[Richard Bartlett]

The VBI spilled noise from the early lines of the picture can be rendered to DVD. Going from DV camcorder to a set top DVD recorder can give you some assurance that you’ve got enough dizzy signal to trigger the copy inhibit.

CGMS and Macrovision levels have different approaches and are all circumventable.

In PAL land there are solutions for VHS (or perhaps for community cable / PEG applications) to have analogue copy protection flags that with a half decent recording VTR, can result in some protection. It is never bullet proof as whatever you can see or hear can be copied, until with have HDMI sockets on our heads/visual-cortex that is!

https://www.gthelectronics.com/specials.htm#R

This is a TBC enhancer/procamp unit that I use, although I don’t trouble over attempting to make it harder for customers to copy. I’d always go for costing the project out with no speculation on media sales. Media sales, given an appropriate level of merchandising to make their order special, work out to just enhance those sales.

Here is the extract from this unit’s capability sheet, it may need some license fees to be paid to the patent holder to use this function legitimately:
==================================================================================
Rights Protection & Widescreen Signal – Works on 625/50 Output Only

Option “R” has a simplified widescreen signalling controlled by the AUDIO button, so widescreen TVs will switch automatically to the correct mode, and CGMS Copy Protection controlled by the MANUAL button. The automatic fader is still available with variable speed using the FADE button and SPEED control but fading is always automatic and audio is always faded with the video. Of course audio can be left unfaded simply by connecting audio directly and not taking it via the ACE. Loss of the manual fade is thus the only disadvantage.

This option lets you prevent customers from copying VHS tapes of weddings or special interest videos to DVD or DV. It will thus force your customers to make only poorer VHS copies rather than lossless digital ones. The 16:9 widescreen signalling option can be used to force widescreen TVs into the correct mode. All of the most common modes can be signalled:

AUDIO MANUAL WSS & CGMS MODE
OUT OUT 4:3 Full Screen
OUT IN As Above + Copy Protected
IN OUT 16:9 Full Screen (Anamorphic)
IN IN As Above + Copy Protected
==================================================================================
Next time you have problems with what has been digitised, attempt to mask the first few lines, this is a line-21 or line-23 (even field numbers provided – you’ll have to calculate which lines for the other field as I never remember them offhand) for NTSC and PAL. These are the lines against the 525 or 625 line system not the line number of D1, DV or DVD. These are usually mapped to the first half a dozen lines somehow by some form of magic that the detectors assess. 😉

[Richard Bartlett]

The 3GB and 4GB ceilings are recent history for x86 machines. 2GB is related to the memory model that the compiler/assembler adheres to which probably equates to a signed 32bit number (31 bits of addressing) for a safety factor when doing math that might otherwise make the 32nd bit come active and cause the OS to throw the dummy out of the pram.

I wouldn’t expect much to change until Vegas becomes 64bit which, as Windows then supports it, more than 4GB will become addressible by the OS part of the memory management of a computer.

Recommendation: keep the preview memory well below the 1GB poing and run other apps in the headroom you’ve got. Like DVD Architect!

fwiw Windows 2003 Server SP1 or above can see upto and beyond the 4GB without going into the full 64bit instruction set / execution engine game. If money is no object and while we wait for Vegas to be ported to XP64/Vista. Tweaks to get more than 3GB aren’t worth pursuing on 32bit Windows for the reasons you stated. Most Windows apps have a 2GB ceiling, if it is even that high.

[Richard Bartlett]

The 280 is plenty enough for the needs you describe.

All the DV camcorders that have a firewire port on them do DV-out. Whether they do DV-in as well is usually a regional taxation/import-duty issue and one for PAL only regions, afaik.

What the premium (e.g. DCR-TRV460, DCR-TRV480 etc) Digital8 camcorders have is the ability to input analogue-port piped video onto DV tape (Digital8 format DV tape in this case). They can also convert Hi8 and 8mm tape recordings into DV on the fly and to your PC. Essentially giving some frame/tape-transport slip enhancement along the way (some might argue, providing a basic TBC function). Having the analogue-capture front end on the camera accounts for the extra $ that Sony are asking for. Sometimes you get some additional menu option or touch screen control, but generally they are much the same camera as the cheaper counterpart.

