JVC GZ-MG555: Will it import?

Hi Forest,

I've had hard drives on my computers die, so yes, I have (but not on a camera; my first HDD cam). The thing is, if my hard drive dies, I have bigger problems than the video that is sitting on that drive; I have a "broken" camera!

I regularly back up my data, and a hard drive dying is less likely than a tape being destroyed, damaged, or lost. Additionally, I've experienced a camera whose tape motor is dying, and that is just as likely if not more so than an HDD failure (tape motors have more and larger moving parts than an HDD).

You are right though about the quality -- the highest quality still comes on a tape. For those who are just hobbyists who like to make fun videos that will not be broadcast on television, the HDD cam is a great alternative to the tape.

I'm using an external hard drive to back up my videos. I also keep current projects on my laptop hard drive. In order to avoid having too much unnecessary data on my external HDD, I back up some stuff to DVD (usually things that I don't plan on changing or messing with anytime soon, since I don't trust DVD-RW reliability and burn my DVD once and then that's it). DVDs are cheaper than DV tapes, and the data rate is quite fast. I can also write a lot of info on the surface of the DVD versus the little writing area of a tape.

But as was mentioned, the highest quality ultimately comes with the tape, and the professionals and even semi-professionals mostly use tapes, especially if their work is going to be broadcast or massively distributed.

You shouldn't have any problems with the import using the firewire. I have a JVC GZ-MG155 that I've been using for about two months now. When importing, I mainly use iMovie 6, just pick the clip you want to start with on the camera, then on your computer, click the record button. It will import all of your clips from that point on until you tell it to stop or you are out of footage.

If you want to back up the raw footage to an external hard-drive for future use, follow these directions. After you're done importing the files, save your project and quit iMovie. Now find your project and right-click or control-click the project. You will get a drop-down menu. Select Show Package Contents. In there will be a folder called media. Inside the media folder are all of your captured files as .dv files. These are the converted files. Copy these files to an external hard-drive for future use. Thes files can be viewed in QuickTime or brought back right into iMovie for use on another project.

A word of advice. If you didn't already purchase your camera, shop around. My wife got mine for $374 (camera, carrying case, dock, no firewire though) when it retails for anywhere from $500 to $600.

Hey Chilly-B,

That certainly works for backing up the files, but an easier solution might be to just simply drag the movies from iMovie's clip pane (especially if you haven't started editing yet). It gets the job done as well.

Another piece of advice. If you're going to be working with any significant amount of video, such as editing a project of over 30 minutes, you'll want a HUGE drive. Hours of footage can easily end up making up only 10 minutes of a project, and those hours make for SERIOUS storage requirements.

Buy one of those 500GB drives and keep it strictly organized with clearly labeled folders. Keep naming your files as you get them, or at least use Automator to name a batch to something like "In the Park-x.mpg" where x = a number.