Interface Cards & Controllers

You've shot that great video of one's daughter's birthday. Now, how can you get it into the pc to do some snazzy editing and maybe generate a VCD or two? If the video is on that MiniDV or Hi8 tape, how can you possibly move it out of there into the computer? Appears tough. Nicely, let this write-up enable you to.

Analog or Digital?

The initial factor you need to do would be to decide if your video is in digital format (MiniDV, Digital8, MicroMV, Digital Tapeless, DVD) or analog format (8mm, Hi8, VHS-C). If it's in digital format, which is increasingly popular today, you will need to transfer the video to the pc making use of a Firewire card. If it's in analog format, you will require an analog-to-digital conversion device to do the transfer.

Firewire Cards

A Firewire card may be the channel via which video from your digital camcorder can enter your pc. A Firewire cable runs from your camcorder DV output port to your computer's DV input port. Because of the very quickly transfer speeds that Firewire achieves, the digital video will likely be transferred with nearly zero loss in top quality. Most computers do not come with Firewire cards - in case you are looking for one, I'd very recommend the Belkin FireWire card which retails for less than $35 online.

If you want to find out what aspects to think about when buying a high quality Firewire card, you'll be able to take a look at my article on picking the best Firewire card.

Analog-to-Digital Conversion Devices

An analog-to-digital conversion device converts video from analog format to digital format. These sort of device is well suited for the following video editing scenarios:

You have video shot by an analog camcorder and wish to convert it into a digital format.

You've got some old VHS tapes that are growing dusty and you wish to convert them into a digital format.

If you are in either of the above scenarios, I extremely suggest you get an analog-to-digital conversion device to assist with the time consuming function. One item that I've had excellent encounter with is the USB Instant DVD from ADS Technologies.

This is really a neat small device that has ports to enable analog video input from your analog camcorder or VCR. It outputs the converted digital video through a USB cable into your computer's USB port. You may definitely want to take a look at my full assessment of USB Instant DVD.

Conclusion

Nicely, I hope this post has given you some insight into the procedure of capturing video into your personal computer. The primary point would be to usually bear in mind what video format you're dealing with. If it is digital, go with Firewire and if it's analog, use an analog-to-digital video conversion device.