Now the DCR-TRV280 is an older line entry point version of the DCR-TRV285. They don’t differ greatly. The price of these camcorders is about a third of what they were 7 years ago – but then they’ve lost a decent eye-piece, no hot-shoe, no external mic and no improvements in CCD or optics.

If you just want to ingest D8 – you may be best sticking with the cheapest camcorder you can find, even a previous gen “low or no hours” model. They, and the tapes they use are much more robust than miniDV, IMHO.

For the greater market picture however the cameras themselves seriously let this format down with competitive 3CCD SD cameras reaching the average pocket for a premium, but not much of a premium anymore. JVC Everio (microdrive/sd and built-in HD models) are also taking a bite out of the traditional D8 marketplace.

For DV-to-analogue-out passthrough and analogue-to-DV-firewire-out passthrough functions – check the specific camera model or the Internet for any remote-control/LANC interface hacks to enable them. But then, you probably don’t need to care for this unless it reduces the wear of a PD150 if you were using that for this purpose already?

[Richard Bartlett]

Lite-On are the factory now under contract to make and badge Sony DVD drives for Sony. The products have some overlap and have done for some time.

I’ve stuck with Pioneer, however if I got out of step with DVDA like it appears you may have – I’d prepare to files and use something else to burn. (Nero, or a freeware ISO maker then burn that with Alcohol120% or something else).

[Richard Bartlett]

Mirage has more in common with PaintShop/Photoshop (and Amiga/PC programs like NewTek DigiPaint/Aura and EA DeluxePaint) than with vector/3D oriented compositors like AE or DigitalFusion. A guy once pointed out to me that you can use Excel for quite a good word processor, if you want. It comes down to choice, your intentions, planned workflows and familiarity (oops, and money).

I’d say the most informative way of seeing the target for Mirage is to check out the tutorials over at https://www.bauhaussoftware.com/training_tutorials.php . As with most things CG and art, there is overlap, but I’d wager you’d find yourself using Mirage as many folks I know have both AE and Mirage. There is slightly more about Mirage that merges real world drawing/painting/cell-animation tools into what you see in the application. Subpixel calculation, 16bit dynamic range per plane, and any resolution you desire. This is what Mirage has as its backbone that you ultimately you find yourself relying on. However I am quite hopeless in my attempts to do anything with real world art, but in Mirage, I am able to hide this fact and create things that hold up against my wife’s work. She is a good painter.

Animated brushes, 2 or 4pt pixel tracking, alpha rub-in rub-out,….

Oasis is a slight exception. Whilst setting up the plug-in there is more of a scalable vector based engine activity going on. Mostly by virtue of the way that the fonts are rendered, but this plug is a quick way of creating luxurious animated and motioned text graphics. By driving Mirage manually, it would be possible to achieve something like the same results, but Oasis is a labor saver. The two parts together (Mirage/Oasis) have more in common with IndiaCG and LiveType. However with AE, you’re not exactly limited in what you can do manually either.

[Richard Bartlett]

Looks like Bauhaus’ product has been welcomed in onto Sony’s radar:
see 3rd party tools
https://www.sonymediasoftware.com/shopping/category.asp?id=109

I have to say that I’m very pleased with Mirage and Bob Tasa’s TitleFX. Recommended if you want those LiveType features and a tailored but quite unique flavor to your titles, lower thirds etc. Mirage doesn’t even overlap with Vegas or DVDA, it compliments both. Enough, just wanted to share my thoughts and that Sony have spotted this “paintbox” wizardry too.

[Richard Bartlett]

IRQ19 is usually the ACPI resource controller that gloops all the actual IRQs of peripherals (the PIRQ lines) and pumps them into the OS using an additional layer. Doesn’t mean that you won’t find some benefit in verifying that you have the right kit in the right slots, that is something you’ll tell using the IRQs that you see on the BIOS boot screen where you see all that guff about multimedia controllers and PCI vendor IDs etc.

Windows doesn’t inherently have a hangup on IRQs. Some device drivers are fussy, but essentially you are matching your peripheral hardware and support software into the grander scheme of things. Sometimes this feels like art, sometimes it is like science, but sure as anything – it is a pain to get right if it doesn’t just go the right way. The manual usually gives clues about shared resources, IRQ and bus mastering signals. You’ll see mention on overlaps between slots and onboard peripherals like NICs and Sound devices. Usually the slot next to the graphics card is a bad place for AV or network stuff. Fortunately we shed a lot of this nonesense by using motherboards with everything integrated or the newer PCIExpress bus interconnect. Not all of us have made the jump there quite yet though.

