is it important to de interlace footage before editing, what difference does it make, and how is it done

on i export i deinterlace, i dont know, i hope you're not supposed to do something else first..

__________________
Mac G5 workstation with 4 gigs of ram, 4x250 gig drives in raid 5. High availability cluster server running centos for a server. 2xCanon GL2 cameras.

TuscSports.com

See no. 1 of the FAQ here:
http://www.videoforums.co.uk/reviews/faq

It depends on the destination of your video,

de-interlacing is not a problem at all if you are only going to watch your video on a TV.

If you are going to be exporting for watching on a PC you should de-interlace.

__________________
P4 1GB Ram 50+160GB, Win XP, Premiere 6, Encore+Photoshop, Lite-on 4x dvd rw.
Sony TRV-250, Panasonic NVGS-75, Canon MV600i