Exporting to Camera from Canopus ADVC 110

Newsgropus on which I posted this question via Google Groups and which offered some help on related questions are alt.video.dvdr, rec.video.desktop, alt.video.dvd.tech, comp.sys.mac.apps, comp.sys.mac.hardware.video besides which I am still trying to join the forums at canopus.com. They won't accept my application due to my email address domains, but either the forum administrator will figure out a way to get me in or I'll join using my friend's email address.

I sure hope someone comes up with an answer as I sort of promised my friend I'd deliver the tape tomorrow.

The firewire has been connected to the back all along, even when I was putting clips in from the camera through the converter to iMovie, in which they worked fine.

The only connector I have for sending anything to the camera is the thing with the two plugs, video and audio, and the connector to the front of the camera. For all I know, the problem could be with this device and not the converter itself. I assume the converter understands if these plugs are connected to the back, it is meant to convert and output (not input back to the computer!)

What I don't understand is what mode to have it in (with all the switches on the bottom and so on if they even come into it.) The light on the front says "Digital In," which I assume is right as the data is coming from the computer, to the converter. But what do I do to send it from the converter to the camera, if that is possible? I had the camera on "Record" before I started (that much of the instructions I understood) and recorded five minutes of the inside of the lens cap. (It's possible the cable plug wasn't in the front of the camera tight enough, but I'm afraid I may have also had the settings wrong.)

If this does not work, I'll have to open ANOTHER WHOLE CAN OF WORMS. I'll have to get out my new DVD burner, connect it, and see if it will burn a DVD directly from iMovie. If it won't, God forbid, I'll have to connect it to the converter and I'll STILL need to know how to output! I would rather bypass all this and send it to my camera with which I am familiar! Thanks for any assistance!

Okay, first I'll try one, then, if necessary, two things.

First, the camera manual DOES have instructions for recording FROM a VCR using the same jack (apparently the only one on it, the hole in the front) as recording TO a VCR, only there's a couple different buttons you push. Maybe that will work with the converter.

If 1. It doesn't work, or 2. It looks totally crummy, I'll record directly FROM the Mac TO a VCR and still bypass all the additional turmoil of trying to connect and understand a DVD burner with which I'm not ready to deal yet.

(Would it really look any fresher if I took it directly from the Mac, to the VCR, with no camera in between? The idea of putting it on the camera was to have it in 3 places, eventually 4 with the DVD--iMovie, 8mm tape, VHS tape, then DVD, in case one of these machines pulls something and loses me the five days of work I put into it.) Or does quality diminishment occur only AFTER it is on VHS and is duplicated to DVD? Because both the guy who is making multiple copies for other people, and me, who will be making DVD copies for myself and a few others, were going to try to cram all four hours onto one disk.

The reason I came asking questions about the converter is it has 6 little switches on the bottom about the position of which the manual is very vague, and God knows if ONE is out of place, NOTHING will work! The "Digital In" light is lit, though, and I suppose the converter understands that if the jacks are connected to the back, and the device connected is in proper recording mode, that it's meant to send the signal out. I'll see if it works. Thanks for the advice and opinions.

Drat. It seems the instructions for recording to the camera from another device are only for the fancy digital model. If I have to Export from iMovie to the ADVC110 converter and then to a VCR that raises another question: the converter demands the connected device be in record the whole time or it will throw a snit and not capture the data. Trouble is, it takes about two minutes to Export from the computer to the converter, then I have NO IDEA if there's something I'm supposed to switch AFTER Exporting to make SURE the data is captured! Meanwhile my VCR has recorded two minutes of nothing during the Export, and then more nothing during however much time it takes to capture, unless it's possible to fool the converter by having the VCR on pause until really ready, which is probably not good for the tape.

What I'd like is some way to Export FROM the computer TO the converter, and then FROM the converter TO the VCR WHEN I'M DARN GOOD AND READY! This was the other big reason I wanted the iMovie titles on the camera--dubbing from the camera, I can put them EXACTLY where on the tape I want them--not just wherever they happen to show up when the machines are ready!

