[nathanm]

Although I'm sure there's far better forums around for this subject, I'm gonna ask here anyway.  What the hey...

Has anyone here had experience editing DV and\or MPEG video?  My project is editing together 20-year old home movies on VHS into something borderline watchable with the end product being a DVD.  Basically I want to know what format is most efficient.  It seems that I can capture the stuff using either MPEG or DV.  If I go MPEG I can use my existing iMovie software, but if I want to go DV it looks like I'd have to use Final Cut Pro or something. ($$$) 

I want to avoid tedium wherever possible and be able to split up and assemble  the clips without waiting for the computer to 'Do Something' if you know what I mean.  I know that dragging in MOV or AVI files into iMovie, even if they're tiny, requires many excruciating progress bars.  That's the part I want to avoid if I can.  I also want the video to look as good as possible of course with as litle generation loss as I can get away with.

Probably not enough information, but if anyone has some advice as to where I should start that'd be cool.  Thanks!

[randytsuch]

Nathan
There is a ton of information here of video stuff
http://forum.videohelp.com/

But, it may be too much.
There are many ways, and many programs to do what you want to do.

My first question is how are you bringing your VHS movies into your PC?  Do you already have a video capture card?  What kind, and what formats does it support?  This may drive how you edit your movies.

MPEG files are much smaller than DV files.  An 1.5 hour DV file from my video camera is almost 20G.  I convert it to a MPG2 file of about 4.5G, for burning to DVD.  So, you need lots of HD space, more if you work wth DV/AVI files.

MPG2 editing is limited, you can basically just cut out what you don't want, or join together smaller files into one big file.  If you work with AVI files, you can add captions, fade in and out, and do other "special effect" kind of things.  Depends how fancy you want to be.

I use a bunch of "a la carte" programs, each one does a special function for me.  It is more complicated this way, but these programs do their job well, as they are only designed to do one thing.  The big companies, Adobe, Pinnacle, Ulead all sell programs that will do everything you need to make a DVD, usually for around $100 or a little less.  Most have a mode for reading in a video tape, and then burning the video to a DVD automatically.  My method is much more labor intensive, but I have complete control over the end product, and I know exactly what happens in each intermediate step.  These integrated programs are easier to use, but they take some of this control away.

Edit
Is this for an Apple/Mac? 
There is an mac forum at my link, I have no experience with Macs, but the generic parts of my comments still apply, on what you can do with MPG2 versus AVI files.

Randy

[nathanm]

Thanks!  No, I don't have any video-related equipment yet.  I just discovered that there's such a thing as Final Cut Express which is a relief, that may be plenty good for what I want to do.  I figure that Apple software will feel the most familiar for me.

I've got a Mac G4 MDD and a fair amount of disk space at least.  A friend who is collaborating on this project does have a cheap capture card, but I had my eye on this model if I decide to go the DV route:

http://www.canopus.com/products/ADVC300/index.php

I think I'll try capturing with his card first and see how it looks.  I also have to digitize footage from his ancient Beta tapes which should be interesting.  Not sure if the deck still works!  My own VCR needs to be replaced as well, as I've got no remote for it and can't adjust the tracking, so some of the tapes are garbled\noisy\jumpy upon playback.

[Carlman]

To add one more step to this issue...
What would be the best way to transfer Super8 or other film to DVD?  Is there a movie scanner of some sort available?
-C

[PhilNYC]

If I go MPEG I can use my existing iMovie software, but if I want to go DV it looks like I'd have to use Final Cut Pro or something. ($$$) 

I edit video from my mini-DV camcorder using iMovie with no problems...

[randytsuch]

Thanks!  No, I don't have any video-related equipment yet.  I just discovered that there's such a thing as Final Cut Express which is a relief, that may be plenty good for what I want to do.  I figure that Apple software will feel the most familiar for me.

