Trolling for an education on video capture devices ?!?!

[DriveIn]

I am looking for experienced opinions on video capture devices and software. What do you use? What purpose? Software interface? Hardware interface? Is the hardware you use an internal card, external device, firewire, usb, ect? What do you use as a storage device or media for the captured images? Tell it all, I'd like to hear it.

P.S. I'd like this to NOT be a Microsoft versus Apple debate. They both have good and bad points. Just list them when appropriate, but don't argue about it please. I'm interested in both and would like to hear your experiences and knowledge. Thanks in Advance.

[wahiba]

There is no better way to start than having the camcorder next to the projector. Projecting onto a small screen. With the camcorder connected directly to computer all focussing can be done from the big monitor screen. I then run the projector and record onto the Hard Drive.

It is important that the camcorder has a shutter speed of around 1/50 second. This virtually eliminates flicker, well it does on mine.

My set up is a Canon Hi-8 connected through an ATI All in Wonder Pro card in a computer with a 350 MHz PII, 128 MB Ram and a 6MB hard drive. I find this just about sufficient for my needs.

The Projector is an Eumig 607D dual gauge with a f1.6 zoom lense or f1.0 fixed focus lense.

I usually record as an .avi file with no compression, or more usually with the Indeo compressor on. This reduces the file sizes considerably and at the quality levels I can work at makes litle difference. I usually set it at 384 x 288 at 25 fps, or 320 x 240 at 25 fps.

I then edit with EditStudio 2 from Puremotion (http:www.puremotion.com) and save on recordable CDs. Puremotion have an excellent forum for problems and one of there people is on it, and other video forums answering all the queries. From a marketing point of view this back up is appreciated and is gaining fom what is a small set up a lot of fans.

The down sides of all this are:

The image is not as sharp as I would like, but is no worse than when I did the same to VHS tapes, but slightly down on what comes directly from the camcorder. However it is more than acceptable for home movies.

Brightness is not always even across the screen. Even so it is better than back projection. I have recently transferreed some black and white negative which was quite dense, and the brightness seems more even. I am going to do some research on this. Maybe sticking filters in front of the projector lense. this is because the problem was worse with the f1.0 lense rather than the f1.6. The f1.0 is great onto a screen though.

Using EditStudio I edit the films, add a sound track of copyright free music and then save again as a .avi file. I then play around with this file using Windows Media Encoder, Reals free encoder and QT Pro 4.

My biggest problem is the time it takes to process movies. 8 hours for a 15 minute film into mpeg 1 means leaving the computer to run over night.

For the internet I usually set it up at 192 x 144 at 12 fps, and for playing off CD roms 384 x 288 or 320 x 240 at 15 fps. Mainly to reduce processing times, and there is negligible quality loss.

If I manage to get a full time job I may get a digital camcorder and faster computer, but at the moment I quite enjoy playing around with this set up.

[crimsonson]

I'm a Avid man all the way. Though I first learned from a Media Studio Pro 5 and later with Premiere.

I use Avid Media Composer at work.

At home its Avid Xpress DV 3 in Windows 2000 PC.
1.4 Ghz (Athlon)
768 MB of PC2100
4 GB SCSI for OS/Programs
9 GB for DATA (MP3, Stills, Personal files)
60+75 GB IDE Media Drives in removable caddies
2 Removable Caddies (I can swap 2 drives at a time)
Firewire OHCI (that is what only works for this AVID)
ATi Radeon wth Dual 19" monitors
DVD/CDRW

Panasonic AG-DV2000 Proline DV VCR

I have Leicina Special fo Super 8 (also use a Canon 814 I gave to a friend as a gift)

My video camera is- well nothing, I am saving up for the new Panasonic 24p cam - early adaptor

I do use my companies BetaSP ENG full package and sometimes a friend's Sony PD150.



Im going to upgrade soon (faster CPU, bigger case, 1 more removable caddy) so I can switch to Avid Xpress DV 3.5. It has a nice color correction system buts its only WXP. I can do it now. But since I am in a middle of a documentary (BetaSP, Super8, DV) I might as well wait when I overhaul my entire system.


Hope this helps. Editing (and ENG shoots) is what pays the bills for me, so if you have any questions feel free in contacting me.

[jessh]

I use a rather non standard setup, for hardware I have an Iomega Buz, it is a nice video capture card with hardware MJPEG compression/decompression, it was discontinued because it has lots of compatiblity issues, but is a great analog capture card when you can get it to work :-) I mainly run Linux so I use Lavtools for video capture. Unless you are very good with computers I dont really recommend my way of doing it, but it is very powerful when you know what you are doing :-) For editing I currently use Adobe Premiere (Unfortunatly for windows). I know this wasnt of much help but I felt like rambling :-)[/url]

[Mattan]

I bought a tv card to watch tv on my pc and i found out that can be used as a nice capture card(composite&s-video inputs) it captures from analogic cameras and it's great solution. now for the digit-cams the best thing to do is to buy a firewire card, thats what i do, then you can capture high quality video from all digital cameras.
pc to VHS\DV.....: i bought a Gforce 4 graphics card and it has s-vhs output so it's no problam to transfer the videos to vhs and everything i want.hope this info is useful...good luck!

[DriveIn]

I use a rather non standard setup..... I know this wasnt of much help but I felt like rambling [/url]

Everything Helps. I do really appreciate the linux as well. I have kind of a computer Spawn shop at home here. There's a little of everthing around here for possible use. Any input is welcome, and none is non standard.

[studiocarter]

The video camera is a Sony TRV-65 XR Hi-8 with a 20x optical lense and stereo.

It is used with SVIDEO into a miroVIDEO DC30 plus analog capture card.