(If there's NO WAY to make it go from the converter to a VCR at will, then I'll HAVE to burn a DVD and just dub from the DVD to the videotape--which means getting out and connecting the DVD burner and reading all THOSE instructions--gasp, shudder.)

It's looking a lot as if I'll have to get a DVD-RW disk and just try it on the DVD burner till I get it right, but even when I get the disk, with or without considering the Canopus ADVC110 converter as part of the equation, I STILL have a question about exporting from iMovie!

It gives me three choices to Export, to Camera, to iDVD, or to Quicktime. Now, is iDVD some sort of application (like iMovie or iPhoto)? If so, I'm pretty sure I don't have it and I KNOW my computer didn't come with a DVD burner--it's a combo drive--plays DVDs only but won't burn them--that's why I had to buy the separate DVD burner.

Or is iDVD a form (like jpeg or whatever) for saving information which can then be sent wherever?

One of the things I am asking is, when I get to the point of connecting my DVD burner, will iMovie relate to it as another destination to which to Export (right now it is relating to the converter as the "Camera") or will it just get confused as to where to Export the movie? Will I have to disconnect the converter, or connect the DVD burner to the converter rather than directly to the Mac even though there are enough ports for both pieces of equipment to be connected to the Mac at once? Thanks.

This says http://www.apple.com/support/imovie/tutorial/imovieTutorial_t9.html that iDVD is an application that helps design and burn DVD disks. I have the sense to see that my material in iMovie, being in digital form, should be transferred directly to DVD, also being in digital form, rather than being run through the converter to tape which would result in a generational loss. Maybe once my DVD burner is connected I'll be lucky and figure out how to get the movie from iDVD to the burner. Guess I'll know tomorrow after receiving the DVD+RW disks I need to do the job!

Since this has both to do with the recording method (to DVD or not to DVD) and the exporting method (how to get the clips from iMovie to VHS tape on the VCR) I'll post this same statement under both threads.

Okay, one advantage if I was able to take things directly from iMovie to a VCR, is, presumably I could select and play each clip separately and could make it come out exactly where on the tape I want. Presumably a DVD can also be advanced or wound back to find a precise point as well.

This statement is to clarify my thinking on generational loss as far as picture and sound from either method. If my reasoning is in any way lacking in these matters, please correct me. The information in iMovie is digital, as is the DVD disk. The VCR is made to copy from DVD so it is my reasoning that tapes made from a DVD disk would come out clear as opposed to trying to take the movie directly off the Mac to the VCR. Of course, I should experiment with both before making anything permanent to compare quality. If I couldn't tell the difference in quality of the finished tape, I should do the method with the least steps. Is this reasoning correct or not? (Thanks.)

Nearly a month into this project (I originally posted on December 15 asking what equipment I needed to get material from my video camera into iMovie and back out again--so far it is in, but not out--) here is my pathetic little progress report. Most of it is in the form of an email to my friend who will be copying the movie for others once it is actually done, but I've added a few technical details I didn't go into with him. If there's anything I am missing, overlooking, not understanding, or getting wrong, perhaps someone will be so kind as to point it out.

Dear Friend,

This is just to let you know of my progress so far and that I am thinking of this project which is right near the front of my list of things to do.

Of course, had I dubbed the tapes directly to VHS from the camera I could have had them done practically the next day. I have already viewed all the footage, decided which section of each will be used for the official "final cut" of the movie, and made careful notes to ensure doing this right.

The delay was because I decided to add some special touches such as titles, and do some tight editing on some of the outtakes, all of which has to be done on the computer. It really only amounts to about 10-15 minutes of a 4-hour movie. The rest will be done the "easy, old-fashioned" way by dubbing directly to VHS but the amount of things to know and time it took to learn and do them were truly frightening. A huge amount of the problem was there wasn't a "simple" way to import and export as I'd bought the plain old tape-shooting camera and not the fancy digital model. Importing was easily solved though purchasing another piece of equipment.