[Richard Bartlett]

Chris – Apologies for any confusion. Video is an art and a science but more and more the science goes into the wings and the art is king. I’d like the 787 qualified by Dr Dropout or someone else fully authoritative. As I’ve said earlier I’m not the owner of the horses mouth. Also your milage might vary.

What the 655×480 said was that it was the native 1:1 pixel AR format for importing computer generated graphics into Vegas (assuming a D1/DV project with its Standard Def AR set). If you supply a 720×480 still frame with the project set for the DV/ITU601 aspect ratio – this will be adapted to the native resolution depending on your choice of setting for “simulate target AR” in preview.

Sonic Foundry (now Sony Pictures Digital – MediaSoftware division) have a history of calculating these things exactly. The industry has a tendency of creating standards based on choices made for how to represent the viewable area of 525 and 625 line TV systems.

If 768×576 works for you and draws circles round with a pixel AR of 1:1 then either Sony have written an exception for that size, your monitor or playout/render device may have a calibration issue, or you may have determined by trial that SoFo mis-informed us originally. 768 is a power of 2 number, or otherwise known as a computer or digital number. So it can be represented readily by digitisation circuits like TV cards etc. It is difficult for a signal digitiser that supports 787 pixels to not also support 1024 pixels and to do this without any further hardware changes. So if 1024 was available, the marketing departments would insist that it was used. Inside software, if 787 is the best representation for square pixels where 720 rectangular pixels were their equivalent, we just have the programmer do the math for us as we progress.

If I were a programmer, I’d draw 720×576 pixels and have the operator adjust the horizontal stretch of their monitor to to fit a graticule that the operator measured with a ruler. For importing square pixels, I’d offer crop or scale in the preferences with a right mouse option on the timeline element to override the default. This method would work OK for CRT, but would be quite bad for folks with LCD/plasma panels of almost any resolution or ratio. The traditional NLE assumed you’ve got the monitor set to show square pixels as that is what is expected from all the well known resolutions from the main graphics card vendors.

Irrespective of your resolution, if the still format you choose specifies the correct AR, Vegas should honor this. However this may end up with scaling artefacts. You may scrub and be more native with 787, 786 or 768, but when you render to DV, 720 discrete luma samples will be in the bits packed into each YUV 4:1:1 line and 360 U+V samples. If you render out to HiDef (upsampled) or for computer playback or perhaps a film transfer, then you’ll not compromise your target from the CG/stills point of view, but you may have an impact on your conversion from any DV footage you have when it goes out as 787 pixels per line scaled from the original 720.

If the science becomes painful, stick to the art. The science usually has some give in it.

[Richard Bartlett]

I suspected I wasn’t right for Vegas with 768. This is more of a feature of MJPEG and uncompressed capture cards. Which probably have engineers, not software purists behind them. So standards get misinterpreted. (a bit like Adobe getting the AVI headers wrong or truncated)

The important difference between established and calculated sizes is a history lesson in itself. Using the simplistic screen aspect ratio as a multiplier of the number of interlaced lines
(4/3)*576 = 768 but that of course doesn’t take into account the internal pecularities of Vegas.

ie
(4/3)*480 = 640 not 655.

655 isn’t the based on the simplistic screen area but pixel AR.
PAL pixel aspect ratio is 1.0925. 720*1.0925 = 786.6 which rounded makes 787×576. Set or crop to this then.

The old SoFo tutorial said this:
“While your default PAL DV project is 720×576, SoFo suggests 787×576 for full-frame stills. Why? Because there is a difference between PAL DV pixels and standard graphics pixels.

PAL DV pixels are wide, they have a “pixel aspect ratio” (PAR) of 1.0926, which means it takes more square graphics-pixels to fill the same width as a row of PAL DV pixels. ”

I guess a lot depends on what the digitiser is doing before you take what you need to be square-native in Vegas.
Perhaps true widescreen video makes this easier. 😉

[Richard Bartlett]

Check that isn’t 768×576 which is a very popular native square pixel size for PAL.
Maybe a typo by Tim but it is rare you’ll catch him out on detail – so don’t take my word for it.