Downloading DV to the computer....

[willydiver]

Just got back from Cozumel and have a load of tapes full of diving video from my Canon ZR-85 mini-DigitalVideo camera and homemade housing. Problem is, the camera is still new to me (my first) and I've never tried to download the video footage from the tape to the computer for editing, etc. I just assumed I could figure it out when I got back but I'm stumped.

The manual goes into fair detail on downloading still images from the camera, but falls short on how to download the video footage from the tape. Best I can gather is I need a "DV" cable that will link the camera to the computer. I've got a fairly new, middle of the road Dell PC. Is this going to require some additional software or some kind of "video-hardware" upgrade to download the video? Or does the standard Windows XPpro platform have what I need?

Thanks for any help. I'm at a road block to converting the tape to DVDs for the family/friends to view of our trip.

Thanks!
WD

 

[diversteve]

Relatively simple answer:

Under the Mic on your camera is a Firewire port. You need a "DV"/Firewire/IEEE1394(different names -same thing) cable to connect your camera to your computer so you can capture video.

You'll also need a Firewire port on your PC. If you don't have one good Firewire cards are in the $40-50 range. I wouldn't buy a cheaper one. This will allow you to connect your camera to the PC and capture footage from your DV tapes.

Then you import the video clips and save them on your HD. Usually this is done in three steps, capture, editing and rendering the final output to DVD(or Windows Media, Quicktime, MiniDV, VHS format).

If you have a USB 2.0 port on both the camcorder and the PC you can use it also, but you'll probably get better results with Firewire, other USB devices could poll the chain while you're capturing and cause dropped video frames.

And you'll want to edit out the bad parts. This is done with a Non-Linear Editing program. Windows Movie Maker is one, it's a free d/l from Microsoft, it may already be on your computer. It handles capture, basic editing and output, but I don't think it author's DVD's. You could capture the raw footage, edit it into finished clips, save them to disk and then author a DVD with a program like NERO Vision Express. You may not like the quality of the finished clips edited in Movie Maker though, it's better for the web than DVD. And this 2-step process is more work.

Better option:

For less than $100, you can buy a program like Pinnacle Studio9, Ulead VideoStudio9 or Adobe Premiere Elements 3. These are full featured video editing solutions that do capture, editing, sound editing, DVD menu authoring and DVD burning. Best Buy, Amazon and similar sell them. Relatively easy learning curve, I was able to make my first DVD in an evening with Pinnacle 9.

Another step up would be programs like Sony's Vegas, Pinnacle Liquid Edition or Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5. These are professional grade NLE's. $800 or less.

Read this forum, there's lots of helpful advice/opinions.

Have fun,

Steve

 

[chuck e]

Just got back from Cozumel and have a load of tapes full of diving video from my Canon ZR-85 mini-DigitalVideo camera and homemade housing. Problem is, the camera is still new to me (my first) and I've never tried to download the video footage from the tape to the computer for editing, etc. I just assumed I could figure it out when I got back but I'm stumped.

The manual goes into fair detail on downloading still images from the camera, but falls short on how to download the video footage from the tape. Best I can gather is I need a "DV" cable that will link the camera to the computer. I've got a fairly new, middle of the road Dell PC. Is this going to require some additional software or some kind of "video-hardware" upgrade to download the video? Or does the standard Windows XPpro platform have what I need?

Thanks for any help. I'm at a road block to converting the tape to DVDs for the family/friends to view of our trip.

Thanks!
WD

Ditto, Steve
Here's a web site I just found on a mysimon search that should have what you need.
http://www.firewire-1394.com/

 

[willydiver]

Thanks for the help. That's exactly what I needed to know. Guess I might have to crack open the old Dell. It's out of warranty anyway!

Can you grab still images off the video footage with the above named software to print out pictures?

Thanks!
WD

 

[Divesherpa]

Ulead allows still capture. I can't speak for the other programs.

 

[diversteve]

Thanks for the help. That's exactly what I needed to know. Guess I might have to crack open the old Dell. It's out of warranty anyway!

Can you grab still images off the video footage with the above named software to print out pictures?

Thanks!
WD

Pinnacle Studio does, Windows Movie Maker does...I'm guessing all of them probably do.

 

[medical1]

A small piece of hardware named "Dazzle" works for me. Quick editing but I don't do professional work so it may not be advanced enough for your needs. PS: Also works from my TiVo to my CPU - great for converting movies to watch on my CPU during long air flights

 

[chuck e]

Can you grab still images off the video footage with the above named software to print out pictures?

Thanks!
WD

Premier allows you to output a frame in bitmap format

 

[RickSp]

One other, oh by the way. When you get your firewire cable and card, if your computer doesn't have one, be aware of the amount of hard drive space that you will need.

Every 4 3/4 minutes or so is about a Gigabyte of storage. Every hour of video that you capture will use up something less than 13 Gig of hard drive space. You will also need hard drive space for temporary files while editing. (When you are happy with your edited footage you can copy it back to tape as your master and dump all the files you captured, then capture more, as you wish.)

If your hard drive space is limited, you may want to consider an external hard drive. I have a couple of 125 Gig drives, which are often close to full.

 

[willydiver]

Really appreciate all the input. I got the Pinnalce V.9 software because it came with the fire wire card and cable. The software is pretty user friendly, but my limited knowledge on this stuff became apprent to me REAL quick.

Pinnacle came with a ton of different editing features like scene transitions, background music, titles, etc. that really make my poor filming tactics a little easier and more fun to watch. I'm sure many of the software packages out there also offer these neat features.

Only problem I'm having now, is I found out I don't have a DVD burner. Thought I did but it's only a CD-R/CD-RW burner. Supposedly you can burn the movies on a regular CD-R as a video file that most DVD players can read.

Anybody have any opinions or advice on the different output formats for playing on a DVD player?

Thanks!
WD