I did have a bit of trouble with the clips, not with importing them but with keeping them straight. I had to ask a whole lot of questions regarding iMovie and one of the things I learned was that clips can be renamed from the "Clip 1," "Clip 2" and so on it gives them when they appear. I now feel pretty confident of having imported everything I need to work on that way and labeling it so I can tell what everything is.

Then, of course, the holidays intervened from at least December 24-28. Right after that the weather had a little temporary good spell and we rushed out to do all the outdoor jobs that didn't get done when it suddenly froze and snowed in November! Now that it seems to have really set in raining I feel I can concentrate.

There are several different ways the clips can be edited and I'm to the point of working on that. After that, there are several ways they might be saved to DVD (I did buy a DVD burner I haven't even got to yet) and IF the DVD plays in my combination VCR/DVD player I'm in great shape. (It's in the case that this doesn't work I've been preparing myself for a major panic!!!) It apparently HAS to be saved to DVD as there IS no exporting, unless you know someone who'd like to lend me a digital camera for long enough to get the stuff out of the computer, then onto tape in the right order!

Anyhow, one of the things that might help is this certain program. (It's called Toast and there is a disagreement among users as to whether Toast 6 or Toast 7 is the best version.) My computer really needs an upgrade, which, if I have it, I can get the latest version of this program. (I'm running Mac OSX 10.2.8, and Toast 7 requires at least 10.3, which is what I'm getting. Then if it doesn't work I can always go back to Toast 6.) I've already ordered the upgrade software and hope by the time I get all the clips really arranged and ready to go it will have arrived and I can do this. (The other reason being, if it gulp doesn't work, with the upgrade it might leave me open to more other options than with the system I am now running.)

So you tell anyone who asks as much of this as you care to repeat. I want to get DVDs for a friend who lives overseas and won't be able to play VHS tapes. I suppose I could make them on my DVD burner by connecting it to the VCR, but it might be easier if I just gave you blank DVDs! I think I'll be giving videos to everyone else on my list as, so far as I understand, the quality might be slightly higher.

What worries me is, for quality reasons, I want to record the master tape on two VHS tapes of two hours each in length. To make DVDs do you have to have material all in one continuous session? So will you have to first run a single VHS tape on LP and then make the DVDs from that? Or is there a way to make DVDs straight from the master tape? Just wondering.

Best to you from your friend.

It's like that song, "Hush, Little Baby," if this doesn't work, then that, if that doesn't work, the next thing. I'm posting it here in case anyone has any helpful suggestions on any step of the process! Thanks for all help so far!

Yes, the Canopus does connect to the Mac via Firewire and yes, iMovie does relate to the Canopus as being the camera. Since the camera connects directly to the Canopus this works beautifully importing.

The problem is with exporting. The camera manual said it would do this, but reading the fine print that applied only to the digital model (which if I'd had it, I wouldn't have needed the Canopus--at least not for this, though it may come in useful for other projects in future--) so there is no way to get anything to the camera (which I would have preferred) via Firewire as the camera has no Firewire connection!

I did discuss simply connecting the VCR to the Canopus, but didn't like that idea for a number of reasons. For one, people assured me I'd suffer all sorts of quality loss that way. For another, although I've made the clips in iMovie as one continuous entity (with a few black space transitions as buffers) it's not meant to be that way on the tape. In other words, I need the opening titles at the beginning, the middle title in the middle, and the closing titles and outtakes at the end, with HOURS of other material in between, and I foresaw an unnecessary degree of trouble, taping a few minutes here and a few minutes there trying to use the Canopus and then dubbing the stuff in between using the camera when it could be so much more easily accomplished using a DVD.

My notion is that if I had it on DVD, I'd have (hopefully) higher resolution AND see better what I was getting--that is, better control as to where on the tape everything ends up! Because playing a DVD, then hitting "Record" on the VCR (presumably how it works), I'd have control as to where exactly it starts and stops recording, which would seem harder to do with the VCR hooked to the Canopus (not to mention lugging the VCR back and forth between the TV where it belongs and the computer.) I'd rather just leave the VCR/DVD combo where it belongs and have a DVD I could carry over to it, and do the whole thing that way. (Another good reason being, with the VCR connected to the TV, if you're not sure what you got, you can play it back immediately. Without this, you have to lug it over to the TV, connect it...and so on.)

