Newbie – capturing troubles

[Lord Weenis]

I have captured video in two manners in my experience, using a tape deck and directly from camera-computer. From what I gathered from your post, it sounds like your going directly from cam-comp, right? If that’s the case, you don’t need to activate device control. Just go File > Capture > Movie Capture. Make sure your camera’s on, hit play on the camera’s playback, and record in the Adobe Capture window. I’m no pro, but I don’t think Adobe CAN control a cam-corder. I think that answers your problem. But IF you’re using a tape deck and are having device control probs, check the Help to make sure that your deck is compatible with Adobe. Hope that helps ya out. Let me know if ya need anything else.

[Cut-splice]

Lord, thanks for your help as you did answere several of my questions (Device Control, Movie capture vs. Batch capture). Yes I am trying to run video out of my camera straight into the computer via firewire. However I continue to have the same problem. When I click File> Capture> Movie Capture a small box appears but the record tab is not highlighted. I can only right click on the box. When I do this a recording options tab appears and after clicking that a capture format menu. There are two options from here: Quick Time capture and Video for Windows. When I click on Quick Time nothing happens, when I click on video for windows the whole program basically shuts down. Does any of this make sense? I think I will put another call into my computer guy later today.
Thanks, cut.

[Lord Weenis]

I think you’re getting this error because you’re clicking Record before your computer HAS anything TO record. You have to hit play on your camera, and THEN start Recording that batch. Since you don’t have a tape deck, you have to play/stop/rewind, whatever manually. I think that’ll solve your prob.

[Cut-splice]

Shouldn’t be THIS difficult. I am positive tape is playing through camera to computer.. there IS something to record. I am running premiere 5.0 on windows XP (Is this program too old to run properly as someone suggested to me?)
I have gotten a step closer I think?! To review:
1) mini dv tape is playing through canon gl2 via firewire into compaq presario (I have plenty of memory and new video card)
2)when I open premiere 5.0 a ‘New Project Settings’ box appears. There is an ‘Editing Mode’ menu with two options a) Video for Windows b) Quick Time.
3)when I click ‘ok’ on video for windows a screen pops up with a timeline and monitor box along with a box titled ‘Project: Untitle1.ppj’ which I basically ignore
4)I click on File> Capture> Batch Capture and a box titled ‘Batch Capture: Untitle2.pbl’ pops up. There are headings in the box such as; Reel Name, In, Out, File Name, Comment and Settings. There are 4 tabs at the bottom of the box; Add, Delete, Sort and Capture.
5)’Add’ is the only highlighted box so when I click on it a ‘Clip Capture Parameters’ box pops up. It asks for a reel name, file name and in-and-out times. The in-and-out times are set at 00:00:00:00 and I MUST adjust this to be able to advance so I usually input 01:00:00:00 in the out time box.
6) This information is then transfered to the previous ‘Batch Capture: Untitle2.pbl’ box AND NOW the ‘capture’ tab is highlighted. I highlight the information line I just inserted then click ‘capture’ and another box pops up titled ‘Select Library’. The ‘Files of type’ window reads ‘Premiere Library (*.pbl)’. I type in the file name which I just created in the ‘File Name’ window and click ‘New’.
7) I new box appears: ‘Create New Library’. I type the file name in again and click ‘Save’. That allows a ‘Movie Capture – C:’ box to appear with a ‘record’ tab. I CANNOT SEE ANY VIDEO IN THIS BOX but I click ‘record’ anyway. A counter begins in the bottom of the box and after :10 I hit the ‘esc’ buttom to stop the recording. AS SOON AS I stop the recording ANOTHER box pops up stating: Unable to open that file. File uses an unsupported compression format. File path: C/temp5.avi/
8) I can then go into the hard drive on my computer and find these video clips. When I click on them they open up and play in Windows Media Player WITH NO AUDIO.

That is the end of my tale. As you can see I have made some progress but I still cannot get this program to function properly.
Thanks for reading this lengthy post and ANY HELP would be greatly appreciated. Cut

[Richard Baim]

5.0 goes back a long way. After that, there was 5.1, 6.0, 6.5, Pro, Pro 1.5 and now Pro 2. I suggest upgrading your software to Pro 2.0, or to save money, Premiere Elements 3. Support will be much easier with newer software.

[Cut-splice]

Thanks all for your help. I figured out my hardware was not supporting 5.0 or Pro 2.0 I have gotten an upgrade (new motherboard, processor, etc.) Pro 2.0 seems to be working fine for me now. I was surprised I couldn’t even run 5.0 but it seems my trouble had something to do with my computer not reading SSE2 intstructions (or something like that.) Anyway it was a hardware issue and I am up to speed now.

Thanks Again,

Cut

[Richard Baim]

Premiere definately can control camcorders with firewire. Device control is used with DV and Digital 8 camcorders with firewire. If you have some other source without firewire, you would not use Device control because without firewire, there is no machine control. An example of this would be VHS source going through a camcorder using the pass through feature. You have an analog source(VHS) and you are using your camcorder to convert an analog signal to digital. VHS- converted to DV in the camcorder-sent into your computer via firewire. That’s why pass through is such a good feature. The original source does not have firewire so machine control can’t be used. Let me know if this is not totally clear.
Rich Baim, Adobe Certified Expert & Adobe Certified Instructor, Premiere

Another option with VHS is to use the analog inputs on your DV or digital 8 camcorder, and transfer from VHS. Then you can use firewire for capture but it’s two steps. With pass through, it’s one step. When you buy a new camcorder be sure to look for a headphone jack, microphone jack, pass through, and analog in. Those features are hard to find on inexpensive camcorders.

[Karthik]

Hi,

I have been going through this thread and I have a related question. I am an independent film maker from Houston…..for the first time, I am trying to capture and edit myself….when i use my panasonic camcorder to capture into premiere pro, the audio captured is too hot sometimes….i get this loud crackling on the captured track….

however, when i used the same tape at my editor’s studio (he captures it the analog way through a tape deck), it works perfectly.

i would like to know if the problem really the firewire or my camera? i shot in a Panasonic DVX 100B….however, i am caoturing in a small camcorder (the home video type).

thanks a ton!