Thanks Marcus !!

Will try and revive this thread here...

I recently purchased a Canon M40.
http://usa.canon.com/cusa/consumer/p...s/vixia_hf_m40

And have been shooting in .mts AVCHD, and am working to determine the best workflow & software packages for me.

Desired Functions;

• Combine Files
• Compress for Smugmug
• Trim Files
• Prepare for BluRay burning (don't know if this is necessary)
• Burn BluRay

My camera splits segments into 2GB files, which at highest resolution is ~11 minutes. I need a way to combine files back into a single video. A tool which came with the camera, Pixela VideoBrowser will do this for me, but I don't care much for the software. Toolset is very limited, and you have very little control over formats.


I combined a video, and it is now 15:18 long, but is a hair over 2.5GB due to the 24mbps bitrate. I'd like to upload this video to smugmug. My internet connection isn't really fast enough to support this kind of uploading as I'd like it, and then it takes a while for smugmug to compress. I'm perfectly happy to compress to 8mbps myself, but many softwares will not open the Canon .mts format.


The .mts format really seems to be an impediment here. I tried using MediaCoder to change to an mp4 package and use Lightworks, but only some of my files converted such that lightworks would open them.


Any advice on a tool (or tools) that will handle (or convert) files to do this couple simple things?

Originally Posted by iambill Will try and revive this thread here... I recently purchased a Canon M40. http://usa.canon.com/cusa/consumer/p...s/vixia_hf_m40 And have been shooting in .mts AVCHD, and am working to determine the best workflow & software packages for me. Desired Functions; Combine Files Compress for Smugmug Trim Files Prepare for BluRay burning (don't know if this is necessary) Burn BluRay My camera splits segments into 2GB files, which at highest resolution is ~11 minutes. I need a way to combine files back into a single video. A tool which came with the camera, Pixela VideoBrowser will do this for me, but I don't care much for the software. Toolset is very limited, and you have very little control over formats. I combined a video, and it is now 15:18 long, but is a hair over 2.5GB due to the 24mbps bitrate. I'd like to upload this video to smugmug. My internet connection isn't really fast enough to support this kind of uploading as I'd like it, and then it takes a while for smugmug to compress. I'm perfectly happy to compress to 8mbps myself, but many softwares will not open the Canon .mts format. The .mts format really seems to be an impediment here. I tried using MediaCoder to change to an mp4 package and use Lightworks, but only some of my files converted such that lightworks would open them. Any advice on a tool (or tools) that will handle (or convert) files to do this couple simple things?

Do you have a Mac or a PC?

If you have a (recent Intel) Mac - FCP X can do all these things for you. You simply plug the camera in and you can play back your movies, select ins and outs and only import what you want. FCP X will also not transcode anything. It will keep the original H.264 codec that's contained in your AVCHD file.
(if for some reason, you only saved .mts files - you'd have to use other software for "wrapping" it into a format FCP X can understand - but it is possible)

FCP X can spit out web video, burn Blu-rays (if you add compresor for $59 and a blu-ray drive of course)
Very simple.

If you have a PC, well then it gets a whole lot more complicated and less user-friendly. I am sure there are some folks on this forum that can help you.... ;-)

--- Markus ---

Originally Posted by THX1965 Do you have a Mac or a PC? If you have a (recent Intel) Mac - FCP X can do all these things for you. You simply plug the camera in and you can play back your movies, select ins and outs and only import what you want. FCP X will also not transcode anything. It will keep the original H.264 codec that's contained in your AVCHD file. (if for some reason, you only saved .mts files - you'd have to use other software for "wrapping" it into a format FCP X can understand - but it is possible) FCP X can spit out web video, burn Blu-rays (if you add compresor for $59 and a blu-ray drive of course) Very simple. If you have a PC, well then it gets a whole lot more complicated and less user-friendly. I am sure there are some folks on this forum that can help you.... ;-) --- Markus ---

I'm a PC user.

Corel VideoStudio Pro X4 (VSP-X4) and above are supposed to be able to burn BluRay, but I don't have a burner to try. VSP-X4 will handle Canon MTS files natively, and the combining and editing is no problem. (I have both the Canon HF 11 and HF S11 camcorders.)

For compression it's best to apply some noise reduction first. Even if you don't see the video noise, it's there, and all video codecs will treat noise as detail, limiting compression or reducing true detail if you try to force compression.

VSP-X4 will allow you to export to mp4 files, which should import into SmugMug properly.