Transfering Videos to DVDs

Yes,
You can get a card which slots into your computer which converts them into Mpeg2, which can then be burnt onto CDs and played as Video CDs in your DVD player. You can also do it into the higher detail Mpeg3 (DVD quality??) but I haven't gone down that path... Mpeg2 (video CD quality) is fine IMHO
Have done many, but the downside is it's very time consuming as you have to sort them out into appropriate size file to fit on the CDs.
Good idea though, as Videos do slowly lose quality with time and worse still can be attacked by fungus or mould which all but destroys them. To avoid this keep your valuable ones in an airtight container with silica-gel.
Cheers

Jen,

There are a number of ways which this can be done. As was previously mentioned, you can purchase a capture card which will allow you to capture to MPEG (1 and 2) or AVI. VCD (Video CD) is MPEG1, SVCD (Super VCD) is MPEG2 and DVD is a higher quality MPEG2 (by higher quality i am refering to a higher bitrate, SVCD uses a lower bitrate of MPEG2 to DVD. i will touch on bitrates later on). MP3 is an audio format. Once captured to MPEG2, this can then be imported into the necessary editing software to allow you to create a DVD (its not just a matter of burning the MPEG2 files to the disc as they need to be setup in a certain way so that DVD players can read them and this also allows you to add menus and other features if you want. ie a slide show of photos).

The other method to capture is using your digital video camera and a firewire card. Most digital video cameras have the ability to input an analogue signal (say from a VCR). You can then use your video camera as a pass through to capture to DV-AVI. This method though requires you to encode the video into MPEG2 (capturing direct to MPEG2 bypasses this as the video is already in MPEG2 format) and will also increase the amount of free hard disk space required.

The quality of the video also depends on the bitrate at which you capture the MPEG video. Most DVD's use between 6Mbit/sec and 8Mbit/sec (this can be variable or a set bitrate - variable allows for smaller files, but not always as it depends on the actual content of the video) The audio for DVD is also at 48Khz 16Bit (compared to 44Khz 16Bit for standard CD). The higher the bitrate used, the more free hard disk space required.

All this probly sounds confusing (just wanted to give some background intfo), but to make life easy, there are plenty of software packages (many come bundled with DVD writers and also capture cards) that make life easy (Ulead VideoStudio, Adobe Premiere 7 to name a couple). They even provide facilities to capture the video for you and import it directly into your project. Then once you are happy with the final product, you can burn it directly to a DVD.

The other thing you need to be aware of is the two main formats of DVD (i wont go into DVD-RAM). There is DVD-R and DVD-RW (for re-writeables) and DVD+R and DVD+RW. Most new DVD players and drives can play both standards, but many older players were not compatible with one or the other.

Don't be put off by all the above jargon (again i just wanted to give you some background info) as I realise it could be very confusing and daunting for first timers to this stuff. For about $400 tops, you can have a DVD writer and capture card and the required software to do the job. And providing your computer has enough power and storage space, it really is a simple process to convert your old VHS videos to DVD.

If you want anything explained more clearly or you need any other info, drop me an email at hall_sa_99@hotmail.com and I will be happy to answer your questions off forum.

cheers,
Sam.

There are also commercial operations around that offer this service, some will go right back to the old 8mm movies and convert them to DVD.Make plans... not excuses.

Jen,
if don't already have the computer for this task can I recommend that you seriously consider a Macintosh. You will need a computer of less than 3 yrs age to have sufficient speed for the task. I use a Sony digital camera as the analog to digital converter. This plugs straight into the firewire port on the back of the Mac. You can then record your old Tape onto the Mac where you can edit it using iMovie (free with the computer), or a more sophisticated video editing programme. Having finished editing you can then export the movie to a CD in Video CD format (which most DVD players can read) or if you have a DVD burner (or combo drive) to that using iDVD (also free). I use a 3 yr old 400 MHz Mac Powerbook with external CD burner. No doubt the newer, faster releases would do the job quicker. On the Mac it is so simple - as you initially thought it would be. The cheapest Apple iBooks are now about $1800 - with nothing else to spend!Bob

hi jen
i am currently setting up to do exactly what you want too do after pricing all the bits to upgrade old computor including 80-100gig hard drive as the analogue videos need a lot of space to transfer i ended up with a new computor with all the bits to do both analogue and digital videos to dvd in about a week when i finish our fernery outside i may be allowed to come inside and try my luck at transferring
point is you need lots of hard drive for the transferring
ps i am retaining my hair at the minute as adsl is working and so are the emails

steveimagine a 03 gu 4.2tdin the picture
as i am having trouble sizing the picture

Not sure where you are but theres a place at birkenhead point in sydney that do it for about $8 a dvd (i think) it might even be $10.
Guy

I recently upgraded my video camera from a analogue video-8 to a digital mini-DV and am in the process of putting all the old video-8 tapes on to DVD.

I converted the video-8 tapes to digital by simply copying them to the digital camera. As the digital camera has a firewire port I had to buy a firewire card for the PC (about $75) so that I could connect the camera to the PC (some newer PCs have built-in firewire ports, also called IEEE-1394). I used Windows Movie Maker to copy from the digital camera to the PC, storing the contents as AVI files. I then used Movie Maker to edit the AVI files to split them into "episodes" and get rid of mistakes, boring bits and stuff I didn't want.

I bought a DVD burner (Pioneer A06 - about $260) which came with the software to burn the AVI files to DVD. You just add the AVI files in the order you want up to the 4.7gb maximum for each DVD, add titles and pictures for each section to make them look good, and burn away.

Once you have burned your DVDs you can then delete the huge AVI files from from the PC. If you think you may need them later to do further editing you can copy them to DVD or even back to digital tape via the camera.

You will need a big hard drive (I bought a 120gb) and lots of time (a 1-hour compilation takes over three hours to process to DVD). It's worth it though - the results are impressive and you can easily distribute copies to family and friends.

Good luck,
Stephen.

Hey Geoff & Jenn,

Not too cut anyones grass or anything but these replys are all do-able, yes, but semi complex to the untrained and unnessicaraly time consuming. I work for Panasonic Australia, and the quickest simplest way to go about would be to buy a DVD Recorder. www.panasonic.com.au under DVD's. These work the same as your run of mill VCR just with with DVD. You run your CAM via AV straight to back of the DVD Recorder. Put your CAM in VCR mode and hit play and then record on you DVD recorder and presto. Some models also come with harddrive like your PC up to 100 gig (a DVD disk single sided is 4.7 gig, you do the math) which means you can record straight to the unit first with out a disk. Edit on the unit, cut out, chop n change scenes, name and split scenes. The firmware is state of the art and worth every dollar. Prices range from under a grand to about 2 grand. Just to bounce some model numbers off you. DMR-100H has a 100gig HD. DMR-E60 no hard drive so you need a disk, no biggy if you dont mind forking out 4 bucks for a disk when you buy the unit. Alternativley contact 132600 Panasonic Customer Care for more info or post a follow up and I will be happy to give you more information. Hope this helps.

Jay