Here's a tip for some would-be HD shooters wondering why get a 1080i or 1080p camera - two shots for the price of one. I always edit 720p, because that's what most local TV stations are putting out right now. But, if you shoot 1080, you really get two shots in one.

Just capture your footage, bring it into a 720p timeline, and start cutting. If you need some shot variance, just right click a clip and deselect 'scale to frame size', and magically you go to a tighter shot.

This way, you can cut back in and out of the action.

Digital photography has come a long way in the last few years. Few today would argue that digital cannot stand as film's equal. In many cases the technology now surpasses film. Not only do we have a digital substitute for film, we also have digital substitutes for most physical filters. Between the built in tools in Lightroom and the many sets of plugins available there are really only two physical filters needed today.

The effects of a polarizing filter cannot be reproduced digitally. Yes, there are a few digital polarizing effects which attempt to approximate some aspects of a polarizer. But only a physical polarizer present between the subject and the sensor can remove reflections and deepen the sky's shade of blue. You can get close with digital effects but it's much more work that just putting that filter on the lens.