Problem with previewing videos. And a second question

Question

I'm using CS4.  So I got this program in last week and have been working on learning some of the tricks for it.  I'm recording most of my footage in HD.  When viewing fottage in the Source player it's fine, but when I actually use the preview player, the one to the far right by default, the video is choppy and hangs, pretty sure it's just using a bit too much of my resources currently, I don't care about seeing the preview player video in HD,what can I do to make the preview player use less resources but still keep my videos in HD format so that when I export they are still in 720p or 480p.  I know it has to do with creating a new sequence, but can't figure out which setting I need to change and to what.
Second, sometimes I'm only able to record footage in 480p because of various reasons, I have the ability to record in 720p most of the time, the problem is when I have a project that involves both resolutions.  I can only see 4 options, 1 record the 720p stuff in 480p when the project involves 480p, 2 scale the 480p video up to "720" (and yes I know this isn't ideal but for my projects this may actually work), 3 add the 480p footage in and simply let it be smaller than the 720p footage and last, make 2 different videos one for the 720 one for the 480, and have my video be 2 parts.  Is there any option I missed?  I do not believe I can have mutlple sequences per video file, is that correct?
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Glad that you saw the red line. Hitting the Enter key will Render your Timeline. It can be limited, by using the WAB (Work Area Bar), in the same area of the timeline. It has a little "bracket" at each end, and you can drag them to limit the WAB. I use this a lot, when I am Keyframing animation and only want to Render a small area. [Note: the WAB can also be used to limit one's Export too.]
Is there a way I can make sure the sequence matches up to the video I'm importing?
If you generate the footage, the easiest way to get full determination of its properties, is to note the camera's settings. If you did not shoot the footage, then the freeware utility, G-Spot, will give you all of the info. If necessary, you can do a Desktop Preset (Custom) for your Sequence to make it match your footage. Say your footage was 640 x 320 @ 25 fps. You could set those parameters in your Desktop Sequence settings. You want to match your Project/Sequence to your footage. If you need another size for output, you do that in Adobe Media Encoder (AME).
Good luck,
Hunt