I've got a Mac G4 MDD and a fair amount of disk space at least.  A friend who is collaborating on this project does have a cheap capture card, but I had my eye on this model if I decide to go the DV route:

http://www.canopus.com/products/ADVC300/index.php

I think I'll try capturing with his card first and see how it looks.  I also have to digitize footage from his ancient Beta tapes which should be interesting.  Not sure if the deck still works!  My own VCR needs to be replaced as well, as I've got no remote for it and can't adjust the tracking, so some of the tapes are garbled\noisy\jumpy upon playback.

The canopus thing looks cool, also looks expensive, looks like it runs about $500.  If you just want to capture video, it may be overkill. 
I am also not sure why you would want to convert back from DV to analog, sounds like marketing BS that has no real use.
And, the part about enhancing old videos, I am sure you can find software that does that (even on a Mac ).
I mean it all sounds nice, but I am cheap, so I would probably buy a cheaper capture device, and then find software to do the other things.

To add one more step to this issue...
What would be the best way to transfer Super8 or other film to DVD?  Is there a movie scanner of some sort available?
-C

You need a video capture device.  I currently have a USB based TV tuner that also has video inputs.  It is made by Happauge, their WinTV-USB2 (I think), but is for PC’s.  There are video capture devices for Macs, but I know nothing about them.

When I was converting my old analog tapes, I used an ATI All in wonder card, which had video inputs.  It had a hardware MPG converter, so it would read in the video, and has chips on the card that convert the video to MPG2 files.  Some capture cards do this with software, which takes more processing power and resources.  With faster PC’s, it should not really be an issue though.  This card became obsolete to me when I upgraded my PC.

You should also be able to capture the files as AVI files.  These are the same file types that you get when you capture DV tapes from a DV camcorder.

If you capture the files as AVI files, at some point you need to “render” the files to MPG2, for burning to DVD.  Some programs make this stuff transparent, I do it all manually. 

Randy

[nathanm]

The nice thing I see about the Canopus (or the Edirol VMC-1 which has more knobby goodness) is that the adjustments are made in analog before it gets converted to digital.  That way you aren't dealing with extra rendering steps.  I always prefer to fidget with knobs instead of the mouse anyway.  Applying effects and filters in iMovie tests the limits of my patience (probably why I prefer to work with still images rather than video, heh!)

I think Carlman is talking about film though, not video.  (Super8, not Hi8)  You need one of those telecine machines for that.  Looks like it might make more sense to have a shop do it for you, as the machines themselves look pricey.  Probably a more daunting task than VHS!  A funny little quote I found from a business that does the service:

The most common job we do is transferring film (8 mm, Super8, and 16 mm) to video tape.   The film is essentially  shot into the lens of a video camera using a device called a telecine converter (fancy name for a mirror).  This can be done at home, but is not a pleasant task.  I would not advise doing this yourself unless you are in dire need of a hobby.

[Jade East]

Nath

I'm a video editor.
Get a mini dv camera record your vhs to minidv.
Use imovie to edit your transfered tapes.
Here is what is good about this workflow.
You have a backup of your video in a format tape.
You dont need a capture card or to bog down the CPU or
hard drive capturing as the camera is doing the conversion
to mini dv on the fly.

Mini dv is way better to edit than MPG2.

Unfortunately quality from the vhs will be the limitting factor
as far as quality of your final output.

[nathanm]

I did consider that, probably a great idea - but I didn't want to open up a whole new can of worms.  If I buy a camera I'll want to shoot something with it and get distracted instead of concentrating on my mission of editing my old stuff. Heh!  I bought the Edirol VMC-1 box so I'll see how that goes.

Let me ask you another question Jade East; I've got about 50 tapes with footage on it I want to use (not all are full obviously) in this compilation.  I want to be able to access stuff from here and there but I am concerned about the storage requirements.  Got any advice as to how I should approach this?  Will an external RAID array be noticeably faster to work with?  I am using a Mac G4 MDD with 2GB RAM and four internal drives.  One system disk, another single disk and two drives striped in RAID 0 using Disk Utility.  I've got a fair amount of free space, but I have my doubts that it will be enough.

[Jade East]

50 tapes. OK.

