I had one problem with the second tape yesterday. Near the beginning it just went silent. This lasted for two separate shots (at least 40 seconds in total) in different locations. At the time I wasn't looking at audio levels knowing it was zoo noise anyway. But this is the first time I've run into this with the camera.

I had planned to do a head clean this week as it was about the proper time, and I'm thinking (hoping) it may have just been tape related. (I have only used the panasonic AY-DVM63AMQ) But now it's raised a red flag.

I tested taping last night after that spot using the same tape and it recorded audio fine.

So, a couple of questions.

Has this happened to anyone else? Searched the forum and couldn't find specific A1 info.

Also wondering if you were actually monitoring audio with a headset would you even hear the audio stop recording or would the monitors go flat? I'm thinking you wouldn't if it was tape related but I'm not sure.

I'm finally starting my first serious shoot mid-week so now I'm concerned.

Trish

Was the sound dead on in-camera playback or capture, or both?
What mode were you recording? SD or HSV?
What sound source were you using? Internal mic, or external mic?
Did you have the VU meter display enabled while recording?

The first/last couple minutes of a tape are more likely to present problems and that is the only place I've ever seen sound problems that were not operator error or external sound source problems, but that should be rare.

The sound was dead on playback - complete silence - but for the capture I really can't say as I was just shooting for visuals and wasn't watching the meters unfortunately. End of the day footage and audio was more or less not a concern.

Recording in HDV, internal mic, no ATT (not needed in this case as the zoo sounds getting muted down too much with it on so I kept it off in case I wanted some bird calls, tiger roars etc. to mix in with music should I put a little piece together)

I do have the VU displayed at all times. But sadly, can't say I was watching them at this point. Would have been very interested to see if the meters went dead during the bad spot. But I'm thinking if it was at tape level, the meters would still show movement, but this is a guess.

This was in the first 3 minutes of the tape, so definitely in the risk portion.

Trish

Try record over the "bad" portion of the tape (archive it first if you need to save it) with special emphais on the audio. maybe shoot in the house with the radio on loud enough to vive VU indications. See if that works. Will tell if it is a permanent bad spot on the tape, or some other issue that has self-healed.

I will try that after I grab the video. I was at the store getting more tapes and asked them, and nobody has an answer or experience with a tape not grabbing audio but still keeping the video intact.

Only mentioned that if the onboard mic was in manual and you hit it or clipped it the levels might shoot down for a bit and then come back up, but I had in on auto and something like that would have certainly been noticeable or you'd think it would be at least grabbing some audio at a low level.

Trish