MiniDV Question

Look at the prices over at http://www.bhphotovideo.com I bought my camera from them (a TRV33), and they were 100 dollars cheaper than anyone else. You'll have to click the "email me a better price" link...... It works well, is relatively small, and an easy camera to use. Actually, I saw it cheaper even, but I had no way of verifying those companies were reputable, B&H has been around for a long time.

Eric
------------------
"I'm hoping to see if any dead people will be my friends." - SS

I have a mini DV camera from JVC. It works pretty well but the computer editing is not that great. If you have a Sony VAIO computer I would recomend buying a sony camera because the computer and camera have a really cool editing process. But the Mini DV camera's are really lighwieght and small. Good for a day at the park.
------------------
when life hands you lemonade you have to add oranges to make super powerful orangenaid.

Eric,

How well does the TRV33 work? Can you give me some pros and cons of the camera? Thanks

------------------
ALL NEW COASTER SITE!
www.coasterinsomniacs.com

What if you don't have enough computer memory at this time, but still want to buy a Mini DV. Is there a way to put all the footage on a VCR tape for storage, then be able to transfer it back to the computer when your computer has enough Gigs to handle the video? My computer may have at most 5 gigs now. Then when I buy a new computer or upgrade I can transfer and edit all the raw footage into a nice finished video. How do you go about doing it this way?

Copying digital video to VHS is a lot like using crayon to touch up a photo. It'll look like crap and you'll have nothing usable. Your choice is to either not recycle DV tapes (something I wouldn't suggest anyway) or buy another hard drive for your computer. I've seen big ones for $60, which doesn't seem like a big deal if you're spending hundreds on a camera.

------------------
Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com - Sillynonsense.com
DELETED! What time does the water show start?

MiniDV IS videotape. It's a 1/4" videotape recorded in an all-digital format.

You can connect your DV camcorder to your TV set and watch the video coming out.

You can connect your DV camcorder to your VHS (or Beta or Betacam or 8mm or Hi-8 or U-Matic or D2 or D1 or DVHS or S-VHS or PXL-2000 or whatever) recorder to make copies just as you would for anything else. Heck, you can even feed the video into analog editing gear if you so choose.

In my case, I bought the DV camcorder at the start of the 2000 season, but didn't buy a computer to go with it until November of 2002!

Another thing you can do with the DV...All DV tapes have drop-frame time code on them. Whether you have a computer you can edit video on or not, sit down with your footage and your computer and log your shots...that is, indicate the tape ID, the contents of the shot, the starting timecode, and the ending timecode. If you have no editing software yet, put all that into a spreadsheet or database. Then later, when you have editing software, you can export that shot log to the software, select the clips you want, hit RECORD on the editor, and it will run off to the tape and start bringing in the footage. Really simplifies editing! Particularly if you can then bring in only the clips that you need rather than bringing in the whole tape including all the useless crap.

Just a suggestion... :)

--Dave Althoff, Jr.
*** This post was edited by RideMan 6/30/2003 4:50:11 PM ***

...and let me tell you, for DV editing as well as other things, having a second hard drive is ALWAYS a good idea.

My computer just decided it didn't like the internal hard drive that came with it, and I had to get it replaced. Thank God I had bought an external hard drive with more than enough space to back up all my video AND 2+ years worth of digital photos.

What Dave says is true too - you can do alot with a camera even without any software. I know for a fact that my Canon camera (and probably, all the other DV cams) let you mess around with the video inside the camera. (Transitions and stuff.) Personally, I wouldn't do it, because I like to have raw footage, but if you're desperate, it is an option.

------------------
"Well, I'm sure I'd feel much worse if I weren't under such heavy sedation." - David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
http://www.loopscrew.com

I'm planning on getting the Sony DCR TRV33....unless anyone knows anything bad about this camera that I should be aware of? Thanks for all your help!

------------------
ALL NEW COASTER SITE!
www.coasterinsomniacs.com

Just to make the point again... copying DV to VHS is like putting chocolate syrup on your salad and calling healthy.

------------------
Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com - Sillynonsense.com
DELETED! What time does the water show start?

Jeff.... I won't be doing that. ;) But thanks for the heads-up!

------------------
ALL NEW COASTER SITE!
www.coasterinsomniacs.com

---

Hmm...well I know for a fact I'm not gonna upgrade my computer to XP. Sorry.

---

Any particular reason? It's a great operating system. What are you running now? 98? Cause older operating systems like that only use FAT32 instead of NTFS for file storage. This means that you will be up against a 4GB limit for your file sizes. Video files can easily get larger then this. So it will possibly be a pain for you to chop things up into smaller pieces. Also, those same older (Non NT/2000/XP) operating systems are prone to crashes and the last thing you want when editing (and especially rendering your video which can take some time depending on effects used) are crashes.

Also, why do you want an external drive? That's more expensive and can be a bottleneck with video editing on some systems. If you're running a windows system, my recomendations would be upgrading to XP and getting a second internal HD formated with NTFS. The drive should be 7200 RPM and as large as you can possibly afford. (You WILL use up space faster then you ever imagined with video).

Also, if you haven't already done so, I highly recommend reading post in newsgroups such as rec.video.desktop and familiarize yourself with terms before you buy anything. Also picking up some magazines from your local bookstore such as Videomaker would be a good thing to do as well.

Hope that helps, and if you have any other questions feel free to ask me.

*** This post was edited by Coasterbuf 7/1/2003 2:27:39 AM ***

Well how else are you supposed to eat Salad?! You've gotta have some taste!

BTW - I've transfered all my raw footage onto VHS (and now onto DVD since I just bought a burner) and I haven't noticed much diffrence in the quality... And this is on a brand new widescreen plasma tv my parents bought about a month ago.

------------------
Corey
"This is America! We speak English not jive!"
*** This post was edited by rOLLocOASt 7/1/2003 2:43:45 AM ***

Some of us have a background where we see how evil and substandard VHS is. I'm the guy who messes with my parents' TV when I come over because humans aren't supposed to glow red.

------------------
Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com - Sillynonsense.com
DELETED! What time does the water show start?

Jeff, do you make house calls? My TV needs some work. :D

------------------
--Greg, aka Oat Boy
My page
"Another visitor. Stay a while. Stay FOREVER!"

But be careful, Jeff...

You get too deep into this stuff and you'll start complaining about how awful 4:1:1 subsampling is for keying, and how if you really want to do good video you have to use something that is 601 native because even 5:1 is too much compression... :)

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

Bah... that's crap. Maybe they need better keying mechanisms. I used to do keys from DV tape imported into Media 100 without a single problem. It's not like we shoot feature films on DV.

------------------
Jeff - Webmaster/Admin - CoasterBuzz.com - Sillynonsense.com
DELETED! What time does the water show start?