how do you make your video more clear and less grainy, - Adobe Premiere

If you shoot DV, transfer via Firewire to edit and later use Firewire back to tape, neither your video card nor in fact your computer are changing the video at all. The grain is on your material as shot ...

GB

How does your stuff look going directly from the cam to a TV? Is it possible your source footage isn't as clean as you think, and you are just noticing it more when you see it on a larger monitor? I think you at least need to rule that out before you assume it's a problem with Premiere or your computer.

I'm wondering if you are possibly seeing the results of your camera trying to compensate for low light levels. Your cam may be boosting the gain to compensate. And a side effecte of that is increased grainyness. Does footage you shot outside in the sun have the same problems? If not, you may want to think about adding some light to your indoor shots.

Also, try turning off your "steady-shot" feature. Unless I'm mistaken, all those Digital8 cams use the digital method of stabilization. To do this your camera is enlarging pixels to compensate for the camera shake. And to make matters worse, the flaws seem to get magnified when the lighting is low. You should also notice your color saturation improving in low light situations if the stabilization is off.

FYI, some cameras use moving prisms to achieve image stabilization (optical stabilization) instead of enlarging the pixels. It is much nicer, but cameras that have it to tend to cost a bit more.

If you are noticing more grain after converting your stuff to VHS ("tape"). ...well that's just to be expected.

Finally, as far as fixing grain in Premiere goes, you might try a adding slight amount of "blur" to smooth things out. Sometimes it can help, But be careful... often the cure looks just as bad as the grain.

If you have Premiere 6.5, there is a light version of Viviclip Filters on the CD. If you install it, you may find that the noise filter does a pretty good job on some material. You might try it first with small clips, as it does take some time to render.
JB

you know, it probably is the lighting, the area i was filming in had a shade of darkness...

if i could remember where i saw it...there's this plug-in that "lights" up poorly lit clips and removes some noise, cleans it up, etc. and it looks pretty good.

once i remember where i saw it i'll post it.