Hi

I am looking into producing a series of half hour programs for distribution on the net. I have an 8mm camcorder but if it is of benefit would like to upgrade to a DV Camcorder. And so to my questions:

1) How long would it take to transfer 1/2 hour of DV footage from the camcorder to the pc via a firewire port?

2) Is it just a case of playing the DV tape and waiting half an hour or is it faster than that?

3) Are there any camcorders that record onto solid state memory like the Sony Memory Stick for example? Is transfer from solid state any faster?

The time question is an issue because the programs would go out weekly for download, and with the time it takes to record the footage and then edit it into a broadcastable quality I dont want to hang around waiting for the transfer.

Thanks for your help in advance

[m@rk]

The transfer is in real time so a 1/2 hour clip will take 1/2 hour to transfer.

I understand some of the Sony cameras use the memory stick but I am not sure how much they hold.

The memory sticks(solid state) only hold snapshots , some large memory sticks can hold around 30 secs of mpeg4 compressed video though, but nothing near the quality or duration of a DV tape, hope this helps!!!, YEs a 30 min documentary to tranfser to Pc would take 30 mins to tranfer it is just a question playing the tape connected to your firewire card....ps How are u gonna convert to broadcast quality ?? do u use adobe premier and use BROADCAST COLOURS option???

Hi guys, man, you are the genius we have been waiting for all our lives :-) you really expect to record half an hour of perfect pictures and sound using only an 8mm camcorder, record it to your PC in less time than there is on the tape, and BROADCAST it over the internet unedited even..................Are you George Bush?

Read some factS and magazines, TALK TO PEOPLE WHO DO THIS SORT OF THING, AND JOIN A VIDEO CLUB............YESTERDAY.
good luck :-)

1) yes i am a genius. it lows on from th ability to be able t read a thread properly

2) who said anything about perfect pictrue or sound? do you consider what you see on tv to be perfect?

3)who said anything about using only an 8mm videocamera? I believe in this thread I asked aout the use of dv as a media.

4)who said anything about broadcasting it unedited? with the minimum use of 3 cameras the need for editing is obvious.

5) George who?

6) the reason for me posting on this forum was to find out some facts. previous postees have been most helpful. you have been shown up as a complete tit

7)now go and put on your slippers, get out your pipe and leave people with serious questions alone

by the way who made your 1200ghz pc. i think he may have been lying to you considering the rest of the world is only upto about 2.2 ghz machines

if you mean 1200 mhz machine try putting it

and before you try to put anything funny about my pc here it is

AMD Athlon 1.44 Ghz DDR
ATI All In Wonder Radeon 8500 DV
1024 MB Ram
2 x 80 Gb 7200 rpm Hdd
Philips 32" Widescreen Monitor

[m@rk]

Originally posted by ispartacus75
by the way who made your 1200ghz pc. i think he may have been lying to you considering the rest of the world is only upto about 2.2 ghz machines

if you mean 1200 mhz machine try putting it

and before you try to put anything funny about my pc here it is

AMD Athlon 1.44 Ghz DDR
ATI All In Wonder Radeon 8500 DV
1024 MB Ram
2 x 80 Gb 7200 rpm Hdd
Philips 32" Widescreen Monitor

Ah well, if we are going to start the mine is bigger than yours thing, I will tell you what I am currently playing with. It only went live this morning.

8 x Intel Xeon 700MHz (2MB Cache) CPUs
16-GB RAM
1-TB Storage Array (fibre channel connected) running RAID S (yes thats an S not a 5)
4MB on board video card (just says Compaq on it)
Did I mention that we were running 4 of them in a Windows 2000 cluster for our 'on the fly' Windows media encoding. These are then linked into 3 x 25' dishes for live broadcast capture and then the finished windows media clip is streamed via a 2.4Gb pipe onto the Internet.



Now if only they would let me take this home with me to play with, I would have a lot of fun although it makes my home PC look a bit small

A shot in the dark but could you speed up the transfer by using the Hitachi DVD Ram camera.

I presume that you should be able to copy the video off faster if you had a DVD RAM drive.

I don't know but it may be worthwhile exploring.

Hi Paul, Sorry to offend you, none taken I thought you were joking Anyway, (puts down pipe, ****s in slippers)
You must go with DV, I don't know your budget, but d8 is the cheapest dv around, uses Hi8 tapes. you also have to get "Firewire" then you can use the Pinnacle Studio editing suite which captures very quickly on account of it doesn't compile the final film until after you tell it to capture full size video AFTER you have edited. OR, I use Ulead Media Pro plus Ulead Studio Video to burn DVDs and Vcds depending on which Country I am sending to. I'm afraid there is no way to transfer faster than real time, even with NASAs computers, What you play has to be recorded in realtime. Using 3 cameras is a great idea, you will need a firewire card with 3 inputs remember. Firewire also captures sound as well.
Hope this helps you, and remember............
Don't take life too seriously, you'll never get out alive.

Ps. Q5 is George Dubya Evil Axis Kickass Bush

Hi Paul, Sorry to offend you, none taken I thought you were joking Anyway, (puts down pipe, ****s in slippers)
You must go with DV, I don't know your budget, but d8 is the cheapest dv around, uses Hi8 tapes. you also have to get "Firewire" then you can use the Pinnacle Studio editing suite which captures very quickly on account of it doesn't compile the final film until after you tell it to capture full size video AFTER you have edited. OR, I use Ulead Media Pro plus Ulead Studio Video to burn DVDs and Vcds depending on which Country I am sending to. I'm afreaid there is no way to transfer faster than real time, even with NASAs computers, What you play has to be recorded in realtime. Using 3 cameras is a great idea, you will need a firewire card with 3 inputs remember. Firewire also captures soundas well.
Hope this helps you, and remember............
Don't take life too seriously, you'll never get out alive.
Ps. Q5 is George Dubya Evil Axis Kickass Bush

Thanks Gurubarry

The ATI Radeon 8500 DV that I am using as a graphics card comes with a firewire port as the card is designed for video editing among other things.
Whil I want to use 3 camcorders why would i then need 3 firewire ports, could i not just transfer one set of footage after another, or are you refering to the time scale that I need to get the work done in?

I was thinking of recording the sound to a seperate media as there would be 2 maybe 3 sound sources (presenters to you and me ). Is minidisc a viable option. I already have the hardware inplace for both the sound capture and transfer to pc.

Up to now I have been using Ulead Video Studio but was thinking of trying Adobe Premier. Have you had any experiences of this software?

My 1 major worry bout using 3 cameras and a seperate sound media is lining all the footage and sound up in time so i dont get the dreaded delay.

Thanks for your help in advance

Hi Paul, the rarion card is OK for one input, I was just thinking of the time factor. I have used both adobe and Ulead. Adobe may be the better system for your project as it splits the sound and picture automatically, in Ulead you do it yourself. The Adobe has a great feature that allows you to lay down timelines;ie : VI V2 V3, then "Enable " sections, so you can get the 3 tapes in the timeline, then enable which sections of AUDIO OR VIDEO you want to broadcast. Also, using the Rapor you can play directly from the timeline with out rendering if you anen't using transitions.
I actually prefer, and use MediaPro, but this Adobe feature may swing it for you. It is available in Media Pro, but you will have to split the sound and vision then delete appropriately, a little longer job. my youngest Son uses mini-disc for mastering Classical Cds, and I have a plal who masters in his recording studio onto mini disc, so quality would not be a problem, but synching would, also it is another layer of time to lay down the audio track seperately. My idea was that with the 3 firewire inputs you couls monitor the presentes and edit "on the fly" . I used to do this before NLE ws invented (and NOT with GAS cameras either
Hope this helps, Barry.

gurubarry

thanks very much for your views on the editing suites. Initially the Adobe product does sound best for my needs. However something you have said has me a little confuse and I am hoping you can clarify for me.

As I have understood your last post if I had 3 firewire ports (not a problem to get hold of) I can connect all cameras to the pc and record direct to the pc, using the pc to switch between camera views as the footage is being recorded. This would mean the the footage recorded would have the sound with it and would need very little editing, save for a few static fuul screen graphics I would need to add in. Is that right? Have I understood you correctly?

If this is the case it would be the perfect answer to my needs (relying, of course, on the fact the the presenters could get it right in 1 complete take!!!!!!)

Thanks again for your help

Hi Paul. well, you have it in one Problem is; I have never tried this it is a theory I fort up. But it should be possible. If the firewire ports are allocated to a specific file you could then record in real time as the signals come in(or is this to be on tape?) if the articles come in on tape you can try the above procedure, OR, using 3 monitors , one to each camcorder, these can be 5" Tvs or even old portables with AV inputs, you can start the cams in sync and edit on the fly as we talked about.
If you want more i'm getting interested now lets' keep this project live M'Man
Cheers, Barry

Thanks Gurubarry

The project is planned for commencing in April 2003 with a pilot this summer.

To give you more info about the actual project, it will be a sports magazine program for American Football at the amateur level that I play (dont know if youve followed the link on my signiture)

As there is only coverage of the proffesional game in this country I am planning to do something at amateur level. The final footage would pereferabley be about 30 mins long, giving us enough time to concentrate on all the conferences in the leagues.

While distribution over the net is not ideal I see it as a free form of distribution to those who want to view it. Depending on the level of compression od the final edit it could take around 4-8 hours to download over a 56k modem ( alot less over cable or adsl)

My only other method of distribution would be CD, and as this is planned on being a weekly program it doesnt leave much time to edit and distribute before the next program is in the making.

There is an option to run the program fortnightly or even monthly, but as the sport is played weekly, on Sundays, I feel that a longer interval between programs would lead to a longer program length needed to cover the missed weeks. While this isnt a problem for CD downloading (and uploading) the file over a 56k connection (which I am using) could verge on the rediculous.

Still think its a viable project?

Hi Paul, I knew you were right on really, my second love after West Ham are Miami Dolphins, as you can see I am a world class loser
So, I will follow your link later on. I think you may like to think about streaming video over the net? You can edit the weeks highlights, even mini interviews with players and coaches, plus the weeks tables , news etc, upload them and let fans select from the server. Yes, I will be a supporter. We had the B52s but I don't think the amateur game has caught public attention. I try to be with my relatives in Canada during the NFL playoffs
Keep me posted, and yes I think you have a "runner" there. how you overcome the net problems could be of great interest to lots of clubs as well.
cheers, Barry