The computer is a PII 300 Mghz with modifications. There is an ATA 66 card for one extra 30GB hard drive to speed it up and use only for video editing and another card, a Raid card, that drives two more 30GB hard drives into acting like one 60GB hard drive. It is able to capture over 6000 data speed without dropping any frames. AVIIO is used to capture over an hour of video nonstop.

The editing software is Premiere 5.1 and works great (now that I know the ins and outs) with Windows 98 SP.

I am just starting to use a WorkPrinter2 that came with a variable speed dial. It will capture in the 2-3 fps range. More work is needed to tweek it faster.

A Goko and a Hope telecine were used earlier for R8 and S8 film transfers and paid for themselves. Rear projection screens and variable speed projectors were used, too. That is what I must use for 16mm film yet, variable speed projectors.

I usually now capture at 640 x 480, edit, then export at 480 x 480 better resize, then export THAT with bbMPEG to SVCD. Nero Burning Rom burns me SVCD disks that play better looking video than VHS on my Apex 500W DVD player.

I used to capture at 704 x 480 or 352 to make VCD disks. There were too many crashes for video of less quality than VHS so that is not done anymore.

The miroVIDEO DC30 plus is great for making VHS tapes but I really want another deck that has the SVIDEO input to take advantage of the extra quality. I used to make VHS edits with the two button method off the Hi-8 camera and onto the Panasonic 1950 deck. It has the flying erase heads needed and single frame editing; it's an old pro deck but still in great shape. It comes with BNC plugs for video and I have to use it with an adapter for RCA.


I really need a new faster firewire computer and a digital video camera but I hate to bury this Frankeinstein; long live upgrades.

[jessh]

I use a rather non standard setup..... I know this wasnt of much help but I felt like rambling :-)[/url]

Everything Helps. I do really appreciate the linux as well. I have kind of a computer Spawn shop at home here. There's a little of everthing around here for possible use. Any input is welcome, and none is non standard.

well if you arent afraid of linux and dont mind using it for video capture and transfering the files (or having a seperate machine networked with file sharing like I do) then the Iomega Buz can be a good cheap choice for analog video capture. That is if you can find one on ebay for cheap. Also keep in mind that these cards conflict with a lot of other things, so it sometimes takes some playing around with pci card locations and irqs to get it to work right. Just so you know these cards wont work in newer versions of windows because drivers are no longer available, but linux has great drivers :-)

I am currently working on trying to get my whole movie making setup working in linux so I dont have to go into windows, I plan on trying to get Avid Xpress DV, Final Draft 6.0, and some other software running in linux using wine, if anyone is interested I will let you know how it goes.

~Jess

[Guest]

I have a very cheap setup that works great and makes excellent quality videos. I capture with a Canopus Raptor card (now discontinued but might be found used) along with Adobe Premiere 6.1 for editing. The cheap part is the computer. With this setup, you can use slow machines for perfect video due to using your camera for overlay output. This means you must have your camera plugged in and turned on while you edit and preview video on your computer. NO BIG DEAL. My computer is an AMD K6II -500 processor with 500 megs of PC-133 ram running on a Tyan 1598 motherboard and Windows ME. (I wish I could run all of it on Linux) You can buy the processor, motherboard and ram for less than $150 new on the internet. The Raptor card is marvelous and works well with Premiere as a plug-in. Only drawback to a super-duper high power real time machine is that effects need to render first before ready for playback and recording. I don't find it any big deal because it doesn't take that long and its nice to break once and awhile from cutting to stop and ponder or review. I think most filmakers would be very happy with this setup and they could save their money for making films.

[DriveIn]

Is anyone familiar with any specific makes of capture devices that work on multiple platforms. I was browsing around and was wondering if something like the Dazzle Hollywood DV Bridge is worth looking at further. It would be nice to have a device that worked with an apple-mac + windows or even a linux platform as well via firewire. I am wondering if anyone has had a good look or some experience with any possibilities or if anyone is using a dazzle hollywood who has some input? Thanks for all the information so far. I have snagged an unused/unregistered premiere 6.0 for dirt cheap. That's a step forward I hope.

[crimsonson]

stay away from Dazzle. Its a piece of sh*t according to almost every editorial or user review I have read.

Check the transcoders (that what thos things are called) from Canopus.
Canopus ADVC 1000 and yes its Mac compatible.

Firewire devices are often Mac/PC compat.

[DriveIn]

:mrgreen: Thanks for the information so far. Now I am looking for more detailed input on capture devices. I have not had any of this equipment in my hands or hooked up to a machine or used any of it, so I am green about all of this stuff. I see from postings and browsing there are some external devices and many internal cards, ect. One question concerns capture cards and external devices. Example: The Canopus ADVC 100 seems to be an external device. Does this need a capture card to function with something like the workprinter or a video camera, or does it do all the capture on it's own without an additional internal capture card? Is the Canopus ADVC device more than a breakout box? What other devices are out there. Is averkey in the realm of comparable capture devices for film work? I like the idea of a device on the firewire port, rather than a card installed in a specific OS computer (ie: mac but not PC or linux, or PC but not mac). I have read the previous postings so far on what people are using. I am wondering what else is there that is not yet listed. If anyone has a capture card or device, I'd like to hear what it's in, how it is used. Is a capture card a must have, or can an external device do what is necessary for a quality film transfer. Is an external device even necessary or can a camera be connnected directly and still do single frame captures to a harddrive or tape. What equipment is tried and proven, what is available, and what is to be viewed as the next greatest gotta have by some. I am looking to transfer film, record and edit video, maybe record some tapes or burn some discs later. This is all uphill to me so far. :?: