Saturday, January 21, 2006
Video Capturing (analog to digital conversion): Data Video's DAC-100
After getting burned by TWO different Pinnacle video capture products, both feeding to the computer's USB2 port, I decided to look for a product which feeds the digitized signal to the Firewire port instead. My reasoning is that most video editing products automatically "know about" firewire ports. Some investigation and one or two reviews led me to this product (link above), which is an externally powered device which takes an analog video input (either compositive or S-video) and turns it into a digital signal which is sent through the firewire cable to your computer). I wanted to be able to import video directly into Adobe Premier Pro.
It's about $200---not inexpensive by any means---but looks and feels solid. The instruction manual is pretty much a joke. It comes with NO software. So far, I had a sinking feeling in my stomach... However, as it turns out, it needs no software. It's pretty much a plug-n-play thing: feed the analog signal into the box, plug the firewire cable into the computer, turn the box on (the computer immediately recognizes it automatically, just as if you'd attached a DV camcorder), and go into Adobe Premier, punch the F5 function key, and you're ready to import. Totally unlike the Pinnacle device, the device starts recording immediately when you tell it to. No 20 second delay. This difference makes me want to dance for joy. (I had to race across the room, backtrack the TiVo unit and start all over again with Pinnacle). When you stop, it stops, and you can start again virtually immediately, making the process of saving a longer work into shorter segments a no-brainer. It increments segments automatically: "clip one" "clip two" etc.
I found that the "noise" at the top or bottom of the screen which Pinnacle created, was totally gone with the DAC-100. Overall, the signal seemed to be cleaner, sharper. And no capture glitches. It works, simply, every time.
So, here's a way to capture movies, specials and old VHS tapes into your computer. It's virtually plug-n-play. Worth every penny. I took a 2 hour special, imported it into the computer in one long capture, and lost no frames, had no glitches. Pinnacle could never pull that off.
Keep in mind that owners of most DV camcorders don't need such a convertor, since their camera will fulfill the function (albeit in a rather roundabout way; usually one has to import the analog video into the camera, making a digital TAPE of it. Then, another two hours to dump the same tape into the computer).
After getting burned by TWO different Pinnacle video capture products, both feeding to the computer's USB2 port, I decided to look for a product which feeds the digitized signal to the Firewire port instead. My reasoning is that most video editing products automatically "know about" firewire ports. Some investigation and one or two reviews led me to this product (link above), which is an externally powered device which takes an analog video input (either compositive or S-video) and turns it into a digital signal which is sent through the firewire cable to your computer). I wanted to be able to import video directly into Adobe Premier Pro.
It's about $200---not inexpensive by any means---but looks and feels solid. The instruction manual is pretty much a joke. It comes with NO software. So far, I had a sinking feeling in my stomach... However, as it turns out, it needs no software. It's pretty much a plug-n-play thing: feed the analog signal into the box, plug the firewire cable into the computer, turn the box on (the computer immediately recognizes it automatically, just as if you'd attached a DV camcorder), and go into Adobe Premier, punch the F5 function key, and you're ready to import. Totally unlike the Pinnacle device, the device starts recording immediately when you tell it to. No 20 second delay. This difference makes me want to dance for joy. (I had to race across the room, backtrack the TiVo unit and start all over again with Pinnacle). When you stop, it stops, and you can start again virtually immediately, making the process of saving a longer work into shorter segments a no-brainer. It increments segments automatically: "clip one" "clip two" etc.
I found that the "noise" at the top or bottom of the screen which Pinnacle created, was totally gone with the DAC-100. Overall, the signal seemed to be cleaner, sharper. And no capture glitches. It works, simply, every time.
So, here's a way to capture movies, specials and old VHS tapes into your computer. It's virtually plug-n-play. Worth every penny. I took a 2 hour special, imported it into the computer in one long capture, and lost no frames, had no glitches. Pinnacle could never pull that off.
Keep in mind that owners of most DV camcorders don't need such a convertor, since their camera will fulfill the function (albeit in a rather roundabout way; usually one has to import the analog video into the camera, making a digital TAPE of it. Then, another two hours to dump the same tape into the computer).
Video Editing, alas...
