i have some tapes i need to convert to dvd and it looks like it would be cheaper for me to have someone else do this for me. anyone here ever done this and where did you get it done?
If you buy one of those Panasonic DVD video recorders for about £120, you can plug in your VCR and then use a DVD-R disc and just hit record. These are more expensive models but it's the same type:
But DVDs are pretty cheap if you get a spindle so just using a normal DVD would be fine. If you do it right, you wouldn't even have to edit on your computer unless you wanted chapters but you could do that with the DVD afterwards.
If you want to use your Mac, you would need a DV interface, like a canopus ADVC110, then use iDVD to lay out the menus...
The other option is a VCR/DVD-R combo STB, they cost about ~$200 and from what I hear (never having used one for this purpose) some units make the DVDs in such a way where other devices cant read them. I once had someone bring in a home-made DVD in my former job, irt would play in our Samsung unit, but not the Sonys or GoVideo...so be carefull.
I was tasked with this same project at work last year for our training videos. Go with the Canopus, import into iMovie where you can add chapter markers, titles and the like before sending the project over to iDVD.
If you want to get really fancy, use some of the plug-ins available from GeeThree.
I'm planning on buying a digital video camera. Several cameras have audio and visual inputs, so you can record from the VCR to the camera. Then hook the camera up to the mac and edit the way you normally would. It adds an extra step (unless you have a camera that has analog to digital pass through), but I need a camcorder anyways, so it makes far more sense to just find a model with these features.
I'm planning on buying a digital video camera. Several cameras have audio and visual inputs, so you can record from the VCR to the camera. Then hook the camera up to the mac and edit the way you normally would. It adds an extra step (unless you have a camera that has analog to digital pass through), but I need a camcorder anyways, so it makes far more sense to just find a model with these features.
I asked a sales person at Best Buy about getting VCR content onto my computer and he said I would get better results recording from the VCR -> camcorder -> computer than I would if I recorded from VCR -> computer. His reason was the camcorder would boost/clear up the signal (video and sound) when it was imported into or exported from the camcorder, I forget which one. I do not know if this applies to all camcorders or the one that he had in his hand so you might want to look for this feature or
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http://www.digitalempireonline.co.uk...es&ModelID=693
http://shop.panasonic.co.uk/invt/dmres15ebs
You would be able to use DVD-Ram to avoid mistakes if OS X saw the video correctly but it doesn't unless you use something like ReadDVD:
http://www.softarch.com/us/products/rdvd.html
But DVDs are pretty cheap if you get a spindle so just using a normal DVD would be fine. If you do it right, you wouldn't even have to edit on your computer unless you wanted chapters but you could do that with the DVD afterwards.
The other option is a VCR/DVD-R combo STB, they cost about ~$200 and from what I hear (never having used one for this purpose) some units make the DVDs in such a way where other devices cant read them. I once had someone bring in a home-made DVD in my former job, irt would play in our Samsung unit, but not the Sonys or GoVideo...so be carefull.
If you want to get really fancy, use some of the plug-ins available from GeeThree.
~~Quentin
Originally posted by Quentin
I'm planning on buying a digital video camera. Several cameras have audio and visual inputs, so you can record from the VCR to the camera. Then hook the camera up to the mac and edit the way you normally would. It adds an extra step (unless you have a camera that has analog to digital pass through), but I need a camcorder anyways, so it makes far more sense to just find a model with these features.
~~Quentin
This is what I've done too.