But if it absolutely WON'T WORK (getting my DVD burner to create a DVD which will play on my player) I guess I will HAVE to do it that cumbersome and questionable way as I really have only two other ideas, both bad.

1. Call everyone I know until I find someone with a digital camera who'll lend it to me, or

2. Go to a store, buy a digital camera, save the sales slip, take it home just long enough to do the job, then return it for a refund.

See what I mean? Bad. I'd really like to complete the job using the equipment I have! If anyone can think of options I've missed, please advise.

The software I've purchased is to install Mac OSX 10.3.0. If I need 10.3.9 to run Toast 7, I guess I'll need to know how to go about upgrading to that, thanks.

Here's a whole conversation with a guy on Usenet telling me where-all I went wrong (I haven't repeated his every remark, which were extensive) and what I should have done, with my replies on what I've done or am thinking of doing and why:

Third, you have gotten some pretty hard to follow and conflicting advice here.

To say the least! And you seem to be giving conflicting advice, too, saying I should put my entire four-hour project into iMovie using iDVD to save it, then saying iDVD won't burn more than 90 minutes on one disk anyway! (At least, that's what I think you said.) Also, I've been told that iMovie craps out right about 90 minutes anyway and nobody could possibly do a four-hour project on it, at least, as one project. And I'm a bit hazy as to how to split something into three or four parts and then reassemble it as one, if that's even possible. Luckily, I don't even want to "go there."

The point is moot as putting the whole project into iMovie, either as a whole or in pieces, is the LAST thing I want to do anyway. All I want to do is get the titles and edited pieces--perhaps a 15-minute total--out of iMovie and onto my plain old-fashioned VHS tape (a four-hour total including the fancy techy bits) without having to buy (or steal) a new camera (or a new computer) to do it!

For example, there was no real reason for you to get Toast (I don't think...). iMovie + iDVD is generally sufficient. And the whole thread about media was pretty pointless (particularly the "penny wise, pound foolish" concerns about whether the $10 or whatever you spent on some DVD blanks had been wasted...)

Well, I haven't got Toast...yet. It's just people seemed to feel that iDVD (which I admittedly haven't tried) was more prone to screwups and Toast was a better way to set things up and really see what you were getting before accidentally burning a bunch of "coasters" which I wanted to avoid. As for the blanks, I hate to see anything go to waste, either money or products, and since eventually I'd like to transfer a lot of VHS home movies over to DVD using the Canopus, I wanted advice on where best to obtain high-quality blank DVDs at good cost, which advice I got. Sorry to have to expound over every detail of my thinking process but when you start skipping all over the place people tend not to get what you're saying or why.

If one has 1) a recent Mac with a DVD-R drive and sufficient free disk, and 2) iLife (comes bundled with all new Macs)

How recent? Mine is three to four years old, and I can tell you for sure it has only a Combo drive, not a Superdrive--that's why I bought the DVD burner. Are you saying I should have bought a new Mac rather than add all this equipment to my old one?

Toast is useful for burning DVDs when iDVD won't - such as with unsupported DVD burners, or if you want more than 90 minutes on a DVD. For the price of Toast, you could have probably bought an internal DVD-R drive that is supported directly by iDVD.

Okay, you've COMPLETELY got me there. Where can I get some quotes on how much Toast would cost vs. how much it would cost to have my Combo Drive upgraded to a Superdrive? (At least I think that's what you're suggesting.) Once I learn the best source and cost of the equipment to do this, I'll look into where I can have it done (obviously taking the thing apart with a screwdriver and inserting the new drive myself is not an option.)

After that I'll worry what on earth to do with the DVD burner I bought! It was $129.00 and arrived December 13, and return requests are supposed to be made within 15 days! So obviously I can't return it for money back--at least from the place where I bought it--even though it's brand-new, untouched, never been used as I'm nowhere near the point of burning anything yet! Then returning it in favor of just using the Superdrive on the Mac (assuming I can get one for my Mac) may still be a mistake as how do I know the one I already bought won't do a much better and/or more usable job? I just want something that will work! In this case, one that will make DVDs which will play on my player without having to buy another DVD player (also over $100.00, brand new a year ago.)

