I have a G450etv, how should I edit my analogs wedding tapes?

[Hulk]

Okay, we're coming up on our 5 year anniversary and my wife would like me to edit our wedding tapes.

The tapes were shot using 8mm analog video, not hi 8, so the quality is not the greatest.

I guess I could capture using the g450etv huffyuv, edit, and then save to a high quality MPEG II format.

The other option would be to use a friend's Sony D8 and capture through the camera to DV format and then go to MPEG II.

I'm pretty sure the first option would give much better MPEG II results, I just hate working with huffyuv files, they're so big...

Any other options that would give good results that I'm overlooking.

My system:
P4 1.9
Lots of hard drives
MS Pro 6.5

I guess I pretty much have the hertz and bytes to burn.

[Patrick]

This is how I do it...

The best way to edit analog 8mm/Hi8 tapes is to play them back on a 8mm/Hi8 camcorder or deck that has a TBC and copy these tapes (using S-video) onto a digital format of your choice, MiniDV or D8. This will then give you device control of your digital playback unit using the DV capture program on your computer. The picture quality will also be superior than what would be captured by playing back the original analog 8mm tapes on a D8 camcorder.

I use a Sony EV-S3000 Hi8 deck to copy analog Hi8 tapes to a Sony TRV900 MiniDV camcorder and the results are great.

[Hulk]

Interesting. I have a JVC 7900 S-VHS deck with TBC. I wonder if I ran the 8mm tape into the JVC and then out the S-video jack if I would get the TBC processing?

[Patrick]

You need a plan "B".

No, I don't think so. From what I understand, the TBC is only in effect when the deck is playing back a tape.

[Ted222]

If it were me I would capture with AV_IO then use MSP 6.5 to edit. The big limitations here are the speed of your hard drives and file size limitation of non Win2K/XP operating systems. To get TBC you need to stripe your Digital 8 tapes and then copy to them off the Hi 8 (works with MiniDV).

Good Luck,

Ted

[Hulk]

To get TBC you need to stripe your Digital 8 tapes and then copy to them off the Hi 8 (works with MiniDV).


"stripe your digital 8 tapes" I don't know what that means.

Mark

[Ted222]

Basically it is recording with the lens cap on for the full length of the tape, which puts a time code on it for DV capture. But this would mean you would need to use the 1394 for capture rather than the AV_IO with the SVideo input to retain the time code.

Have I got you thoroughly confused yet?

Ted

[Hulk]

Okay, let me see.

Stripe my dv tape.

Copy from my analog 8 to dv

Capture via 1394 from dv to hard drive


still not sure what striping the dv tape will do for me


Thanks very much for the advice.

[Ted222]

Just a side note. You have a very similar set-up to my old video editing system (G450eTV). I found that the AV_io/PICVIDEO captures we far superior to the DV in the final product, until I got a RT2500 system. Very big difference, making me very hesitant to use DV in my projects. The PICVIDEO files are big, but with your processor, very workable.

I don't know why, but my new RT2500 system gets the same results now as I used to get with PICVIDEO. Doc has more technical details on this situation.

For me its just the results that count.

Ted

[Hulk]

Yes, I have also noticed the quality of the PIC Video codec.

Quality on 19 or 20? I usually go 19 since the files get huge on 20.

[Patrick]

Ummmm....

To get TBC you need to stripe your Digital 8 tapes and then copy to them off the Hi 8 (works with MiniDV).

Basically it is recording with the lens cap on for the full length of the tape, which puts a time code on it for DV capture.

No offence Ted, but just what the heck are you talking about??!!! This is absolute nonsense. Time code and time base correction are two totally different things.

[Ted222]

Patrick,

Sorry, you are absolutely right. I was thinking of getting a base time code onto the tape to make capturing/editing a little easier.

Oh well, you get what you pay for.....

Ted (just another geeky video idiot)

[Patrick]

We all make mistakes...

Ted, I just didn't want anyone to be led astray by what you said.

In regards to striping the tape, here's a thread at another forum you might care to have a look at.

http://webboard.pinnaclesys.com/read_messages.asp?lng=1&WebboardID=1&ForumID=77&ThreadID=15740&Search=1&ThreadStart=0

I used to record black on all my camcorder tapes prior to using them the first time, but after reading this I realize it's almost a complete waste of time. (To say nothing of the extra wear and tear on one's camcorder.)

[colinbr]

<i>The best way to edit analog 8mm/Hi8 tapes is to play them back on a 8mm/Hi8 camcorder or deck that has a TBC and copy these tapes (using S-video) onto a digital format of your choice, MiniDV or D8. This will then give you device control of your digital playback unit using the DV capture program on your computer. The picture quality will also be superior than what would be captured by playing back the original analog 8mm tapes on a D8 camcorder. </i>

I'm a bit confused about this. If you play an analogue 8mm tape
on a Digital8 camcorder then isn't the output digital? In which case why should the quality be worse than playing the analogue tape on an analogue deck and recording the analogue signal on a Digital8 camcorder?

I would have thought the Digital8 camcorder would be better at playing the analogue tape directly.

I'm particularly interested in the answer to this as I have a large collection of old 8mm analogue tapes and now nothing to play them on. I was thinking of buying a Digital8 camcorder for this reason.

Colin

[Brian Ellis]

Colin

I may be talking through the back of my head (or farther down the back), but I'm consoled that I'm not alone in this thread

If I were you, I'd pick up a cheap analogue 8 camcorder (or other deck if you can find one) to play back your existing tapes and capture them via analogue. Converting to DV first is not going to improve the quality by a single iota, even if the tape is played in a D8 camcorder. Rather the opposite: you'll get the worst of both worlds. Then you can buy a mini-DV for new shooting and profit from the better quality that this will give you.