Wonders with Video

There was a time when a video editing solution would cost the earth. No wonder that it was used only in studios, by those who could shell out moolah by the hour. But that’s now passé, for affordable desktop video-editing solutions are here. Today, you can get a video capturing and editing solution for as low as Rs 4,500. You may not get professional quality video, but it’s good enough for what we’ve in mind. 

Accompanying these video capture solutions are bundles of software that let you add special effects to your recordings. This software is so easy to use that anyone can add professional-looking special effects to their videos within minutes. Some even have wizards to guide you through common tasks. You can edit unwanted parts from a video, take snapshots, play around with frames, and do lots more. 

If you’re a corporate, you can use it to add punch to your presentations. Meetings, seminars, and the like can be recorded on videotape or a digital-video camera and later converted to digital format using one of these cards. You can then post it on the company intranet for the benefit of those who were unable to attend. All they’d have to do is fire up a Web browser and get a taste of what actually happened during the session. These are only some of the possibilities.

That’s not all. There’s a lot more you can do with video-editing solutions. You can use them for adding surveillance mechanisms in offices, shops, railway stations, museums, etc. They can function like advanced

CCTVs. Hook a card inside your PC, connect a video camera or a Webcam (which doesn’t cost much) and position it to the surveillance point, install the software, and you’re ready to roll. Most of the software available with these let you perform advanced functions like, beginning recording when it sees some motion, or sound an alarm, etc. 

Then of course, there’s the home. You can use it to store videos of functions, trips, and picnics. You can take snapshots from these videos to send to friends and relatives. 

One of the greatest benefits you get from these solutions is ease of use. You don’t have to be a professional cameraman or a graphics artist to create digital video with punch. With a basic knowledge of computers, and a little bit of creativity and patience, you can work wonders. The other benefit is better quality, especially over time. Videotapes eventually degrade in quality over prolonged and repeated playback. That’s because a videotape is made of magnetic material. But when video is stored in digital format, quality doesn’t suffer, no matter how many times you play it. And finally, adding special effects also becomes easier. 

So, the digital revolution is in full swing. And a PC is not just a place for doing mundane tasks like spreadsheets and databases. It’s a lot more, and a video-editing table is just one of its avatars.