Havin' a b*tch of a time...

[groovewonder]

Havin' a b*tch of a time trying to record from my digital video camera to my laptop. You guys have any suggestions? We can't get anything to work. Even bought an external drive to try to go direct but it won't even notice the damn new drive. We're running on XP, got a 20 gig HD, 30 gig HD, and an external 80 gig HD (two separate laptops networked together) and can't get shit to happen!!!!!



Starting to hate my pc again.

I could use some help on this. Maybe if Rop Pongi could give me some pointers...... Dude is like super man!

I probably just need to buy more memory or something simple like that. Camera is high quality, laptop is a recent Vaio. HD is brand new. Any tips? Really want to learn this stuff but keep getting beat up by my computer.

[maraboutslim]

Here you go...

http://www.apple.com/switch/ads/janieporche.html

or if you prefer Japanese...

http://www.apple.com/switch/ads/satoruyokouchi.html

-Slim

[cstaylor]

Here here! The Mac is an awesome video editing platform if you can afford the hardware and Final Cut Pro.

[groovewonder]

I wouldn't mind switching to mac, but unfortunately this is not a possibility at the time being. But I know plenty of people who were able to get this video thing going without turning around and changing loyalties to mac. Just most of them use PC. Don't know anyone having success with a laptop, but anything is possible.

[Caustic Saint]

I could use some help on this. Maybe if Rop Pongi could give me some pointers...... Dude is like super man!

Wait...there's a third Pongi? And you say he wears a cape....?

[Taro Toporific]

I could use some help on this. Maybe if Rop Pongi could give me some pointers...... Dude is like super man!

Wait...there's a third Pongi? And you say he wears a cape....?

Oh that's just a typing error. He meant Fop Pongi--the gay Pongi who wears a pink cape. Or maybe Lop Pongi who wears a bunny suit. Oh where is Vince with the photos of these Pongii?

[GomiGirl]

I wouldn't mind switching to mac, but unfortunately this is not a possibility at the time being. But I know plenty of people who were able to get this video thing going without turning around and changing loyalties to mac. Just most of them use PC. Don't know anyone having success with a laptop, but anything is possible.

You don't have to swtich over 100% - we are 90% mac (including a MAC OSX Server) in our office and everything works in harmony..

[Big Booger]

you just need some software:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/home/using/howto/movies/starting.asp

or you can get Adobe Premiere. Movie Maker is free, Premiere is not.


Last thing,
If you have a video capture card on your PC or laptop, you can capture the feed that way. Simply plug your camera into the capture card with an S-video or composite cable. Turn on your PC or laptop, run the software that came with your capture card, then start capturing the video.



Hope that helps.

[groovewonder]

If you have a video capture card on your PC or laptop, you can capture the feed that way. Simply plug your camera into the capture card with an S-video or composite cable. Turn on your PC or laptop, run the software that came with your capture card, then start capturing the video.

Thanks. That's what we've been doing though. We've been doing exactly this, but for some reason the recording feed is going dirt slow. No movement whatsoever almost. I thought maybe it'd be possible to lower the frames per second, but I haven't figured out if this is a possibility.

We bought a new network hard drive two days ago (not USB), and though it kicks ass, for some reason, the video capture refuses to be saved onto the network HD. It'll save to the laptop, but it gives an error whenever we try to save to the network HD. the laptop has shit for space available. the new HD has all kinds of free space. Waste of gahdayum money.

I'm gonna try to snag a copy of Premiere tommorrow to mess with.

You guys aren't aware of Rop Pongi? He's a pretty well known guy out here in Okinawa. Maybe distantly related to Rob but with the same calibre of technical prowess. Sorry for the typo Rob.

[Big Booger]

What do you mean network HDD? Do you mean it is installed in a PC, and you want to save it by sending the data over the network?

Is it an external HDD? How does it connect? have you any updated drivers? What error exactly does it give when you try to save it?

What are the specs for the laptop?

Ulead also makes a fine video capturing and authoring software that is a bit more expensive than Premiere AFAIK. You might want to give that a shot.

If you can post the error that you are getting I might be able to help you further.

As for the slowness of the feed, it could be that your PC needs a ram upgrade or a processor upgrade, especially if it is pre Pentium4, or Pre 1.0ghz..

I'd recommend at least 512MB of ram, bare minimum..
1gig would be a lot better for video editing and transfer. YOu could also try, if you have a firewire port to transfer the video that way.

[maraboutslim]

It's possible that the write speed of your drive isn't fast enough to keep up with the video capture. Or that the connection of the hard drive to the computer isn't able to handle that speed. Sorry I can't provide any more specifics but that's just something I'd look at.

-Slim

[gpvillamil]

Can you describe *exactly* how everything is plugged together?

You mentioned that you have two laptops networked together - is that over a LAN?

How is the external drive plugged in? Is it connected to one of the laptops, if so what kind of port? Does the drive work for other things, but not video capture?

How are you connecting the video camera to the laptop? Are you *sure* it is the video input, and not a firewire/i-link port?

[kurohinge1]

Here's my 2 cents:

It sounds like you need to format the new drive so your system recognises it, then make sure you're copying to the dedicated drive with all the available space. You want to avoid the main drive as it has background operations that slow everything down and cause a loss of some frames during capture.

I use Pinnalce's Studio version 8, a 40G HD with about 512 memory and capture DV via a firewire without any loss of frames.

Hope this helps.

[Taro Toporific]

My computer just crashed...as soon as I'm able to get my crap laptop back in action. ... Taihen. Sayaku.

A new name for it: CRAPTOP computer

[groovewonder]

Sorry, last post was from me. Can't seem to remember to log on with other people's computers...

[groovewonder]

Got my "craptop" fixed. I guess it had some bad memory so I had an upgrade done and it works like a champ. I could use a memory upgrade myself.