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How to Record Smooth Video

jernatety

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Hello, I'm hoping somebody can help me out. I just bought an iPad Pro 9.7" 32GB

For the past 4 years I have used the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 to record my boys hockey games. No it's not a conventional camera but it's large screen provides extreme ease of use to capture all of the action without exclusively following the puck all over the place and losing it. The resulting video is better than average but it isn't what I would consider conventional HD. I upload all of my kids hockey games to youtube on their hockey channel where the team can re-watch at their leisure. Although Youtube tags the videos as HD, they don't particularly look that way when viewed in full screen mode. Quality tails off a little but it's still pretty good and isn't pixelated or blotchy.

I was recently directed to the iPad Pro by a friend of mine. He told me the device has multiple recording resolutions and could provide a better quality recording experience than the default 720 dpi the Galaxy does. I did the research and spoke with an Apple Rep at Best Buy yesterday and was convinced into buying the tablet.

Because of the repetitive stops and starts in game play the rep told me I'd have to download a video recorder app with a pause button because the native iPad video recorder doesn't have one. I got home and set up my iPad by changing the video resolution from default 720 to 1080 60FPS. I also downloaded and installed "Videocam" app to use to record. The apple rep told me the quality would be unmatched but the video size would be double the average 3.5-4 GB file size I was recording on the Galaxy for approx 1hr of footage. Whatever the case we went to the game and I recorded it in it's entirety. It was :53mins. After I saved the video to my camera roll I checked the quality. It was terrible. It definitely did not turn out to be 1080. It's blotchy and pixelated like a tiny 320 sized video that gets blown up. When I got home I transferred it to my laptop to check it's config. I found it was only 853MB in size and it's a .mov file.

Can anybody tell me if the "Videocam" app uses the tablets resolution settings or it's own when recording? If it uses it's own this app won't be of any use for me since the quality of the recording is terrible. Is there a video recorder app which will use the tablets video resolution settings? Are there more settings I need to change on the tablet? Perhaps the codec and compression the recorder uses to capture and save the video?

Any help is greatly appreciated, I don't want to return the tablet but if I can't find anything that works it's what I may have to do.
 

jwt873

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I took a quick look and see that the paid version of the Videocam uses the camera resolution, but the free version only records in 480P which is pretty low.

And.. MP4 and MOV files are essentially the same. The video is no different, they just use different wrappers to hold it. .MOV is Apples preferred 'wrapper'.
 
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jernatety

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I took a quick look and see that the paid version of the Videocam uses the camera resolution, but the free version only records in 480P which is pretty low.

And.. MP4 and MOV files are essentially the same. The video is no different, they just use different wrappers to hold it. .MOV is Apples preferred 'wrapper'.
Hi jwt873. That explains it! I'm new to the Apple stuff. My kids 11 and 13 both have iPods and set everything up for me, I'm still trying to figure it all out. I asked my son when he set up videocam if we were good to go and if I had to buy the app. He told me it was free and there isn't a paid version. The video looks exactly as you suggest, 480 and when blown up on youtube, even worse. Guess I'll have him purchase the paid version and install that, thanks for your help.
 

jwt873

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Just to add.. The videocam app is free.. According to one review I read, It's actually the 'In app purchase' that opens up the resolution... Of course, I'm going by the reviews, I've never used it.
 
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jernatety

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Ok, what's that mean the video is free? Do you have a link? I'm at work on my computer and I'm Googling Videocam app for iPad and all that's coming up is "Filmic"
 

jwt873

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It's hard to find on the web.. On your Pro, open the 'App Store' app. Search for Videocam. It shows up there.

Click on 'Revews. As of now, you'll see there are no reviews for the current version, but if you click on 'All versions' and scroll down to review 4, you'll see where the info comes from. Also on the main screen, click on "In App Purchases" to see what you need to pay for.
 

giradman

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Ok, what's that mean the video is free? Do you have a link? I'm at work on my computer and I'm Googling Videocam app for iPad and all that's coming up is "Filmic"

Hi Jernatety - welcome to the forum! :) Now, I don't do much w/ video on my iPad Air 2 and have no 'dedicated' app for that purpose. But after reading your initial comments, I did DL Videocam for free - for $5 'in app' purchase, the ads are eliminated and I'm assuming that more HD features become available - cannot be specific since I really did not want the app.

But, you mention FiLMiC - this is a $10 app outright purchase, but looking at the offering in the app store (screen capture below), the version number is up to 5.x and the developer's website can be assessed - check HERE for more details on what to me appears to be a superior video app and is just another 5 bucks. Hopefully, a member w/ more 'video experience' on an iDevice will respond - good luck w/ your choice(s). Dave
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Screen Shot 2016-10-17 at 11.51.53 AM.png
 
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jernatety

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Ya, they're so cheap I might just buy both to see which one I like best. And to be honest all I really need is to make sure it records in the resolution I select and it has a pause button. The hockey videos are just a recorded game which I put on youtube for the boys teams. I don't customize them or anything. I just want the best quality video so they can be watched on tv for the coaches to go over the games with the kids.
 

KevinJS

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One thing that might help is to use the native video recorder to make separate videos of the action and then use iMovie to edit and join the pieces.

Or make one long video of the entire game and edit out the pauses with iMovie.
 
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jernatety

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One thing that might help is to use the native video recorder to make separate videos of the action and then use iMovie to edit and join the pieces.

Or make one long video of the entire game and edit out the pauses with iMovie.
Hi @KevinJS that was suggested by the Apple rep when I was at Best Buy. He actually wasn't familiar with any video recorder apps besides the native video recorder. That's the one thing I want to avoid, I don't want to have to do any editing at all. That's why I need the pause button for in between stoppages, end of periods and faceoffs. I record 2-3 games each Saturday and Sunday. I have to record, then copy over the video to my laptop and upload to youtube. Then delete off the tablet and power it back up for a full charge to be ready for the next game.
 

KevinJS

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Ah, right. So the native app won't work for you then. Pity it doesn't have a pause button.
 
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jernatety

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Yes, I find that very strange they give you a video recorder with no function to pause. Makes no sense, or maybe I just don't know Apple products well enough.
 

KevinJS

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I think they feel they are covering the bases by providing iMovie. A pause button would definitely be handy though.
 

cboehme

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I just bought an iPad Pro 9.7 and shot my sons hockey game in 4K last weekend. This is the 1st time I've done it and used iMovie to edit it. It's very easy to string all the clips together and make 1 video. Plus it gives you the capability to post to youtube once you are done. The only problem I had was if you select all the clips at once, it did not put them in the correct order... so I just selected them 1 at a time, and was done in a couple of minutes. This was 3 17 minute periods, plus a 15 minute OT game and turned out great.
 
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jernatety

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What did youtube do to it after upload? I assume it was compressed to a minimum of 1080p HD?

I scrapped the first recorder app I bought, (FiMIC] and bought a new one. It was only $5. It's basically the native recorder built into the iPad and for the life of me I can't remember the name of it right now. I has a pause button and uses the built in recorder specs for resolution. The output file is compressed .mp4 and I record in 1080p 30fps. The videos come out great and don't change resolution after being pushed up to youtube. The quality is excellent. A 55 min video is typically around 1.9GB in size. Tiny in comparison to what it would be if it were the format the native video recorder records at that resolution as .mov.

What is the output size of your joined video and what file type do you save as after editing in iMovie? Another cool thing is that I don't have to join anything after the game video is done. It saves to one file directly to the camera roll and then I upload to youtube, takes about 15mins.
 

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