Canon - transferring from tape to PC

[davynub]

I'm new to all this DV camera stuff, but recently purchased a Canon MV830i DV camera. I've filled 2 tapes worth of holiday,etc and have now come to put it onto my PC, then onto DVD. The software which I got with the camcorder is crap, basically dealing with transferring stills. I bought a DV cable at the weekend thinking that would solve the problem. To an extent it does. It makes the PC recognise the camcorder and gives me an option of using Windows Movie Maker to capture/edit/burn then file. I've done this, but the quality is crap, when replayed on PC, and will not replay at all on my DVD player, as it is a WMV file (I think). When I replay the recording on TV through the camcorder the quality is very good. I contacted Canon UK, who said that they do not have any software of their own to use, but recommended Pinnacle. Am I missing something very simple ? Help is appreciated...

[Brian110507]

No - moviemaker is a very good basic programme and you can find out a great deal about how to use it at http://www.papajohn.org but unfortunately it is not able to burn a DVD that you can view in a DVD player on your TV.

Moviemaker will create a video file that you can use in Roxio or Nero or any other disc burning programme.

You do really need a capture / editing/ disc burning programme like Pinnacle Studio or Ulead VideoStudio

[MarkE19]

Other than the advice already given by Beejaycee (need to get on the forum earlier in the day to beat him to it ) I suggest that you do all the capture and editing in Movie Maker as AVI files. The WMV files are highly compressed, hence the low quality, and are not compatable with most DVD players. However the AVI files will be around 13Gb per hour of footagfe captured, so you do need loads of disc space.
If you are happy with MM for capture and editing (and it is very good at this) then you can just buy a DVD authoring program such as Ulead DVD Movie Factory to create the final DVD discs. The quality from this (and many others) should be almost as good as the very large AVI files you capture directly from the camcorder.

Mark.

[davynub]

Thanks very much. I think I'm nearly there on this, though the tapes are already well worn with "over-capture" !
I'm capturing the video as an avi file right now, then I'll try to get it to DVD, which I should be ok with. Cheers.

[rimshot]

Just read about how much gb is taken up capturing, am I doing something wrong? Trying to capture a gig i was playing at on ulead studio after 45 minutes of capture i find i have used 53 gb of harddrive space and running out of free space. I am captureing in AVI, is this the best way, and can i use less space using a different format?
Roger

[Brian110507]

Sounds like you are capturing as 'Uncompressed' Roger - you will get very large files that way, you are correct to capture as .avi but check your capture settings and select "DV type 1" or "DV type 2" - this will not actually compress the video any more than it already is on your tape and should result in a file size between 13 & 14 Gb for a one hour video.

[rimshot]

Thanks for that! Been recording by av connection as digital camcorder connector up the shoot in camera, so if i used another digital camcorder and set up as you advise, everything should come out ok?
Roger

[MarkE19]

Even captureing via AV connections you should still capture as AVI, and the amount of space used should then be the same as it would be captureing via firewire.
If everything else on the cam works fine except for the firewire output then I would suggest getting hold of a second hand/cheap cam to do the transfer. The improvement in quality will be quite big.

Mark.