mentioned in some of the Mac tutorials on foolishpassion.org). It will take too long; trust me on this. Spring for the MPEG-2 Playback component ($20 US) and trim to just the scenes you need in MPEG Streamclip. (Link to related tutorial discussing MPEG Streamclip.) Also, old computer users probably won't want to convert their finished video to the H.264 codec (though H.264 is an excellent codec) because H.264 takes longer to encode. Stick with using XviD or DivX for making your finished, web-reading files if your hardware is slower.
Some example videos made on old hardware:
Edited on a 1 GHz Dell PC with Windows 2000 and 256 MB RAM, using Ulead VideoStudio 9: Guy of Gisborne video (5.8 MB, MPEG-1, right click to download).
Edited on a 533 MHz G4 PowerMac and Final Cut Express 1: "Fierce Creatures" (General RA video) (10.1 MB, MPEG-1, right-click to download.)
Minimum Hardware and Operating System Recommendations:
I know that fans were editing videos back in the early '90s, but I wasn't making videos then (I didn't have a computer for most of the '90s!) so I cannot help anyone who is still using circa '90s hardware and/or software. My apologies. To follow the fan video tutorials on FoolishPassion.org, my recommendations are:
Macintosh:
Any G3 Mac with Firewire. (Blue & White G3, iMac, etc) G4 or above recommended. Mac OS X. (Must be able to run vital software, like Mac the Ripper and MPEG Streamclip. Mac OS 10.2.8 may suffice.) 256 MB of RAM (512 or above recommended.) Must have DVD drive (either internal or external). At least 12-20 GB free disk space. This disk space can be internal or on an external drive connected to Firewire port or USB 2.0 port. Monitor should be able to display 1024x768 resolution.
Windows:
800 MHz processor and 256 MB RAM or above. (Enough to run Ulead VideoStudio 9 or Sony Vegas Movie Studio 6.) Windows 2000 or above. Must have DVD drive (either internal or external). At least 12-20 GB free disk space. (Like with Mac, can be internal disk space or external, connected to USB 2.0 or Firewire.) Monitor should be able to display 1024x768 resolution.
A note about free disk space: You should always allow 10% free disk space (even after all your video files and program files are on the computer). For instance, if you have a 40 GB internal drive, always leave 4 GB free. If you have an 80 GB drive, 8 GB should be free, and so forth and so on.
Minimum Software Recommendations:
Macintosh:
Final Cut Express 1.0 or higher, or iMovie 5 or 6 for editing video. You can find used copies of Final Cut Express at places like eBay or Amazon Marketplace. iMovie 5 is part of the iLife 05 Suite, also found on Amazon and eBay. You may already have a copy of iMovie that came bundled with your Mac.
Windows:
Sony Vegas Movie Studio 6 or higher, Ulead VideoStudio 9 or higher, or Adobe Premiere Elements 1 or higher. (Make sure your PC will run Premiere Elements. Version 1 requires an 800 MHz CPU, 256 MB RAM, 1.2 GB hard drive space, and Windows XP.) Sony Vegas is recommended as it is probably the most "old computer friendly."
Preparing your video clips for editing:
Follow the tutorial on this page for preparing video clips from your DVD. This tutorial will explain more about your DVD ripping software (Mac the Ripper for Macs, DVD Decrypter for Windows) and using a plug-in (MPEG-2 Playback Component) to get your video converter software (MPEG Streamclip) to open the ripped DVD digital files and convert them to something that your video editor can recognize.
Some vidders (fans who make fan videos) edit with file formats like XviD or DivX AVI, which don't take up a lot of disk space, but I'm not going to recommend that, as these compressed types of video often make your software (or your whole computer) crash. They may work for a while, and then one day they mysteriously stop working. (To read more about the evils of editing in DivX, XviD, WMV, MPEG, etc, consult this page.)
If you have only a little bit of disk space available, you're going to have to judiciously trim down the scenes that you need for editing. Scroll through your ripped DVD and just select the teensy bits that you want to use for your video, or else just the areas or scenes which you think you'll need. Don't convert over the whole program; one hour of footage converted to DV (a video format suitable for editing) takes up about 12 GB of disk space! With careful planning, you can trim down to just the bits you need, possibly only using up 4 GB of disk space.
Using a different codec to save disk space: The tutorial I link to above talks about converting everything to DV for editing. DV is a great, high quality codec, but it does make for large file sizes. If you are seriously hurting for space, try editing in MJPEG AVI for Windows (Mac users will have to stick with DV unless they have Final Cut Pro, and some Sony Vegas users may need to use MJPEG MOV instead of AVI). Change the quality setting to approximately 50-60% (40% can be acceptable as well, but do tests first) and your file size will be much smaller. But do tests first, and be sure to get your aspect ratio correct. (Select the frame size in MPEG Streamclip for 16:9 or 4:3, depending on your source video's aspect ratio. Read this tutorial for more info on aspect ratio.)
Explanation of disk space usage:
As stated under hardware requirements, 12-20 GB of free disk space was recommended. (More is always better, of course.) The need for so much space is explained thus: You will need approximately 7 GB for your DVD rip (extracting an exact copy of the DVD's contents onto your hard drive). Then you will need the remaining space for any software you need to install, plus your converted video files.
If you find that you just can't squeeze the footage you need to use into the available disk space on your computer, seriously consider using an external drive. You will need a Firewire port (most Macs have this built-in) or a USB 2.0 port (good for both Mac and Windows). External hard drives are getting more and more affordable. Many video professionals store their video files on external drives, so this is a pretty standard method of video editing.
Preparing Good Quality Video Files For Dial-up.
If you are a vidder who is still stuck on dial-up, you may feel at a disadvantage in an age where many vidders are making 50-100 MB high quality files available for download, and now YouTube is offering an HD quality option.
It would probably take too long to try to upload an HD-quality video file to YouTube or elsewhere, to share with fellow fans. But that doesn't mean that you are stuck with only showing low-res, blocky and blurry videos. Here are a few tips to maximize the quality in your finished video files.
Edit with only high quality clips. This means rip from a DVD (don't download clips online) and edit in DV or MJPEG at a higher quality setting. Try to keep as much of the original DVD's detail as possible.
Export using high quality settings. Exporting as DV (or "Full Quality" in iMovie). If you have the disk space, export as uncompressed (a finished video exported this way may take up several GB of disk space). Then open this DV (or uncompressed) file in another converter like MPEG Streamclip or Avidemux.
Use specialized software for optimizing your finished video for the web. Your video editing software (whether it be Final Cut Express or Sony Vegas Movie Studio or whatever) can make nice-looking web-ready files, but for more control over quality, consider using converter software like MPEG Streamclip, DivX, or Avidemux. These other video converters have extra options which may squeeze out a little more quality from your video. An H.264 MP4 file with a Data Rate (bitrate) of perhaps 500-700 will look pretty nice, but will be small enough in file size to upload to places like YouTube if you're still stuck on dial-up. The DivX encoder has built-in filters to smooth out noise, which makes for a prettier dial-up file. Avidemux offers many additional filters for optimizing quality. Both DivX and MPEG Streamclip will give you an estimate of how large your finished file will be, which can be useful when every extra MB counts.
Many of the tutorials on the FoolishPassion fan video forums will have more "recipes" for optimizing quality in your fan video files.
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