Capturing from DVD

[Brebos]

If its a homemade dvd can’t you just import it in from that drive? Or am I wrong.

[Mr. David]

The DVD was brought to me and I was told that the original source didn’t exist anymore. However, I searched old posts and learned about ImTOO DVD Ripper, which I downloaded and am testing out right now. It seems to be working OK for those with similar questions. Thanks.

[Mike Velte]

Best bet is to play the DVD directly to Premiere through your camcorder’s pass-thru feature…the quality might be better.

[Dex Craig]

I have had good results playing the DVD out through a camcorder and capturing to Premiere Pro that way, as Mike suggests. I find it to be quicker than trying to digitally rip the file. You may wind up with better quality digitally ripping, but then again, you may not. I guess it depends on how much time you’re willing to spend on it.

– Dex

[Mr. David]

Thanks for the advices, Mike and Dex. Does the camcorder have to have any specific features or just any camcorders that can play DVDs would do?

[Dex Craig]

Acutally, I just use a DVD player — standard set-top box — and plug the audio and video outputs to the A/V input on my DV camcorder. Then I plug the firewire of the camcorder into the computer. Open the capture utility (F5), play the DVD and click the record button. Eureka! There’s video in the Premiere Project.

Of course, if you’re trying to capture video from a copy protected DVD, this won’t work. The DRM schemes in DVD prevent a camcorder from recording a signal from a DVD player. But you did say it was a home-made DVD, so this should work just fine. I do this fairly often at work.

Good luck.