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Sony Mini Dv to FCE

Been asked to edit footage from another individuals camera. Wanting to transfer footage to a digital format.

It's a Sony HVR HD1000U MiniDV 1080i HD Camcorder. It uses miniDV tapes. I have tried a variety of things but no luck.

What I am running into:

Working on a Mac OS X - Version 10.6.8


  • I hook camera to Mac with 4pin to 9pin firewire
  • Put camera in VCR mode (i think)
  • In Final Cut Express 4 I select File/Capture Project
  • Opens window the warning comes that says "Unable to Initialize Video Deck"
  • I have tried different settings in the Easy Set Up option..... NOTHINGS WORKING!


Also my scratch disc is a Glyph Drive - GTO62E. It uses the only firewire port I have....when I plug this camera into the extra port on the back of the Glyph it ejects it (the drive) from my mac Any advice you have would be appreciated.


Do I need to purchase a video deck? I normally work with digital cameras, and SD cards.....


iMac, Mac OS X (10.6.8)

Posted on Mar 12, 2013 10:29 AM

Reply
1 reply

Mar 12, 2013 10:56 AM in response to heathertime89

The HVR HD1000U is a HDV/DV camcorder. You need to select an Easy Setup in FCE that matches how the recording was made in the camera ... before capturing the video from the camcorder. Assuming you are in North America, the correct Easy Setups would be as follows:


  • If it was HDV, then select the HDV - Apple Intermediate Codec 1080i60
  • If it was plain DV, then select DV NTSC


Also, make sure the settings in the camcorder match how the footage was shot. In HDV/DV camcorders there is a menu selection to specify the output to be HDV vs. downconvert to DV.


Second, most camcorders that use Firewire do not play well with other FW devices connected at the same time. Try disconnecting all other FW devices including your Glyph drive, and capture from the camera directly to the internal drive. If that works, you can always copy the media files to your Glyph drive later, when the camcorder is no longer connected. Don't daisychain the camcorder off an external FW drive - this doesn't work very often.


Third, in FCE you have to use Capture to capture HDV footage from your camcorder. You cannot use "Capture Project" to capture fresh media from a camcorder, nor to capture HDV footage. Capture Project is only for re-capturing previous DV footage to a project that already exists (and even then you had to be careful to assign a Reel # in FCE to each tape at the time you did the original captures.)

Sony Mini Dv to FCE

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