Are they 1 hr tapes or 120min tapes.
Estimate your total footage time?
Free space on the drives?
Drive speeds?

What software are you going to use?

I am unfamiliar with the edirol
and the codecs it uses but I will look at it.

Don't start digitizing your stuff whole hog just yet.
We want to look out for any problems that may pop up
with your work flow.

[nathanm]

120 min tapes.  Good question on the footage, geez, I have no idea.  Many many hours!  There aren't long stretches, just little segments of stuff here and there.  Lots of junk too.  I will be using iMovie for the time being.  Otherwise I might have to give Final Cut Express a shot, even though it may be overkill.  I do like the idea of having more than one video track to work with.  Drives are 7200RPM Seagate Barracudas ATA-100. 

I suspect I will have to be very conservative and just grab what parts I know I will want and leave the rest.  I am assuming more storage will be required.  Right now I have about 500GB free.

[Jade East]

I looked at the unit quickly it looks like it is doing the conversion from
Analog to mini dv through firewire.
4 min of mini dv is about a gig so 15 gigs an hour.
Most firewire or better drives should be able to handle the through put to do minidv.(your atta is  fine)

You don't have to digitize everything if you make a paper edit first hand.
Watch all your footage and make notes as to what is on the tapes.
Just rough sketch with sequantial information at time from the
absolute begining of the tape.

Editing has some unfun aspects to it but you will be thank full later in
the process.

* you have just posted before I got this 500gb will do fine.
I have a couple of other sugestions but feel free to ask
anything else.

[jqp]

I too recommend Jade East's suggestion of getting a Mini DV camcorder.

Why?

The camera does all that work for you, and you focus on editing the clips.

Take a Sony camcorder. It will convert any analog input from VHS camcorders or VCRs to Mini DV format for you on the fly, probably about as good as it can get.

It has analog in/out and firewire in/out.

Otherwise you will spend hours and hours playing with the settings to get just the right video conversion, then spend the hours doing the actual editing. The computer will chug away for as much as 8 hours at at time, just to get 1 video tape onto the PC with decent quality. Then you will wonder if that is really the best quality you can get from your components and tweak the settings...

A Sony camcorder, at least my old Digital 8, can output your VHS to the PC on the fly, and it will be about as good as you could get it 99% of the time.

Another option is to get a DVD Recorder and burn your VHS tapes, through a Mini DV camcorder which you would also need, directly to DVD. This is handy if you want give someone a copy of what you taped, on a DVD. With this setup you can very easily cut scenes out as you record to the DVD (by pressing the pause button on the DVD Recorder).

[nathanm]

It is on the fly.  The VMC-1 is doing the same thing as a camera would, just with additional signal controls. (a "proc amp" is the term I believe) You plug the VCR video output into the analog input and DV comes out through the firewire cable.  Then I assume the computer\iMovie is merely copying the incoming data to a file. The VHS tape is playing in real time so the computer would obviously have to be recording in real time.  The lengthy chugging away is probably the final rendering of the edit in iMovie and I suspect if there are minimal transitions\titles etc. to process then it probably goes quicker.

[nathanm]

I got it all running and it seems to be working fine, aside from some iMovie crashes.  What I can't figure out is where these capture files are located on the drive.  It starts with "Clip 01.dv" but I can't find where it's supposed to be.  Some invisible temp folder somewhere?  It doesn't really matter I guess, the thing works, but I wanted to know where they were.

[jqp]

It is on the fly.  The VMC-1 is doing the same thing as a camera would, just with additional signal controls. (a "proc amp" is the term I believe) You plug the VCR video output into the analog input and DV comes out through the firewire cable.  Then I assume the computer\iMovie is merely copying the incoming data to a file. The VHS tape is playing in real time so the computer would obviously have to be recording in real time.  The lengthy chugging away is probably the final rendering of the edit in iMovie and I suspect if there are minimal transitions\titles etc. to process then it probably goes quicker.

Ahh - didn't see that you had already bought that one.