Utility Offers Import of AVCHD on G5's, G4's

I read about a nifty looking utility in a Final Cut Express review at macworld.com. Voltaic is the missing link for PowerPC users who want to cut AVCHD footage.

The need for this utility arises from Apple's refusal to support AVCHD on PowerPC Macs--only newer Intel Mac's can convert AVCHD footage to something that you can edit. This applies to both iMovie '08, Final Cut Express, and Final Cut Pro. Voltaic lets PowerPC users convert their AVCHD footage to AIC (Apple Intermediate Codec.) AIC is supposed to be similar to ProRes 422 with the main difference being that AIC is 8-bit and ProRes 422 is 10-bit. Also, Voltaic offers a workflow for cutting AVCHD footage recorded onto DVD's, which Apple isn't supporting now.

So what's AVCHD? If you don't know, you can check out these older posts:
AVCHD Support in FCP
AVC: More Format Wackiness
AVCHD Is a Pro Format

While we're on the topic of AVCHD, Canon has announced a couple of new camcorders, which record in AVCHD using flash memory, as well as a replacement for the popular HV20. Here's the news on that:
"Canon Debuts First High Definition Solid State Camcorders: HF10 and HF100"
"Move Over HV20, Here Comes the Canon HV30"
These flash memory camcorders are really small, and I have hopes that Canon's new camcorders will produced some good looking high-def video. I got to play around with Sony's AVCHD flash memory camcorder the HDR-CX7 recently--could be a decent B-Cam and its size makes it inconspicuous and good for travel.

Camcorderinfo.com's annual list of the best consumer cameras CamInfo Selects 2007 saw Canon take home the top honors. The HV20 was the best camcorder, and the HG10, which records AVCHD to a hard drive, was also honored. Apparently Canon's cameras do a better job of encoding video into AVCHD than either Sony's or Panasonic's camera. This isn't good news for Panasonic because unlike Sony and Canon, Panasonic is trying to use AVCHD in cameras marketed to Pros.

iMovie 6 for Free

Apple released iMovie '08 (skipping '07 all together) as part of the new iLife '08 suite. Apple has really changed the application--some say for better, others for worse. I like that it provides a way to catalog video like you can catalog photos in iPhoto. I have a new niece, and my Mom is going bonkers recording movies on her flash-memory camera/camcorder. This new iMovie will be great for sorting through all those movies easily.

They have also simplified the edtiting process. After watching demos, it does look like it is a really fast way to put something simple together. I taught my Mom iMovie, and it was maddening for me to figure out how to cut in older versions of iMovie. But some features have been taken out it seems in transitioning to the simpler editing approach.

Apparently to compensate for high system requirements for iMovie '08, Apple is giving away iMovie 6 (the previous version) for free here. You're supposed to have iLife '08 to install it, but there are workarounds. xlr8yourmac.com has details on the workarounds (sorry, I don't have a direct link to the workarounds info on the site.)