Pinnacle Studio version 10. I gave it up. In the dozen or so times I tried it, it never produced worthwhile footage, but often led me to believe it was going to... (i.e. wasted time). Furthermore, the video capture device I bought with it is pretty much zero---it drops frames or freezes up, and as far as I can determine will work (if it does) ONLY with Pinnacle 10. (pretty much a dead loss, in my book. Pinnacle is now officially on my sh-- list. Pinnacle, you lost a good customer.)
So, Adobe, here we are. I've learned that Premier Pro can do things I never thought possible, provided you're willing to spend the time learning. After all has been said and done, most of the program is intuitive, given prior experience only with Pinnacle. I've learned that my 2.6 Ghz AMD processor (and 1.5 gigs of RAM) is adequate for the task (provided that one primarily edits .avi files; compressed .mpg files are more CPU intensive, and create the "stuttering" in the editing process, probably not in the finished product; also, see below regarding Adobe's Encore).
When you're done editing your video in Premier, you export the "movie" as an .avi file. Then you have to choose which product to use to finish the process of creating a DVD. Encore is Adobe's "DVD authoring" software offering.
Compared to Premier, it is very dense, not intuitive, and at least in my hands thus far, somewhat glitchy. (e.g. it tells me that I have too much program to put onto a single DVD, even when the sum total of the content is something less than 40 minutes). Only after much fiddling, can I coerce the program to finish the project.
Encore allows ready integration with Photoshop, in which one can create custom menu's---a feature which is a WHOLE LOT nicer than being forced to use the same canned menu's time-after-time in Pinnacle. Taking the edited .avi footage from Premier, "transposing" (compressing) it for DVD, adding menus (and presumably subtitles and a secondary audio track if you want), and then burning a DVD is a time-consuming process. Not only the operator end of things, but also in processor time: 3 or 4 hours to digest (transpose) a 1 hour movie. Here is where a faster (much faster) processor would undoubtedly help. However, the product in each of three cases, has been turned out without a glitch, and "that's where the money is," as they say.
I do believe that as my familiarity grows with these two products, I'll be happy that Pinnacle forced me to abandon ship.
Pinnacle Studio version 10. I gave it up. In the dozen or so times I tried it, it never produced worthwhile footage, but often led me to believe it was going to... (i.e. wasted time). Furthermore, the video capture device I bought with it is pretty much zero---it drops frames or freezes up, and as far as I can determine will work (if it does) ONLY with Pinnacle 10. (pretty much a dead loss, in my book. Pinnacle is now officially on my sh-- list. Pinnacle, you lost a good customer.)
So, Adobe, here we are. I've learned that Premier Pro can do things I never thought possible, provided you're willing to spend the time learning. After all has been said and done, most of the program is intuitive, given prior experience only with Pinnacle. I've learned that my 2.6 Ghz AMD processor (and 1.5 gigs of RAM) is adequate for the task (provided that one primarily edits .avi files; compressed .mpg files are more CPU intensive, and create the "stuttering" in the editing process, probably not in the finished product; also, see below regarding Adobe's Encore).
When you're done editing your video in Premier, you export the "movie" as an .avi file. Then you have to choose which product to use to finish the process of creating a DVD. Encore is Adobe's "DVD authoring" software offering.
Compared to Premier, it is very dense, not intuitive, and at least in my hands thus far, somewhat glitchy. (e.g. it tells me that I have too much program to put onto a single DVD, even when the sum total of the content is something less than 40 minutes). Only after much fiddling, can I coerce the program to finish the project.
Encore allows ready integration with Photoshop, in which one can create custom menu's---a feature which is a WHOLE LOT nicer than being forced to use the same canned menu's time-after-time in Pinnacle. Taking the edited .avi footage from Premier, "transposing" (compressing) it for DVD, adding menus (and presumably subtitles and a secondary audio track if you want), and then burning a DVD is a time-consuming process. Not only the operator end of things, but also in processor time: 3 or 4 hours to digest (transpose) a 1 hour movie. Here is where a faster (much faster) processor would undoubtedly help. However, the product in each of three cases, has been turned out without a glitch, and "that's where the money is," as they say.
I do believe that as my familiarity grows with these two products, I'll be happy that Pinnacle forced me to abandon ship.
