When I bought a Flip camera in 2008, I also grabbed video editing software. Before buying the software, I researched for a good editor that wasn’t fancy or power-packed. Just enough to get the job done without spending much time with the user manual. With new software, I can usually dig right in. However, past experience with editing software involved more reading time than editing time. After talking to a few folks and reading reviews, I went with Sony Vegas Movie Studio Platinum Version 8.

I installed Vegas and never used it. Eventually, I uninstalled it because it took up unneeded resources and space. I decided to do a little winter cleaning by identifying the largest files on the computer. Three HD videos made the list, so that prompted me reinstall the editing software.

It can’t open the .m2ts files. This 2008 software has “HD” on the box, but it couldn’t open these files. I went to the website to see if the company had a patch or upgrade so it could open these files. It turned out they no longer support that version of the software. How hard would it be to create a plug-in to import these HD files? A search of user forums yielded nothing. I guess not too many people are using version 8 or they have cameras that don’t produce .m2st files.

Having learned my lesson that I don’t make time for editing videos, I looked around for freeware and cheap converter to convert these HD files into one Vegas 8 could handle. Unfortunately, no freeware app can handle these big files. Actually, there was one and it failed. Besides, I wasn’t comfortable using it because there had been concerns about the app having malware. (While working on this, I came across 10 Free Apps for Working with Video, but none could solve this problem.)

The trial version of Sony Vegas 11 converted the three big videos into one. Windows Media Player (Scroll way down to MPEG-4 section for why) couldn’t play it. Two other players could. Whew. I’m out of the video editing business. Back to using the old digital camera for videos.

I understand software companies have to draw the line in how long they support older versions of software. Is it fair to stop supporting a three-year-old app? Maybe Sony would’ve had a fan in me if they had a solution other than upgrade to 11.

What’s your take on software and support?

And now for your weekly links …

Brain food …

• How to Read Virtual Body Language in Email. Some people still don’t know how to write emails and rub people the wrong way. Here are 10 virtual body language cues.
• 20 Ways to Live a More Simple Life. Always try to keep kids’ activities to a minimum and possessions few. For more ideas … 100 Ways to Live a Better Life.
• 5 Unusual questions that freelancers MUST ask their clients. A keeper. When I meet potential new clients, I always ask how they found me. These questions are for after you’ve landed the client.
• 10 Best Ways To Show Gratitude For Others. Gratitude … it’s not just for Thanksgiving.
• 30 Top Facebook Apps for Business. Save yourself time … try this list first.

For fun …

• Daily Infographic. Infographics are cool and provide neat insight. But really … most of them are not true infographics because they have a lot of content. Effective infographics let the pictures do the talking.
• 12 Cutest Finger Drawings. They do look like they have personalities.
• 10 websites that changed the world. Surprised I’m not familiar with most of them.
• 12 hilarious closed signs. Warning: PG-ish sign or two.

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2011 Meryl Evans

Game Music 4 All releases its first free internet compilation. It is called Here Comes a New Challenger. It is a compilation of chiptune, nerdcore, and VG musicians collaborating together as a tribute to video games. Get more info and download the album for free.

Here are the details about the meryl’s notes blog’s 8th birthday celebration. Yes, that ugly logo up on the blog’s home page is the blog’s original logo.

You’ll get the following amount of entries based on the following guidelines:

• 25 entries: Be a guest blogger.
• 25 entries: Create a video mentioning meryl.net and post it on Youtube (send us the URL. Add 5 more if we can see the meryl.net mention for those of us who can’t hear.
• 10 entries: Contribute a prize.
• 10 entries: Twitter a post and become a follower of my Twitter at http://twitter.com/merylkevans
• 10 entries: Make a blog post about the birthday celebration, the prizes, and link to this page
• 10 entries: Subscribe and activate to our RSS feed by email.
  • Subscribe to both meryl’s notes blog and games
  • Subscribe only to meryl’s notes blog
  • Subscribe only to games
  • Subscribe to Bionic Ear Blog
  • Subscribe to meryl’s notes, the newsletter (not the same thing as the above)
• 10 entries: Link to any meryl.net blog entry.
• 5 entries: Twitter about meryl’s notes and link to this page (Need to comment a link to your twitter so we can verify it)

Sound good? Go!

We’d appreciate it if you track your entries — this way we ensure we don’t miss any. Email them to merylk [at] gmail dot com with subject “Happy 8th Birthday.” Deadline will be on the date of the last guest blogger entry (sometime after June 1). Keep checking here for the deadline.

We’ll use Random.org to draw the entries.

I rarely check out videos because chances are high that it won’t have captions or subtitles. But I bit on this Lenovo-produced video comparing its ThinkPad X300 to the MacBook Air [link: Dave Winer]. It presents a powerful visual message without using words.

But not one to let commercials sway me without research, I wondered how many attachments MacBook Air owners realllllly use. Lenovo smartly added attachments of products it has in its ultraportable Thinkpad X300 to the Mac Air to make people think thinner isn’t always better — you sacrifice some things.

Just looking at the two computers, the Mac Air still wows with its thinness. I found a twitterfriend who owns a Mac Air FabGal — check out our twitversation:

FabGal: Sorry, but mah MacBook Air could kick that ThinkPad’s ass. And also? It’s shiny! And silver! And my preshus. (drool)

Me: Mac Air does still look wowie wow wow. What do you add on to it regularly?

FabGal: I haven’t added anything to it so far. Everything transfered from iBook wirelessly. Am thinking of a superdrive, though.

So there you have it. One owner who doesn’t even have anything on her Mac Air. So seriously, how many Mac Air owners buy attachments and use them regularly? One attachment might not be so bad.

Nonetheless, the message comes through powerfully and will likely sway Windows users not to make the switch to a Mac … not just yet.

I finally got around to trying out my digital camcorder that I lucked out and found a great deal on it. I recorded my daughter’s team’s volleyball game last night and experimented. First, I would start/stop between plays to keep it short, but it has a slight delay when starting and stopping, so I stopped that.

In volleyball, the referee stands atop the net on a small platform. That platform gets in the way when watching the game. You miss out when players move into specific spots. I tried filming while directly behind the ref, standing on the gym floor where I could see the whole game in front of me, and sitting on the side where our players played.

The camcorder came with CyberLink PowerDirector Express and CyberLink PowerProducer. I started with Express hoping it would be a quick job — pull the videos together and burn to a CD. Instead it was time-consuming and frustrating. In Director, I added the title and text at the start of each game. Unfortunately, the text appeared over the video rather than on a blank screen. It didn’t have any features to add text that didn’t overlap the video.

OK, fine. Not a big deal. Moving on. I put the videos together in order and produced an MPG file. When I was ready to publish it, PowerProducer opened. There, I could create chapters and a menu like you see on videos. Once done, I burned it as a VCD. It created four folders and nothing that was obvious for clicking on to watch the video. I could play it, but an average user wouldn’t know what to do when confronted with folders with no executable.

The VCD didn’t work on our DVD players. Paul said he has created VCDs before and they worked on DVD players. But that wasn’t important it would be viewed on the computer rather than a DVD player. So I tried making a VCD using Nero instead. Same result. Another wasted CD. In the end, we burned the MPG to the CD using the regular burning option. The MPG landed on the CD and it plays fine on a PC.

I’m no media expert as I’ve never had a need to edit videos and burn them till now. There has to be an easier way to produce the CD and have it load the menu or run the movie as soon as the CD is inserted into the PC. I’d like to figure out a simple process for creating DVDs for DVD players and for computers that may not have a DVD drive. Anyone? Anyone?