Photo Storage and Video Editing
Analog vs Digital
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Clocks are a good way to understand the differences between analog and digital information.
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Data in modern devices is stored in digital form, as a collection of 1’s & 0’s.
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Analog data degrades over “generations” of copies.
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Digital data is less susceptible to degradation due to copies.
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An exception to this is when the data is stored in a “lossy” compressed format.
Lossy compression
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Some common, lossy compression formats:
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mpeg, mpeg2, mp3, mp4 – Audio and video
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jpg and gif – Images
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Most modern, digital cameras use jpg by default.
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Rule of thumb: When editing jpeg photos, avoid multiple editing sessions on the same photo file.
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Instead, go back to the original photo, if you can.\
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Taking digital photos
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This is not the topic of today’s session.
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I suggest you visit the website Glade Presnal shared with us (http://www.jasonrichclasses.com) and view these two presentations:
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“Take & Share Awesome Photos Using Your iPhone or iPad”
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“Showcase and Share Your Vacation Photos”
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Converting analog photos to digital
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A flatbed scanner is the best way to digitize your photos.
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Many “consumer-grade” scanners available today will be good enough for most needs. Most of these will scan at pixel densities of 300 – 2400 dpi (dots-per-inch)
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For higher-resolution needs there also are photo scanners, which have a much higher dpi capability. For example, the Epson Perfection V550 Photo Scanner ($170 on Amazon.com) is a highly-rated product that can scan at 6400 dpi
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Rules of thumb for scanning:
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The higher the dpi, the more space the storage the photo will take. (But storage is cheap and getting cheaper by the day.)
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It is better to scan at a higher dpi and then scale the photo down to a smaller size for printing than to scan at a lower dpi and then scale the photo up.
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When uploading photos for printing, your printing company may have suggestions on resolutions for particular print sizes.
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Printing your photos
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Rule of thumb: Upload your photos and have them printed on photo paper (for example, with Wal-Mart) rather than printing them on your home printer.
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If you use plain paper on your home printer, the quality of the paper and image will be lower than a commercial print.
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Whether you use plain paper or photo paper at home, the cost of paper + ink will be (significantly) higher than for a commercial print.
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Check with your photo printing company to learn the suggested resolutions for particular sizes of prints.
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For example, Wal-Mart suggests these minimum image resolutions:
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4 x 6: 540 x 360 pixels
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5 x 7: 546 x 390 pixels
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8 x 10: 960 x 780 pixels
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Multi-Scan
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Multi-scan is the term used to describe scanning multiple photos at one time.
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Many of today’s scanners come with this capability built into the included software.
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Multiple photos (perhaps of differing sizes) can be scanned in one take.
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One photo file will be created for each photo, cropped to its edges.
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There are a number of commercial products can split photos out of a scanned image, if your scanner software cannot do so.
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Gimp (free) also has a plug-in available for splitting photos from a scan.
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Digitizing slides
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Most photo scanners digitize not just photos, but also negatives and slides.
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Digital photos can be created from negatives.
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There are trays included with or available for photo scanners that align slides and allow you to scan several at a time.
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For folks with hundreds or thousands of slides, there are scanners with manual or automatic slide feeders built in.
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Many of these are dedicated devices, only usable for slides.
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Google “35mm slide scanner”.
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Rule of thumb: After scanning the slides, examine them to see if you need to rescan after cleaning the slide.
Storage needs for digital photos
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Most cameras today store there images on removable, SD or micro-SD memory cards.
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Older devices or some smartphones may not have removable memory.
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Whether the device has removable memory or not, you almost certainly can connect the camera to your computer via USB or wireless.
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Most cameras today store there images on removable, SD or micro-SD memory cards.
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Older devices or some smartphones may not have removable memory.
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Whether the device has removable memory or not, you almost certainly can connect the camera to your computer via USB or wireless.
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Current capacities for Micro-SD card include:
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8GB (about $6),
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16GB (about $8)
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32 GB (about $15)
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64 GB (about $25)
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28GB (about $50)
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256GB (about $100)
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Your camera may not work with the larger sizes; check your user’s manual for limitations.
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A typical 10-megapixel (about 10,000,000 dots) photo stored in jpg format ranges from 10MB to 18MB in size.
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So, about how many 10-megapixel photos will fit on a micro-SD card (worst case)?
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8GB – 455
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16GB – 910
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32 GB – 1,820
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64 GB – 3,640
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128GB – 7,280
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256GB – 14,560
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Safely storing your photos
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If you DropBox, you can install its app on your Apple, Android, or Windows phone or tablet, and then enable the Camera Upload feature.
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This feature automatically uploads photos from your device to your DropBox account immediately after the photos are taken.
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The photos are stored (by default) in a DropBox folder named Camera Uploads.
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Use caution with the Camera Uploads feature!
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If your device is connected to DropBox via your carrier’s cellular network, you may exceed your monthly data plan.
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Thus, you may want to synch your photos manually, once you have access to a wireless network.
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If you upload your photos to your computer, there are many options for safely storing them.
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Keep them on your hard drive or SSD. (Not safe!)
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Burn to CDR/DVDR/BDR.
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Store on a flash (thumb) drive – 64GB for about $30.
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Store on an external drive – 2TB Western Digital drive for about $90 – about 116,500 10-megapixel images.
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Store them in the Cloud.
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Whichever you choose, you should keep an “off-premises” copy.
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Arguably, the safest storage solution for your digital photos is “the Cloud”.
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A backup service, such as Carbonite or Mozy – monthly fees.
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Free backup services, such as iCloud, Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, Flickr, Picasa, etc. – data mining may occur, plus they may share your information with 3rd party advertisers. Read the fine print if concerned.
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Video editing – Why?
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Perhaps you have a video camera or a smartphone capable of capturing video.
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Today’s smartphones can take very good video.
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Most are capable of capturing at 720p or 1080p.
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More and more are capable of capturing 4K video (4 times the resolution of 1080p HD video).
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Even if you are an expert cinematographer, you will need to edit your raw video if you want it to look its best.
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What type of editing might you do on your video?
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Add title and trailing text.
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Create smooth transitions between scenes.
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Rearrange or edit out scenes.
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Add voiceovers, soundtracks, or sound effects.
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Add pointers or text overlays for emphasis or clarification.
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Video editing products
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In addition to the expensive, commercial products, there are a number of video editors that you can use for free.
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In general, there will be a tradeoff between complexity of use and availability of features.
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Larger feature set → more complex to use
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Easier to use → fewer features
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The product that we will look at today is less complex, but still has a good selection of features.
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It’s name is HitFilm 4 Express.
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It is available for both Windows and MacOS computers.
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We will use the free version today.
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There is a professional version, which has more features.
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You can download it from the site https://hitfilm.com/express
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Video editing products
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There are a number of other good video editing packages available for free.
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You can learn more about them at the URL http://www.techradar.com/news/software/applications/the-best-freevideo-editor-1330136
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VideoPad Video Editor
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Demo time!