Consumer DVD recorders are designed to record "live" direct to DVD from a video source.

DVD-R drives, in conjunction with a computer, aren't.

As far as I can tell, you just answered the question I raised, and in my favor. Or is that wishful thinking on my part and we're really talking about two different things here? I do know it's said a lot of DVDs will play on a computer which won't on a DVD player connected to a TV--which, given the nature of the projects I'd like to do, does me no good--that's why I thought the DVD burner a good idea!

You are assuming that your DVD recorder can record a four hour DVD.

My friend hasn't answered, but I'm pretty sure he said his would, and that people who wanted DVDs were giving him only one blank disk, not two. What mine will do, I have no idea as I've barely looked at it yet. For my own part, whether I end up making my DVDs on my own burner or having my friend make them, I think I will use two disks to get higher quality. I was asking for the benefit of the people who gave him only one blank disk and thought they were going to get the whole thing on that. As for number of copies--last he told me he had 40 blanks given to him by people wanting copies--I think most were VHS tapes but some were DVDs.

Based on what I'd read, I'll guess that:

You don't have all the raw video imported

You don't have enough disk space to do so

The DVD burner you have is not directly supported by iDVD

It isn't clear at all whether the DVD burner that you bought is a DVD-R drive (in an external case?) or a consumer DVD recorder.

Well, you certainly got all those guesses right! That's why I'm putting "the lesser, the better" into iMovie--only the complicated stuff which NEEDS to be done there--the rest of it gets done the straightforward way that I understand!

As for the DVD burner I bought, it is a LaCie DVD +/- RW 16x4x16x Double Layer FireWire device.

The ADVC110 most definitely will export to whatever analog video tape you want. Straight from iMovie. "Export to camera..."

That's what the video & audio out ports on that device are for...

There are one-way devices out there, but the ADVC110 is not one of them. I've never used one myself, but was able to determine this from the very first web page I looked at...

You have mistaken advice that you shouldn't export to cruddy VHS for a reproduction master with advice that you can't do so.

No, I didn't really, although people seemed to think that was what I was saying. Below is my response to a question on another forum explaining what I did, what I want to do, and my rationale for doing things the way I have or plan to based on advice I've gotten. If there is a better way (short of buying all-new everything!) I am open to that advice as well.

(Here follows the entire reply I posted above in response to ThomasG.)

Everybody takes on at least one project where they are completely over their head.

Gee, thanks, now I feel in such good company. So...I'm not an idiot? I have got the project PARTWAY done! Anyway, back in the "old days" of special effects, when the first "Star Wars" movies were done, a whole team of people might take five months to do something that would take five minutes onscreen, while the parts requiring only sets and actors, some of which took more screen time, were accomplished much more quickly, so I am not all that far off!

Asking advice on Usenet for such a project can quite easily cause a whole bunch of wasted time and money, following advice from folks who don't really understand exactly what you are trying to do and what constraints you are under. If you don't have a reasonable understanding of the basics, you will have a very hard time sorting the wheat from the chaff.

It certainly was hard knowing what advice to take. I started out just calling a Sales Rep at the same company from which I purchased my computer and monitor, telling him what I wanted to do, then buying what he said to buy, which I needed EXTENSIVE instructions from various online groups to make work. (The manual on the Canopus was, in particular, next to useless. You could read it all in 15 minutes but you still wouldn't know anything. I hope the instructions on the DVD burner are done by people who understand English.)

Thanks for your lengthy consideration of my problems.

Right now I'm still using dialup but plan to switch to something faster as soon as I look into three different internet services available around here. Too many choices, yes, that's one reason I've held back. The other is what to do about the ISP I'm on, which is automatically paid a month at a time by credit card. Hate to sound cheap but if I switch in the middle of the month, do I lose half of what I paid? Maybe the new service will give me a break on that.